“Look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see, and wonder about what makes the universe exist. Be curious.”
— Stephen Hawking
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Posts Tagged ‘Thoughts’
Ever Curious
Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, creativity, inspiration, Thoughts, Writers on September 15, 2024| Leave a Comment »
This Could Get Tricky
Posted in Science!, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, art, biology, color, inspiration, perception, Thoughts on September 13, 2024| Leave a Comment »
Mr Man and I recently went on the hunt for the perfect blue gift for a friend. We did eventually find a beautiful piece of handblown glass in a dark blue with silver flecks. Lovely.
The only issue, we later discovered, was that our goal should have been a color that was closer to teal. So not the deep blue of a falling dark sky, but the vibrant green-tinged hues of a Caribbean sea over a white sand beach.
Regardless, the piece was still pretty. And it brought up the question of whether one person’s idea of blue is the same as another’s.
And then this site came across my desk: Is My Blue Your Blue?
If you think the page color is blue, click the button at the bottom right. If you think it’s green, click the bottom left. And don’t be surprised when it starts to get tricky!
For more on this topic, check out this article on the variability in color perception, and interpretation, in humans.
The science of color perception
A lot of factors feed into how people perceive and talk about color, from the biology of our eyes to how our brains process that information, to the words our languages use to talk about color categories. There’s plenty of room for differences, all along the way.
For example, most people have three types of cones — light receptors in the eye that are optimized to detect different wavelengths or colors of light. But sometimes, a genetic variation can cause one type of cone to be different, or absent altogether, leading to altered color vision. Some people are color-blind. Others may have color superpowers.
Superpowers? Yes, please!
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This Beautiful Dance
Posted in Science!, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, geology, inspiration, science, Thoughts on September 12, 2024| Leave a Comment »
How did we get the landscape that we have today? I’m talking the big stuff, geology, not horticulture. Plate tectonics. We all know what Earth looks like now, but how did we get here?
This animation starts with the world we recognize, then rolls back time to show how the planet’s macrostructure has changed. Fun, right?
Witness 1.8 billion years of tectonic plates dance across Earth’s surface in a new animation
Mapping our planet through its long history creates a beautiful continental dance — mesmerising in itself and a work of natural art.
It’s a beautiful dance.
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To Remembering the Past, and Building the Future
Posted in Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, 9/11, Thoughts on September 11, 2024| Leave a Comment »
No One’s Ever Really Gone
Posted in Entertainment, Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, #sadsadsad, Darth Vader, James Earl Jones, movies, star wars, the-lion-king, Thoughts on September 10, 2024| Leave a Comment »
James Earl Jones (1931-2024)
His career spanned three-quarters of a century and included work from stage to voice to movies, but for me he will always be Darth Vader. I’ve written about my love of Star Wars before, and that’s my anchor when thinking about James Earl Jones.
Who else could have captured Vader’s complex and contradictory traits? Who made us both hate and finally feel for the tortured soul that was Anakin Skywalker?
‘Star Wars’ colleagues lead tributes to James Earl Jones
“James was an incredible actor, a most unique voice both in art and spirit. For nearly half a century he was Darth Vader, but the secret to it all is he was a beautiful human being. He gave depth, sincerity and meaning to all his roles, amongst the most important being devoted husband to the late Ceci and dad to Flynn. James will be missed by so many of us…friends and fans alike.”
— “Star Wars” creator George Lucas
A lot of tributes are being published, and if you’re interested in learning more about his impressive and wide-ranging career, I recommend reading them. Here’s just one, from NPR: Actor James Earl Jones, a beloved baritone, dies at 93.
But if you just want to take a quiet moment to appreciate the loss of this generational talent, may I recommend this:
Thankfully, as Luke says, no one is ever really gone.
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Busy, Being Silly
Posted in Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, quotes, Thoughts on September 9, 2024| Leave a Comment »
“Mix a little foolishness with your serious plans. It is lovely to be silly at the right moment.”
— Horace
Hope you have fun being a little silly today too.
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A Thought on Indecision, and the Inexorability of Time
Posted in Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, indecision, Thoughts, Writers, writing on September 8, 2024| Leave a Comment »
I gave this advice to a friend once and still find it to be useful: Whatever you do, make sure you do it on purpose.
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The Essentials
Posted in Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, advice, life, quotes, Thoughts, Writers on September 7, 2024| Leave a Comment »
Light, water, kindness, and not giving up. These are huge; all there is.
— Anne Lamott
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Sayonara, Shadows
Posted in Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, creativity, quotes, Thoughts, Writers, writing on September 5, 2024| Leave a Comment »
“Keep your face always toward the sunshine—and shadows will fall behind you.”
— Walt Whitman
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We Are Connected
Posted in Holidays, Other, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2024, inspiration, quotes, Thoughts on September 2, 2024| Leave a Comment »
“From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that we are here for the sake of each other – above all for those upon whose smile and well-being our own happiness depends, and also for the countless unknown souls with whose fate we are connected by a bond of sympathy. Many times a day I realize how much my own outer and inner life is built upon the labors of my fellow men, both living and dead, and how earnestly I must exert myself in order to give in return as much as I have received.”
― Albert Einstein
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