Complex Culture Revisited

I’ve just finished reading a book on immigration to the U.S., focused on undocumented immigration from Latin America to San Diego, California. It's called Shadowed Lives: Undocumented Immigrants in American Society, a case-study written by anthropologist Leo Chavez. In the epilogue the author investigates the intent of 90’s immigration reform and argues that its aim was split along production and reproduction. By denying legal and illegal immigrants social services women and children would be less likely to live and settle in the U.S., but migrant workers as well as other young single men and women would not be further deterred from finding work in the U.S.

“Proposition 187 and most of the immigration and welfare reform proposals that followed it, targeted health care, education, and other social services as the principle attractions for immigrants, both legal and undocumented. This approach to the control of immigration, however, targets women and children, or the reproduction of the immigrant family, rather than targeting the labor of the immigrant worker (both male and female). Since immigrant women and children are more likely than immigrant men to use health care, educational services, and other social services, denying immigrants these social services would, supposedly, reduce the incentives for family formation (i.e. reproduction), and thus fewer spouses and children of immigrant workers would decide to come to the United States.” “Proposition 187 did not advocate more funds for ensuring fair labor standards and practices and thus reducing the incentive for hiring immigrant, especially undocumented, labor.”

Chavez goes on to say “…the point I am trying to make is that denying immigrants social services would clearly make immigrant families’ lives more difficult. But if the families of immigrant workers decide to return to Mexico or other family members back home stay put, then we will have reduced costs associated with immigrant labor while maintaining, and even increasing, the profits of that labor.”

Such reform undoubtedly perpetuates the often unfair, unregulated treatment and wages of undocumented immigrants which benefits employers. Chavez’s point about the intention of such reform is driven home with the example that Governor Pete Wilson, “one of the most vociferous proponents of denying health care and education to undocumented immigrants, often encouraged the immigration commissioner to stop raids on California companies, arguing that sweeping up undocumented workers caused unnecessary disruptions to business.”

These reforms, whether or not intentionally, logically lead to immigrants that contribute equally (in some cases more so) than U.S. citizens to economy and culture but cannot benefit equally from the combined efforts of the society to which they contribute. Immigrants are treated as inferior citizens, sub-class. This complex, conflicted, evolved creature that is the politics of immigration in the U.S. reminds me of the passage in VAS in which a doctor contemplates euthanizing a moribund young girl with inexplicable symptoms before her father would arrive and disallow him from performing an autopsy.

Don't worry about reality...

I sort of shut up in class when we started talking about whether or not certain parts of Pi were supposed to be taken literally or not. I ran into the same brick wall when writing my explication of the opera sequence in Vas. When we start to pry reality from unreality in these types of stories, I feel that we risk missing the meaning in them. There is much to say about taking things at face value. In Pi, I would rather not try to figure out whether or not the various antagonists were a fiction of Max's delusions. I would rather see the narrative as a representation of Max's perception of his surroundings. Same with Vas. Now, as far as Beautiful Mind is concerned, that is a story of a real person who really had delusions and so it IS important to understand which parts of the narrative are depicting reality and which are depicting illusion. Max and Square are not necessarily historic figures and so the only important side of the story is theirs.

Buy More Now and Be Happy

Yesterday, my girlfriend and I watched the first film by George Lucas, THX 1138. I had never even really heard of the film before, but my girlfriend is trying to make the most of her Netflix membership before going off to med school and has an infinite queue of movies to watch. I'm sure others have made the connection between this and We before and I know it is not related to Pi or any current content, but I still found it to be very interesting.

The similarities between the movie and We were so frequent that I do not believe there is any way George Lucas could have never read We. The movie takes place in the future when the human race has apparently relocated to an underground dystopian society where sex is prohibited except for certain couples for the purpose of reproduction. The characters are identified by a string of letters as their "prefix" and then a number that follows the letters. Also, the members of the society take pills to supress their emotions and personality. Their world is constantly patrolled by faceless android policemen, reminiscent of the guardians of We, and those in violation of the rules (drug violation, unpermitted sex, etc) are usually destroyed. THX and his roommate both violate the drug laws and begin to have a relationship with each other and end up having sex illegally. After they stop taking the drugs they decide they want to escape the underground society in which they live.

I read reviews of the movie online and many found it to be boring and bleak, but I couldn't help but be drawn in simply by the similarity to We and Vas and the topics we have been discussing this semester. It really made me wonder what attracts people to these themes and topics. Why are we so interested in stories like We, 1984, and THX 1138 and what makes writers create these stories? Is it simply the fear of ending up in a society such as these, or just a desire to experience something other than our dull day to day lives?

The Two Flatlands

I was thinking today about Abbot’s Flatland: A Romance of Many Diminsions, and the similarities and differences between Abbot’s imaginary world and that of Tomasula. Both novels are social commentaries of sorts, with strikingly similar arguments. Abbot illustrates the naïve nature of Flatlanders and their incapability of imagining a third dimension or the benefits of a different social structure. Tomasula quotes Goethe’s assertion that we are “the organs of [our] century, which operate mainly unconsciously,” to open his novel. Abbot goes very in depth in his description of how we, in the third dimension, should visualize his Flatland. He also vividly illustrates how Flatlanders perceive each other and how this is different than our perception of them. Tomasula uses the setting of Flatland mostly as a rhetorical device. It is apparent that Square, Circle and Oval are not physically limited in two dimensions as the characters are in Abbot’s novel. However they are still driven by their society, which I believe is Tomasula’s main point in Vas. With continued advancements in science, it has become increasingly more difficult for the characters in Vas to maintain the same ethics as in the past. I believe that the characters in Abbot’s Flatland are products of their dimension, while those of Tomasula’s Flatland are products of their generation, all of which are ruled by limitations.

Evolution of Language and Society

I find the connection that Vas makes between the evolution of language and the changing views of society very interesting. I was exploring this connection writing assignment 2.1 and I thought I would share some of the thoughts I had about it. I was looking mainly at the fold out page near the beginning of the book and the way it explores this connection. It seems to connect the difficulty square has in expressing what he wants to express in his story with the evolution of language itself. This is kind of summed up on the fold out page when it says "If it's in the language, it's in the thoughts." It's suggesting that the language of a society directly affects how people think. When Square is trying to write his story, it's sometimes difficult for him to express exactly what he's thinking since his language often represents the ideas of the society as a whole and is not necessarily ideally suited to expressing the thoughts of a particular person. This might be related to why so many great writers are known for their unique style of using the language to express themselves very clearly.

Sterilization quotes

The issue of steralization brought about by Tomasula's style regards who to steralize, and how far it should be taken and who get to make that decision. "It would not be difficult for governments to add something to the food supply which would prevent procreation [...] and only people whose procreation [was] desired could reveive" an antidote "which would counteract the effects" (Tomasula 125). This "sterilization [is] like a vaccination" for people who "failed an IQ test" (Tamasula 122). But where do you draw the line? Do you vaccinate "epileptics...and the antisocial: unwed mothers, prostitutes, alcoholics, the sexually promiscuous, petty criminas" and so on (Tomasula 122)? "Mensa members advocated the extermination of the homeless, retarded and elderly" (Tomasula 130). Now there is a new line drawn dealing with extermination instead of vaccination. These Mensa members, ironically, are "a society of genuises" "says an IQ test" (Tomasula 124). It seems that Mensa is "see[ing] the entire world through the lens of their specializaions" which they might think is the best way (Tomasula 136). Tomasula's style of putting facts next to images and next to ideas constantly forces the reader to pound through questions about where society is heading. These add to the ultimate themes of eugenics and brings up questions addressed throughout the book.

Comfort in Average

In Vas, Square claims that by screening for birth defects, we are in fact making a decision as to what is good and what is bad. These sorts of screenings happen all the time. When children visit their pediatricians, their heights and weights are taken and plotted against the rest of the population of children of similar age and gender. I personally was always a small child and my height and weight were never anywhere near the measurements expected for a kid my age. I understand that to many parents it is important to see how their child is developing as compared to his or her peers, but by telling me I was shorter and skinnier than most, I always felt that these were negative qualities even though I had no real control over them. Any time we model anything with a normal distribution, we are suggesting that certain qualities are uncommon and sometimes undesirable. So why are we so comfortable being average? Why do we find comfort in the mean? Sure, being tall or having an above average IQ are enviable qualities to many, but being an equal distance away from the mean on the opposite side of the curve is rather undesirable. How is comparing yourself to everyone else a good indication of the quality of person you are? Every time we judge ourselves against the rest of the population, we are acknowledging that average is fine, and a divergence to one side is admirable and to the other is unsatisfactory.

Our Bodies: Possessions or Vessels?

Recently, I was watching PBS with my girlfriend when the story of Dick Proenneke came on. It is a documentary called "Alone in the Wilderness," I am not sure if any of you are familiar with it. Anyway, Dick lived a life of hard work as a carpenter in the Navy, rancher, mechanic and handyman type positions. At the age of 51, he was injured while working as a diesel mechanic in Alaska and ended up deciding to retire in the wilderness and built a cabin by hand in the Alaskan wilderness over the course of two years. After he built the cabin, he lived there for the next 30 years of his life until he was 82 and decided he was too old to handle Alaskan winters.

What I'm getting at is Dick lived a life pursuing different careers to make a living, but all the while he probably dreamed of getting away from it all and just "being," much like Square's thoughts about most all people now "having" a body rather than just "being" their body. It's the difference between possession and existence in some sense. Dick pursued his retirement life in the wildlife in the best of both his and his body's interests. He was strong, healthy, and active well into his 70s, something that cannot be often said of many people in common society today, and I would bet he outlived many, many of his peers.

Similarly, back in January of 1967, between 20 and 30 thousand people convened on San Francisco's Golden Gate Park for the Human Be-In. The event was provoked by the banning of LSD by the state of California and the announcers of the event at the San Francisco Oracle hoped to bring together the somewhat clashing societies of the New Left (Centered much around the political activists at Berkeley) and the Counterculture (Hippies
based out of the Haight-Ashbury district who created their own society as a protest of the mainstream). But, rather than holding a protest or rally, the focus of the gathering was simply to exist (and drop a great deal of LSD) and that is what they did. There were a few speakers and some musical acts, and even an open mic, but mostly people sat around the park all day, just "being".

So, this seems to be a rather common theme throughout American society and one I have thought about a lot, and I'm glad that it was brought up in Vas and given some thought, because it is something fun to wrap your mind around. With all the technology, entertainment, and other distractions in our daily lives, how many of us ever take the time to just exist. I know the times I have done it, it has felt great. This summer, I was a member of the Texas 4000 for Cancer and spent 70 days riding my bike from Austin to Anchorage, AK, and probably the best part of that experience was having so much time each day to just enjoy the scenery and what I was doing, rather than being preoccupied with worries about tomorrow or next week because I knew I would be riding 80 miles again, just as I was doing that day. I would have to say it was the closest thing to complete freedom I have ever felt.

Are you existing, or just using your body as a means to survive?

Pretty Pictures from P. 188-292

I really liked two pictures from last week's reading.

On p.194, the poster publicizing the play "The Black Stork" is really attractive. I would love to see a play like that if they were showing that today. There was a Dr. Harry Haiselden who helped kill defective newborns. When I read the text, I was really surprised eugenics was discussed at that time and so publicly because I feel it is a serious matter. The picture seems humorous yet sad at the same time. Humorous because it is a cartoon figure and I get the feeling it may be a satire. Sad because of the despairing look in the stork's eyes...the desperate baby's face...and the hurtful sign on the door "Black Stork Babies Not Treated!"

On p. 228, the family tree with the beans is really sweet. I'm not sure I really understand how the round gene is passed on to create a round offspring from the family tree but I can see this is probably Oval's work. The expressions on the beans are really funny.

If anyone can point out any other appealing pictures in the novel that'll be great.

small talk

my roommate (i'll call her k) and i were talking about one of her professors, who is a sexist pig and believes women are made to serve men and he believes in the theory of evolution and survival of the fittest. he claims that adam and eve were not the first human beings and that adam even had a wife previous to eve named lillith. this leads into a discussion about religion and i realized that all my classes are connected to each other. in this class, we're reading vas and, well, you all know what that's about. in my astronomy class, we've learned about the big bang theory and how earth was created and that there's probably life on other planets in the universe. my women's gender studies class is taking us through history and showing the places where women had a big impact. i'm learning about the evolution of women and the role they play in or according to society, which has tremendously changed and evolved over the last hundred years. i'm also taking a religious studies class where my professor is basically doing her best to convert the class to her religion (this is all still part of the conversation with my roommate). k and i have different religious backgrounds and we both realized that even though we heard all the big bang theory and evolution talk when we were younger, our family's religious practices and beliefs never really allowed us to take these other views into consideration. i don't feel like i had a choice between believing in god or accepting Darwin's theory. i was placed into this family who instilled their beliefs in me from the moment i was born. i was baptized when i was only a couple months old, and i wonder, how did my parents make that decision for me before i could even speak? i'm not saying that i want to change my beliefs, but would these still be the beliefs i would choose if i had the option of any beliefs that are available today? obviously i'll never know but i thought this tied in nicely to the concept in vas of genetic screening. if you can be given information that will help you understand what kind of life you and your child might lead, i think you should take advantage of that. you're going to know eventually, so why not start preparing yourself as soon as possible. sorry if this blog is all over the place.

Wrdos, Wrods, and more Words

The same thoughts and ideas just keep popping into my head or coming up in what ever i do. During yesterday's class we talked about words and languages in VAS. All the things we talked about just overlapped with more ideas that have been following me for a while, for example when i was preparing to write my History paper i read a quote from a Cheyenne Native American which said

" We need our land and we need our language. The two are inseparable".

This gives a lot of power to language, which is often very faulty. Take for example this conversation i had with my girlfriend about love. "Love" is such a restricting word. there is only one word and yet it is supposed to be used many different ways(i.e. for you friends, family, dog, house, significant other...). All of these are very different forms of love and yet we have only one word. When i do think of this i refer to the bible often, not because i am super religious or anything, but because of the language it was originally written in ( some sort of Greek). So in this form of Greek there are four words for love: Storge, eros, phylios, and agape. I also thought of this in class when someone referred to that Native tribe that just had two words for color opposed to the more advanced peoples nine ( just for an example). It just leads me to think the more advanced a people and their understanding is then the more advanced or more wordy their language is. So i assume the Greeks are just better than us at certain things, like love.

What also caught my ear during class is the way that we are capable of comprehending things and how that affects how we then see those things.

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer inwaht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are... the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae.

The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm.

Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Whether this is really true or not, i can still read it so it means something to me. When ideas or letters or numbers are all scrambled up people have a hard time making it have a meaning. Being a cartoon nerd i always think of Bender from Futurama when something is a bit confusing until i flip it around. In one episode Bender, being a robot, reads a line a binary and declares it jibberish, but when he turns around and reads it in a mirror then he becomes afraid of the message. It also happens in math. there are certain sequences that you just have to know the trick to understand, like the fibonacci sequence ( 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 ...). Most of VAS is like this, or at least i think it is. On the first read through i was really confused on why certain parts were there and how they would fit into the book. Now that we are done some of these are making more sense, while others may need another read through. Now that we know where everything is going we can figure out how we got there.

So language can be anything that has some meaning behind it ( or at least that is what we said in class) therefore silence can be a language...










... i wonder what that meant to you.

Oh, and if futurama can teach you anything it is that God speaks in binary so make sure and brush up on it before you decide to kick the can.

“The Internet is a copy machine”

From VAS:

Though your body is constantly
plagiarizing itself, it never gets it right.
It’s like making a copy of a copy
Copies of copies proliferating (306–307)

Kevin Kelly – “Better than Free”

The internet is a copy machine. At its most foundational level, it copies every action, every character, every thought we make while we ride upon it. In order to send a message from one corner of the internet to another, the protocols of communication demand that the whole message be copied along the way several times. IT companies make a lot of money selling equipment that facilitates this ceaseless copying. Every bit of data ever produced on any computer is copied somewhere. The digital economy is thus run on a river of copies. Unlike the mass-produced reproductions of the machine age, these copies are not just cheap, they are free.

Technology and Decision Making

Are we products of our time or do we determine what is tolerable in our time? Do we make decisions based on what is socially acceptable, or do we define what is socially acceptable at a given time by the decisions we make?

In Vas, Square seems to believe that he is forced to make decisions he wouldn’t have to make if he lived in a less technologically advanced society or era. He gives us the sense that he almost wishes he lived in the simpler time of Mother’s youth. But are the decisions that Square has to make necessarily bad? He never asserts whether he would rather take the chance of having a child with birth defects or have the opportunity to screen for such defects and then make a decision with regard to abortion. Yet he laments over having to make such a decision. He never suggests that vasectomy is immoral, but he desires not to have to make the decision whether or not to go through “the procedure.”

It is unfair to complain about the choices technology brings forth if you are unwilling to live without the advantages advancement presents. Civilizations will evolve, languages will die out, physical ideals will transform, but humans will always have the ability to make choices, though these choices may become more ethically blurry.

The Eye of The Beholder

The concept of beauty is ultimately decided by each individual...


With this is mind, I think it's fascinating how the perception of beauty has changed over time. Here are some examples:


In the 15th century, women would pluck their hairlines to make their foreheads seem higher. Also, men and women would die their hair blonde because it was a symbol of high class.


In the 18th century, men wore white-powdered wigs and women wore elaborate coiffures. Pasty skin was viewed as very attractive.


The turn of the 20th century brought about a new sense of freedom for women. They fashioned a bobbed hairstyle and wore a great deal of makeup. Men wore suits and parted their hair in the center.

And finally, the 1980's! From jheri curls to mullets to big hair, anything in excess was hip.


Just with these few eras mentioned, most of you will agree with me that the perception of beauty will never be stagnant. Styles and fashions that we think are cool now will certainly be laughable will looked back upon years from now.


So I kind of want this blog to be an open forum for all of us to share our views on what we think beauty is or is not.




Is this what beauty is?





Is Kate Moss beautiful?



I think this could lead to a rather interesting discussion.


Source: www.ukhairdressers.com

My own crazy thought process

I thought that if these writers, and others, could use stream of consciousness to write all, or in this case most, of a book; then i should be able to do the same for a blog post. Lets see what happens.

This book talks a lot about genes, from Circle aborting her child because of a 75% chance of bad alleles, not any known problem just a chance, to all the talk about creating the perfect Barbie doll human. It all reminded me of this special i watched on the discovery channel about the possibility of bringing dinosaurs back to life. It went through early theories, like the one that brought about Jurassic Park, and concluded that these were all impossible. The focus then shifted to some newer accidental findings. Many researchers trying to learn about the genome use easy to find embryos to study, chickens. While looking at many of theses embryos the researchers would occasionally find anomalies in them, such as tails that were to long of the beginnings of teeth. This prompted research into the possibility of actually creating birds with teeth or really long tails, just like their supposed ancestors the dinosaurs. Which is all a bit cool. The research found that all the ancient genes from our ancestors are still in our DNA, they just need the right triggers to turn on. This made me think of all the crazy mixed creatures that have been created. The two i immediately think of are the liger and the tigon ( both actual creatures). These two are obviously both combinations of lions and tigers. The cool thing is the very large discrepancy in size. the genes controlling growth are inhibited in each case: for the liger the gene to stop growth is basically destroyed and so these cats grow to enormous sizes, while the tigon has the exact opposite problem and causes a smaller cat.

Why is any of this related to Vas? Because the shear size of our DNA, i would like to review you all to pages 202-225ish to see just one chromosome, any forceful change would just be stupidly hard. It just makes more sense to allow things to progress and see what happens.

Also the idea of evolution of not only body, but also morality. This is of course true and obvious. The tribesmen talked about in class thought of just one thing and that is survival. Like most animals in the world survival is of the utmost importance, or at least it was then. As people evolved, in body and mind, their ability to survive increased and so more ideas would develop,such as protecting the weak.. Altruism seems to be a very new idea in human history, probably from only a few thousand years ago. The earliest evidence of this i can think of is with the Ancient Egyptians. There is evidence that this great and powerful civilization took great care of its disabled. it could do this because of its power and ability to survive and protect itself. The idea of looking out for the week can also be seen in more primitive creatures. Elephants for example take great care of their young. this is most probably because of the very few offspring that can be produced at once and the time it takes for the young one to reach a point when it can protect itself. One of the most obvious depictions of this is shown in any good elephant documentary and that is the baby elephant getting stuck in a mud hole. Unlike many other herd animals of Africa, Elephants will all band together and attempt to save the youngster. if they succeed they are all visibly happy and if they fail then there is visible sadness as the herd tends to stand around in what looks like a moment of silence before somberly continuing on.

Sorry i really don't know where i was going with that at all. and oh year follow this link to a fun little Intelligence test.

pro-choice in action

i want to talk about a discussion we had in class. someone said something along the lines of square supporting the abortion because he agreed with circle that it was for the best. i don't believe this at all. i definitely don't think that square wanted her to have an abortion but i do believe he's pro-choice and it's part of the reason he didn't try to stop circle from the procedure. i think circle took complete control of the situation and he didn't object. even if he had, she probably wouldn't have taken it into account. she seems like she might be the one to wear the pants in this relationship. i support this with random things throughout the book, for example...when mother is telling them to have another baby and square doesn't disagree with her at all. circle is the one who says no. he probably does want another baby because he was prepared for one that never came and there's a void that needs to be filled and i'm sure he thinks another baby would do that. another time, when he went off on one of his rambling sessions and he was imagining that oval was picking out traits for her baby, i think that showed that he is excited to someday be a grandfather because he probably really likes babies and children. someone else in class said that square's a romantic and i definitely agree with that. he married a realist who tells it like it is and she probably keeps him grounded.

random question: is the title of this book, Vas, just short for vasectomy?


side-note: it took 25 pages to write out the code for the SHGC-110205 gene. human beings have 20,000-25,000 genes. it would take 500,000-625,000 pages to decode all our genes. just sayin.

No Money, Mo Problems

A post to make up for that one I missed (oops):

Recently, thoughts of We crept into my head as the next diversion to keep me from getting a full night's sleep as seems to be routine these days. And, something struck me. I could not and still cannot recall an instant in We where there was any mention of money or currency. The only related icident I could remember was D-503 talking about how they were all given special unifs for the Day of Unanimitiy holiday/celebration/election, whatever you wish to call it. But again, he said they were all given the unifs, nothing about having to purchase them. Also, they all seem to live in identical buildings with identicle rooms, all made of glass. So, as we have all noted, it is the ideal realization of socialism, and the only motivating factor is to work for the benefit of the One State and the overall happiness of the population.

As far as Vas, there seems to be currency involved, but it makes me wonder about the nature of the classes, if they exist, in Flatland. Are vasectomies available to everyone, or only the middle and upper class, and are the lower classes even concerned with eugenics or simply survival?

Ok, so maybe I'm not saying anything groundbreaking or even remotely interesting for anyone, but to me it is a big realization because the whole time I was reading the book, I felt like it was a possible future for mankind, even if only slightly. But now, I realize that the One State is nearly impossible. I do not think there will ever be a society that operates without currency. Unfortunate in ways, but also fortunate as is the nature of the beast. I can only imagine how bad apathy and laziness would be if there were no money, but at the same time it would enable many people to do so many things they could not have previously if executed properly. Of course, all of this is incredibly hypothetical and when you throw human nature into the caldron, it will never work. And, as always, Socialism looks great on paper, so let's just leave it at that.

An argument for a failing grade

I may get in trouble for this, but did anyone else think it was funny that the most random thing that J. Jones could think to compare the story to was season six of American Idol? It was as if we all got a glimpse into his mind and there, staring back at us was... season six of American Idol.
But on to Vas. As far as I can tell, one goal of this book is to make readers think about eugenics in a different way. It seems that they first talk about the eugenics theories of the past in a grimy and barbaric sounding way, and then pepper in some examples of these theories in practice today, i.e. the Miss America Pageant. It certainly is a good way to bring these ideas to light. I find myself feeling quite disturbed while reading pieces of this book. It’s funny how there is a bit of a pro-life, anti science sense to this book. But on the same hand it seems to be written from a leftist point of view, which is by far and away pro-science and pro-choice.
Another Funny thing about the book. I told my girlfriend that I had to read 100 pages last evening and she was like “Jesus!!” And I had to be like , “No, it’s not that bad!”

The illusion of color

From VAS (271–272):

It’s sort of like whether or not you believe a flower changes color when you put out the lights. If by “color” you mean appearance (an artist’s conception), the answer is yes. If by “color” you mean chlorophyll (a biologist’s understanding), the answer is no.

You might have seen this shaded gray squares illusion before. Squares A and B are the same shade of gray.

See more color illusions here.

Getting in tune with Vas

In class today we spoke about how Vas did not “make sense”. To me Vas is a piece of art. One of my favorite places to go is the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan. I love to stare at the paintings and to see what happens inside of me. I notice the feelings and thoughts I have as I give myself over to each painting. I notice any sensations I may feel in my body. I take in the colors, the motions, the patterns, the textures…and I allow the painting to speak to me and to speak through me. I have a similar experience as I read Vas. It is not just the text itself which is speaks to me, but the space in between the text which speaks to me. The dangling and patterned words, the symbols, the images…all make up the experience of Vas. In music there are notes and there are the rests in between the notes. The rests are just as important as the notes. The spaces in between the text are just as important as the text. As I read Vas I find there is a certain mindset or rhythm that I need to get into in order for Vas to “make sense.” It is the same mindset I put myself in as I gaze at an abstract painting. It is in this space that I “get in tune" with Vas.