In a song by Horslips, you can’t fool the beast, there are a few lines interesting. Ah yes, they're blind already. They're blind to love, blind to pain, Blind to hope, blind to gain. Ah you can fool them alright But can you fool the beast? Love Poem by Robert Bly: When we are in love, we love the grass And the barns, and the light poles And the small mainstreet abandoned all nights. Another line from Bill Watterson, the cartoonist of Calvin and Hobbes. ...

Two mini-stories: water-bottle In a library. Put my water bottle on the foutain stand and went into the restroom. Upon returning, my water bottle was gone. While I have left it this way many many times, the water bottle always stays there without leaving. Where is it? I went outside and saw a man leaving. Ran to him and saw my water bottle in his hand. “Excuse me, that water bottle is mine.” “Oh, I thought somebody lost it.” ...

纽约地铁上黑人流浪汉被谋杀已经有几天了。不少媒体的报道着墨于无家可归，却对大庭广众之下的私刑谋杀轻描淡写，这是很奇怪的事。对弱势群体的同情，似乎被无缘由的（对黑人、贫穷和无家可归者的）害怕和厌恶所取代。 社会学家Matthew Desmond有本书，Poverty by America。在一个访谈中他说，“许多人从贫穷中谋利。” 在百老汇音乐剧Hadestown中有首歌Why We Build the Wall这样唱道： Why do we build the wall? We build the wall to keep us free ... The enemy is poverty And the wall keeps out the enemy And we build the wall to keep us free That’s why we build the wall We build the wall to keep us free Because we have and they have not Because they want what we have got The enemy is poverty And the wall keeps out the enemy And we build the wall to keep us free That’s why we build the wall We build the wall to keep us free

汉语中数字有三种表达，阿拉伯数字，简体和繁体。繁体的主要用处是在会计记账和书写支票以防涂改。 PinYin Hanzi Daxie ling 零 零 yī 一 壹 èr 二 贰 sān 三 叁 sì 四 肆 wǔ 五 伍 liù 六 陆 qī 七 柒 bā 八 捌 jiǔ 九 玖 shí 十 拾 bǎi 百 佰 qiān 千 仟 wàn 万 万 yì 亿 亿 zhao 兆 兆 一兆 = 一万亿 两千两百一十七万四千六百 = 2217,4600 2,225,250 = 二十二万五千二百五十 两百零五 = 205 二 vs. 两 二三四 (two, three, four) ...

And you never meet the people. You never shake their hands. You never hear their story or tell yours. But somehow, in the act of making something with a great deal of care and love, something’s transmitted there. And it’s a way of expressing to the rest of our species our deep appreciation. So we need to be true to who we are and remember what’s really important to us. ...

The title is a line from Lynn in the 2017 Thai movie, Bad Genius. “Don’t you see – even if you don’t cheat, life cheats you anyway.” When I learn English, the literal meaning is easy to get but the subtle culture and personal feel is hard to grasp. This can come to the difference between two persons. What do I know what you say means the same as I say the same words and sentences? In this sense, the language is not static as a book waiting to be read but a two-way interaction between you and the world. This can be rephrased as another line: I know what I give you but I do not know what you receive. ...

哲学的重要性在于世界观和价值观是与政治直接挂钩的。人类的种种冲突多半源于这两观的差异，以唯心为基础的哲学本质就是个人自我中心，而唯物论的基础则在于事实和科学认知。唯心论者从一己观世界，却不能跳出自己的局限与狭隘。虽是人性，却不利于解决人与人之间的矛盾。唯物论者看到宇宙浩渺，个人若尘，因此不必过于看重自己，或许对冲突的解决有利。 上篇提到佩索阿的诗句Nature is parts without a whole.其实可以稍稍改动一下： Truth is parts without a whole. Universe is parts without a center.这样看世界，或许更接近真相。当然，每个人从自己的经历得出的认识总是各有不同，知道生命的局限或许能看得更清楚更真实。 执与不执，总是一个问题。不过这个问题归根结底是如何选择，欲海无边，人生苦短。正如赫尔曼黑塞（Hermann Hesse）这样说：人们必须找到自己的梦，这样一来，这条路就会变得轻松许多。不过，没有一个梦可以永远持续，每个梦都会被新的梦取代，我们不可以想要紧抓任何一个梦。

Nature, is parts without a whole. When I read this line, it is like a lightning strike. For each of us, there are some universial patterns of our experiece in this world. However, it is each of us that makes the whole, loosely connected and remotely located. Yes, there is no such a whole. No one could experience everything in this universe. 2023-04-20 Another line from Marilyn Monroe’s poem runs in the same vein. ...

In my backyard, there are always bird dramas going on and on. As you may know that birds are territorial animals. One year, a robin couple fought with another couple of black crow because somehow the black crow stole their chick and ate it. the poor robins called all their friends and had a fight on the garage’s roof. This spring, two Magpies built their nest on the apple tree. The construction took about a month. Now both are busy for internal decorations. ...

I know what I have given you. I do not know what you have received. Infancy is what is eternal, and the rest, all the rest, is brevity, extreme brevity. Out of a hundred years a few minutes were made that stayed with me, not a hundred years. One lives in the hope of becoming a memory.