Hard problems

 

I think, and for no particularly good reason, that some of the most

difficult problems in the world are problems that need to be

solved, right here, in this country.  


If American exceptionalism is anything at all, I have to imagine

it is connected to the good ( or bad ), fortune, in having some

pretty extraordinary people, and people who are both willing

and capable of solving some of these kinds of problems, and

the willingness to go after them.  As one past U.S. President

once commented about a " shiny city ", well, a shiny city is

not so much, unless there are some equally "shiny " people

around to inhabit it.  ( You know what I mean? ).


Unfortunately, we have not found our selves at a time in which

doing nothing is really an option.  And so, what it comes down

to is, we all have work to do, because, among other things,

we all in this country need to become better, and solving

some of these problems will not just rely on those with the

greater abilities, but really upon every one, now, to take small

steps, or even tiny steps, one at a time.  Then, I think, some

of these very difficult problems may be resolved.  But I think

we have to do this together.  We can encourage each other

with each of those small or tiny steps.


Finally, I had to struggle for a while about whether to capitalize,

President of the U.S. , and actually not sure about it, but

what the heck ....

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Puzzles

  It seems to me that one  activity which many people enjoy as well as participate in or engage with is puzzle solving.  Part of the enjoyment  in puzzle solving is the actual conclusion where all the pieces are in place. There is also a related area of culture like mystery novels and various kinds of mysteries in art and culture. The standard model in physics could also be viewed in that way. This may not be a particularly good analogy, but it seems like you could view all the problems in the world or at least most of the big ones as one giant puzzle.  And in this picture many people are working on arranging these pieces, trying to figure out the patterns which might suggest how to orient or position a given piece.  Sometimes we have more than one group or individuals which are trying to place  a particular piece into place, but it seems like these efforts often contradict  each other, creating sometimes a lot of frustrations, and other difficult...
Read more

Belief, faith, and meaning

  Well, these three concepts are obviously closely connected, but yet you can possibly make distinctions between them.  The first two are of course clearly related and you may even think of faith as a container for some beliefs.  The exact nature of what that container might be or how you might comprehend it, of course, is, kind of, what faith is all about. But talking about belief by itself, it seems pretty clear to me that what you actually do, at any given time is somehow connected to what you might believe, which is kind of handy and convenient, because you can, kind of, figure out , more or less , what you do believe by what you in fact do, and then, may have some clearer understandings about what you belief , which can also help you navigate some of the actions or activities you engage with. Without going to much more into the subject of  faith, then, it is clear that meaning has a lot to do with belief, on account of how we perceive things , will indeed effect...
Read more

Okay, on space and time

  Well, it's a lot easier to think about if you just call it a manifold, which is not exactly super simple, but makes it a little easier to think about in terms of how " real " it is. So, this is motivated by article which I did not read, about how real is space and time. In mathematics, of course, this stuff is really real, because without it you can get absolutely nowhere.  But , let us not get too hung up with the math. Now, on a day to day basis of course we have " time " or we don't have any " time ". So, I would have to imagine for your average person, it's pretty darnn real, as of course is space, because, we are always involved with translations, meaning going from one place to another, and also, we put other stuff in spaces.  Now whether you want to believe that the stuff, you are using to jam into the space, is also space, I figure, that's all up to you and what makes you most comfortable. So, I am not going to get into an extende...
Read more