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An interesting test, evaluating your moral judgements towards some bizarre situations. The situations presented are activities which are harmless (at least in a narrow sense), private and consensual, yet violate strong social norms. For example, how would you morally evaluate the actions of a family, which cat has been killed by a car in front of their home. Instead of diving in to grief for the dead pet, the family cooked it and ate it for dinner.
The intention of the test is to demonstrate that there are tensions in the way that people reason about morality. There three dimension towards each situation, aiming to show your level of tolerance towards those situations, your judgement whether on not the society should interfere to punish or prevent that behaviour and whether morally wrong actions depend on a specific culture, or they are universal.
The other tension in moral reasoning has to do with the role of reason and emotion in moral judgements. One of the interesting things is that people who have very strong emotional responses to those stories frequently find it difficult to provide an explanation or justification for what they are feeling. People have gut feelings that give them emphatic moral convictions, and they struggle to rationalize them after the fact. The dangers of rooting moral attitudes in emotion are obvious. It means that a “yuk-factor” might lead us to condemn actions – and even people – we have no good reason to condemn.
You must be thinking of St. Valentine’s day, but it is not about it. At last not all about it.
In my lands, there is another festival on that day, called Trifon Zarezan, the patron of vineyards and wine. The legend about his nickname “Zarezan” says, he cut his nose off while he was pruning his vineyards. That happened, because when he was pruning his vineyard, the Virgin Mary passed by. Trifon laughed at her that she did not know who the father of her child was, so she condemned him to cut his nose with his pruning shears. I guess he was just sufficiently stuffed with the end product of the vineyard because of obvious existence reasons (February, cold and snow, you really need internal flame to keep you running).
Trifon Zarezan comes from an ancient pagan tradition, similar to the Dionysus celebrations, originating from the Thracian times, and Thracians were reputable wine connoisseurs. It was a lads party – only men were allowed to attend the vineyards and celebrate on that day. After the ritual of pruning the vines, the men would choose a “King of the Vines” and move the party to his place. Ones gathered around the table (I suspect gals had been just cooking and serving slaves on that day), and — now be very careful — men have had the obligation to get very drunk, as that was the way to secure abundant harvest for the coming year.
Showing once a year affection based on a herd principle doesn’t convince me much, but seems lots of people enjoy the gooey tradition of Valentine’s day. So having an opportunity to substitute it with something more reasonable seems to me very appealing. Besides, I firmly believe, with enough wine you can make even the hardest love flourish.
Wine is a necessary foundation for love, so I guess at the end there is a strong connection between those two traditions.
It doesn’t matter in favour of which one of the two festivals you rise your glass tonight, the important thing is that the glass is full of glittering red wine, and your heart is filled with joy.
And don’t forget to enable
#REPEAT cheers{
#UNTIL while (!completely_wasted) { cheers!() }
I have always felt irresistible fascination towards skies. When I was a small kid my grandfather taught me about constellations and how they have been used to map the sky and to navigate through the sea. He had also firmly planted the idea in my mind of not being the only intelligent form of life in this huge space.
Years later, I was still dreaming of being an adventurer, a brave discoverer in an endless quest for new secrets and excitements. Unfortunately, my parent’s plans for my future included classical piano, well behaviour, solid education in arts and culture, stiff collars and ribbons and mild character.
Something should have gotten very wrong in between, because instead of my collars and ribbons, someone obviously should have slipped my character into the cauldron with the starching liquid. After 16 years of piano playing, I didn’t become a famous concerting piano player, and broke the hearts of every single member of my family. I went to a normal university in the most distant place within the borders of the country. That was the time when I first saw and touched a computer.
Studying is fun, so couldn’t resist when I got an opportunity to study at the State Flight Academy of Ukraine. Besides, it was just too close to the space shuttles and dreams for the open space, to say “no”. Not really, I got that later, but I still have a diploma which says I’m a bachelor of aviation and cosmonautics. No kiddin’.
Since now I am a certified master of Aeronavigation Information Flight Servicing and Flight Planning , I think I have full rights to wish for more – a PPL – Private Pilot Licence. This is something like next topic on my agenda. Flying yourself is not anymore an activity for special groups, it is not even special itself. The only thing you really need is endless love towards the skies and desire to conquer them.
Now, this is how I do imagine the perfect family vehicle. It is not that I don’t like some cars, but flying is much more exciting. Those small aircraft are very cool – sure, they are not even close to flying stable in the are, but they definitely don’t drop like irons from the sky. No, really, just imagine the way I see it: having wonderful time constructing your own aircraft with a couple of friends, making quick jumps by the seaside for the weekend, having the obligation to fly your own birdy, in order to keep the brevet valid…. Life could be worse.
If you are still not convinced, it is time for you to watch “Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines “. Ready to take off?
Bulgarian literature is barely known in the western world, and the most commonly translated books were the ones of the Bulgarian classics, which are mainly novels about the period of the Otoman occupation in the area.
After the curtain new authors and ideas came out, and fortunately one of my favourite modern Bulgarian authors has been translated. He is young, smart, talented, and his sharp language makes me enjoy every sentence of his essays and novels. He is Alek Popov.
Of course I will speak again about Bulgarian literature, but now I want to present this piece, which will help you navigate and understand in a funny way some specifics and clichés about Bulgarians.
Mission London is a post-modern story about the newly appointed ambassador at the Bulgarian Embassy in London. His task is to build a proper image of the country in the transition to a democracy. His mission is impossible, as the heritage of old habits dies last.
Bulgaria? Backward, corrupt and lazy?
As the new ambassador in London, Varadin Dimitrov, is designated to enhance the image of Bulgaria in the West. When he rings the bell at the respectable address of the embassy in Kensington one morning, he finds that there is indeed a lot of work ahead of him: a provincial mayor at hangover breakfast, the cook at loggerheads with his wife, the vacuum cleaner – broken.
Indeed, the civilized world owes thanks to Bulgaria for the invention of the water closet, but that does not help the new ambassador on his mission, nor does the fact that his predecessor refuses to clear the house as he is desperately fighting his return home. And above all: the freezer in the cellar houses ducks kidnapped by the Russian Mafia.
Here is an excerpt, enjoy reading.
Rocky Horror Show Rocks!
I got the tickets as a birthday gift from my wonderful husband, and I knew that I am going to have a lot of fun, but the performance actually turned out much more than I expected.
Janet and Brad are a conservative minded newly engaged couple, which due to a car tyre accident got introduced with the lifestyle specifics of the sweetest transvestite from Transsexual, Transylvania. All these covered in cabaret style, lace and garters and great music.
I wonder how this openly trans-sexual open-sexual idea has been accepted on its première in 1973. At last in my country, for such daring thoughts the whole artistic collective would been sent to a labour camp to mine rock salt until they would been fully recovered from such deviations, typical for the rotten western societies.
It wasn’t only the performance, which made the things so exciting, oh no. It was the audience. I got myself surrounded by charming groups of RHS fans, undressed suitable for the event. At first, I thought they were the performers themselves.
The cult of going to a RHS performance or movie screening is not only to sit quietly in your chair and enjoy. Actually, the audience should be properly armed and prepared in advance to actively participate, by creating off stage special effects, serving as backing vocals, dance and etc. and in general behave adequately. You really need some basic supplies – rice, water pistol, torch, confetti and other stuff. The list of proper armoury is here, but there are usually more things to be done – for example shouting “asshole” and “slut” at the proper time.
I secretly envied the trans-looking man around, they had so cool laced underwear and their abilities to balance on stilettos were better than mine. Damn! I regreted thousand times I didn’t dare to ask for making some photos with them.
Some pictures from the performance I had the pleasure to attend and ha-ha – I was having so much fun with the crowd, that noone suspected I was a virgin there. Well, not anymore.
The Time Warp
“…It’s just a jump to the left
and than a step to the right
with your hands on the hips…”
Awwwwwww…
Not me, Spider. But sometimes, I so much feel on the same side of the barrier.
Thanks to Matthias, I got one of the absolutely-coolest-comic-ever – Transmetropolitan.
It is a simple story, about good and bad, and the truth. No, not the truth, Her Majesty The Truth.
Spider Jerusalem is a journalist, a brilliant, smart, cynical as hell filthy creature, which I loved from the very beginning. He cares about the truth. No matter how much it is going to hurt, when it is spoken. And for the goddamn truth, he is going to lie, cheat, blackmail, bribe in whatever order you put it. Oh, and he is a openly misanthrope, a convinced one.
Most of the technologies and the society specifics seems to me not that far away in the future, it is scary when you think about it. It is also scary how thin the margin is between the fictional characters and places, the possible direction of the events and the real ones.
Transmetropolitan is available at the better bookstore of course, and wherever else you find it.
Thanks, Matze!
This is going to be the place where I speak about the things, made me curious or interested… which are not going to be software topics, except if I have something to complain about.
I am quite a harsh person, but fortunately a fair one. I that sense, I am going to value criticism, aimed at correcting miss-punctualities or mistakes I have made.
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