Intuition + knowledge = direction

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Kennemer Dunes, today. Walk it [ talk it ]

Min/max temperature: 6°C/12°C; humidity: 83%; precipitation: 0 mm, sea level pressure: 1015 hPa; wind WNW 15.9 km/h; visibility: 10.0 kilometres; Clouds few 670 m.

"I believe that the processes of autoregulation are as stable and as capable of providing the same importance in any formation as heredity itself. [ As ] a rule, autoregulation in the organism limits itself to preserving a certain state of equilibrium and, in the case of deviation or of new formation, to bringing it back to its initial state; whereas, on the contrary, autoregulation in the realm of behaviours constantly pushes the organism -- or the subject, if a cognitive behaviour is involved -- towards new extensions. The physiological organism has no reason to change; […] there is no "necessity" in evolutionary changes. Conservation is the supreme rule for physiological equilibrium. Whereas [ in ] the field of behaviour [ …] two goals are pursued: [ 1 ] the extension of the environment, […] the surpassing of that environment which now encompasses the organism, trough explorations and research in new environments; [ 2 ] the reinforcement of the organism's power over that environment. An autoregulation that is capable of preserving the past as well as constantly surpassing itself trough the double end of extending the environment and reinforcing the organism's power […] when we are dealing with behaviours and cognitive processes, [ are ] a much more fundamental mechanism than heredity itself."

Jean Piaget in 'Language and Learning; The Debate between Jean Piaget and Noam Chomsky', page 61, edited by Massimo Piatelli-Palmarini, first published in 1979 in France. English translation by Harvard University Press, USA

"[…] Hawthorne […] once remarked, "We certainly do need a new revelation -- a new system -- for there seems to be no life in the old one." […] Whatever the complaint sound or the vision proffered, [ the artist is ] revolting against the prevailing official culture, and the revolt usually consists in an escape from a place they don't like to someplace elsewhere. […] In most instances […] the artist's journey at least crosses trough some kind of wilderness, and that also takes many forms. […] Emerson gives us the first clue when he says in Nature that to know nature is to know yourself, […] what is found in nature [ corresponds with ] what is found in the mind, the point of transcendence being to liberate yourself from the constrictions imposed by habit, routine, dogma, education […] by society, so […] the true self […] can emerge. […] In Death in the afternoon [ Ernest ] Hemmingway moves himself as self to centre stage, he enunciates his famous credo: moral is what makes you feel good afterward and immoral is what makes you feel bad afterwards. In the same section Hemmingway identifies the three most difficult problems of writing as "knowing truly what you really felt, rather than what you where supposed to feel, and had been taught to feel"; putting "down what really happened in action," "what the actual things were which produced the emotion that you experienced"; and then finding "the real thing, the sequence of motion and fact which made the emotion." [ When ] people "have learned to appreciate values trough experience what they seek is honesty and true, not tricked, emotion and always classicism and the purity of execution." Near the beginning of The Wild Bunch there is a seemingly innocuous line, spoken by an anonymous character, which goes, "it's not what you meant to do, it's what you did I don't like" -- a line that is, in many ways, a paraphrase of Hemmingway's credo."

Paul Seydor in 'Peckinpah, the Western Films, A Reconsideration', page 314, 315, 316, first published in 1980 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois, USA

"To count in advance on success, […] to calculate or foresee communication with the spectator, seems to me infinitely more risky than fidelity to oneself."

Andrei Tarkovski, 'Andrei Rublev', page xii, introduction to the original Kino roman by Philip Strick, first published in 1991 by Faber Faber Limited, London

Flow

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Bloemendaal aan Zee and Kennemer Dunes 360° today. Break the chain [ free the mind ]

Min/max temperature: 3°C/12°C; humidity: 63%; precipitation: 0 mm; sea level pressure: 1013 hPa; wind: SSW 9.0 km/h; visibility: 10.0 kilometres; Clouds: Mostly Cloudy 2346 m., Mostly Cloudy 11887 m.

"Angst essen seele auf' ("Fear eats the soul.")

Rainer Werner Fassbinder (1945 - 1982)

"Everybody is looking for an out clause."

Téa Leoni as Jilli Hopper in director Daniel Algrant's 'People I know', written by Jon Robin Baitz, photographed by Peter Deming, first released in 2002 trough Miramax Films

"[F]ear comes from a lack of training. [Y]ou must have a confident mind; then you will not be in danger. If you learn [ to strengthen ] your sensation of vital energy, you will never make a misstep."

Miyamoto Musashi, in Kenji Tokitsu's 'Miyamoto Musashi. His Life and Writing', page 385, first published in 2000 by Editions Desiris in France

"To empty one's mind of all thought and refill the void with a spirit greater than oneself is to extend the mind into a realm not accessible by conventional processes of reason"

Edward Hill as quoted by Betty Edwards in 'Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain', page 88, first published in 1979 by Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, New York

Smile

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Zandvoort aan zee, 360°, today. Perceive [ project ]

Above: Dutch socialism/neo-liberalism at work; cars, refrigerators and gated communities. Beach sign reads: 'Private Property. Entrance only for members and benefactors of K.V. [ camping association ] Helios'

Min/max temperature: 6°C/9°C; humidity: 69%; precipitation: 0.51 mm; sea level pressure: 1027.65 hPa; wind: NNW 24.1 km/h; visibility: 10.0 kilometres; Clouds: Few 518 m., Few 762 m. ; Moon: Waning Crescent, 21% illuminated

"When it comes to bullshit, big-time, major league bullshit, you have to stand in awe of the all-time champion of false promises and exaggerated claims, religion. No contest. [...] Religion easily has the greatest bullshit story ever told. Think about it. Religion has actually convinced people that there's an invisible man living in the sky who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do. And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever 'til the end of time.

But he loves you. He loves you, and he needs money. He always needs money. He's all-powerful, all-perfect, all-knowing, and all-wise, somehow just can't handle money. Religion takes in billions of dollars, they pay no taxes, and they always need a little more. Now, you talk about a good bullshit story. Holy Shit.

But I want you to know something, this is sincere, I want you to know, when it comes to believing in God, I really tried. I really, really tried. I tried to believe that there is a God, who created each of us in his own image and likeness, loves us very much, and keeps a close eye on things. I really tried to believe that, but I gotta tell you, the longer you live, the more you look around, the more you realize, something is fucked up.

Something is wrong here. War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, and the Ice Capades. Something is definitely wrong. This is not good work. If this is the best God can do, I am not impressed. Results like these do not belong on the résumé of a Supreme Being. This is the kind of shit you'd expect from an office temp with a bad attitude. And just between you and me, in any decently-run universe, this guy would've been out on his all-powerful ass a long time ago. And by the way, I say "this guy", because I firmly believe, looking at these results, that if there is a God, it has to be a man.

No woman could or would ever fuck things up like this. So, if there is a God, I think most reasonable people might agree that he's at least incompetent, and maybe, just maybe, doesn't give a shit. Doesn't give a shit, which I admire in a person, and which would explain a lot of these bad results.

So rather than be just another mindless religious robot, mindlessly and aimlessly and blindly believing that all of this is in the hands of some spooky incompetent father figure who doesn't give a shit, I decided to look around for something else to worship. Something I could really count on."

George Carlin in 'You Are All Diseased', recorded February 6, 1999, Beacon Theater, New York City, New York, released May 14 1999 trough Eardrum, USA

"Why have the higher mental processes been so resistant to meaningful investigation? […] In accounting for the course of thought and action, there has been repeated reference to the subject's motives and action, and even to an "executive" that seems to have purpose of its own. [ In the book 'Cognitive Psychology' ] we have seen that this leads to no logical impasse. […] but it surely does raise a practical issue. If what the subject will remember depends in large part on what he is trying to accomplish, on his purposes, do not predictions become impossible and explanations ad hoc? If we give no further account of these purposes, how can we tell what [ the subject ] will think of next? [ T] he course of thinking or of "inner-directed" activity is determined at every moment by what the subject is trying to do. Although we cannot always see only what we want to see, we can generally think what we like. The classical procedures of experimental psychology attempt […] brutal force. In an ordinary learning experiment, the subject is supposed to have only a single motive: he must get on with the experimental task, learn what he is told to learn, and solve what he is told to solve. If he has any other desires -- to outwit the experimenter, or walk out, to ask what the answer is -- he must do his best to act as if they did not exist. In this respect, experimental situations are very different from those of daily life. [ S ]implicity of motivation and flexibility of response are characteristic of ordinary life, but they are absent -- or are assumed to be absent -- from experiments on the higher mental processes. […] The simplifications introduced by confining the subject to a single motive and a fixed set of alternative responses can be justified only if motivation and cognition are genuinely distinct. If […] they are inseparable where remembering and thinking are concerned, the common experimental paradigms may pay too high a price for simplicity. Thus, it is no accident that the cognitive approach gives us no way to know what the subject will think of next. We cannot possibly know this, unless we have a detailed understanding of what he is trying to do, and why. "

Ulric Neisser in 'Cognitive Psychology', page 304, 305, first published in 1967 by Pretice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey

Naturalness vs artificiality

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Kennemer Dunes 360° today. Inside [ outside ]

Min/max temperature: 2°C/12°C; humidity: 69%; precipitation: 0 mm; sea level pressure: 1031 hPa; wind: SE 11.3km/h; visibility: 16.0 kilometres

"It is very important that people are lit realistically from existing light sources. And if you cheat, you cheat with light sources that you do not see but feel that they could be there."

Vilmos Zsigmond as quoted by Ross Lowell in 'Matters of Light & Depth', page 45, first published in 1992 by Brodd Street Books, New York

"I believe that what is functional is beautiful, that functional light is beautiful light. I try to make sure my light is logical rather than aesthetic."

Nestor Almendros as quoted by Ross Lowell in 'Matters of Light & Depth', page 45, first published in 1992 by Brodd Street Books, New York

"[L]iving things react positively to what is life-supportive and negatively to what is not; this is a fundamental mechanism of survival. Inherent in all life forms is the capacity to detect change and react correctively -- thus, trees become smaller at higher elevations as the oxygen in the atmosphere becomes scarcer. Human protoplasm is far more sensitive than that of a tree."

David Hawkins in 'Power vs Force', page 45, first published in 1995 by Hay House UK Ltd