October 12, 2011

• Little Big Adventure

  

  

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  When Andrea @corvyusmorte wrote her wonderful poem Fractal she mentioned me and my recent post Endless, this was really nice of her but she also suggested that I expand on the concept which kind of made me freak out lol :S

  If i’m honest i’m more of a random luck sort of guy, if I ‘try’ at anything it usually ends up feeling forced or contrived.

  But with that excuse in place heres a follow up
  Also if you’re wondering about the title? it’s the name of a pretty cool old French adventure game and it’s quite appropriate to my point…i hope.

  In the poem Andrea chose fractals to describe this concept, and they are in fact the perfect choice because a fractal has many facinating features, most important of which is that every part of a fractal contains the whole.

  There is a free (i think) program called Fractal Forge which i’ve used to explore pre-generated fractal calculations (i’m no where near able to understand the math) they are mesmeric, you can begin with one beautiful shape then pick a tiny part of it zoom in and suddenly you’re back to the same original shape.

  The things is that this can be applied to so many things because we can change levels with our perception.
  My previous example of a movie for instance, you can enjoy the simple emotional raw impact of it the first time but if you see it again or expand your knowledge of similar films you’ll then begin adding new layers and perspectives, enjoying the cinematography, the acting, writing, direction then the references, the cultural influence and many hundreds of other details and layers.

  Then you can even go beyond the details and simply enjoy a film right back at its basic level again out of respect to the original thrust of its creators, or even enjoy it ironically.

  This process of refinement and adding of detail is universal, like zooming into something.
  As you look you see more, but there’s a moment like in the fractal when you suddenly realize that all the detail and complexity is in fact right there in everything no matter the scale or refinement, its a truly Endless system.
  They used science to go within the Atom, and there they found electrons and other particles that followed the same rules that can be seen in the movements of the planets.
  And when they went further into the Quantum they discovered rules that gave hints to the nature of our ENTIRE dimension, and how the very structure of reality is made, formed and changed….and this was from something on a scale that makes Atoms look like planets.

  Also mentioned in Andreas post was the tendency for such thoughts to lead to hopelessness and despair. This is in fact a bit of a problem for me, due to the vast potential you become aware of if you follow this concepts path you can end up feeling nihilistic, as if no matter what you do it will never be anything more than anything else.

  But this is perhaps just being indulgent or dramatic because it actually equally points out how valuable everything is, think about it. If every part contains the whole then EVERY moment, thought, action and perception carries with it the entire universe, which at least in part makes you and everything you do the most important and incredible thing that will ever exist in that moment.

  But finally for people, like everything else they are just as complex, but where as with a film the layers available are set and limited within the films borders with a person you must add the fourth dimension…Time.
  With time involved the potential explodes, the detail multiples beyond all measure. We can change, learn, invent and re-invent all on top of a structure that is in it’s simplest form for want of a better descriptive word Devine.
  You are a wonder, a single and total point of perception, learning and experiencing for the first and only time in this time, the thought of it alone is exciting we’re on an adventure within and as part of a fractal of such complexity and detail that it cannot even be approached, but as with any fractal no matter how big or layered it’s all there in a single grain of sand on any beach, in every leaf and every face.

  • 7:44 pm
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