Sunday, January 3, 2010

When East met West (Omegle online)

A true life e-generation epic by WQ editors


Omegle is a simple Web start-up idea. What if two complete strangers were to strike up a conversation across the country for no apparent reason? That's the idea. All Omegle tells you to do is say "hi!" Fun, mystery, or mind numbing disappointment ensues. Here are actual transcripts of a recent exchange on the meaning of life, teaching the Dharma, and Boxxy. Instead of "Thus have I heard," all sutras on Omegle begin: "You're now chatting with a random stranger. Say hi!"


You're now chatting with a random stranger. Say hi!
Stranger: oh!
Stranger: i suppose that means i should say hi!
Stranger: so... hi!
You: Hi stranger
Stranger: no, no, no, i'm not a stranger, you are!
Stranger: this website calls me "you" and it calls YOU "stranger"
You: Yeah, you're right. I guess I can't imagine what anyone is seeing on the screen
You: All I see is blank, and then it's like GO
Stranger: wow.
Stranger: such is life.
Stranger: you're prophetic.
You: True, makes me wonder if life is living me or if I just want a cappuccino
You: where are you?
Stranger: What is life for?
Stranger: and if god created the earth, did he ever intend for us to be bored enough to go on a website called omegle.com?
You: Life is wasted on the living
Stranger: and if he did not, then mustn't god be infallible?
Stranger: and if god is infallible, then why does the majority of the world worship him?
Stranger: and if the majority of the world worships an infallible god, then is not life wasted?
You: God is fallible when "god" is just another guy. When it's karma, it's infallible
Stranger: and if life is constantly wasted, then why does it exist?
You: Life goes on because of causes and conditions, not because it is going somewhere or has a point
Stranger: but then why does it end for people
Stranger: if it's continuous
Stranger: and forever in fact exists
Stranger: then won't humans become awfully bored
You: It doesn't really end, just changes. Those changes we call ends. It goes on yet not in any way forever, just for the moment
Stranger: but then does life exist after death?

New website that randomly connects people briefly explained and demonstrated

You: Humans won't become bored because they don't see it happening. They can imagine anything they way. And their lively imaginations keep them humming along, happily enough
You: Life exists after life.
Stranger: when a brain dies, does not the imagination die too?
Stranger: so when you step on an ant, it doesn't all just go blank?
Stranger: it starts dreaming or imagining things?
Stranger: because that's part of the brain, which has just been crushed.
You: There's this one as there have been hundreds of thousands before it, like a strand of pearls. The life of the mind is not the brain. Consciousness infuses the brain like software. As for the ant, it does not go blank
You: Mind is one thing. Conk a person unconscious, but there will be life still. When normal thinking resumes, the mind closes the gap. One imagines, and yet things are real. The real is, and imagination overrides. But the real is just the same
Stranger: but an unconscious human functions because their brain and heart and organs remain intact
Stranger: once they do not, it should go blank.
You: Yes, in a sense. But it does not stay blank. If it's coming back, it could seem blank. If it isn't -- even if the signs are there that it isn't -- consciousness won't skip a beat. Don't confound brain with mind. They aren't the same.
Stranger: alright, well, if afterlife is as you say, does it go on forever?
Stranger: do people imagine things in their brain based on their short one hundred or so years on earth for all of eternity?
You: Let me ask you, does a hamster wheel go on forever?
Stranger: not when the hamster gets off
You: So in the same way, if we get off, then it will not be "forever." But say the hamster, theoretically, didn't get off, how long would it go on?
Stranger: forever, but if the hamster dies, it stops
You: Yes, in a sense forever. So long as we keep on, it keeps on. The hamster is not the wheel. It's an analogy. You are not this you, this 100 years. So long as you think that, you could well say it is on now, brain is functioning, and the BLANK is coming. But it is not that way.
You: Sadly, the blank is not coming. It'll keep going on. We say, hooray, I don't have to die. You'll die for sure, at least this "you" will. This is not you. Will that be you next time? No more you than this time. Yet the wheel will keep keeping on. Given that, shouldn't we want for a way off?
Stranger: but
Stranger: all the senses
Stranger: everything, even that involved in understanding the idea of myself
Stranger: all of that is controlled by this "me"
Stranger: so without that, it must end.
You: The brain is tied to the senses. The brain is the body. But the mind is different, as different as hardware and software. The best computer is junk without a smooth operating system and program, and vice versa. All of "this" is taken to be you, a mistake. It's not you. For example,
Stranger: who is to say said "mind" exists
Stranger: it is a concept thought up by the brain.



You: For example, did you know that blind people have been operated on and "died" on the table. It was a near death experience, not death. When the body sensed itself dying, it released the mind. The mind rose, and they looked down. Hello. They're blind. Yet they saw, and they described what they could not possibly have seen. So when they said
You: ..."I saw this and that was there," the doctors and nurses were bewildered. How could they "see" anything, dead or not dead? A) Dead don't see, and even if they do, B) the blind don't. All this is to say that the mind and brain/senses are not one and the same.
Stranger: hm
Stranger: you make interesting points.
You: Thank you. Yes, and that's not all.
You: The fact that you're listening or reading on, why is that?
Stranger: i'm interested in what you're saying. i'm not sure i believe it all, but i'm interested.
You: Surely I'm talking "nonsense." Well, anybody knows we're just brain/senses. And God is great. And people are silly...
You: No, you know why I think you're listening/reading on? I think, and this is just a thought mind you, that you hear it on another level. Like Stephen Colbert jokingly says, you feel the "truthiness" of it. Why is that? Surely if this were all just a 100 year jaunt, you'd say, balderdash!
You: ...bollocks, hogwash, pooh, Lake Titicaca
Stranger: i mean, there are aspects of it that i'd certainly like to believe
You: Ah. :) Which aspects?
Stranger: but honestly, i think that life after death is a mystery and if it were as simple or as assumed as you say then life would be pointless.
You: Yes, friend, have you heard of shamans and mystics?
Stranger: yes
You: Is anything they have to say of use to us in our workaday "normal" state?
You: I'm interested. Tell me. What have I said that seems simple? If anything, I'm saying a more complicated thing. I think that, OH if only I could go blank at the end of it all. I mean, I wouldn't have anything to worry. Row row row this boat, gently down the stream -- and have fun in the mean time because, you know, life is but a dream.
Stranger: well
Stranger: you seem to have all the questions of death answered by the single concept of a mind vs a brain
Stranger: but i don't think you can answer questions using a concept invented by man
Stranger: well, i mean, all concepts are invented by man
Stranger: but an unproven idea
You: No, I don't mean to sound that way. It's only that anyone who equates mind and brain takes the Materialism camp. It's a philosophical argument that life is as simple as it appears. It is just what we normally see. But we can deduce that it is far more complicated, right?
Stranger: but who is to say life isn't as simple as it appears?
Stranger: oh, and just wondering, (in typical omegle fashion) asl?
Stranger: like i'm curious as to where this is coming from
You: I am. And I'm not the only one. I've just told you about the blind in near death experiences "seeing." The evidence they came back with, I mean, that's not concept and opinion. That's the fact. And that's but one isolated piece of evidence. Shall I adduce more?
Stranger: but they come back with things they want to believe happen.
You: Who, the blind?
Stranger: in a near death experience, it can be explained by imagination, or what they imagine sight to be
You: Yes, that's right. I mean they must "see" in their imaginations. But I'm telling you they saw what actually was. Dead or alive, they could not have seen that. Yet they saw. They reported it correctly. If you tell me you're in Los Angeles, then I'll say, Oh yeah? Look out the window. What do you see? If you're actually in LA, you stand a chance of telling me. If you're blind and not in LA, what chance do you have? For blind NDEs to see, that's like a double-blind study.

Stranger: (and you ignore my question about age/sex/location)
You: Oh, sorry, Omegle fashion, 25, male, usa, west coast, college type, pensive,

You: ...wonky, wondrous, the whole thing...
Stranger: hahah
Stranger: do you have instant messaging


Stranger: or something?
Stranger: i'm just wondering because this is an interesting conversation
You: yes, I suppose I do, but you know...
Stranger: i was going to say facebook, but seeing as you're quite a bit older than me that doesn't seem like much of an option
You: I have facebook because this girl I like is on it all the time, and to see her latest pics...
You: Omegle fashion and all...asl? And I haven't even heard your humor. How's about a laugh, mate? Tickle the rib cage?
Stranger: hahahah
Stranger: i mean, this hasn't been a very humorous conversation
You: I know, that's why I say how's about a joke, an amusing anecdote at least?
Stranger: it's rather taken me by surprise, you see, normally i go on omegle and mock people or make them feel uncomfortable, leaving them to disconnect
You: ha ha ha, you're a cad!
Stranger: well you get some good ones.
You: You can say you don't have a joke on hand. I can produce. I'm a laugh riot.
Stranger: for instance
Stranger: You: oh hey Stranger: heyyyyYou: whoa whoa whoa, wait a sec, why all the y's? You: stocking up for winter? Stranger: wtf Your conversational partner has disconnected.
Stranger: that was a lovely short and sweet one.
Stranger: but a friend of mine had a good laugh with
You: Did I miss the asl?
Stranger: You: hi Stranger: hey, are you a horny girl with a webcam and msn? You: replace girl with balding middle aged man, webcam with saggy tighty whities, and msn with a passion for fashion and we're in business! ;)Your conversational partner has disconnected.
Stranger: what asl?
You: your asl
Stranger: ohh.
Stranger: i'm male
Stranger: east coast
Stranger: 16
Stranger: hence my hesitance to friend you on facebook. i'm sure your a lovely person, but seeing as i'm still in high school, it doesn't seem wise.
You: That's right. Don't friend people. Just tweet them or something. Whoa, whoa, whoa, where's all the deep philosophy coming from if you're still in high school?
Stranger: i mean, sooner or later one has to think about it, right?
You: I heard a funny one today. Have you ever heard of the word "chutzpah"? Of course, look who I'm asking. "East coast," philosophical, mocking the good folks on Omegle, you wouldn't be one of the chosen, eh?
Stranger: not to say i'm an intense book nerd, far from it actually, but i'd like to think i'm more mature thinking wise than teenagers?
Stranger: chutzpah?
Stranger: is this a foreign concept to the west coast?
You: No, it's a joke.
You: That is to say, the joke is coming if you haven't heard it. But I hear the East coast is all jokes, all the time.
You: So maybe you've heard it. What's the definition of chutzpah? (That's the rhetorical opening of the joke).
Stranger: (i see?)
Stranger: Gee, I haven't a clue, what is it?
You: This lady opens up a sidewalk stand selling pretzels for 25 cents.
You: This guy comes around every day and buys one. Only thing is, he never takes one. He just drops a quarter in her can.
You: One day he comes by and is about to drop a quarter in the can when the woman blocks him and says, "Hey, they're 50 cents now."
You: Now that's chutzpah!
You: {Crickets sounding}

Stranger: I'm not sure I understand
Stranger: hahaha
You: The nice Jewish lady has some real b*lls. I mean the guy has never taken a pretzel and she's going to jack the price up on him, come on, that's some cahones.
You: All right, we've covered God, and bad jokes (of an ethnically sensitive nature), let's talk about our other favorite topic, okay?
Stranger: ohhhh hahaha!!!
Stranger: what's our other favorite topic?
You: Girls, I hope, I mean, you do like girls, right?
You: And not just as "friends."
You: Like, for instance, this will sound dumb. Chris Crocker is off-putting but Boxxy is gorgeous, no?
Stranger: Actually I'm gay.
You: All right, let me rephrase that. Boxxy is a piece of t*rd. But that Chris Crocker's a real looker, yes?
You: No, come on, gay or not, Boxxy is amazing, or does everyone in high school hate her to the point of oblivion?
Your conversational partner has disconnected.

Boxxy the Internet phenomenon analyzed as epic viral media

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