this month I donated $28 to the Miami Foundation's Give Day. a bestie of mine works for them and solicited my donation. i'm not sure about all the work they do, but i definitely trust my friend so was happy to give!
next month, if nothing else comes up, i'll probably donate to wikipedia. which i realized i do use at least once a month when looking up something random.
the annual long beach gives starts in september so this month i am doing my usual $25+ donation (plus because i donated the extra $1.62 to cover credit card costs) to both algalita and to moore institute.
recently, when down in sd with friends and visiting other friends, i rewatched black mirror's "be right back" episode. my friends and i ended up arguing a bit about it, so i thought i'd write a post. as i started, i thought i'd see if i'd written a post about it before, and, me being me, it turns out that i had! that post is here.
it's interesting to see that i basically feel the same way as i did seven years ago. the only thing that's changed is that i now DO think it's disrespectful to "upgrade" your person, but i'm still not sure if it's ethically wrong to do so. i think that may depend on the consent of the original person, and probably your motives for doing so. giving something to someone they always wanted seems fine, giving them something they never cared about also seems fine. but giving them traits they never wanted, and would find insulting if changed, seems morally dubious. but i wonder sometimes if motives should affect morality as much as we want it to, but i dunno, so imma leave that part "blank."
anyway, back to now. my friends seem to think that this is terrible tech and should never be implemented because 1. people should move on and 2. relationships with real people are better than relationships with fake ones. another fear of theirs is that by 3. not moving on, one will disregard all real relationships and become a non-contributing member of society, which is bad.
i had a lot of issues with pretty much all aspects of this.
1. people should move on.
i already addressed this in my previous post so i'm not going to get into it again, but while i agree that people should move on, i don't think it's as necessary as my friends seem to think it is.
2. relationships with real people are better than relationships with fake ones and
3 one will disregard all real relationships and become a non-contributing member of society, which is bad.
my friends seemed to stress that you can't have a real relationship with a non-sentient being, and especially not if you can control that being. the show seems to indicate that you can alter the personality of the android thing more to your liking, and less what the person would have really done/said/been. let's accept that premise. my friends seem to think that if you can now create a "perfect relationship," you will, and that that will negatively affect your relationship with others since, presumably, you won't have prefect relationships with others, so you'll cast aside all other real relationships and only up keep only the perfect one.
firstly. why are real relationships better than ones you create?
normally, reality matters. i'm thinking about celebrity stalkers here. but if this isn't even a real person, the relationship isn't really reciprocal, so you're not misinterpreting something to someone else's deficit.
second. would that many people want to create a "perfect relationship?" let's say that yes, they do. but would that negatively affect your relationship and interactions with others? i don't really think it would. and if it did, would it so terribly affect your relationship with others that you would give up on all interactions with the real world? my friends seem to think so, but i really don't. i don't see that happening hardly ever. in the show, the main character seems ashamed of the android so she hides him away, but would people do that if this tech were to become more mainstream? i can imagine going to a friend's house where her andriod husband is there and we all hang out as real humans do. he can't come to my place, sure (in the show, they have to remain within ~30m of their activation point), but i imagine she would have a normal life outside of her home. she still has to go to work, and grocery shop, and such. it's not like her whole life would revolve around this android. and if it did, it would no more or less a problem that if her whole life revolved around a human man that she also would never leave.
also, i don't think that being a contributing member of society is so important. we have a lot of people who don't particularity "contribute" to society but we're okay with them. (i'm thinking people in comas, people in prison for life, severely mentally or physically disabled people, the list goes on.) we don't complain about these people not giving back to society, and in fact, they actually "take up" resources in ways that an android wouldn't.
actually, what does contributing to society mean anyway? having a job, volunteering, spending money which grows the economy and keeps people employed, being part of a community which enriches people's lives, creating something long lasting, making at least one person happy?
ultimately, i'm not saying that i'm for this kind of tech. i just don't think it's as bad as some others seem to think it is. i'm generally a "you do you, and i'll do me" person. if it makes you happy, and doesn't hurt anyone, then go right on ahead. i think A LOT about morality and i try to form my judgements based on morals, not just what feels right or wrong. i think that's why i'm a lot more accepting of things and people. ...which i think is good, lol.
bit late with my july donation. but i finally did it. :)
last night j and i went to a free concert at the hatch memorial shell. it was so nice! we brought a blanket to sit on, leftover pizza, and some other foods. we listened to the music and stared up at the darkening sky and we each saw a shooting star!
the concert was presented by the Boston Landmarks Orchestra and the Rivers School Conservatory. I donated to the first (mostly cause they asked for it, and i didn't even realize the rivers school thing until i looked it all up online today in prep for making this post)
.jpg)
it was great! kind of like being at a more intimate hollywood bowl. with much much much more goose poop, lol.
minivan school buses (rather than the usual yellow school buses)
so many colleges and universities; few locals. also so many hospitals.
radiator in every room, even a mini one in the bathroom!
lack of parking, very few drive thrus
streets are rarely on a grid. so many curves and offshoots and rotaries (roundabouts)
so many toll road, but at least they aren't expensive
both more aggressive and more courteous drivers
quick to honk when light just turned green. but also a lack of honking cause they seem to get it when you fuck up cause it's difficult to navigate here; people are happy to just drive around you
often inaccurate google maps
scooters and motorcyclists regularly run very red lights. wear very little protective gear either
cops seem particularly inept
differently colored emergency vehicles (orange striped ambulances, highlighter yellow tennis ball fire trucks)
rains pretty much every week
top down bottom up windows, but only one window screen which are damn hard to maneuver
11pm to 7am noise ordinance
lots of red brick buildings
lots of pedestrians and bicyclists
single windmills
very large black ants! weird silverfish looking guys in more of a flesh-tone than silver. also HUGE centipede/millipede guys
cherry blossoms, dogwood flowers, and so many varieties of hydrangeas
yellowish tap water / toilet water
dumb alcohol laws, even grocery stores don't always sell wine / beer. obviously liquor is more tightly regulated.
expensive produce. $7.99 a lb or peaches in august!! $1.29 for a single lime!!! 2 regular sized kiwis for $5!! (these are not the prices at every grocery store, but each of these WAS the price different stores. and these aren't like erewhon type grocers, just regular places like h-mart)
more bland (under-seasoned) food
