turtles all the way down

people like to talk. they like to talk about things they think they know something about. and they like to add to it. as if they are adding a unique piece of information/fact/opinion on the subject that no one has ever added. even myself, as i write this am writing and thinking ideas that have probably been repeated. this is nothing new. but its all fascinating me right at this moment. why is this? why do we do these things? why do we even communicate in the first place? is it because we long for community? we long to be bonded to others and feel close? to feel as one? am i wanting you all, whoever you are, to read this and bind with me on some spiritual intangible level? or perhaps im hoping for the tangible, im hoping one of you will make note of these thoughts that theyre good, and ill be commended. recognized. ill be the first to introduce these thoughts to you, right? even though im unoriginal, and really im only made up of everyone else. i am not myself. bla bla. what am i saying? rubbish right? brilliance right? isnt it just a matter of interpretation? nothing make sense and everything makes sense. or does it. or does it not? have you ever seen i heart huckabees? one of my favorite parts of the film is this confrontation of a man who thinks he is "all that". and the confronters are trying to convince him he is not. he responds at the climax: "how am i not myself?" then the confronters respond: "how am i not myself" over and over and over. how am i not myself. how am i not myself. google the phrase "i think", you will get 332 million references. i dont even think that many people in the world have internet access. i think another idea is that people want to be right. i think they want to have the correct view, the correct interpretation. i think. or more they want their view to be the right one. and then, once the have a view formed, its like they shut off all other options. they defend. so then, one has to wonder if people like to argue. maybe the whole "people want community" thing is absolutely wrong. maybe people want to fight. maybe we are all warriors at heart and we passionately want to be passionate about something. but we go to our offices each day, or drive in our cars, or get high and play video games and our passion has no outlet other than what we surround ourselves with. so we get passionate about our jobs. we get passionate about being the best Halo 2 player. we get passionate about the girl or boy we are falling for. or maybe its all combined on a plate. resting upon a turtles back. and little kids swirl us around like peas and carrots and cry out because they want to eat brownies. or maybe we are all crazy. or maybe just one of us is. and surly im wrong. because there is always someone that thinks so. but im always right. because the chances that one of those 332 million "i think" phrases say what im saying. but can we really be right and wrong? ive been on a roll the last few weeks saying some terribly "wrong" things to people. i might as well keep the ball rolling. things are not as bad as you think they are. things are not as good as they seem. i am not myself. how am i not myself?

heres a bit that henry david thoreau wrote in his journal on may 4th, 1852:

Men are making speeches… all over the country, but each expresses only the thought, or the want of thought, of the multitude. No man stands on truth. They are merely banded together as usual, one leaning on another and all together on nothing; as the Hindoos made the world rest on an elephant, and the elephant on a tortoise, and had nothing to put under the tortoise.

and here is something stephen hawking wrote in his book a brief history of time:

A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the Earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the centre of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy.
At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: "What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise."
The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, "What is the tortoise standing on?"
"You're very clever, young man, very clever," said the old lady. "But it's turtles all the way down!"