Inception

Christopher Nolan got my heart since I first watched his low-cost but phenomenal production - Memento. He is such an amazing story-teller, no matter how twisted the plot is, he never failed in keeping the pace tight and tensioned. So was his last blockbuster The Dark Knight, which I enjoyed it under the huge screen of IMAX - he made the classic so much alive.

When expectation is high, many a time I got let down. But Inception is an exception.

Instead of praising how well the plot is written or how sophisticated Nolan's way of filming is (which everybody has already been talking about), I would like to talk a bit on another catching point - his choice on casting.

In fact Leonardo Dicarprio was Nolan's first and only choice of playing Cobb, and I cannot agree more. Leonardo's power in playing emotionally-overwhelmed characters is simply unquestionable, judging from his previous films Shutter Island, Aviator etc, he is so much gifted in acting out the inner struggle and pain within a character, which synchronised the audience to go on with the plot. Seriously I would say, his first Oscar award is not far.

On the other hand, Ellen Page's play is a surprise. My impression about her still remained so much on her leading film Juno in 2007, and thats why, in my mind she is still that pregnant girl who goes to school. This time in this darker Inception, she played it right to the point, no more happy faces, but became a much more mature smart young lady.

Another star who amazed both Landico and me is Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Gosh his elegant and intelligent character in the movie glued our eyes throughout, and, he-is-so-charming!

For those who have not yet watched this movie, buy a ticket and go for it, if you found it sucks, I get you the refund =]

The Texas Play

I am always a big fan of Texas Holdem, and recently the 2010 World Series of Poker has just started.

With the entry fee of US$40,000 (and my poor poker face), by no chance I could ever join this tournament in Vegas. Still, watching the highlights in youtube still offered me quite some excitement. No doubt one of this year's spotlight would be on the 21 years old Tom durrr Dwan, who has been such a young successful online poker-pro, and indeed, he is one of my favourite players - with his aggressive bets and phenomenal reads - it's simply amazing.

Lots of friends when hear the word "poker", they instantly yelled: nah, gamble. Indeed, just like Mahjong, Texas Holdem would loss its soul if money is not involved (when you say all-in, its all your money in). Still, I would say, the gambling component may actually be less than what you imagine, perhaps, luck is even more important when you are playing Monopoly Deal.

The essence of poker is not to win in all hands you played, instead, it's all about making the right decisions at the right time, in every calling, raising and perhaps more importantly - folding. When poker is played in smart and experienced hands, in the long run a rising amount will come, that's also the reason for why there are so many professional poker players (Phil Ivey!), who could earn a living - a very decent living - just by joining tournaments and online challenges.

So, you now see why there is never a "World Series of 賭大細" in Vegas.


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Tom Dawn vs Phil Ivey in High Stakes Poker

God and logic

Can God work beyond logic?
This is a disturbing question.

First, we need to make some terms clear. Nowadays, we use the word "illogical" quite off-labelled - when a couple quarrels, the girl may fire: You are being so illogical - well, I must say that, he may act or speak in irrational reasoning, but he is definitely still under the boundary of logic.

Day to day, like oxygen, we live so close with and actually rely very much on logic, we simply cannot get out of it. An closer analogy would be Newton's law F=ma, its almost impossible to have an actual example (not those hypotheses in theoretical physics) that violates it. And logic would be something even more primitive, as Newton derived the law also from logic.

So, when we are dealing with problems, we would best use the exclusive terms "logically possible" and "logically impossible" (where the exclusivity also embraced the simple logic of true+ not true = all). By means of logically impossible, it indicates a self-contradictory property eg. an angled circle.

With this basis, the notion "God can work beyond logic" can be rendered meaningless - because we simply don't understand what does it mean by beyond logic - do you mean he can work in logically impossible way or do you not?

At least for what I believe, God has to follow our logic (or His logic if you feel it offensive, or in stricter term, the logic), at least in all his messages left for us, or else, there is no ground at all for us to build any faith or understanding on this so called religon.

Even if He does create or do something logically impossible, would that actually mean anything to the-definitely-logically-bound you?

Stockholm Syndrome

Wikipedia:
Stockholm syndrome is a term used to describe a paradoxical psychological phenomenon wherein hostages express adulation and have positive feelings towards their captors that appear irrational in light of the danger or risk endured by the victims.

Came across this term while getting some extended reading on hostage psychology. It is such an interesting phenomenon which has been consistently demonstrated in a series of kidnapping events. Well, as I previously mentioned, human emotion may partly (at least what I believe) be generated via a sequence of subconscious reflex neuroendocrine responses - its not hard to imagine such a biased and tilted affection to emerge, when somebody is put in a particular extreme situation.

But then what interests me is the psychoanalytic explanation of this syndrome: "a primitive gratitude for the gift of life". Personally I aint a keen advocate in the psychoanalytic/psychodynamic theory, but this illustration did ring me a bell on the citizens in North Korea.

The absolute dictatorship and complete information shutdown does not necessarily preclude the occurence of happiness in this country. In fact, when we magnifying our view, probably it is a reflection of millions of hostages under the sole control from the captive, who serves to provide the only source of basic needs. Indeed, somehow it fulfills the diagnostic criteria of Stockholm Syndrome:

• the captor becomes the person in control of the captive’s basic needs for survival and the victim’s life itself
• the hostage endures isolation from other people and has only the captor’s perspective available
• the hostage taker threatens to kill the victim and gives the perception of having the capability to do so
• the captive sees the perpetrator as showing some degree of kindness

Umm. I start to appreciate Freud.

If

If I were one of the hostages, I would definitely fight back after the first bullet was out. Judging from the snail-like actions by the local Phil police, I would rather fight for my own life. Of course, in that narrow aisle in the coach, with only a handful of men, it is a gamble of life - it either works, or I die.

If I were the police officer in charge, I would have asked two of my elite collegues (corrupt them if needed) to go and replace for the two old hostages. It would be the simpliest way of capturing him - less blood, I expect.

If I were one of the SWAT members pushed out on site, I would have performed in the exact same way. I am not trained (and paid) for risking my life, even the whole world is watching.

If I were the poor lady who had lost her entire family in one single day, I would probably have gone mad by now...

If I were the man with gun. I would not have initiated this at all - abducting somebody is simply the silliest crime I would have committed - there are only two mutually exclusive endpoints: either be caught or shooted.

Blame

When the phrase of foul language broadcasted lively in TVB news, nobody would lodge a compliant on it - simply, it ventilated all our anger and disappointment, seeing the professional SWAT team in operation.

Apart from the word stone-aged, I cannot find another that could better be used in describing the entire rescue process. Going without helmets, staying in cross-fire positions, hammering windows with hostages inside. Gosh, for God's sake, if we were allowed to send our local team there, things can be solved in a much less sissy way.

But then, despite the burning anger, it may be wise for us to limit our blame. It is of no point - and so unfair - to turn a problem of country underdevelopment into racism. Extrapolating our hate in a single person (or the group of police) to the entire nation, only make us an even less socially civilized city. Moreover, when taking Philipines' baseline condition into account, our reaction might be a simple expection-reality mismatch - it is not an issue for us to be outrageous in, instead, we should feel pathetic for them.

I am not justifying the faulty rescue operation, but love and hate always come with a certain degree of rationality. Afterall, we are not mental terrorists.

Maybe its time to let our government do their work in blaming, and divert our emotions in praying and giving hands for the suffered ones.

Do we have a choice?

Talking about Inception, recently I has quite a strong idea ruminating in my mind.

In the past, I used to consider determinism as something naive, but these days when I read more on neuroendocrinology, I started to see how our thinking, emotions and judgement are easily explainable by the minute shoot of neurotransmitters/ hormones. If so, every tiny choice we made in life can simply be attributed to a reflex physiological response.

This may sound simple, but if its true and the whole world accept it, think about the gravity behind. A serial killer raped and killed 10 girls, he can boldly say: My brain made me do it. He is then deemed guilty not because of his cruelty or coldbloodedness - you can only blame his genes and neurons. The social implication is even wider, each and every of us need not at all responsible for our own acts, but instead, we are living only to fulfil the social norm.

The metaphysical meaning of this view is what truly stabbed me hard. I just intuitively cannot accept myself being a uncontrollable program - your conscious mind is reminding you of the freedom to make choice second to second, while in fact it is just a damn scam of life. With this desperation - I can only resort to death.

It is such a huge paradox, gosh!

Totem

Watched the stunning Inception with Landico the second time. After the mind-drilling Memento, Chris Nolan pushed his art in storytelling to a master level, and again consumed all my brain glucose within this 150 minutes. Absolutely, best movie in 2010 so far.

The second time in theatre doesnt make the film dull, knowing the plot, I enjoyed the movie with much more appreciation to the fine details. This time what catches me is the role of the spinning Totem throughout the story. It is so true that, when you lived in a vivid dream for such a long time, you would definitely need something to remind you of the reality, or, you will get lost - sad enough, without knowing it.

Of course I have no doubt in THE real world i am living in, but indeed from time to time, when life becomes a routine, duplicating itself day by day, I often got quite a strong sense of derealization (yah, quite like the kind in Panic Disorder). Somehow, things around me look distant and unreal, and its hard not to question the certainty of my own being.

But then, I have my own Totem to remind me how true this world is - the unique kiss from my lovable girl.

You may ask: how does it work?
Oh, it defeats the purpose of a Totem if i tell - and - dare you go and try!

Satisfaction

The difference between surgeons and physicians is so much that you can basically put them in two species. Physicians are teased as boring impractical philosophers, while surgeons are primitives who work in reflexes.

I guess this forever-ongoing accusations originate from our different source of satisfaction.

Surgeons are powerful, they diagnose, investigate and CURE. Who would not be amazed after surviving from a Whipple operation? It is simply amazing to every patient who has been bombarded by bad news of cancer, while being treated completely under surgeons' hands. So, surgeons love to see things cured - all at once.

Physicians are different. They think, think, and THINK. The most bit of satisfaction probably come from making the diagnosis itself. This is so true for all those brainy internalists, who can spot a case of rare endocrine disorder based solely on trival derrangement in electrolytes. After the diagnosis, can they offer a cure? Err, quite often - a big no.

But being unable to cure dosent mean we can do nothing. Controlling progression of medical diseases can as well prolong a patient life (hopefully the quality of it), though definitely not as drastic as from curative surgery.

Yea, this debate will go on, as even I myself is so much tilted in personal preference.

Euthanasia

Watching the recent news, you may notice the previous (and probably, current) euthanasia advocate moving into his new house, finally leaving the bedbound life in hospital.

After the claim for euthanasia, people from everywhere starts eagerly to donate and offer all kinds of financial and technical help, and finally he sees the world again.

Though cruel, i ain't very much excited about it.

I have no personal opinion towards euthanasia. But my point is, among all the bedbound patients here, there are lots who are not saying a word, choose to stay strong and live. While the advocate is enjoying his new house (dont tell me he doesnt), who is going to grant the other a chance? Somehow, this is another example of resource mal-allocation in this city with capitalised love and tender care.

Afterall, I am not the one who faced the same ceiling for 20 years.