The good life | Kamiel Choi

“I cannot be the only one who…

"I cannot be the only one who basks in the illusion by breaking it. When did we grow ears to the story of value that is told through us, the root of our essence as social beings? Such brilliant fiction, and so undeniably true. We live in language, says the bedridden poet. Our chain of ...

Beguiling Ambiguity

I wrote a theoretical reflection about binary communication with babies a few weeks ago, and I'm going to add something to that. Don't worry: I won't advocate ternary or n-ary communication here. Rather, I want to say something about ambiguity and undecidedness. About half an hour ago, Miru was hungry (she eats a lot) and ...

Cries and Music

This is part of a series of blog posts that is inspired by our baby daughter, Miru. It is well known that babies have a sonic prehistory that starts in the womb, and advice to comfort a baby often includes exposing her to white noise similar to the audible sensations she had while in utero. There ...

Awaiting Binary Communication

This is part of a series of blog posts that is inspired by our baby daughter, Miru. Every infant starts out in this world with a one-word vocabulary, the content of which we (from the perspective of our infinitely nuanced expressive apparatus) then interpret as crying. I don't know how the baby herself experiences the crying, ...

Burping the baby

This is part of a series of blog posts that is inspired by our baby daughter, Miru. Imitation, it seems, begins as soon as our children open their eyes, just in ways we are unable to recognize due to our preoccupation with highbrow communication techniques like smiling and cooing. What if the baby develops its ...

Babies Are Cute!

Most people find babies cute, and for good evolutionary reasons. A newborn human is more completely dependent on the care of its parents than any other mammal (there probably is an exception to this rule, but for the purpose of this article, we go with the clich'e). I just want to share an experience with ...

Carried Away By No Photo

Here's the scandal: My baby is three weeks old and the photo of my baby is still not all over the Internet, despite the fact that the most common reaction is -"Congratulations! Photos?" Of course as a healthy-grumpy-cynical philosopher I recognize how mindless this reflex is, and how we as members of a predominantly visual ...

Finally thought I understood something about the Internet

What follows is the post scriptum for a facebook group I founded, entitled Future sustainable living village, a group I couldn't continue to be a member of for reasons explained below
This group was started by me a few months ago to seriously consider a future sustainable living group using a facebook "group".
But seems to be ...

Naming Miru

It is our invitation to the cultured realm of existence: giving her a name. It is the first "act" and symbolic gift we bestow upon her. Naming has played an important role in every religion, and newborns have almost always been named after something or someone. Naming preserved a lineage, honored the founding elders on ...