surplise!

haha... against all odds, I am actually posting something for the first time this year... at the behest of a couple of pp who have been politely clamouring for a post, i had resolved to post sometime back. However, due to forseen circumstances (like busyness, laziness and just pure procrastination), the resolution has not materialised till now...

Till now. So wat's so special abt now? Nothing, indeed. Except that I've been engaged in a fierce battle of wits with my supervisor the past few weeks, and I'm tired. Trying my darndest, via various arguments, to show that "reasons cannot be reduced to natural causes."

w-w-what's that again? u ask. don't even get me started. (the short answer: it's part of my thesis)

anyway, as i was saying - each time i produce what i think is a fool-proof, water-tight argument, he manages to give a clever objection to it. And this has happened the last 3 or 4 times. it's like Sasuke finally learning the Chidori, only to find it rendered totally useless against Itachi when he tried it against him. It's like finally capturing your opponent, having trapped him on all sides, only to realise that you're the one caught in his genjutsu. It's like taking an M2O3 and... and... ok, i think i've made e point.

So here I was, this past week, lying in the wake of another minor defeat, my arguments in tatters - the pieces falling past me and blown away like leaves in the wind - thinking on whether to go for something less ambitious in my thesis. Or to keep fighting for the big one.

It's a funny thing, really, this whole business. U're chipping away at a huge wall (read: very significant opposing views), and each time u think u've made the crucial blow and wait for the rock to crumble and the stones to fall, the wall stays there somehow. And u don't know how thick it is. At the same time, u also know that there's a thinner wall (less significant opposing views) beside you, which is easier to break through. Why not just chip away at that wall instead? Well, for one thing: if the huge wall falls, u're in for a pot of gold. The thin wall? Maybe a plate of chicken rice. Nice chicken rice - but not very nice after u swallow it.

And all the time, the water's rising around you and come july/august, u'd better break thru some wall if u want to survive. So, tough choice man. What would u choose?

For now, I'm gunning for the big troll, not the irritating little orcs running about. Stubbornness, courage, or stupidity? I don't know. I just don't like giving up so soon. (How soon is too soon? Again, i admit it's subjective.) Maybe through this I'll learn some lesson from God. Maybe I'll learn whether it's worth it for me to try for a Ph.d next time. Maybe I'll learn that arguing for a view which I think I know is true is harder than I thought. Come what may, it's in His hands. What I need to keep in mind is to do all this with the right motives.

In the meantime, the small piece of good news is that i managed to come up with something this week in response to my supervisor. at one point, i really wondered whether the present arguments were leading to a real dead end. well, thank God i managed to modify 2 arguments, and they look promising (though it's true that they always do, at least before I discuss them with him).

hopefully, i'll be meeting up to discuss them with my sup tomorrow. and if i do get around to blogging again soon, i'll give an update... but that's a big IF... :)