Razors and vampires

Seeing a poster on vampirism, which always seems to be a hot topic, I realized again what little sense it makes to me. However, the concept of emotional vampirism does make sense. Dr. Judith Orloff talks about it in "The Emotional Vampire Survival Guide: Emotional Freedom in Action." Some believe in psychic vampires.

***

Bela Lugosi as Dracula, quickmeme

***

I don't fully believe that there are evil people, just ignorant ones who are mostly unaware of the consequences of their actions--both for themselves and others.  Often evil is a label that observers (and victims) place on people and things that are counter what is defined as good, sometimes at the moment.  This label could be used to define a gossip who spreads a rumor about you or a dictator who kills indiscriminately.

Many philosophers and religions have discussed evil and attempted to define it.  I'm partial to the Bahá'í Faith observation:

"Nevertheless a doubt occurs to the mind—that is, scorpions and serpents are poisonous. Are they good or evil, for they are existing beings? Yes, a scorpion is evil in relation to man; a serpent is evil in relation to man; but in relation to themselves they are not evil, for their poison is their weapon, and by their sting they defend themselves. (`Abdu'l-Bahá, son of the founder of the religion, in Some Answered Questions)"

Thus, evil is more of an intellectual concept than a true reality. Since God is good, and upon creating creation he confirmed it by saying it is Good (Genesis 1:31) evil cannot have a true reality.

My apologies to those of you who are atheists.  For you there are a variety of razors, or eponymous laws. As an example--

Hanlon's razor – A corollary of Finagle's law, and a play on Occam's razor, normally taking the form, "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity." As with Finagle, possibly not strictly eponymous. Alternatively, "Do not invoke conspiracy as explanation when ignorance and incompetence will suffice, as conspiracy implies intelligence."

However, there are dragons, ones that rise up in your face when you least expect it.

***

Nine-Dragons1, Wikipedia

***

-- Marge

Out sick with a cold or the flu

Can't concentrate and my eyes aren't focusing well, so calling it a day.

Here's a meme to tide you over; it's from the collection "Brace Yourself, the Flu Season Memes Are Here," posted by Emerald Catron.

***

Quickmeme, TheFW

***

This is the one I really like:

***

Imgur, TheFW

***

-- Marge

All about Murphy's Law with cartoons, too

My home has been a working example of Murphy's Law lately, hence this post about it.

HowStuffWorks has an article by Josh Clark titled "How Murphy's Law Works."  Of note is that it's called Sod's Law in England.

There are sites dedicated to the subject.  The Complete Edition of Murphy's Laws gives an exhaustive glossary of the law, its corollaries and derivatives.  This one I experience on a regular basis:

O'Brian's Law
If you change lines, the one you just left will start to move faster than the one you are now in.

This cartoon is in Clay Bennett's archives:

An collection of cartoons by Diana Denny at The Saturday Evening Post contained this cartoon (all I know is it was published in the summer of 1971, can't read the cartoonist's signature):

And, lastly, here's a demotivational poster from quickmeme by rriverstone:

Have you noticed that social sites have started using the term karma?

-- Marge