From an email received today...

I usually have no use for 'bacn' (which I consider as 'spam' you signed up to willingly receive), but I find I do open messages from the Daily Stoic. From today's email:

There are two ways to do math in this life. The one that looks at the odds and says, Why me? and the other that looks at the same odds and thinks, Why me? Why am I so lucky? That’s what Epictetus meant when he said “every situation has two handles.”

We can see all the things that go wrong in the world, all the breaks we didn’t get, all the things we wish went differently. Or we can see how truly fortunate we are to be born here and now in a time of antibiotics and chemotherapy, to have the privilege of even owning a computer to look at this email, to count our blessings and acknowledge how far ahead we have come out so far.

We choose which handle we will grab, which math we will do. And this decision determines the quality of our life, long or short, easy or arduous.

I find the mention of chemotherapy interesting, for without said therapy, I would most certainly have died almost two years ago.

In other aspects, I have to say that my life—both professionally and personally—would have been substantially different, and not necessarily in a good way, without the Internet and search engines.

Never forget: amor fati.

vale

Reponse to something I saw on Facebook...

A graphic distributed by the Citizens Corporation states that on

June 13, 1943 the Supreme Court ruled that no one can be forced to participate in patriotic rituals such as the Pledge of Allegiance and the National Anthem.

When you call for an NFL player to be fired, you are calling for the law to be broken.

It's not open for debate.

It's established LAW.

What I commented:

FWIW, in the case referred to, the Supreme Court ruled that the *government* did not have the power to compel public school students to salute the flag and recite the Pledge of Allegiance. The National Anthem was not an issue, and the last time I checked, the NFL was not a government agency.

Personally, I don't care what players do. Take a knee, flip the bird, or sing an aria from Turandot. But the Citizens Corporation is being a bit disingenuous here.

P.S. BTW, the NFL has, in the past, dictated how players may express themselves when wearing team uniforms. That they choose not to in this instance is, well... interesting.

I chose not to go into details, but I found it interesting that the case arrived at the Supreme Court because the children of Jehovah's Witnesses were being penalized for hewing to their religious beliefs.

I am also allergic to the idea that any subject is "not open for debate."

Poppycock.

Should the Dred Scott decision of 1857 been "not open for debate" after the ruling was made? Obviously not.

That said, I'm not arguing that the Court's decision in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette was wrong. I'm arguing that nothing, ever, should be labeled "not open to debate."

vale