Forum rank(s) / Karma.

[grouper52]

If one had really good "karma," in the traditional sense of the word (before it was trivialized by the social media blight that has infected much of the population), one would not care a wit for, nor take personally, the opinions of a bunch of named avatars and their attached words - which are all merely pixels on a screen, when you come right down to it, entirely lacking in tangible reality. These pixels are supposed to represent some actual person, or some actual tree, as they might exist if they were real - but they are flimsy substitutes for the concrete reality of actually meeting someone or examining their trees, and people enjoyed this hobby/art and produced marvelous bonsai long before computers and the web and the phenomenon of social-media addiction.

I know this in many ways, but mostly because I've met three people who post here with some regularity, and they stand out as having a more fundamental reality for me because spending time in their physical presence tells me who they are, and whether I "like" them or not. I also had the experience of sending one of my actual trees to someone who posts here - the avatar-pixel groupings that later appeared on my screen to communicate that, while the pixels which had appeared on his screen representing that tree in the past had impressed him, the reality of standing in the physical presence of the actual tree was far beyond anything he had imagined beforehand from the pixels representing it on his screen.

I do bonsai as a hobby because I enjoy it, and I come to these collections of pixels named "Bonsai Nut" because I've always enjoyed the give and take, the fray, the free-wheeling wild-west virtual atmosphere here. But I have no illusions that my self-esteem or my enjoyment of the hobby ought to be predicated on what goes on here. Nor do I have a sense that my or anyone's fundamental, essential learning about such a subtle art will really deepen in an appreciable way by what I or anyone else posts here. I spend time with my trees for that, or time with actual flesh and blood friends and their trees. I post pixel images of my trees here, and pixel language symbols about them, because other avatar-pixel groupings communicate that it has given them some enjoyment or inspiration or useful information, and because creating such postings is something that I enjoy in certain moods. This is my hobby - I do it because I enjoy it, and I post here because I enjoy it, not because my self esteem depends on the strange mental reality I might conjure up based on some pixels that appear on a screen.

 

[Eric Group]

If one had really good "karma," in the traditional sense of the word (before it was trivialized by the social media blight that has infected much of the population), one would not care a wit for, nor take personally, the opinions of a bunch of named avatars and their attached words - which are all merely pixels on a screen, when you come right down to it, entirely lacking in tangible reality. These pixels are supposed to represent some actual person, or some actual tree, as they might exist if they were real - but they are flimsy substitutes for the concrete reality of actually meeting someone or examining their trees, and people enjoyed this hobby/art and produced marvelous bonsai long before computers and the web and the phenomenon of social-media addiction.

I know this in many ways, but mostly because I've met three people who post here with some regularity, and they stand out as having a more fundamental reality for me because spending time in their physical presence tells me who they are, and whether I "like" them or not. I also had the experience of sending one of my actual trees to someone who posts here - the avatar-pixel groupings that later appeared on my screen to communicate that, while the pixels which had appeared on his screen representing that tree in the past had impressed him, the reality of standing in the physical presence of the actual tree was far beyond anything he had imagined beforehand from the pixels representing it on his screen.

I do bonsai as a hobby because I enjoy it, and I come to these collections of pixels named "Bonsai Nut" because I've always enjoyed the give and take, the fray, the free-wheeling wild-west virtual atmosphere here. But I have no illusions that my self-esteem or my enjoyment of the hobby ought to be predicated on what goes on here. Nor do I have a sense that my or anyone's fundamental, essential learning about such a subtle art will really deepen in an appreciable way by what I or anyone else posts here. I spend time with my trees for that, or time with actual flesh and blood friends and their trees. I post pixel images of my trees here, and pixel language symbols about them, because other avatar-pixel groupings communicate that it has given them some enjoyment or inspiration or useful information, and because creating such postings is something that I enjoy in certain moods. This is my hobby - I do it because I enjoy it, and I post here because I enjoy it, not because my self esteem depends on the strange mental reality I might conjure up based on some pixels that appear on a screen.

So.. Did you vote "yes, no or maybe"?

JK

Great post Grouper. Speaks directly to a massive problem in society today- we are not relating in person the way we used to, there is no focus on it. People take communications on a computer or cell phone as "good enough" and do not put the effort into making a real connection.

 

[Anthony]

Hey, Hey Eric,

we still use telephones [ Vonage ] you can't fake responses with active speech, and quite a few don't give numbers, so you
begin to fade away on them.
E-mails can be doctored for improved reading / responses, but the active voice - ha !

The telephone almost as good as being there in person.
Great Year
Anthony

 

[grouper52]

So.. Did you vote "yes, no or maybe"?

JK

Great post Grouper. Speaks directly to a massive problem in society today- we are not relating in person the way we used to, there is no focus on it. People take communications on a computer or cell phone as "good enough" and do not put the effort into making a real connection.

Voted "no" - as you might suspect.

Your points about the effects on our society are well taken. In my day job I've been a psychiatrist for about 30 years, board certified and all that, and I've been impressed over that time by two competing forces. On the one hand, the suffering of my patients which is caused by biological brain disorders due to genetic predispositions, or due to actual insults to the brain from infections and other medical conditions, or from trauma to the brain, or from ravages to the brain caused by substance abuse - this type of suffering has in general become increasingly easier to treat, and treat definitively in many cases, with advances in psychopharmaceutical agents and other treatments like ECT and TMS. I can now get most of these people much better, and a few entirely well, and that's been very professionally gratifying.

But these improvements in "biological" psychiatry are more than outweighed by the suffering I see that has resulted from societal factors that began 50-70 years ago - factors which continue to escalate, and for which treatments are significantly more difficult and less effective. These societal factors include such scourges as rampant substance abuse, the breakdown of the family and other societal norms and structures, the generational crescendo of pathologic narcissism that Kohut and his disciples accurately predicted in the 1950s, and now the growing atrophy of mature and authentic forms of connectedness, identity and meaning fostered by the addictive lure of the pixels on small screens that we now let define us.

 

[Eric Group]

Voted "no" - as you might suspect.

Your points about the effects on our society are well taken. In my day job I've been a psychiatrist for about 30 years, board certified and all that, and I've been impressed over that time by two competing forces. On the one hand, the suffering of my patients which is caused by biological brain disorders due to genetic predispositions, or due to actual insults to the brain from infections and other medical conditions, or from trauma to the brain, or from ravages to the brain caused by substance abuse - this type of suffering has in general become increasingly easier to treat, and treat definitively in many cases, with advances in psychopharmaceutical agents and other treatments like ECT and TMS. I can now get most of these people much better, and a few entirely well, and that's been very professionally gratifying.

But these improvements in "biological" psychiatry are more than outweighed by the suffering I see that has resulted from societal factors that began 50-70 years ago - factors which continue to escalate, and for which treatments are significantly more difficult and less effective. These societal factors include such scourges as rampant substance abuse, the breakdown of the family and other societal norms and structures, the generational crescendo of pathologic narcissism that Kohut and his disciples accurately predicted in the 1950s, and now the growing atrophy of mature and authentic forms of connectedness, identity and meaning fostered by the addictive lure of the pixels on small screens that we now let define us.

You are dead on especially regarding the narcissism! We are no longer even allowed to tell children they are WRONG, in any form... And people wonder why they grow up without any respect for laws or authority! We have a whole generation of people who grew up knowing they were perfect and they won't let anything change their mind about it!

 

[Bunjeh]

Karma is only a bitch if you are.

 

[Shima]

It makes about much sense (none) as rating size or quality to the amount of posts. I'd vote for nothing but name and number of posts.

 

[crust]

So.. Did you vote "yes, no or maybe"?

JK

Great post Grouper. Speaks directly to a massive problem in society today- we are not relating in person the way we used to, there is no focus on it. People take communications on a computer or cell phone as "good enough" and do not put the effort into making a real connection.

I have noticed this kind of attitude cropping up these days (via online) that some how that nonphysical communications are bad and sad and in the end destructive. At one time the same was thought of for books and letters. I think this is crazy. The level and extent of communication between humans is evolving to become astronomical powerful and amazing thing that is building and building, linking the remote and dissimilar, linking the lonely and the fanatical. Physical intimacy is self promoting--if it is worthwhile (which it often is not) it will thrive meanwhile human kind will become a beehive of leveling and freeing communications. The young and elderly and the working drones alike are being lifted up by it. Some of my most intimate communications and relationships have been done via letters (text)--I would never be able to do this face to face--but when I am, it sets the stage for a deeper understanding. I believe the most positive aspects of future will be shaped by the expansion of interconnection--fearlessly in all shapes and forms.

 

[Geo]

"You are dead on especially regarding the narcissism! We are no longer even allowed to tell children they are WRONG, in any form... And people wonder why they grow up without any respect for laws or authority! We have a whole generation of people who grew up knowing they were perfect and they won't let anything change their mind about it."-Eric Group


“It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it; but the young know they are wretched for they are full of the truthless ideal which have been instilled into them, and each time they come in contact with the real, they are bruised and wounded. It looks as if they were victims of a conspiracy; for the books they read, ideal by the necessity of selection, and the conversation of their elders, who look back upon the past through a rosy haze of forgetfulness, prepare them for an unreal life. They must discover for themselves that all they have read and all they have been told are lies, lies, lies; and each discovery is another nail driven into the body on the cross of life.”
― W. Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage

 

[Eric Group]

I have noticed this kind of attitude cropping up these days (via online) that some how that nonphysical communications are bad and sad and in the end destructive. At one time the same was thought of for books and letters. I think this is crazy. The level and extent of communication between humans is evolving to become astronomical powerful and amazing thing that is building and building, linking the remote and dissimilar, linking the lonely and the fanatical. Physical intimacy is self promoting--if it is worthwhile (which it often is not) it will thrive meanwhile human kind will become a beehive of leveling and freeing communications. The young and elderly and the working drones alike are being lifted up by it. Some of my most intimate communications and relationships have been done via letters (text)--I would never be able to do this face to face--but when I am, it sets the stage for a deeper understanding. I believe the most positive aspects of future will be shaped by the expansion of interconnection--fearlessly in all shapes and forms.

Sure, connections can be made over the net that would never be made in person... Nobody is saying we should all go off the grid. My point is that it is WAAAAYYYYYY out of control. I see it in my own family at times- I look up and my wife and both kids are on some sort of tablet/ phone/ lap top... While sitting in the same room. Ignoring each other to see what somebody "liked" on FB or watch something on Netflix... I saw it start years ago when I was a server and when I go out to eat today- people burying their nose in a smart phone instead of engaging in conversation with those at their table... There are positives, but anybody who claims that this over expansion of social media and smart devices has not eroded the family unit to some degree or to imply it has had no ill- effect on how people communicate in person... Well that is just flat wrong. Social media and the devices we use to connect is an addiction, and there are many negative side effects.

OMG, I didn't even mention TXT speak! LOL
This is how people communicate today... The written word is being replaced with emojis, busted spelling and abbreviations.

 

[Vance Wood]

[QUOTE="Eric Group, post: 313813, member: 15627"
This is how people communicate today... The written word is being replaced with emojis, busted spelling and abbreviations.[/QUOTE]

With occasional interruptions due to falling into open man-holes, open pits, ditches, poles, other people, ponds, fountains, and being hit by cars, bicycles, busses, landing air craft, taking off air craft, crashing air craft due to the same problem where the pilot is texting, surfing the net, checking porn, doing more than checking porn, and typing that some perceived idiot on Bnut has dissed him.

 

[Anthony]

Grouper - Technology does not a civilisation make.

New Technology, has to have controllers, they come as time passes. Joe Average seldom handles technology well.

On our side, little real education leads to multiple problems school or school of hard knocks.

In reality land, I know few, and have seldom met anyone who smokes ganja, the admissions on Bnut, were for me ---eye popping.

The world is mostly problem finders and problem pointers, I tend to look for problem solvers.

Wow these posts today are extremely saddening.
Good Day
Anthony

 

[M. Frary]

Wow these posts today are extremely saddening.

Don't be saddened Anthony.
It's the Nut!
Sorce and Nwaite can't help being being dopers.
Adair needs to tell people about wiring. The OCD thing of his.
Fredman feels the need to make this a better place.
Grim is put out because Adair told him about wiring.
Vance and Al are trying to get people to think for themselves.
Dave 4 has progressions going.
Stick has a new cool chop for his work.
You keep pushing compost.
New people wanting to know what the hell kind of tree they bought.
Mach 5 blowing us away with maples.
Sawgrass teaching art. (I read it but feel outclassed too much to reply)
And I'm still a throbbing member.

Just another day on the Bonsai Nut forum.

 

[grouper52]

. . . Some of my most intimate communications and relationships have been done via letters (text)--I would never be able to do this face to face--but when I am, it sets the stage for a deeper understanding. . . .

Virtual intimacy is the perfect medium for the most delusory sort of narcissism.

Let me suggest you run a little experiment on virtual intimacy with some people you really care about, or with people that you want to really care about you:

First, send them a large number of texts or emails expressing yourself as intimately as that form of communication allows, perhaps with some photos of roses, or a few selfies, or such.

Then, at intervals, send them a similar, but much smaller, series of cards, or letters written on nice stationary. See if you are then more likely to take the time to think carefully about what you will say, and exactly how you will say it, perhaps even writing a few rough drafts to make sure you hit just the right tone, anticipating carefully how each sentence, each phrase, perhaps even how each word might affect the other person. Send those cards or letters through the mail, or better yet, hand-deliver them each time in person, perhaps on occasion with some flowers.

Then see for the both of you which form of communication feels more personal, more intimate, which one brings you closer together, leaves a more lasting and deeper memory of your connection.

See which form of communication is more likely to be kept through the years, perhaps in a treasured or intimate location, and perhaps re-visited and re-read at important times as the years go by.

 

[crust]

Virtual intimacy is the perfect medium for the most delusory sort of narcissism.

Let me suggest you run a little experiment on virtual intimacy with some people you really care about, or with people that you want to really care about you:

First, send them a large number of texts or emails expressing yourself as intimately as that form of communication allows, perhaps with some photos of roses, or a few selfies, or such.

Then, at intervals, send them a similar, but much smaller, series of cards, or letters written on nice stationary. See if you are then more likely to take the time to think carefully about what you will say, and exactly how you will say it, perhaps even writing a few rough drafts to make sure you hit just the right tone, anticipating carefully how each sentence, each phrase, perhaps even how each word might affect the other person. Send those cards or letters through the mail, or better yet, hand-deliver them each time in person, perhaps on occasion with some flowers.

Then see for the both of you which form of communication feels more personal, more intimate, which one brings you closer together, leaves a more lasting and deeper memory of your connection.

See which form of communication is more likely to be kept through the years, perhaps in a treasured or intimate location, and perhaps re-visited and re-read at important times as the years go by.

I guess I don't fully understand. I guess you are talking about non-in-depth communications and in-depth communications. Common sense says the quality of one is more meaningful than the other--I get that--and I think that the current cursory communications are just a blip on the screen of world culture. Managing the addictions of cursory communications or watching TV or reading books or masturbation will be a self-streamlining process. What I think is BS is the whining folks do about how everybody is communicating via another medium than their mouth and somehow this is inherently bad. I carried on a love affair with my wife for 3 years while stuck in a war-zone--all done via digitally transmitted text, without a digital medium it would have been impossible. People all over the world are learning and seeing and hearing things previously inaccessible to them--it is changing human kind--it is empowering the world. Facebook is often belittled but millions of elderly people (and future elderly people) lives are deeply enriched by the interconnection with families that previously just did not happen was is to expensive to carry out. The societal potential is amazing to me.

 

[Cypress187]

Well, you and 2 others
View attachment 90501
I noticed you've started quite a few threads regarding things you want to change about Bnut. You may just have to learn to love it as it is.

There are also 4 maybe's! Well, i studied multimedia and see alot on internet, just suggesting things.

 

[Cypress187]

My biggest threat!

 

[Arcto]

Social media is convenient and efficient. It fails in that for example, you don't express affection for someone because it is convenient and efficient. You express affection irregardless of whether it is convenient and efficient.

 

[armetisius]

No Karma for me... this site is mainly just a social club anyways, where the only people who get comments or likes on their trees are the "Cool Kids".
People will attach a vote or point to their buddy because of this... This is why we already have so many people of authority in Bonsai, who don't know what their doing.
Oh, and looking at one's tree's does not work either! Anyone with money can buy nice trees...

Agreed.

 

[Cypress187]

I have thought about it some more and i have another/better idea. Because my goal was to make it more clear for everyone to recognize skills of an particular member (which is clearly not going to work with a vote system/ranks). I was thinking, what if there was an extra subtitle/room under every member-name (in the details-section) which can be edited by the member themselves?

Here is an example i photo-shopped to make it more clear (with my own profile-frame):

Here is another example how the detail-box/profile-frame could also be used in a more casual way (or for other purposes), i used a completely random member to illustrate this (and ofcourse censored out the personal details of this user):

This way people can chose to reveal or not and we won't have any reward/competition-system ranking people.

p.s.: This could maybe allready be achieved with the correct bb-code's in the "Location" field in personal details. (tryed it but i don't know all the codes / maybe it's disabled).