Stories By Van

Finally, the first Mythical Day in October! The greatest month of the year. I've been waiting to write about more Halloween stuff for a while, and it all starts here (technically, I jumped the gun early on and wrote that article about werewolves , but I couldn't help myself). Alright, enough chit-chat. Let's talk about witches. You don't need to be under a spell to know that witches have had a bad run of it in history. In fact during the Early Modern Period (1400-1700), an estimated 70,000 to 100,000 souls were executed for allegedly doing the Devil's work. To get us all in the spirit of the season, I looked at five famous "witches" who've haunted the ages. What is a Witch? Before we take a look at some of the most well-known witches, let's examine the real definition of a witch. According to dictionary.com, the general and misleading definition of "witch" is: witch [wich] A person, now especially a wom...

I know, I know. This doesn't seem  like an "existential" post about our society, but there's a lot of issues happening around this subject right now, and since it's happening around the global society, I think it fits in on Society Day. Look, I try to stay away from the more topical  subjects because I don't want to date any of my posts, but I think a few hundred years of women's consistent struggle for equality means I'm in the safe zone to talk about this. So, we're doing it. Get over it. It's my blog. I can do what I want with it. Gender equality is a human right, but our world faces a persistent gap in access to opportunities and decision-making power for women and men. Globally, women have fewer opportunities for economic participation than men, less access to basic and higher education, greater health and safety risks, and less political representation. Guaranteeing the rights of women and giving them opportunities to reach thei...

Ahhh...  What a wonderfully gloomy day to discuss the existential questions haunting our minds. I was doing some research on different existential questions to talk about today (because I want to make sure everyone thinks I'm smart), and what I found was really interesting. There are a lot of blogs out there that have titles like "20 Existential Questions & My Answers." and these are fine, but they're not really what I like in my pondering. Most of these blogs had authors that gave straight and clear-cut answers to these impossible questions. Telling people what the truth is as they see it, and I'm not a fan of that. Not a big supporter of people telling other people their  truth. I prefer laying it all out at the beginning that I have no idea what the answer is. Everything that I spew out on this blog is merely opinion and shouldn't be taken as truth. They're based on my own personal opinions. Instead of you taking what I think as the truth, I...

The mind is an interesting thing. It literally helps us live, and it does whatever it can to ensure that life is full of happiness. But, if you are able to poke the right (or wrong) parts in just the right way, you can alter the brain and cause it to spiral in horrifying ways. That is the darkness that comes with exploring the mind with existential thoughts. However, putting your mind in those scenarios that deal with death and danger can also have a positive effect on how you perceive your life and how you continue to live it from then on. Let's do a little thought experiment. Read this scenario, and make sure to really put yourself into the scene... You’re visiting a friend who lives on the 20th floor of an old, inner city, block of apartments. It’s the middle of the night when you are suddenly awakened from a deep sleep by the sound of screams and the choking smell of smoke. You reach over to the nightstand and turn on the light. You are shocked to find the room filling...

Let's talk sci-fi. I just started listening to Neruromancer , the first book in William Gibson's "Sprawl Trilogy" and the forefront of the "cyberpunk" genre. Also, this series (especially Neuromancer ) was a huge inspiration for "The Matrix." So, I'm having a good time getting lost in the beautiful mix of technology and religious philosophies that Gibson uses in his stories. I was really hoping to dive deep into these stories and write about that today since it's Technology Day, but I don't want to spoil anything in the book, so I went looking for other sci-fi things. I was knocking some ideas in my head, and I thought I'd do another kind of can-we-actually-do-this post like the cloning article I wrote a few weeks ago. I ended up landing on teleportation. Zapping things from one place to another. Is that even possible? It sure would make travelling easier, but do we really have the technology to make that classic sci-fi trope a...

Alright, listen up. I got some flack from my conspiracy theory last week about the Queen of England being a cannibal. Here's the thing: that is a known  conspiracy, and it's been known for a long time overseas. I am not the first person to make the connections. There's a lot of people in Europe that strongly  believe this and more. In fact, the entire royal family has been doing this for hundreds of years! Look it up. I'm not the news, so if you doubt what I say just look it up for yourself. The truth is surprising sometimes. That being said, did you guys know that the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge was actually a satanic ritual? I know ... shocking. Okay, this one is pretty out there, and I highly doubt this theories points, but then again, my favorite conspiracy theories are the ones that seem so outrageously crazy that they can't possibly be true in any sense. They're my favorite because of that little thought that pops up in all our heads when we read a craz...

Death has been discussed comprehensively by very few philosophers. Those who have dealt with it offer their views mostly on the awareness of death. Indeed, the only knowledge we have regarding death itself is that it is an inevitable universal event. We all know that we will die, and sooner or later most of us confront the reality of our own mortality. Let us look at the changing attitudes towards death over time, and then turn to the significance of death from two existential perspectives: Martin Heidegger’s and Karl Jaspers’. I would like to say a few words, however briefly and simply, about the popularly-held religious view of the significance of death. This will provide a good contrast with Heidegger’s and Jaspers’ views. According to this view, a person’s death is not seen as the end because the soul is regarded as immortal. In the medieval period, for example, the soul was regarded as the ‘form’ of the body and the two were seen in natural unity. This unity is broken up at ...