rattus rattus’ blog

[Ratta is trying hard to remember how to forget.]

There must be something about sustainability that is pretty scarily dangerous. I have seen quite many projects, institutions, lecture series, websites, forums and more, all about sustainable development, sustainability research, and human ecology, and yet they simply stopped, evaporated, ceased to exist, or got nixed.

[Ratta’s coffee maker is in for service.]

Walls degrade.

When you tear down the walls
they are not gone.

Walls can be surmounted.
Move.

Walls can be burrowed through.
Dig.

To be one, to be united is a great thing.
But to respect the right to be different
is maybe even greater.
— Paul David Hewson

In The core trouble of feedback, I presented a WYRIWYG questionnaire.

When I used the acronym WYRIWYG for What You Request Is What You Get, (closely following the acronym WYSIWYG) I had no idea that it’s already being used at least by John Howe, see his web site wyriwyg.com where it stands for What You Read Is What You Get. His WYRIWYG even is self-referential and alas a little lying. Very well.

Patrik Tast uses WYRIWYG as an abbreviation for What You Receive Is What You Get to describe a piece of software. And, of course, there are other variations, too, such as WYAIWYG — What You Accept Is What You Get. Got it?

The portal of the St. Marx cemetery (Friedhof St. Marx) shows a hexagram, well known as Star of David. Yet, I was told that this hexagram was (and still is) not meant as a Jewish symbol.

Interestingly, a number of gravestones there show six-pointed stars which some consider variations of hexagrams. Though, I found one engraving showing a six-pointed star within a hexagram.

What is part of a symbol?

One of Heinz von Foerster’s favorite symbols was the Ouroboros. (Von Foerster often used a variation where 2 snakes devour each other’s tail.)

At the St. Marx cemetery some gravestones carry Ouroboros, many with an arrow pointing from left to right.

Are symbols just symbols?

I vividly feel as if I was an Ouroboros on fire.