The Super Meme That is My Avatar · 10:00pm Dec 10th, 2019
A PM was sent to me recently that linked me to a pic of another long eared pony indirectly asking if that was me. Although my pony form would probably have long ears, my avatar is actually a long running meme of sorts. I am deeply warmed by the fact that even more people are carrying on this tradition, and here is why:
My avatar is Blink from the 1989 anime Aoi Blink (aoi meaning blue, making it a very literal title). Blink is a thunder beast. In the show Blink is helping Kakeru find his kidnapped father after Kakeru rescued Blink from kinda starving to death. Here is a subtitled episode on YT. Aoi Blink was the last anime to be made by anime god Osamu Tezuka. Tezuka admitted that Aoi Blink was his take on Конек Горбунок (The Little Humpback Horse) after he watched the international release of the 1975 movie.
Конек Горбунок has a similar theme of a magic long eared pony helping a troubled boy. Ivan wins the unnamed humpbacked pony (but named Ziff in the English version) by managing to capture another magic horse trampling his family’s fields. That magic horse tells Ivan that the pony is very special and he should never part with him. The pony quickly becomes Ivan’s friend and helps him out of impossible situations using quite a bit of magic.
Here you can watch the 1977 English version, named The Magic Pony, which changed several sung portions of the music. You can also watch the Original 1975 Version Here.
The 1975 version is actually a remake of the 1947 version of the same movie. Despite the fact that 28 years had passed people still loved this story, but at that time, the negatives had become too worn to create additional prints, so using the original script, a new movie was created. Years later, although I don’t know when, the original 1947 version was restored and it can be watched Here with optional subtitles.
The movies come from Pyotr Yershov’s 1834 novella which features a beautiful rhyming scheme and a significant amount of magic. Ivan and the humpbacked pony would meet phoeni, the Sun, the Moon, and the maiden of spring. You can read an English translation here. The story shares and underlying relationship with My Little Pony besides the obvious inclusion of ponies and magic. You see, although I cannot say so in any official capacity, the magic horse feigns weakness to give the gift of friendship to Ivan through the little humpbacked horse. Just as Celestia feigned ignorance to the return of Nightmare Moon to Twilight.
The pony who never once complains about being Ivan’s “property”, seems to have been in on the scheme the whole time. The pony helps Ivan, guides him, teaches him, makes him more that he could have been before, and why? Because Ivan is a kind person in a world of unkind people – because friendship. In My Little Pony, we see Twilight in both roles as the guide and the guided. Through her friends, she too becomes more than she could have been before, and no, I am not speaking of her alicornism.
The story of this little pony, as it is written, is 185 years old. Although I cannot prove it, the origin of the story goes back much further than that. So you see, it brings me joy to know that the heart of the story continues still.
Thanks for research, I stopped basically at 1977 version, without digging much further. So, world is round, but sometimes in strange and subtle ways. One story can inspire another, and so on, so all those stories allow to see our world from many points in time and space, seeing what was universal.. Of course such continuation is double-edged sword, because some quite sad (or dangerous) ideas propagate via same mechanisms. But I come to conclusion "folk wisdom" is recursive, in sense you already must have some wisdom for any useful application of those, often opposite in their advice, short lines.
... while I might appear too repetitive, I still think about this strange cross-link..
In 1960x one scientist-philosopher proclaimed dolphins can do language, and possibly a lot more than this. I especially liked this passage at the end of The Mind of the Dolphin:
Well, with this little.IMPORTANT bit about _voluntary_ contact, not something forced by humans ...
Next, british doctor found some truely unuusal dolphins in 1970x and 1980x - and advised Lilly to actually seek libre dolphins at sea. But for some reason Lilly was not up to task ... He visited Japan, for example, and may be this even played some role, in making different future but this future was not different enough for stopping this
Meanwhile in Russia (then USSR, still), someone (see ref. to "Markov and Ostrovskaya" here) again claimed he found way to prove dolphins DO have language, but this info was much less known in USA, and other voices were heard much more often. And scientist himself {Markov} was nowhere near Ken's level of awareness about ethical issues .... So, this russian track mostly died, if you don't count some half-hearted attempts at fighting cetacea captivity business here ... business originated partially "thanks" to this sick scientist: Lev M.Mukhametov (who might die from old age finally some time soon, not unlike Lou Herman and others ..but 'thing' he helped to create still running ..with no end in sight ... :/ )
But around UK {Ireland} /France other dolphins appeared, and sometimes stayed around for long time. This still can't change tides when it comes to captivity, and other problems, and I don't know what kind of miracle can motivate big enough class of humans to wake up and search for _effective_ ways to combat such situations ... because current and past activism simply can't cut it ... Even if at some point it looked like victory was just around the corner.
But I was reading other stories too, for example recently
"Mad for Foucault: Rethinking the Foundations of Queer Theory" (preview, may only work in russia or show you different pages.. I was reading first few decapages). Strange story, linking USA and France in some way, but also introducting such concepts as "reading outside the book", and other applicable philosophy.. I wonder if this divide between 'moral behavior" as it usually understood in our countries (Russia, UK, France, USA, etc) and truely ethical behavior actually can be explained by simple fact we usually only feel our own feelings, so if something comes from 'outside' (moral) it often become half-rejected by our true self, yet if we come to some specific conclusions about what is good and what is not good at all from our own mind/soul - then this become ethics, but you barely can teach it, at least in simple ways .. because it will become external thing for most of your listeners ...
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... How does any of that relate to my blog post?
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"everything is related" - I just wanted to show you some known and new examples of how _ideas_ travel around the world, across countries and oceans, yet not always work up to expectations of their authors (or authors themselves are unable to follow their ideas fully).
This is way I think - connecting 'unconnectable' items .....
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My point though was not "everything is related"; my point was that these two things are related by a specific intention of growth through sublime teaching.
I don't see what you are doing as connecting two unrelated things, but simply that everything you talk about is dolphins. This is very frustrating to me, because for starters it makes it seem as though you aren't paying attention to anything else.
Look... Are you familiar with the phrase "You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink"? That is the case for dolphins. You seem to think that it is humans who need to reach out to dolphins, but actually it is the dolphins who need to reach out to humans. Dolphins think faster than humans, and to them we appear to be moving in slow motion. You have probably read that experiments to teach dolphins human languages have used fish as a reward, however, you should also know that those experiments taper off during the times when dolphins go into a type of hibernation where they eat less. Dolphins don't see the need to work for food when they are not hungry, so they quit and like children away from school, they forget. See, it's almost an evolutionary hubris. Dolphins have evolved to live in water so well that they, much like humans, think themselves gods of their domain. Tragedy strikes here and there, and if they had tools like newspapers and video cameras then such things would happen far less as they spread the knowledge of these dangers among themselves.
The way I see it, such teaching can only work if there is a need and use for the skill being taught. Or! If the teaching has negative consequences. How are children taught in schools today? They are punished if they don't learn what is expected of them. How do you punish a dolphin for not learning? Zap the tank. How do you teach dolphins that this language is a necessary skill? Firstly, aside from the obvious containing them in captivity so they cannot simply run from the lesson, show them 3D rendered videos that demonstrate all of the instructions they need to learn for the entire curriculum. Secondly, using the Rosetta Stone (software) technique that associates pictures to spoken and written word, then if they want to be fed at all, have them press a feed button that speaks one of the many words they have been taught, then on a separate touch screen board have the box for the corresponding word dispense food where at least a hundred options are listed so brute forcing will be far more exhausting then memorization. Thirdly, Isolate several of them in tanks where they can see each other, but not hear each other forcing them to use computers in the language they have been taught to convey messages. At the same time, provide them with books so that they may learn the words for concepts not easily conveyed in pictures alone.
But Peach, that's inhumane! Yes, the school system is inhumane, but to make skill beyond one's own personal interest there must be need. For years, I've thought about all of this, and it frustrates me to hell and back. The thing is, dolphin are intelligent enough to choose to not listen, and without this bridge of language it is not possible to convey to them the need to make themselves recognized by humans as a sapient race. Of course, it is this bridge of language that would allow them to convey their sapience. It is not feasible for any human or a group of humans to learn the dolphin language(s) because it is not structured like human language, and we have no Rosetta Stone by which to hope to understand it.
Sometimes, the way you speak of dolphins implies that you think they are sapient but stupid. Comically, they think the same of humans. Yes, there are human cruelties in this world, but do not forget that dolphins are predators too. They are smart enough to gang up and kill what preys on them. They also been witnessed to kill for sport, including humans. Heh, if tuna is the chicken of the sea, then dolphins are the humans of the sea, and that should serve a mirror to humanity but it doesn't.
Knowing what they are, I can tell you that dolphins have hit a plateau and will most likely never on their own come to communicate with humans. You want humans to protect them because you see them as worthy of protection, perhaps incapable of protecting themselves. I have little concern for this because I know that spirits on earth live through both bodies without differentiation, and as long as there are bodies on earth the spirits of earth will be fine. Still, it would do the world good to bridge the two, if for nothing else, than to take humanity's pride down a few pegs for stupidly believing even now that they are unique in their ability to think and reason. How funny it is that for both human and dolphin it is the belief in one's superiority, the propensity to treat other life differently than one's own species, is exactly what causes all of this confusion and suffering.
Now Andrew-R, as you can see it is not that I don't care about dolphins but that I am deeply frustrated about what I see, and all your talking about dolphins only serves to remind me of this frustration - that so much can be gained for all involved if one or two things would just go in the right, albeit unexpected, direction. You have the passion to work toward this end, and I encourage you to do so. However, discussing it here helps nobody and is for the most part, preaching to the choir, as many people here have the capacity to understand but are either unable to assist or have come to the same conclusion that I have: that the world collectively does not want this answer.
In any case, now that you understand why this whole complicated matter is such a thorn in my side, PLEASE stop making every single thing you talk about revolve around dolphins.
well, what I can say ..thanks for LONG answer.