Sometimes I'm an apatheist: the question is no longer interesting, and the answer no longer matters. I find this applies not only to take-home finals and papers that I spend way too long on, but also to the big questions in life.

Kinda lame, but in the spirit of finals week and Christmas...

Twas the night before exam week, and all through dorms, not a student was studying, this was usually the norm.
Kegs in the kitchen, jello shots in the hall -- thanks to the liquor, it was a late night for all.
Passed out all around, the kids all slept tight. When they woke up the next day, they thought, 'Man, whatta night!'
'We're too hung-over to study' they shouted with cheer. So to hell with exams, just bring on the beer!!

So they made a movie about Phil Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment... check out the trailer of "Das Experiment" by clicking here. It's quite a bit over the top... no wonder he wasn't pleased about it. The website is pretty cool. I thought that you were assigned (and were supposed to believe you were assigned) randomly to the particular group?

"The more sand that has escaped from the hourglass of our life, the clearer we should see through it."
-- Jean Paul Sartre

http://www.wikipedia.org/
'...a collaborative project to produce a free and complete encyclopedia in every language. We started in January 2001 and are already working on 94579 articles in the English version, with more being added and improved all the time. Anyone, including you, can edit any article right now, without even having to log in.'

My new cousin is named "Hemant" and I get to see him for the first time in a less than 2 weeks. I was just thinking how that name would be kinda confusing for Americans. It sounds nothing like "He-man"... the "Hem" sounds like "hem" of a garment. The "ant" part is not like the insect, but like the British way of pronouncing "aunt"... kinda like saying "until"... I'm told "Hemant" means mountain. I wonder what effect that'll have on him. Does everyone know what "Roshan" means? If you don't, ask me. Maybe that way I'll get an idea of how many people read this blog...

"You scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours."
-- an old saying from somewhere which, I've discovered, has some rather profound applications...

"Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. That's relativity."
-- Einstein

A pretty interesting situation raised in "Solaris" (2002) [if you haven't seen it, this might spoil the movie a bit for you and might not make so much sense]:
Rhea knows that she's created from Chris' memory and that she's not a complete person (i.e. she was missing parts of her own memory). Could you exist being only the pieces that another person remembered? Did they remember you correctly, or as they wished to remember you? How could she deal with her own emotions and feelings? Also, is she the person that he was in love with, or a complete fantasy? Obviously she wasn't the original. But would we be satisfied with a copy? If you carried a lot of regret like Chris did, then probably yes. But otherwise?

Another interesting (but unoriginal) idea brought up: try not to find answers, but choose a path and move forward. There are no answers, only choices. This is very existential.

Senior year sucks because you are reminded regularly that everything around you is temporary. You find yourself in situations out of compulsion - like looking for jobs and doing grad school stuff. Because of the lack of stability it messes with some parts of regular life. It makes it harder for certain things.
But senior year doesn't suck. On the whole it's going great!

“If you cannot find the truth right where you are, where do you expect to find it?”
- Dogen

I'm a Martini (although I never really order or make Martini's). What's your alcoholic personality?

"The past is only an unreliable memory held in the present. The future is only a projection of your present conceptions. The present itself vanishes as soon as you try to grasp it. So why bother with attempting to establish the illusion of solid ground?"
--H.H. Dilgo

In the East a parent will punish a child by threatening to lock him/her out of the home (and thus out of the comfort of the inner circle of the family/group); whereas, in the West a parent will punish a child by threatening to lock him/her inside the home (and thus deprive them of their independence).
Interesting, eh?

"If you want to understand the truth in martial arts, to see any opponent clearly, you must throw away the notion of styles or schools, prejudices, likes and dislikes, and so forth. Then, your mind will cease all conflict and come to rest. In this silence, you will see totally and freshly."
-- Bruce Lee
By the way... this summer I learned that at university Bruce Lee studied philosophy and psychology.... isn't it a coincidence that those are my two majors?!?

"Time you enjoyed wasting is not wasted time."
--T.S. Elliot

"Every time you measure something you settle on a reduction."
- prof. Costanzo in class

Thought and excessive reflection are seductive because we do not implicate ourselves. We distance ourselves from an authentic and passionate existence. Thinking gets in the way of doing. We should make choices, take risks and accept the responsibility. It doesn't matter what we choose, as long as the choice is freely made and relflects our own passions.

though you hear the buzzing of the bee grow louder
be still.
do not fear a sting you have never felt,
you just might be a flower.

(I don't know who wrote this)

If you claim to know the cause of something, you should be able to reproduce it or prevent it. Try to think of examples for where this is false. Can you? For the sake of argument, planetary motion doesn't count (cuz we know how it works, but it's obvious we can't do much about it).