Dear Androids,

I am writing to you to wish you all the best for the festive season and, in fact, for the rest of the year, the decade and your life. The reason for this letter is partly as an exercise in being nice, partly as I have nothing better to do but mostly out of empathy.

You see, empathy interests me at this time of year. Part of the Christmas spirit has always been about empathy. Phillip K Dick defined an android in his book "Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep" as a sentient being which lacks empathy. His argument was that there are members of the human race who are indistinguishable from robots as they have no capacity for empathy. His "Turing Test" for being a higher being was emapthy. Not IQ, not sympathy: empathy.

I write to you to tell you that I understand why you are the way you are. You are an android and you have no empathy. You meddle in others' lives as you feel that your life is one to emulate, but you cannot empathise with their lifestyle or their suffering and so you don't understand. You claim that morals are declining, values are missing and the cause of all ills is a lack of faith in some deity. Your lack of empathy creates a situation in your psyche whereby you cannot understand why others think and behave in the way they do. In ways that your lack of understanding finds offensive.

But I understand, and it is OK. I understand because I can empathise. I can create a mental state in my own mind that echoes yours. It gives me insight into why you think and behave in the way you do and I refuse to any longer find it offensive.

You see, I am tired of seeing otherwise intelligent people wasting their energy trying to make you understand concepts like compassion, kindness and empathy. You simply do not have the wiring in your brain. Without the wiring, which is formed early in development, there is simply no argument that can convince you. There is no slot in your mind to place the information. Just as I and my kind lack the wiring to understand your arguments and concepts.

We are all guilty of treating our own thought processes as correct. We all have the mental feedback loop that affirms our own ideas as irrefutable simply because we thought of them. It makes sense, as a brain which doubts its own knowledge is inoperative.

However, all is not lost. It is possible to condition the mind against such rigid thinking. I am not suggesting you try this. To embark on a journey of enlightenment such as this is a decision to be made by each individual free from external pressure. I only mention it simply to inform you that I am embarking on this journey. If you wish to walk the same path, I will welcome the company. If not, I'll see you when you get there.

Merry Christmas and all the best for the second half of the Naughties,

Chas

The Year That Was

2004.

Where did it go? It feels like nothing of any import happened on a personal front this year. And yet it was an important year. It was a year of little victories and steady progress. Am I in better shape now than this time last year? I don't know. I don't think I am in worse shape.

So that was the first half of the Naughties. Bring on the second half.

Person of The Year 2004: Viktor Yushchenko. A well documented case of poisoning for political purposes hasn't happened in my living memory (78 was the last?). A reminder, like S11 was, that 20 years of relative peace has gone and the machinations that inspired Ian Fleming are alive and well.

Defining Moments of The Year 2004: Results of Aussie and US elections. They didn't go the way I wanted, but kudos to the victors. The Naughties are truly the Decade of Demagogues.

Best Times for Chas 2004: Melbourne Conference and Sunshine Coast working holiday.

2005 Resolutions: Keep living in the present, not the future. Fuck resolutions. These are times to be endured.

I have created a religion.

Again.

From the most floopy regions of the spiritual plane, I have channeled the disembodied spirit of Douglas Adams, bringing to you the wisdom and Sofa of the lost city of Nutjob. To usher in the New Age of Octopii you must heed my words and flog slowly. The time is soon when the space death stars of our galactic cousins will return and our collective wizz-bangness will reach critical mass. The highest frequencies of the universe will spiral through the left toe chakras of the worthy, and our 3rd right ear lobe shall be opened. But first we must look deep inside and accept our inner photo frame. We must feel the inner photo frame, become the inner photo frame, kill it as though it was a cd. We must accept our karmic past, and, as our yogi master, Willam Shatner, always says 'The true form of a plane is actually a stupid cat , but enlightenment is like a fake hair piece on the wind'. For there is no right or wrong, no tricorder or anti-tricorder, only one great and omnipresent wing.

Where have I been?

Queensland. Sunshine Coast. Coolum. Golf. Working Holiday. Buggered.

Phew.

Still, I could be walking from Woolongong to Eden in search of enlightenment like Blake Elliot is (Blake is an old friend). I once walked from Auburn to Circular Quay (20kms or so) and that certainly provided some enlightenment. Like wear comfortable shoes.

I was born in the year of the Snake, so I know all about shedding my skin and reinventing myself. The markings stay the same, though. Good luck, Blake.

Everyone else, pop into Blake's blog and follow his journey.