2013年3月17日

alter ego? (and stats)

"his mind slid away into the labyrinthine world of doublethink. to know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly forget it again: and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself.  That was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word "doublethink" involved the use of doublethink."

George Orwell, "1984"

I was noticing that after reading 5/6 pages of japanese that I would get tired and my mind would start thinking in things other than the content of こころ.

Yes, I'm now reading 夏目漱石's こころ.I have been reading at a relatively slow pace, I'm now in the middle of the of the middle of the book. 「両親と私」, this chapter starts in page 102, finished in page 150, and I'm in the 126th.

Slow pace because, you know, the book is divided in micro chapters, with 2/3 pages long, and at the end of each micro chapter I add new words to my srs.

Finally, I can read in japanese. FINALLY.
I disconnected from the world during the past 4 years to devote myself to learning japanese, and I finally can put the language to some real use, other than living here. Videogames are also cool, but, meh. gotta try'em again sometime soon.

But, was I was going to say before all this off topic, I'm sure you have already noticed the quote from George Orwell's "1984". A book I have been wanting to read for a long time. I was planning on starting to read it, well not today, but couldn't resist.

Because, then again, reading in japanese without breaks makes me lose focus. Instead, I read in small chunks (1, 2 or 3 chapters at a time), then break, add vocab, do something else, and repeat the cycle. Just like my srs (though lately my chunks are bigger like 50 card at a time).

Anyway, I found that quote very interesting. because, despite being in this case associated with the "freedom" (rather lack of it) of the self in the world of what, despotic socialism?, I can also relate it to me, and to my japanese alter ego. Yes, when I speak in japanese, wether I like it or not, I behave considerably differently from when I speak in portuguese (as I have said before). In this case, there's the positive, the conscious Winston's self that has to make the effort of turning into an "unconscious" being in order to stay alive. In other other words, he has to deliberately change his frame of mind in order to adapt to the environment he is in. 

And last but not least, I'll post my srs stats. I don't know why, but I can't use anki in japanese since I upgraded it to the new version. and I'm not even sure if I understand the meaning of these stats, but oh well.

Total cards:11986
Total notes:11986
Lowest ease:130%
Average ease:138%
Highest ease:301%





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