Carl Sturtivant is probably one of the most entertaining professors at the University of Minnesota. He usually teaches the internet programming and algorithms classes. I’ve taken several of his classes and have enjoyed all of them.
Anyways, El Sturtivante often ends his lesson with “and that’s how the game is played.” Even when he’s talking about something quite serious. That phrase stuck in my head and causes me to thinking about life strategy. It probably offends some people to think of life in terms of a game, but I secretly entertain this idea sometimes. Professor Sturtivant is a very logical person and to logical people, myself included, life decisions can be viewed as strategy.
The reason I thought to write about this phrase is that I just had a conversation about religion and the afterlife. Part of the game of life is trying to only think about topics in a way that is productive. Thoughts about the afterlife are particularly unproductive because you probably won’t figure it out until you get there. Enjoy the surprise.
I’ll write more about life strategy when I’m less tired. Perhaps next time I will explain why sleeping with someone is less effective than mere flirting for getting something you want from them. It might be fun to write a series of blog posts about life from a highly logical perspective. And I promise I’m not a cy-anything, just a very logical person.
5 Comments
Alain
While I strongly agree that life is just a game (an infinitely more interesting and potentially rewarding than any other game I’ve played to date), I’d like to submit that perhaps thoughts of afterlife aren’t so unproductive.
I tend to fear that there’s no afterlife (death, IMO, is like a endless dreamless sleep). However, instead of depressing me, this motivates me to enjoy life to the fullest!
For some folks, thoughts of afterlife reassure them and make them feel better, so while IMO, they’re probably misleading themselves, it makes them feel better and there’s value in that!
MikeCa
No end, no journey.
You can quote me in 500 years.
Philly
Carl Sturtivant was one of the few people who could make me listen to something I cared little about (I’ll never get the Turing machine out of my head).
He’s also the person who got me interested in the web, which eventually led me to my current career path. I also took his lesson about playing the game to heart. Although I’m not gallivanting around with CSS and design masters out in sunny California as you are (it’s currently 7 below in Minneapolis), I still realize that in order to accomplish anything important you have to know the ins and outs of life.
Yes, I am jealous and bitter that I didn’t follow the same path you did, especially since we started out from same school (and I assume it was around the same time), but in the end figuring out what you need in life is more important than figuring out what you want.
Wes
Life: a competitive activity involving skill, chance, or endurance on the part of two or more persons who play according to a set of rules, usually for their own amusement or for that of spectators.
And that’s how life is played.
Andy Atkinson
I enjoyed Sturtivant as well, a refreshing improvement over other less-skilled computer science instructors. My favorite phrase of his though was how he starts each lecture, in his English accent, with “Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen.” (or morning) Like clockwork.