Tag Archives: rational

Marvel's Super-Squad Assembled

The Avengers Official Trailer was released yesterday online giving us our first glimpse of Marvel Studios‘ purported blockbuster movie franchise.  Given such thoroughly exciting news lets take a look at Marvel’s four flagship superheroes and the steadfast Logistical Administrator that leads them into battle.

Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures have strategically released independent films providing backstory for the Avengers’ four major characters.  Those being Iron Man, the incredible HulkCaptain America, and Thor.  And like any dynamic and complex set of major characters, these four ‘Avengers’ together represent all four basic personality types.  Captain America is of course the stalwart Guardian who defends justice with his iconic shield.  Hulk is likewise the emotional and impulsive Artisan who transforms into a raging beast when angered.  Iron Man is the Rational industrialist and ingenious engineer that utilizes a mechanical suit.  Finally Thor is the championing Idealist God of Thunder who fights ‘for Asgard’ and is constantly learning life’s lessons.  Together, they assemble to fight against threats to humanity.  Much like the four temperaments assemble to do the same.

Captain America is the hard-hitting Guardian who actually leads The Avengers into battle, with his infamous battle-cry ‘Avengers Assemble!‘.  A born leaderdefending  justice with his iconic indestructible shieldThe Sentinel of Liberty is undoubtedly a Supervisor Guardian.  Strongdependable, and hard-working: ‘Cap’ is a poster-boy for the ideals of our nation, a nation that was indeed founded by a Guardian.  Dutiful, commanding, and disciplined Captain America is the vocal leader of the Avengers, and knows like all Supervisors do that one must ‘lead by example‘.  The ‘first avenger‘, Steve Rogers is very much the back-bone of The Avengers, much like Guardians are the back-bone of society.

DC/Warner Bros. has made it known that it has similar aspirations to assemble it’s own superhero team in a similar way and put a Justice League Film together by 2013 in order to directly compete with Marvel’s The Avengers.  One could argue that they are slightly behind schedule, since Chris Nolan’s Batman franchise will not be connected with a JLA (Justice League of America) film, and neither will Zack Snyder’s upcoming Man of Steel.  That leaves DC with only one established character in the Justice League Universe that of which being Green Lantern who’s film without being too cynical was quite the thespian blunder.  Warner Bros. president Jeff Robinov has made it clear however that a Justice League film in 2013 is the studios top priority despite all evidence to the contrary.  Earth’s Greatest Hero’s assemble in theater near you on May 4, 2012.

The Bat Squad

With the Dark Knight Rises filming in major cities Pittsburg and now Los Angeles naturally a plethora of on-set spy photos and videos have surfaced all over the web, most of which have been quite spoilerish.  This most recent spy video is perhaps the most revealing one as it shows Bruce Wayne ‘limping’ with a cane out of his Lamborghini into a party. This of course strengthens arguments that the film will borrow plot points from the story arch Knightfall in which antagonist Bane badly injures Batman and infamously breaks his back.

Without giving too much away let’s take a closer look at the titular Caped Crusader, and his well-rounded supporting cast.  Bruce Thomas Wayne had the unfortunate luck of witnessing his parents murder by a mugger as a young child, an event that no doubt had a major impact on his life.  Arrogant billionaire industrialist and notorious playboy by day, and a ruthless masked vigilante by night, Batman/Bruce Wayne is undoubtedly a Promoter Artisan.  Bold, daring, and audacious with a tough-minded persona Bruce knows as most Promoters do that ‘nice guys finish last‘.

Primarily trusting his impulses with a knack for tool usage, Batman is definitely an Artisan, but certainly doesn’t get the job done all by himself.  Alfred Pennyworth is Batman’s faithful and tireless Guardian butler and confidant.  Lucius Fox is Batman’s Rational financier, gadget man, and behind-the-scenes business manager of Wayne Enterprises.  Commissioner Gordon is Batman’s Idealist link to Gotham City’s Police Force who is strictly and naively concerned with ridding Gotham City of evil.  Given such a well-rounded bat-squad let’s hope that even with a broken back Batman will be able to best his powerful nemesis Bane in Christopher Nolan’s highly anticipated conclusion to his blockbuster trilogy.

Word on the streets is that the Dark Knight Rises’ ending sequence is so over-the-top that it is only known by five people including Christopher Nolan and will be done entirely in CG.  So apparently Nolan’s conclusion is so epic that it has to be done entirely in visual effects?  Guess we’ll find out July 20, 2012!

The Master of Innovation

The founder of Apple Inc. and CEO of the decade Steve Jobs has tragically died today as he lost his battle with pancreatic cancer.  Jobs was an imaginative genius and innovative business icon, and his death is certainly heartbreaking and unfortunate news.  Rather than dwell on the negative the best thing to do is honor the legacy of arguably the greatest and most influential Inventor Rational of all time.  Indeed Steve Jobs is the quintessential Inventor, with his name on over 230 patents.  Most notably the iPod (304 million sold as of 2011) iPhone (100 million sold as of March 2011) and iPad (15 million sold as of march 2011) Jobs inventions have undoubtedly changed the world.   Jobs is largely known as the heart and soul of a company that was briefly the most valuable in America.  Steve’s visionary leadership and innovative genius have revolutionized the way we think about technology, and the world will certainly not be the same without him.  Visionaryrebel, and icon, Steve Jobs is the American Dream at its greatest and will be sorely missed.

Super Brawl

DC Comics is relaunching its entire stockpile of 52 comic book titles this month in hopes of reaching a broader audience.  Such a ‘reboot’ goes hand-in-hand with DC’s parent company Warner Bros. aspirations to put a Justice League Film together by 2013 in order to directly compete with Marvel’s The Avengers.  Warner Bros. new president Jeff Robinov has made it clear that such a project is the studio’s top priority with the company looking for a new cash cow in the wake of Harry Potter’s franchise concluding.  Regardless of the logistic reality of such a task let’s take a look at the four main characters of DC’s flagship team of superheroes.  Superman is the indestructible Guardian known as the Big Blue Boyscout who is steadfastly reliable and follows a strict code of ethics.  Batman is the billionaire playboy industrialist Artisan who dons a mask at night and ‘beats criminals to a bloody pulp with his bare hands’.  Green Lantern is the nurturing Idealist who wields a ‘power ring’ that translates his imagination into green energy using the strength of his willpower.  Finally The Flash is the Rational scientist who thinks at superhuman speed, travels through time, and defies the laws of physics.  Marvel/Disney clearly has an advantage in Hollywood having almost wrapped principal photography on the Avengers after solidly establishing all four major characters.  DC/Warner Brothers on the other hand has it’s work cut out for it having not successfully established any major characters yet outside of Chris Nolan’s Batman franchise.  Robinov however has made it clear that a Justice League of America film will happen in 2013 regardless of how many characters have been solidly established with audiences beforehand.  Given these two supersquads I think the question on everyones mind is: which one wins in a streetfight?

Be A Viking Bystander

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view – until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.” spoken by Atticus Finch, in To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee.

How do you “truly” climb into another’s skin and walk around?  It is a hard thing to do, well.  For that person may be a different kind of person from you, from a different time, and from a different place.

My avocation since I was a child was as a Viking bystander.  My vocation lately has been as a Viking reader of books and people.

One can try to “climb into another’s skin” through watching a movie or play, or reading a book.  This is something we can do as humans.   We can visit different lands and different tribes – the modern words for “lands” and “tribes” is countries and cultures.  We can also visit different “ages” – through movies and living in cultures that are “slower” than your “culture” – although there are limitations and there is a possibility to not really get the “gestalt” of that age and place.

Mostly, we don’t understand “truly” – the Temperament, the Tribe, the Age that is not like us

But we can try.

Here are some autobiographies of the various Temperaments, many from a different time and different place.  Climb into the person’s skin, and walk around in it – at least for awhile.

Rationals

Ben Franklin (Inventor)

Mark Twain (Inventor)

Margaret Thatcher (Fieldmarshal)

Ulysses S. Grant (Mastermind)

Charles Darwin (Architect)

Linus Torvalds (Architect)

Idealists

Jane Goodall (Counselor)

Mohandas Gandhi (Counselor)

Jane Fonda (Teacher)

Albert Schweitzer (Healer)

Karen Armstrong (Healer)

Joan Baez (Champion)

Artisans

Katherine Hepburn (Crafter)

Lance Armstrong (Crafter)

Donald Trump (Promoter)

Neil Simon (Composer)

Jim Cramer (Performer)

Bill Clinton (Performer)

Guardians

Barbara Walters (Provider)

Sam Walton (Provider)

Andrea Mitchell (Inspector)

Mike Wallace (Supervisor)

George H. W. Bush (Protector)

A Brilliant Mistake

If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. – Issac Newton

isaac_newton

Isaac Newton was a reasonable man as long as he didn’t have to suffer fools.  This attitude made him appear as both an arrogant man and a humble man at the same time.   This is not surprising, for he is one of the iconic examples of the personality temperament, called Rational, in particular a Mastermind.  Masterminds are not concerned with ideas, for their own sake, as much as the Architects, but rather are interested in ideas for their use and utility in reality.  And Newton had no use for useless or wrong ideas, and for those people who could not see what was obvious to him.  However, Newton saw far — farther than anybody else in his age. But he did make a mistake, a brilliant mistake in a form of simplification, and with that, he, and notably his followers, opened up the world to reason and the scientific revolution.

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What Dreams May Come?

Number 137.  Was this the key to understanding the Universe?  Or was it an impossible Dream?

It was a kind of Dream Team.  One was awarded a Nobel Prize in Physics.  The other was an internationally famous psychiatrist.   They both were interested in Dreams.  Other than that, they are an odd pair.  So was their relationship.

He had felt like a Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde.  He didn’t know what to do about it.  He was a Rational.  He was a scientist, and the leading scientific skeptic: the gadfly of quantum mechanics.  He had the ear of Albert Einstein, Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg – the supreme Rationals of the day. They put up with his caustic wit for he was good at finding problems with their theories: the Mephistopheles of Physics. Successful professionally, but his private life was a mess.  What was he do?

By the day he was about Science, at night he had frequented the bars of the red-light district of Hamburg: he knew his relationships with females was out of control. His Mister Hyde — he hid this from his colleagues –  he was embarrassed.  He felt he was in crisis. He decided to consult with that famous psychoanalyst, Carl Jung – secretly.

Carl Jung was interested in the “mind.” He viewed himself as an intrepid explorer of psyche.   He had adopted Freud’s interest in analyzing dreams, but he had his own unique, and lucrative techniques.   Those rich female European ladies of Vienna and Zurich had money to burn and all the time to talk, and maybe other things.  “Archetypes” was his word, and the “collective unconscious” was his game.  What did all those dreams mean?  Symbols, myths, intuition, ESP — what was the truth? The Idealist, Carl Jung was eager explore and analyze The Rational, Wolfgang Pauli’s, dreams.

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Real Idea Men

It is one of the biggest corporations in the world, with yearly revenues greater than the gross domestic products of 169 countries. Not bad for a company that was co-founded by two young nerds on April 4, 1975 to develop and sell software on computers. They didn’t have much money then.

In fact, one of those guys who arrived in Albuquerque, New Mexico airport from Boston in 1975, didn’t have enough money to afford the “upscale” moderately priced motel the computer manufacturer who was interested in buying this software had reserved for this nerd while he proved that his software worked on their computer. He was very nervous about the software — everything was riding on the code — which was punched onto a small role of paper computer tape he carried with him. But, it worked the first time, largely because they had used an emulator of the computer (a software program written by this guy) to build and test the code back in Boston.

This guy, although he didn’t have much money at the time, he did have a big idea. Now others had similar ideas,which was to sell software for computers. That wasn’t the big idea. He and his co-founder shared a firm belief in this big idea, but they were a little different in personality.

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