Joshua Inkenbrandt

It's easy to take life for granted. In a nation like ours, it's almost impossible not to. We complain about everything: taxation, healthcare, discrimination, education, rights, etc - the list is inexhaustible. But let's step back just a bit. Let's take a moment and look at the rest of the world: put our "problems" in context.

The things we complain the most about, are usually things we are taking for granted.

I'm not saying we shouldn't fight for what we believe or what we think is just; I'm saying we should be thankful for what we have while doing so.

The fact that we exist is more than any of us can comprehend. It's the most important question. Why do we exists? No matter what your answer is, it will require some faith; in religion or science. Unless, that is of course, your answer is: "I don't know".

It's a question that has never had a certain answer — which, when you think about it, makes sense. If it was certain, this world would be a completely different place. There would only be one way. Our morals would have no other influencers. The fact that you can't give an answer that doesn't require some bit of faith leads me to believe that faith is a necessary burden.

You and I have no gapless proof of why we exist. All we have is faith.

I actually discovered this nice little feature when I was up working late one night. When you pass a dictionary into self.write(), it will automatically be JSON encoded and will set the Content-Type header for you.

import tornado.web
import tornado.escape

# Long version
class HelloWorldHandler(tornado.web.RequestHandler):
    def get(self):
        response = dict(error=False, message="Hello World")
        self.set_header('Content-Type', 'text/javascript')
        self.write(tornado.escape.json_encode(response))

# Short version
class HelloWorldHandler(tornado.web.RequestHandler):
    def get(self):
        response = dict(error=False, message="Hello World")
        self.write(response)