Proof In Protesting

Protesting with high volume and extreme attitude often adds to the proof of the thing being protested.

Endorphins And Danger

When a creature interprets its current state as one of imminent doom, endorphins may be released to stop pain from being experienced in the process of dying. If the dying doesn't end up happening, what is the result on the mind and future behavior from the endorphin release? Plus, if this happens too often, will the body stop releasing endorphins when danger is sensed because of too many false alarms?

Rudely Picky

It seems that being super picky means being rude about it. Is there a deep connection between being extremely picking and being rude?

Comedic Weight

Comedy can provide a wonderful view of truth but, unfortunately, rarely delivers its corresponding weight.

The Complimentary Insult

"Those who can, do; those who can't, teach" is often used as an insult meant to highlight failure. The ability to teach, however, is a skill to be admired. Anyone who has this phrase thrown at them disparagingly should take it as a compliment and respond with thanks. “How nice of you to acknowledge and take notice of my work!” should continue the response. “I’ve worked hard to be an effective teacher and it has paid off. It’s nice to be appreciated. Thank you so much.”

Belief Not Rocket Science

Believing in a god is not rocket science, although many who do pretend it to be the case.

We All Deserve An Apology

If it turns out that there is some sort of being running the universe that we all get to meet after we die, I want an apology from this creature. I want to hear "I'm sorry."

With feeling.

Any intelligent entity would not have come up with the conditions under which humanity has to live. For example:

- Constant need to eat
- Need for sleep (and daily, at that)
- Hiding
- Disease
- Religion
- Pain
- Greed
- Carnivores
- All evidence pointing to being's non-existence
- "Natural" disasters
- [Continue on your own from here. The list is endless]

These are not signs of intelligence. These are signs of a work in progress, a random set of conditions under which some life forms can exist if they try hard enough.

I want an apology if it's anything else. We all deserve it. Compensation can be in the form each person desires. An eternity separated from religious nut balls, lawyers, career politicians, greed-driven business people, and people who, in general, don't think would be a place to start.

National Shell Game Debt

The ongoing debate about the causes of our national debt is not based on a basic reality: It’s all an accounting shell game.

The U.S. government "borrows" from itself by taking money in the SS Trust Fund (and other supposedly separate funds) to pay today's bills and sells Treasury Bonds to make up the rest. We are only pretending these trust funds are separate entities. On paper, yes. In reality, no. It's all the U.S. government in the end, run by the same elected officials who can vote any moment to do whatever they want with the money (or debt). To pretend otherwise is to fool ourselves.

It doesn't really matter which government spending program ends up with the money in the trust funds--Medicare, Medicaid, military, interest on the debt, or new toilets for the Capitol building. We, as a country, still have the same total number of dollars missing. Missing in the sense that we spent money we don't have. Borrowing it from trust funds or through Treasury Bonds sales to foreign countries or individuals produces largely the same result--debt, and lots of it. If we raise income taxes, capital gains, FICA or any other tax doesn't mean that the money stays separated.

Think for a minute about the other taxes we often get approved this way. We approve a lottery easily if the money goes to "schools" or "education," for example. "Sure," we collectively say, with little argument. "If it goes to schools, then it's okay." What we don't realize is that the extra money is not added to the current school budget, it replaces what's already there, freeing more money to be used from the general fund for other things. This doesn't happen at first because it would be too obvious. But over a short number of years the school system's budget simply gets replaced by the lottery money, not augmented by it. Gas taxes for roads, cigarette taxes for health care, hotel taxes for infrastructure...it doesn't matter. It's all the same lie.

This idea of "targeted" taxes for certain programs is never what it seems.

We need to stop even thinking that one program or another is really separate from others or is "the" financial problem. Accountants may try and keep it all separate, but it's a false distinction at the most basic level. (Remember that silly "lock box" debate during Al Gore's presidential run? Everyone knew it was all crap.)

The idea for a commission to present a solution in an "all or nothing" fashion is a bad idea. It doesn't actually remove politics from the process as is claimed. It only allows the politics to be hidden from public view, which is what many people actually want. Private backroom deals will be the only forum.

Maybe we should look at everything from scratch. We can't keep going like we are. As our national debt goes up, our worldwide clout goes down. Eventually we won't have any leverage at all; someone in deep debt never does. We will be the ones with restrictions placed on our behavior, the same way we've done for years to the rest of the world. When that happens it won't matter what promises or plans we've made for ourselves. We will have sold our right to make our own decisions in order to keep the richest in this country rich just a little longer.

Oath Of Separation

Instead of adding "so help me god" to our oaths for public office, we instead should add "I will work to maintain the separation of church and state."

A pipe dream, I know. But, it would be a nice movement to initiate to see what the reaction would be.

Living With How We Will Die

How much time and effort do we assign to picking and planning the method of our own death by trying to eliminate or reduce the chances of some causes of death, narrowing the modes down to a limited few we can live with?

Failed Toughness On Crime

Use of DNA to overturn decades-old convictions provide strong anecdotal evidence as to why harsh sentences need to be abolished. They show the system to be anything but fair, reducing confidence in it and causing it to lose credence. A system of justice not seen as fair and balanced is never respected. Without respect resistance will always be high, greatly diminishing deterrence value.

Because prosecutors and police have an agenda to convict that very often overrides the search for truth, safeguards for the system's victims need to be enforced. Everyone can then take pride in a system that produces results that make sense and the victims of crime can also have some confidence is a more just outcome for everyone.

Contractual Seduction

Imagine a company that has an expensive contract with a celebrity spokesperson suddenly finding itself in a financially challenging position. The only way for them to get out from under the contract is through a "morality" clause being breached. Now imagine that company hiring someone to seduce the celebrity into cheating on their spouse and arranging for that information to get out.

Real Training

Way too many people mistake demonstration and observation with training.

We All Like Exceptions

All of us want to be the exception to the rule--and be admired for it.

Spin Is Everywhere

Be careful of the claims of capitalism's prosperity. Those who make the claim typically only include figures from the U.S. or some other Western nation. What is conveniently avoided is the effect of capitalism on the rest of the world. Many of this planet’s poorest and underdeveloped countries supply the West with its capitalist-based goods. By this arrangement we separate and try to hide the negative side of capitalism then don’t look at it in order to make positive claims.

We also do this with religion. Those who wish to support one religion or another rarely put front and center the evil caused by their own religious belief and dogma. The purely evil edicts of another’s religion will be readily pointed out, but not those of one’s own.

Spin is not purely a political phenomenon.

Running Interference

Society is built on the concept of middlemen. The people at the privileged end of any spectrum (religious, wealth, power, prestige, celebrity, military, political, etc.) all hire people for the task of dealing with those at the opposite end. Separation supports society’s structure with middlemen convinced their role is also privileged. “The people” don’t have any influence because of the middlemen hired as interference block the attempt. All social structures are the byproduct of the sad human trait of consolidation of power in a few, supported by a few more hired to keep the masses away from them.

A Free Standing Army

A powerful nation would never need to protect itself with an army if it acted benevolently, rationally, and fairly. Everyone would be a standing army by default, happy to defend and protect it with pride. Only a greedy, selfish, and unreasonable nation needs to hire an army to protect it. No one would do it without being paid.

Merchants Movin' On Up

As our ancestors have tried on various belief systems and philosophies throughout human history, the merchant class was never seen as at the top of society’s social structure. They were a necessary class, placed above peasants and entertainers, but below the classes of soldiers, nobles, priests and royalty. It was well understood that the greed driving a merchant is not to be left unchecked.


Today, however, the merchants have moved up, now called capitalists. The old systems keeping this class in check had some serious failings of their own. But the replacement structure we currently employ, based on praise of greed, has caused a great deal of pain and fixed little in return.

There might be some more movement of people, giving the illusion of a system that’s increased “fairness” for everyone. Wealth, however, is still highly concentrated among a small pocket of people. The large numbers of poor remain, too. Only the names have changed and the point of view slightly altered along the way.

We may think we’ve changed a great deal when all we’ve really done is re-title the groups, leaving their concentrations the same.

Beware Of Experts

When exclusively observing or studying something long enough, anything at all can be gleaned from the subject. It is a dangerous assumption that someone who concentrates too much on one thing--becoming an “expert,”--can’t get tunnel vision and begin to make unreasonable claims. When a person’s identity becomes too wrapped up in a single subject or pursuit their metaphorical vision can become hallucinatory. Without a variety of interests and/or an opening that remains available for new information to be fairly considered and evaluated, a person’s mental output is in serious danger of becoming bizarre, even preposterous. Too much of one thing can result in ugliness.

Ex-Smokers' Ashtrays

When a ex-smoker finally removes the ashtrays from around the house, a new place must be designated as the depository for toenail clippings.

What's Really Out There?

(I am going to be mis-using the word 'self' on purpose for effect below.)

Your self is automatically removed from everything else by the nature of its existence. Because it is separate from everything it encounters, all information coming its way is a translation of the original--the medium of transmission necessarily alters the information being carried. The receiving self’s decoding methods will also necessarily alter the original independent of the transmission medium. You do not have a tree inside your brain through the act of seeing or touching one. You do not recreate a strip of bacon in your head when smelling one being cooked.

We can accurately say that everything is perception because even if there is a ‘real’ thing out there somewhere triggering our perception tools to fire and notice, our medium of existence does not have the ability to experience it or its effects directly--you can’t become or join something else in order to experience it as it is. You can’t integrate your self into a rock or become a tornado. You can’t even be sure that you see the same colors that I do, even when looking at the same source at the same time.

Sometimes we assign a label to a purely perceived object trying to make it real. Money is the perfect example. Its only value is whatever we all agree it is. It wouldn’t exist without humans around to give it value through our perception of it. I’m not addressing the bills or coins themselves. I’m addressing their meaning and value to our self--it is what we perceive it to be.

Similarly, think of Lagrange points. These are points out in space between bodies (stars, planets, moons) around which an object can orbit, just as if there was a ‘real’ body there. We have satellites out there right now orbiting nothing. The forces that keep an object there are a combination of the gravitational fields of nearby objects, making it seem like something is there, too. But there is nothing there.

If there is a ‘real’ object behind something our self perceives, then we can’t ever know what it is with certainty. Our attempts to find out can only produce a paraphrase of the original, an altered and inaccurate version of it. How do we know what it is we are perceiving is not the equivalent of a Lagrange point? We can’t.

Islam requires its followers to read the Qur’an in Arabic. They see the translation into other languages the same as an “explanation” of the original, a form of commentary. It’s not the original and can’t be understood as intended unless read in Arabic.

Even this attempt at conveying these points is not going to be perceived in the way I intend. I can’t even read this myself and get back the same information I started with. It is a second generation copy, degraded by the process.

So, everything may not be perception alone, but that’s all we get to work with. We can’t take off the glasses because without them we get nothing at all. We’ve got no choice but to live in a soup of personal existence (at least) once removed from all else, never knowing everything else as it really is, or if something’s even there at all.

Divine Wealth

There is no world philosophy or religion that looks highly upon the pursuit or possession of money. Yet, so many who have wealth claim a divine right or natural law as justification, never seriously challenged.

Shaded Memory

I don't always remember the trees when I remember the shade.

"Visions" of god

As I read a little of this and that I sometimes run across something that I find interesting and wonder why I never knew about it before because so many others seem to--and have been keeping it a secret from me! LOL

My latest "discovery" that so many others already know about is John Keel, the guy who wrote The Mothman Prophecies, which was used very loosely for the Richard Geere movie a few years back. What I didn't know was his investigations of UFOs (bare with me!), and other paranormal events, coining the term Fortean for the "discipline." He also is credited with the "Men In Black" phrase and accompanying description that spawned the movie of the same name. (His "men in black" were not quite like those portrayed in the movie, though.) He has written many other books and articles in his career investigating various odd phenomenon. He died in July of this year.

I read a reference to him in a Dave Barry book (of all places) I picked up last week. So, I looked up a few other references online. His ideas about where UFOs and extra-terrestrials come from is unique and "out there," if you'll pardon the bad pun, and not why I'm writing this. What caught my interest was his conclusions about why so many people think (or believe) they see UFOs and, in some cases, interact with them.

He attributes the "boom" in UFO sightings to one particular story from 1947 in magazine called Amazing Stories. The story was about evil aliens visiting earth and controlling people through "rays." The magazine's publisher began to get a huge number of letters from people claiming that the phenomenon was real because it had happened to them.

"[The magazine's editor Raymond] Palmer had accidentally tapped a huge, previously unrecognized audience," Keel wrote. "Nearly every community has at least one person who complains constantly to the local police that someone--usually a neighbor--is aiming a terrible ray gun at their house or apartment. This ray, they claim, in ruining their health, causing their plants to die, turning their bread moldy, making their hair and teeth fall out and broadcasting voices into their heads. Psychiatrists are very familiar with these 'ray' victims and relate the problem with paranoid schizophrenia. In earlier times, [these people] thought they were hearing the voice of God and/or the devil. Today they often blame the CIA or space being for their woes...Ray Palmer unintentionally gave thousands of these people focus for their lives." (Emphasis added.)

This caught my attention. What if this idea is even partially true? What if the people who wrote down and/or otherwise relayed the myths behind the world's religions were delusional, but only in one specific area? There are many cases of people who have claimed to see or interact with UFOs who are perfectly normal otherwise. We've all heard the stories of the sheriff, retired Air Force Colonel, etc. who report sightings but act no differently than anyone else in every other way, just waiting for the right conditions to tell their story and "give focus" to their lives.

As I hinted, Keel himself reached an odd conclusion about such sightings:

"I abandoned the extraterrestrial hypothesis in 1967 when my own field investigations disclosed an astonishing overlap between psychic phenomena and UFOs . . . I feel that the ultimate solution [to the UFO question] will involve a complicated system of new physics related to theories of the space-time continuum . . . The objects and apparitions do not necessarily originate on another planet and may not even exist as permanent constructions of matter. It is more likely that we see what we want to see and interpret such visions according to our contemporary beliefs."  (emphasis added.)

Is it possible to take the conclusions here seriously (in bold), even if some of the stuff he writes otherwise is questionable and/or nuts?

Here's a piece of a description of Keel from ufomystic.com:

"Keel first challenged the extraterrestrial hypothesis with his idea of the 'superspectrum,' which theorized that UFOs were controlled by intelligences that moved freely between wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum, appearing and disappearing from the infrared and the ultraviolet. Building on the ideas of little-known researchers like Meade Layne and Trevor Constable, he also proposed the theory (and provided ample evidence for this) that UFO entities were not from other planets, but were most likely native intelligences that had been involved with mankind throughout history and prehistory, and perhaps did not have our best interests in mind."

Crazy, right? I'm not trying to claim otherwise. I just find that sometimes the people on society's fringes are not excluded from getting an accurate insight in their view of things, overlooked by the rest of us because of so much other stuff from them that's not all that normal.

Maybe we all overlap in our views of human nature with the truth in that connected space. For some, that  makes up a huge part of who we are as individuals. For others, not so much. But that doesn't mean that a small part of them doesn't make that connection, too, and we can't learn a thing or two--about them, us, and everyone else.

The Destruction Of Lies

An hour of sincere lies can easily be undone with a good joke containing a single line of truth.

Scales Of Choice

When asked to choose a score among a specific set of points along a scale, how many people would think it more accurate and prefer to choose a score that falls somewhere between the available points? In contrast, if the scale is open with only end points as parameters, how many people would then rather wish for a restricted set of points from which to choose a score?

Brilliant Friendship

To have “learning” not always replace existing thoughts, but come to rest beside them and interact in friendship to let the truth win without bias is the essence of brilliance.

Reverberating Ripples Of History

The effects of past events—even very distant ones—have huge impacts on today's conditions. It is a common mistake to consider only recent events when looking at the causes of current conditions and change in general. Without taking all into account, the reasons we search for to explain the "whys" of life will not be answered.

The communist Chinese leader Chou En-Lai once said in the 1970s that it was still too early to determine the impact of the 1789 French Revolution. Lena Williams, in her book on race relations The Little Things, she makes the point that black people see what some people consider distant history (slavery and segregation) as relevant today while white people do not.

Impacts of events on society do not have a cutting off point; they fade but never completely. Time and space give distance, but never can entirely cut off the effects of the past. The fall of the Roman Empire or asteroids hitting the planet still reverberate. We need to pay attention to everything, not just the stuff that happened yesterday, last week or last year.

We also need to pay attention to distant history because everyone needs and seeks that connection to their past. It is a crime if it is artificially disturbed.

Randall Robinson has compellingly explained that slaves and their descendents are disconnected from their past due to that institution. Slavery people off from their heritage. The ripples of history give people a needed connection to the source of those ripples. Everyone for whom those ripples are unavailable is unavoidably damaged. It is a type of injury that can’t be repaired, a crime against humanity. All that can be done is to try and rebuild a new source of ripples for future generations. But, even then, they will be false in some sense, an imitation of the real thing.

These imitation ripples still produce effects, though, and we need to consider them will equal consideration. They will be rippling through society just as strongly as the ones they replaced, moving societies in unforeseen directions, especially if we don’t pay attention to them.

In Tune With The Ether

Does all music already exist somewhere in the ether, in the universal soup in which we all exist? Do composers and performers simply know how to grab music from one of thethe shelves of existence and reproduce it for the rest of us? If so, the same may be true for authors and other artists. Mathematicians and other scientists may also tap into this all-pervasive pool of knowledge, able to pull out what they find and make sense of it. Those who are in sync with a particular pattern or two of the medium in which we live are the lucky ones.

Garden Of Eden And The Fertile Crescent

What role did tales of the Fertile Crescent play in the writing of the story in Genesis about the Garden of Eden?

This crescent-shaped land area that included a large part of ancient Mesopotamia contains the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, the ones mentioned in the Garden of Eden story. It strikes me that this story is likely based in part on legends of this area--to the east, as described. There were likely stories told to the Hebrews and other about an area that must have seemed like paradise when described to desert dwellers.

The question had to have been asked--"If our god loves us and is powerful, why are we stuck in the desert?" If this is true, it's anyone's guess as to when this question was asked in relation to the other myths of Abraham's family religion. But, the answer that was given might have come in the form of the Garden of Eden story. They were in the garden at first, but an ancient ancestral couple blew it for everyone, getting them all banished. But if the garden still existed, as current travelers insisted, why couldn't they go back? Ah, cherubim are guarding the gate. We can't get in, so we shouldn't even try. The remaining contradictions can be sloughed off to fancy tales of lying travelers.

(An aside--there is at least one case of a Native American who was killed by his tribe after returning from a visit to Washington, D.C. because the descriptions  given of the city, its buildings, and its people were thought to be outrageous lies.)

The tale was born, and of course molded over time, as happens for all myths. Maybe the Hebrews' claim of a promised land in Palestine instead of Mesopotamia come from the existence of this story. If their origin was the Tigris and Euphrates region, why else would they not battle their way back there instead of Palestine?

Ancient Shorthand

As writing moved from stone and clay to papyrus, parchment, and paper, it also got simpler, less pictographic in some cultures. Is it possible that this happened at least partially because of the increased availability and reduced cost of the written medium, causing an increase in the quantity of written documents? With simplified symbols, documents (and copies of them) could be created much faster. A “shorthand” was developed and quickly replaced the original.

The First Human-Made Fire

How did the first person to make fire through friction with wooden sticks decide it would work? There appears to be nothing in nature to indicate success, other than observing that wood burns when struck by lightning.

Earning It

It’s an interesting contradiction that many who are against financial support for those who have not “earned” it are also not in favor of an inheritance or estate tax. The children of the rich are exempted from having to “earn” their money, but the poor are not given the exemption.

Obama's "Change" Disappears

This may not be fair, but a lot of us voted for Barack Obama in no small measure because he is black. We felt ready for a real change. We thought that a truly smart, non-radical black man could be that person: experienced to a degree (but not overly so), reasonable, level-headed, contemplative. And black. Support was not purely because of his race, but being black made him a "true" outsider in a sense that no other combination of characteristics can capture.

I think we’ve been hoodwinked. He’s a politician as much as any other and his descendency in the minds of the public is going to be a harder pill to swallow than almost anyone before him. He could actually be the cause of a huge collapse in public support in United States as a country, as well as the U.S. government in general and of the Democratic Party in particular.

If he’s not “change” then who is? There are not many options left for those who don't like the dragon that is the U.S. government, having grown with the nourishment supplied by every president and every Congress.

Unreasonable Pride

Attacking the poor and the weak, blaming them for the ills of a system in which they have no power or control, seems to be the general principal under which modern Western nations are concocted. If only the powerless would stop, the sentiment goes, the remainder could live without trouble.

Why is it that governments continue to engage in policies making it nearly impossible to be proud of their country?

Mensa Insult

Possible fun insult: "I may not be smart enough to join Mensa, but you would need some serious assistance to send them a letter."

Connotation Or Definition?

It would be an interesting study to see what part(s) of the brain react when trying to decipher the difference between two similar terms.

For example, if asked to describe the difference between the words “average” and “normal” do people dig for the cold definition to do the comparison or tap connotations instead? Or a combination of the two?

What happens if an individual’s definition of a word or phrase is not clear to him- or her-self? Is the attempt to access it bypassed in favor of a connotation, which might be more easily retrieved? Or, if there’s trouble, is the definition of something else used, such as “common” or “familiar”?

Suicidal Plea

If a person pleads guilty to a crime they know will result in the death penalty, is that a suicidal act? If so, isn’t that illegal? Those who carry out the murder will then not only be committing murder, but assisting in a suicide, another illegal act.

Bible As Fairy Tale

To read the bible in the correct frame of mind, only one small change needs to be made.

A Mission's Context

It is an intriguing insight to realize that “mission” is most often used in the context of war and religion.

Broken Will Does Not Fix War

It is contended by some that a war is won when the enemy’s “will is broken.” This is a not an accurate assessment of a defeated party and, therefore, is a misguided goal.


The implication is that the loser will never wish to fight again if this mission is somehow achieved. This is only true if the losing side’s reasoning for war is undermined. They must see it as unfair or unreasonable in some fashion, independent of what the victor thinks or does. (For example, after WWII Japan’s attack on the U.S. and Germany’s Holocaust let the people of those countries easily drop their will to fight.)

In many cases the will to fight lives on, especially if the victor is seen as unfair or unreasonable in their actions--before, during or after the conflict. (The U.S. in Afghanistan and Iraq.) If they can’t fight directly they will fight indirectly, covertly, and continuously.

Getting a foe to drop their weapons--never to pick them up again--is not an aim accomplished through brute force, which actually serves to harden resolve.

Real peace comes when reasonable and understandable actions rule.

Are We Really Different Now?

Feeling Dirty After Justice

Until we can look at violent murders and not feel immediate blind rage with willingness to act on that rage we are stalling human progress. We all know this at some level due to the fact that we don't let victims or their families get involved in punishment decisions.

To clearly look at ourselves and find answers, we need to maintain a calm demeanor and not base our decisions on the low-level emotions used to commit heinous crimes. We can--and should--keep such people away from the rest of us. But to think a torch-and-pitchfork mob-rule attitude is useful does more harm than good. It creates nothing more than a government-approved lynching, elevating no one and dragging the rest of us down a notch or two, wondering why we feel dirty.

You Are Not Always Looking For Your Keys

When trying to find the truth behind human events, many mistakenly engage in the search in the same manner one looks for a missing object. In trying to locate a set of keys, for example, when the keys are located the search is concluded. The object was known at the start, with no debate necessary about the item being sought.

But with a search for facts behind human events, truth can’t be found with a pre-conceived formulation of the search’s conclusion. If a search is stopped at the moment an item that confirms or contradicts a pre-determined position is found, nothing has actually been accomplished.

If a person is looking for a conspiracy, for example, and stops at the first hint at one, nothing is gained but solidified ignorance. The search can’t stop there.

In some cases the search may never end.

Time Perception

In some circumstances do we alter time in order to accommodate how much information our brains can store? When under extreme stress or extreme fear time can sometimes appear to slow down, at the time of the event(s) and when recalled. If during these situations we automatically record more detailed long-term memories than usual, the amount of information could be too overwhelming to process, save and still record time at a normal rate, too. It might need to be stored in an artificially stretched time scale in order to fit it all in. The information is there, but distorted in time—it's just too much information to do it any other way. Airline delays might be a close analogy—time is extended when there are too many planes to fit in the available system.

Creating Good Music

We all want to make good music with wonderful harmonies and a lasting beat.

Piece Of The Action

People will do a surprising number of things for recognition alone. A piece of the action is worth more than money.

The Fight Goes On

When one side or another in a conflict reaches its goal, the victors quickly lose cohesion, separating on some previously overlooked, ignored, or minor point unnecessary to consider in the previous battle. The new rift is now ready for exposure, giving energy to yet another engagement. All the while, new players enter the system, queuing up for their chance to enter independently or connect to one of the others. The need for some sort of contest--relevant or not--never seems to go away.

Punishment And Time

Humans have a misguided sense of justice when it involves long periods of time.

When a devastating act has been committed and the offender(s) is not caught within a few years, the victim(s) almost always move on. They eventually accept the situation as much as possible, reintegrating into their family and societal lives.

If the transgressor(s) is eventually discovered years later, prosecution might best be left alone. The case will bring back the old hurts, many of them having been healed. The main thing being accomplished is more pain—and for more people—as the victim(s) likely have new relationships of all kinds who will also be effected.

What might be best is to let the investigation continue in private, not to be revealed until after the perpetrators’ and victims’ deaths. The perpetrators’ legacy will then be the thing which is punished, and that’s not a trivial thing. Having someone’s permanent legacy tarnished can be a deterrent in and of itself.

At a certain point in time after the initial act the victims could be offered this arrangement. We might be surprised at how many would accept it.

The Greater Good

The goal of our physical existence should not simply be the prolonging of it. Rather, its goal needs to be the creation of the formulated and emergent self into a positive force for all, with the continuation of positive lingering on, well past the body's termination. If the continued existence of the body is in disagreement with this goal, others may sense its presence as one would a poison.

Friendly Advice

Increasing the frequency of friendly advice creates an inverse reaction to one's number of friends.

Broad Commonalities, Weak Intimacy

The more broad the definition of what people can find in common with one another, the less close they actually will be. Intimacy–of all kinds–needs very specific points of commonality.

Disappearing Dimples

It is an awful feeling to make someone's dimples disappear.

Sales And Capitalism

For the same reason a business is not structured so that the sales force runs the place, pure capitalism can not be unleashed on a society without controls.

Candle Power

So often in politics a hurricane is created to snuff out a candle.

Less Sleep Can Hurt

To reduce your time spent sleeping can be torture if your waking hours are frivolous.

Sad Favorites

Favorite things that don't ever change is sad.

Standardized Tests Fail To Hit Their Mark

We know that the results of standardized testing do not predict very well the test taker’s abilities in real life situations. At best (and not always), the tests only expose a potential ability. Despite this contradiction, for over a century we have still be using standardized tests to predict was a person can supposedly do.


The problem is due to a very simple fact: Where the brain stores knowledge is separate from the parts of the brain called upon to analyze and use that knowledge. When a standardized test is given, the person’s actual ability is not the thing being tested because the wrong part of the brain is being called upon during the test. In order to find out what a person can actually do, the test needs to include the actual activity and then evaluate the result, calling upon the parts of the brain that are involved in real life situations.

Omnipotence Is An Oxymoron

The concept of an omnipotent god is something like a relationship based on S&M. In a relationship where one is being dominant over another, it is assumed that the one taking the action is the one in control. This is not the case. The person to whom the punishment is being inflicted can stop it at any time and change the behavior of the other because the rules of the relationship include it. A safe word, or other indicator, by the recipient of the action calls it off in a instant.


Similarly, with the concept of an omnipotent god, it appears that the god is in complete control. But the rules indicate that humans can make this god express an emotion (angry or sad or happy) or action (curse or bless) by a human’s actions. This actually gives control to the human, not the god. The god can be controlled by a human by ‘making’ him angry or happy.
 
Omnipotence is an oxymoron.

Accepting Postive, Passionate Energy

When someone is happily passionate about what they are doing, observers can't help but be attracted, even when the activity is normally considered silly by the onlooker. Even if a witness normally thinks of the activity indifferently, the gleeful spirit being shared is captivating none-the-less. Some of us will fight this pull, feeling that we would be surrendering to a substandard instinct to accept interest in an activity previously dismissed. For those who don't accept the enticing sentiment being shared lose out on a wonderful boost to their own being, rejecting a free gift everyone should accept. Positive, passionate energy needs to be accepted when it's offered.

Keeping Students Together, Gifted Or Not

By separating out the ‘gifted’ students from everyone else, we are supposedly doing a good thing for them. If we change our thinking just a little bit, we can do something even better for them, and, at the same time, do everyone else a favor, too.


One of the things that we know is that being around people who are more intelligent or have different skills rubs off, even if it’s not intentional. Just being in the room and hearing the questions that are asked, the methods used to solve problems, and the overall positive attitude pulls everyone else in those directions and leads to increased understanding. People don’t improve very much while hanging around people who are close to their own skill level and with the same skill set(s). Yet, we still expect the non-gifted students to advance and even excel.

One of the other things we know is that one of the best ways for someone to learn something is to teach it, or help teach it. While it is true that not all people with clear knowledge can teach very well, the attempt does improve their own knowledge even more.

So, what would be best, it seems, is to institute an educational classroom environment where there is a mixture of students, with the ‘gifted’ ones helping and teaching others. If a ’gifted’ student’s teaching skills are lacking, then the instructor can play the lead role, or find someone else to do so, and let the ‘gifted’ student with poor teaching skills assist. They can then also learn from one of the other ‘gifted’ students who possess better teaching skills.

This student-as-teacher role only needs to be a small part of their curriculum. It doesn’t take much for this to work for everyone, where no one gets left behind, figuratively and literally.

Labels For Transferring Life

Why do we not use 'hunting' when it comes to fish? Or crabs? Is the difference between 'catching' and 'hunting' simply motive? Or is it the result--life or death? Are insects hunted or caught? What is the real difference between 'gathering,' 'picking,' and 'harvesting'?--What do we get from the use of  these different terms to describe the point-of-no-return in ending life in order to then absorb it and continue our own?

Europeans As Invasive Species

Without specifically excluding it, there is no accurate definition of "invasive species" that does not include the European migration to the Americas.

Destructive Capitalism

Capitalism is perhaps the most destructive force the planet has ever experienced.

Holiday Giving's Winners

Christmas has become a method of wealth distribution under the name of gift-giving. But the wealth being transferred in not from the giver to the receiver exclusively.

Because this transfer has attached to it a level of status and cultural support, gifts are being given to those who don't need them by those who can't afford them. To maintain the culture’s environment, its members must continue to accumulate debt in order to give these gifts, forcing them to work more than necessary to repay it. This fuels even more overall consumption by everyone. (Only a few of us can increase work without increasing consumption.)

The system’s goal is simply to move money around so some can snag a piece as it moves by. Whether people want to or need to is irrelevant. This goal allows those who produce things to take a piece of everyone's current wealth through the transaction, called profit. Lenders get some of our potential future wealth, called interest. The rest of us end up with less than when we started through the deal.

So, while we give money to the shops borrowed from the credit card companies in order to give an object to someone else (who’s doing the same thing), we all end up with less in the end, the difference going to the brokers of the deal--the shop owners and creditors, who encourage us to keep it up.

Happy Holidays.

Consuming The Earth's Resources

Humans can eat just about anything, but each culture chooses a basic narrow diet. Like locusts, we can easily destroy a food source before moving on in search of another. But we can take down many food sources because we can eat so many things. We can also make use the planet's other resources more widely than any other species, destroying them in the process as well.

We can destroy quite a bit of the planet by eating a resource or consuming one in some other fashion. We don’t really seem to care either way.

Five Free Days

Ancient Aztec and Egyptian calendars had five extra days not reconciled into their months. Could this “open” time be untagged purposely, indicating the possibility of new knowledge, a symbol that there was always more to discover? Was this an indicator of an acknowledged open wound in current knowledge?

GM Foods, Famine, And Fortunes

Why do we let the genes that produce food be patented? When too many foods are eventually produced this way, the control of the world lies in the hands of corporations. They can hold food for ransom, legally.

There will be a time when a famine is worsened because a corporation will insist on a price too high to pay. It will be argued that the corporation has the right to make a fortune if the unfortunate can't pay up. Millions will suffer and millions more will die, all in the name of protecting the patent of a gene.

The control of food has shifted from kings to corporations, and protected by the government, the corporations’ servant.

Rejoicing In White Space

Why do we get joy from the encounter with those pages at the end of a chapter that have only a few lines? The page has mostly blank space and we get to jump ahead quickly to another page with the sense of having gotten away with something. Even if we like the book we are reading, being able to take a sudden leap forward gives us a little boost. Did we somehow cheat and get away with it? Do we just like the break in the pace? Is there a need we get fulfilled to “progress” without effort, a feeling of accomplishment without toil?

Gateway To Sex

Kissing is a gateway drug to sex. But, then again, so is sight.

When Consumers Are Full

There have been many stories about how when pre- and post-holiday sales are disappointing for merchants it drives prices down too far. Within those stories there seems to be an assumption that consumers should continue to spend for anything as long as the price is low enough. "It's not that consumers don't want the things being offered," the sentiment appears to be, "they're just being stingy with their money and looking for bargains."


While traditional supply-and-demand economics has trained us to think this way, there is something else in play that is often overlooked. Consumers may simply be "full."

Acquiring things has limits. Even if prices drop to near zero, some items just will be seen as unnecessary at a certain point following a period of sustained acquisition during "good" economic times. Economic "supply-siders" will tout the notion that just about anything will drive an economy as long as there is enough of it--a large supply of something will drive down prices and offer an irresistible call to buy. It is the lowering-of-prices side-effect that is the important part of this ideology, not size of the supply, really. We just need to reach an "equilibrium" and things will begin to recover, goes the thinking.

This thinking hurts sellers, though, as they are often forced to close when price demands fall too short. In all the economic theories that we are taught, we forget that most things that can be categorized within a "system" will reach a limit eventually--a point of being full. No amount of tinkering with supply and prices will force a change in behavior from consumers when consumers just doesn't want anymore of whatever's being offered--when they've had enough, already. This state has not been unforeseen, it's just been responded to with different pricing methods to try and avoid the inevitable point of consumers being full.

For instance, pricing strategies have moved toward bundling of items in an effort to increase sales. Prices are set at two or three...or 10...for a certain price; items from socks to plastic bowls can rarely be bought individually any more; products that require an ongoing supply of something (i.e., ink) do not include much of it with each replenishment; contracts for service get extended (i.e., cell phones) for longer period of time; etc.

Growth, the buzz word that we all hear as the goal of any economic or corporate policy, has its limits. There will be declines and reversals. Policies never seem to take this into account. Therefore, when it happens, the sting is more severe than needed.

We need to change our thinking about economics and turn toward a goal of sustainability, not ever-increasing growth. No system can grow forever. Economics is no exception. If we wish to reduce the pain--the economic ups and downs--that is the result of our looking to unrestricted growth as a goal, we need to realize that the goal is the problem.

There has been next to no research on what it would take to build a sustainable economy. We need to get our best minds on the subject and listen to what they have to say. If we don't want to continue to experience the pain of uncontrolled growth as our only economic goal, we need to look to alternatives. It's long past time to do so.

Imminent Death Is Relaxing

People who know that they will die imminently (i.e., sick, death row, trapped) with no options are generally not fearful. If the knowing does cause fear, it is a temporary fluctuation of mindset quickly resolved back to a calm demeanor. Knowledge, even of your own death, can produce calm; ignorance can breed fear—even if the knowledge in question should be frightening. Now that we understand this, society has lost a major presumed reason for the death penalty—to see fear while being put to death, and the public witnessing the act to experience it, too.

High Intelligence?

The mistaken impression of high intelligence can be achieved by someone who makes a simple new discovery or is willing to say something publicly that is obvious but others are not willing to acknowledge, especially if that 'something' is cathartic by being publicly acknowledged.

Capitalism's Unequal Equilibrium

We have mistakenly given the term ‘equilibrium’ a positive connotation, which has produced those on the political right with a false sense of superiority about unfettered capitalism.


The equilibrium of a system is defined by the forces within that system, which push it toward its equilibrium point. (If that point is a moving target, it may never actually be reached—like a railroad car never catching the engine.) If the system's forces are aligned in such a way that a positive outcome is not its equilibrium point, then the system is flawed. But we never even look at that question because too many people think that the push for ‘equilibrium’ is valid on its own, not even bothering to look at, let alone evaluate, its destination.

The equilibrium of capitalism is one of unequal access and outcomes—some will be rich and powerful, others (the vast majority) will not; some will have access to resources, some (the vast majority) will not. This should not be considered a positive goal for any society.
 
Pure capitalism does have an equilibrium, but it's negative and it’s required by its structure.

Attention, Negative Or Positive

Even if something is not seen as generally positive, when someone is good at it or an expert in it, another person who could be an object of that attention is insulted if excluded. A woman might be a little insulted if a known womanizer doesn't at least give her some attention.

Dividing By Zero

Every time someone insists that the idea of a god be accepted, it's like demanding a mathematician divide by zero--any result is nonsensical.

Pathological Opinions

Human behaviors and emotions can be arbitrarily called pathological based on nothing more than current cultural opinions because there can be no objective model for an ideal human. We are always just the current result of evolutionary forces with no specific point.

The Outisde View Of Pleasure

When denied pleasures and interests, they are still sought. If found in places not seen by the majority, it creates separation from them, resulting in either admiration described as genius or loathing described as craziness.

Boiling Away True Meaning

After reading (or absorbing in some other way) a large or complicated set of information, we will often try and boil it down to something easily remembered or understood, which can seriously distort the original. We then mistakenly use the distorted version for future thought and action, which begins a chain reaction of errors.

Giving At A Distance

The current method of giving through charity is via groups and government. We do not want it to be personal. We pay others to do it in order to keep the classes apart and knowledge of those being helped in a fog. In this way a privileged person’s conscious can be kept unoccupied with society’s inequalities.

Belief No Path To Truth

Those who believe rather than think only find truth accidentally and rarely.

Non-Family Mentor

It may be that a healthy, wise, and confident person is more likely produced when a supportive, consistently available, and friendly non-family member is there be completely open and non-judgmental from childhood. This supporting adult could be a grandparent or an uncle or aunt, but it may be even more powerful if this adult is not related. The support, praise, and guidance will not be attached to family baggage, and allow the relationship to be seen by the child as in certain ways more "clean" and more legitimate because from an outsider, friendship is seen as earned rather than obligatory, boosting the child’s confidence in their self.

Repugnant Colors?

What if different odors were as different colors, noticeable but not necessarily repugnant?

The Inevitable Fight

Wherever religion is involved in government and a is substantial force in society, all peace is temporary. Religion on its own is a singular cause of conflict, continually gleaning forces for battle, only keeping the violent kinetic energy formed in the gathering's creation at bay while preparing for the next engagement.

No Need To Ask Who's There

Now that everyone has their own phone, no one needs to ask "Is so-and-so there?"

Do It Again, And Again, And Again...

If a student wishes to rediscover a known fact by doing an experiment verified a thousand times before, let the student do it. The knowledge gained by doing it will be useful to all future endeavors. A hands-on event is better retained and more likely to bring in future discoveries via serendipity.

Were Twins The First Talkers?

Is is possible that the first uses of language came from identical twins? If language development is evolutionary, then the first individual with language abilities would have needed someone to talk to--and understand the speech--in order to have the ability continue through a population. It is hard to see a single talker with no one who is able to understand having a procreative advantage.

Since we also know that language is much more easily learned as a child than an adult, the first child born with language abilities would see those abilities fade with age without being able to talk to others to "activate" it. In addition, by the time this individual reached an age of reproduction, the language ability would have largely passed and, therefore, communication with offspring who might also have the inherited genetic disposition for language, would likely not happen for the same reason it couldn't communicate with others when this individual was an infant.

However, if there were a set of identical twins born with the same ability for language, they could potentially talk to each other by developing their own language--as we know happens with modern human twins--and pass it on to their offspring. So, there is a high probability that the use of language by any of our ancestral populations was a side-effect of the birth of twins.

Battling Bell-Ringers

Imagine a Salvation Army bell-ringer and a homeless person with a kettle and bell standing side-by-side, each with a kettle asking for money. Who would get more? Who would get removed by the police and go to jail? Who would people look down upon with a denigrating attitude?

Employer As Adversary

It is odd that lawyers and "security experts" have convinced business owners and their managers that it is in their best interest to treat employees like adversaries, enemies of which to be wary and suspicious. At the same time, loyalty is demanded within this adversarial framework of distrust and animosity. How odd.

Initial Pursuit

When one thing is initially found in common between two strangers, hopes of having more in common are often quickly dashed. In trying to size up a relationship with someone new, if initial hopes are high and then immediately disintegrate, we will detach. But, if there was no initial commonality to pursue, then we drop the attempt abruptly when we could have much more in common that not. It's a shame that we give up or pursue so easily based on first impressions.

New Ideas Need Help

When one has new information or a new idea that contradicts conventional wisdom held by the general public, those in opposition will often concentrate on one small piece of the new whole, looking to place a wedge on which to pound. Because of this, it is possible that the more detail provided about the new 'thing' the more likely it is to be rejected by the general public; there will be more single points to pull out and assert as representative of the whole—a type of mis-logic similar to attacking an analogy instead of the thing being analogized.

Because the new intruder is presented as uniform, singular, and cohesive, an attack on one part of it can be presented and accepted as an attack on the whole. Whether the attacker's position turns out to be false because of its narrow focus or inaccurate assumptions, those who wish to dismiss the new thing are allowed to easily latch on to the attack anyway. Even if the attack is valid on the single point, it is mis-logic to invalidate the entire new thing based on the single attack. New ideas often need to be molded after initially presented in order to be confirmed.

So, to present something new and give it a good chance of survival in the general public, maybe it makes sense to brief and concise, giving little extraneous information that could lead to false and unrelated tangents and attacks.

Or, create and support a more educated public. 

Mis-Labeled Phobias

All fears of separating from the pack are phobias. We only label some of them clinically.

The Falsehood of Solo Success

No one can say "I did it" truthfully. Accomplishment is not a solo affair. No one succeeds alone. Achievements do not come through singular effort. We all tap into the assisting forces around us everywhere, even if we don't know it or acknowledge their presence. To claim independent triumph is an apparition, a mirage that disappears when examined closely.

Magnified Justice

Lady Justice should remove her blindfold and pick up a magnifying glass. Or maybe better yet, place the blindfold over one eye and hold the magnifying glass up to the other one, making the image of justice the balancing the ideas of mitigating prejudice and considering all available details.

Temporary Users Of The Planet's Stuff

What happened to all the Crayons ever made? All the pictures, melted blobs, shavings, etc. went somewhere, but where? What happens to everything we humans produce? We seem to be, in large part, temporary re-groupers of the planet's stuff. We parse and re-align for our temporary amusement, needs, desires, etc. and then put it all back, but in different places and different forms, altered and damaged. We are redistributors, modifiers, and destroyers of the planet's ingredients. Are we really anything more?

Knowledge Highlights Ignorance

The acquisition of knowledge includes within it the unavoidable consequence of increasing awareness of the depths of human ignorance.

Genetic Indulgence

If it turns out that the study of genetics is eventually able to predict what diseases are lined up to eventually kill us, can we then freely indulge in all the harmful things that wouldn't kill us until after the first predicted cause of our death?

Belief No Virtue

Belief is not a virtue. Belief is where thoughts go to die.

Forced Followers

You can't drag someone behind you and claim you're being followed as a leader.

Design With Limitations

Designing something new from scratch may take longer and be less effective than making a simple structure based on less-specific parameters and then modifying it to meet the more specific goal. This is because we, as humans, have a hard time making decisions when we have too many choices. If we start with nothing, there are too many choices to think clearly and gain focus quickly. Just getting started can be a major hurdle; we can get bogged down when deciphering choices and deciding among too many things.

However, if given a partially constructed starting point it can act as a catalyst. We can then move on from there more quickly because many of the decisions have already been made by the existence and limitations of the given starting point. So, a design team might need to be two independent groups that do not communicate at all—one that has the task of coming up with catalyst for the second group, which continues from there to meet the 'real' goal.

Analogy

Analogy proves nothing.

Connotaton

A word's connotation is often more powerful than its definition.