On Health Care And Education

I am a free market capitalist, however, I am not so blind and naive as to think free market capitalism should be applied to everything. It is my opinion that a healthy society will employ several different economic strategies to the institutions within its overall structure, depending on the role the institution plays in the society. Capitalism is wonderful for widgets, automobiles, and other commodities, but for such institutions as health care and education it simply does not make sense.

We are a community species; we simply cannot exist without help from our family, friends, and neighbors. Our ability to construct complex communities and societies is what separates us from the rest of life on this planet. It is a simple fact that the better off our neighbors are, the better off we are. Like in real estate, one crappy house can lower the overall value of the whole neighborhood.

When applied to education, we know that the better a person is educated the less likely they are to commit a crime against the community. So, the question is do we pay to educate the child, or do we pay to incarcerate the adult? It has to be one or the other, and it cannot be neither. There will be some who say that education is the responsibility of the parents and if they do not take care of this for their children it is their fault. But, this is an unrealistic argument on two levels; first, we already know the damage an uneducated child can have on our communities, and second, with the widget part of our society being free market capitalism the presence of unsuccessful and struggling parents who do not have the wherewithal to properly ensure their child's education is guaranteed.

On health care, accurate scholarship has proved the economic advantage to a healthy community, but what is not considered so much is the simple fact that all of our health is connected. Forest managers do not focus on the health the individual trees, but the forest as a whole because it does not matter how healthy one tree might be if the tree next to it is a staging area for insect and disease infestations. In human terms, we have all noticed that there seems to be more diseases floating around these days. I don't know for sure, but I would bet that there is a direct correlation between the number of diseases floating around and the number of people who do not have access to simple affordable health care. And, again, the argument that everyone must provide for this themselves falls apart when considering the realities of free market capitalism.

It is my belief that many of the problems our society faces today is because of the popular misconceptions that are held from the earliest understanding of evolution and survival of the fittest - that it is a dog eat dog world with every person for themselves. Capitalism is the economic expression of this fiercely individualistic perspective. The problem with it is that humans are a pack animal; individual survival depends of the survival of the whole pack. I think it is perfectly fine to structure a society where a persons skills and achievements are the measure of the position and comfort they have in that society, and I think it is fine for those people pass that extra benefit on to their children, but that does not make it wise to completely neglect the health and well being of those who are - or choose to be - less skilled, assertive, or aggressive.

In free market capitalism, there are winners and losers... but if the price of losing is too low, the losers will eventually stop trying to succeed within the community and start trying to succeed against the community. And from that point, it's just a game of numbers.

Have a nice day C:)

Migration of the Promised Land

I'm going to do a little thinking ahead here... you know, just to get the wheels rolling. My idea is this: after Israel turns itself into a radioactive pile of rubble, it would be a great place to store the worlds nuclear and biological waste.

What is funny to me is that the people who are all "The Holy land" this, and "The Promised Land" that, have obviously not spent any time watching children fight over a favorite toy. Children tend to make up stories and tell lies in order to get their way; "dad, said that it was my turn", "no, you had your turn yesterday." Why this is relevant is very simple... Sumeria and Judea only became "The Promised Land" after every learned person in the civilized world realized that who ever control that land controlled ALL the trade routes in the known world. Who ever controlled "The Holy Land" was going to be very rich and powerful. Thus, everyone in the area developed a story why "The Promised Land" was theirs to control. I'm not saying there is no God (I do have my own crazy views on such things; see Craigianity), but it would be very naive to think that people have never used the belief in God to create stories and lies that benefited their own pursuit of wealth and power. And why this is so funny to me is because that favorite shiny toy has no value anymore... it has literally turned into a lump of crap.

"The Promised Land" has become a lump of crap because of airplanes and cargo ships. There are no trade routes going through the land of Sumeria and Judea anymore, and yet the stories that the children developed to justify their pursuits have become more important than the pursuits. If it was not for this state of constant war bringing in all sorts of military revenue and donations from zealots, no one would ever hear of Israel. That is why I say that the greatest risk to Israel's future is if the Palestinians up and left. At that point, they would have to declare war on someone to keep their economy going. It is kind of like the greatest risk to Christianity is Jesus coming back. It would be so funny, all those people and institutions claiming power in the name of Jesus, and he comes back... "I'm back", "no, you can't be back. I just put new marble in my bathroom and I haven't paid for the new fixtures yet." They would probably crucify him again... probably why he was crucified in the first place... "when we say we are waiting for the Messiah to come it doesn't mean we actually want a Messiah to come, it's just our passive aggressive way to get what we want. To actually have someone show up claiming to be the Messiah completely screws up everything."

Anyway, this is all in my mind lately because I have heard and read about this small movement of fanatics who are now saying that by their interpretation of the Bible, Israel is not the real "Promised Land". The real "Promised Land", according to their interpretation, is in... wait for it... Eastern Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan. You know, exactly the most ideal place to control the flow of oil and gas on that whole side of the planet.

Have a nice day. C:)

A Fourth Branch

There is a serious problem with the checks and balances system in our government. It is all well and good that we have the Supreme Court to determine whether or not laws and policies are legal, but what we are lacking is a branch of government that determines whether a law or policy is practical and is in alignment with a (any) long term vision.

As it stands, we have elected officials who cannot see past the next election and they spend all of their time positioning themselves for the net election. These days, all of our problems are large and complex and require more effort than just throwing up some sort of politically motivated mumbo-jumbo that turns out to do nothing but give more money to the companies the lobbyists represent.

This is why I would like to see a fourth branch of government, much like the Supreme Court, with members that enjoy a lifetime appointment, who can determine a law or policy to be frivolous, impractical, or lacking any long term community management direction or vision. Certainly there would be the forever battle between left and right, but there is nothing we can do about that. Left or right is actually less important to me than whether or not there is long term vision and direction. You know... big picture stuff.

I know it's not Christmas, but this is what I want from Santa this year. C:)

Netflix vs. Blockbuster

After a couple of years of having Netflix I am going back to Blockbuster. I missed picking movies on a whim or a mood. You know, "I'm in a stupid mood and I would like to watch a stupid movie" kind of thing. Netflix doesn't allow such spontaneity... unless you want to watch a movie on your computer. With Netflix there is a sense that all your choices have to be good ones; that's allot of damn pressure just for a movie and it takes all the fun out of seeing a bad movie.

Interestingly, if I think back at times when my intuition picked a movie (or a book), I didn't necessarily like the movie (although someitmes I did), but there was always something about it, or in it - maybe just a scene, that struck a chord with something I was thinking or going through at the time. That's what's nice about the spontinaity.

However, I must thank Netflix for making Blockbuster's prices cheaper. C;)

Fear: The Experience

Remember the first time you were in love and how you behaved? If you are anything like me, you probably blushed a little bit thinking about what an idiot you were back then. Although we know it is not our fault - we simply had no experience in love then. Now, things are different. We are calm and cool with the emotion of love because we have gained lots of experience with it, and that is what allows us to build deeper relationships; the experience.

Now, consider how people respond to fear. I find that our society is structured to avoid the things we are afraid of. The unfortunate result of this reflex is that when something we cannot avoid arrives, there are many (MANY) people who don't have much experience with the emotion of fear. As a result, we get a lot of people who act with the experience, confidence, and clarity of a teenager in love.

It is my opinion that a healthy person should push their fear envelope on a regular basis. No, not the lying in bed at night afraid of what ever your mind can come up with... tangible fear. Not to be careless or stupid, but things we consciously know are safe that elicit a reaction of fear; like maybe skydiving. rock climbing, or whatever. It doesn't even need to be that dramatic. Every now and again, when I am walking the three miles home from my local pub along a pitch black trail through the woods, I'll get spooked by a startled dear, a peculiar noise, or just my eyes seeing something in the shadows. By the time I get home I am laughing at myself, but happy to have gone through the whole fear cycle one more time. When I tell people that I walk home along that trail late a night, they look at me with surprise and tell me I am crazy - that they would never be able to do such a thing because it would scare them to death. I laugh and agree that I am crazy, but tell them that one of the reasons I do it is because it sometimes scares the crap out of me. They give that look that I am so used to these days and I reply with:

"- I tell the tale that I heard told.
Mithridates, he died old."


Have a nice day. C:)

A Question of Faith

I have said it before, and I will say it again, everyone has to have faith in something.

Faith is what guides our behavior, whether it is a faith in a higher power or in a mathematical/ logical order, or a little of both and every shade of gray in between. Our faith tells us how we will interact with other people in good times and bad... but it always seems far more important during the bad times. And, from my perspective, it does not matter what a persons faith is in, so long as it guides their behavior in a manner that is best suited for the current environment and situation. Of course, the only judge of whether our faith is correct or not is the survival of the behavior our faith invoked. Some would say that it is the survival of the individual, but that would be contrary to the evolution of a species that is a community based pack animal. With humans, the survival of an individual will not guarantee the survival of the species, but the survival of a behavior will.

Sometimes our environment throws a new situation at us and we scramble to figure out how to cope. It seems from our history that people have always tried to cope with new situations by either reacting without thought and letting chance decide their fate, or by forcing an already established behavior to fit the situation. And, again from my perspective, we are at an important point in the evolution of faith. It is a point where we have the ability to logically develop and adapt our behavior. However, we know that we cannot adapt our behavior through force, laws, or any other physical manipulations. It can only be healthily achieved through faith; whatever that faith may be. This is to say that we are at a point in the evolution of faith where our faith must adapt the ability to adapt.

I hope that made sense... it made sense in my head and that is all that matters to me C;P

Have a nice day C:)

Earth Day Perspective

So, here I am looking at my hideous lawn. It's early spring and it just looks nasty. I simply refuse to try and make it a perfectly green Kentucky Bluegrass lawn; it simply isn't practical. It gets too much sun (way too much sun; it bakes all day) and there is a good slope to it, so to keep it perfect and green would require a ton of fertilizer, weed killer, and constant watering. What I am doing is trying to manage the thing into a natural ground cover that needs little maintenance by pulling out the weeds I don't want and letting everything else that can grow here, do so naturally. The problem with this approach is that it takes a few years for it to take effect and in the meantime the lawn looks hideous.

I get plenty of advice from family, friends, neighbors, and passers by. But all of their advice begins with dumping chemicals on the lawn until the neighbors dog grows five testicles. So, I just smile and say no thanks. Then they say that I got to do something with it being so ugly, and I reply that lawns apply to what we have learned already with actors, super-models, body builders and athletes, as well as with industry, security, and all sorts of relationships,... if we want to be healthy, then we cannot be perfect or pretty all of the time.

Have a nice day. C:)

The Manifestation of Societal Structure

As individuals, to achieve what we want in life we have to have a vision of what we want. It is true that a healthy person will certainly understand and accept the fact that they cannot have exactly what they want, but to get off the couch there needs to be a vision. The same is true for a community, or society. It is my perspective that, whether we believe in God or not, generally speaking, on a societal level, religion is a vision of what community structure should look like and how people should behave in that society. All the mythology, belief, and stories that go along with religion can be considered as nothing more than justifications - or rationale - to pursue the vision.

Some will say that their religion teaches peace and brotherly love, and this is certainly true. However, the structure of the vision is of a hierarchy of power and inequity. There is God at the top who acts with impunity, we people at the bottom who must suffer the consequences, then all sorts of levels of power in between. It is the vision of the structure that we manifest and not the teachings associated with the structure. And, over time, people grow weary of how the structure of a certain religion impacts the structure of their society and they rebel, or deny, the religion... becoming atheists. But, this never lasts too long because atheism is the religion of anarchy; with no vision of social structure or justifications. People without a vision of any kind of order or purpose will never hold out very long against people who hold even a rudimentary vision of order and purpose.

Some will say that they do not believe in God, but they do have a vision of a society where all people are equal and free and happy. To those people I have only one question; what is the connection between people? What is the commonality between people, the justification, that empowers people to see your vision and work towards it? And the moment your mind formulates the image of a response, whatever form it takes, I would argue that at that point you are seeing the image of God.... whether you believe it is real or not.

Have a nice day C:)

Intellectual, Physical, and Emotional Boundaries

Someone with well defined intellectual boundaries can have a conversation with a person who believes different things, let's say someone at the opposite end of the political spectrum, without it affecting their ability to behave like a civilized person. Basically someone who has control of their behavior whether they are talking to someone they agree with or not; boundaries are all about self control.

Physical boundaries is the same thing, only with a physical conversation. For example, picture a magazine cover beautiful woman who has no problem getting men to do what she wants by using her body. The men who react to her body and fall all over themselves do not have very good physical boundaries. And the woman, if she gets all flustered and upset if a man doesn't become enslaved by her body, doesn't have good boundaries either. I have seen men act this way as well when a guy doesn't get scared by the muscle man flexing tough guy routine. ("I'm flexing and acting tough... you should be afraid!!").

And, emotional boundaries are the same but with an emotional conversation; that we may be able to feel other people's emotions, but we are not responsible for them. Like when someone lets out a sigh and you can tell the are sad or upset, but they don't want to just come out and say it... so they play a passive aggressive game to get their way - no different than the woman using her body, but with emotions.

But, none of this means that a person cannot respond to a persons ideas, body, or feelings... as long as it is responding and not reacting... responding is having control over our behavior.

The End of Philosophy? Not Nearly...

Oh, boy... These days there are plenty of doom-sayers out there; the end of the world, the end of religion, the end of this, the end of that, and now the end of philosophy. On April 6th, New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote an editorial entitled "The End of Philosophy". His opinion reflects the popular view of philosophy, but I have always had a problem with the popular view of philosophy.

Originally, philosophy was the pursuit of understanding the human consciousness, the self, and what a philosopher did was develop a perspective of consciousness and it's origins, and then build theories and concepts of htose theories as applied in the real world. Plato, for example, described consciousness in his theory of The Good - as described in his "Allegory Of The Cave". The, Plato goes on to develop many other theories on governance and community structure that was based on his understand of The Good (and more so with Aristotle). So, you see, the issue is that up until the late 19th century philosophers assumed that consciousness existed apart from the human mind.

In the late 19th century, Philosophers began to follow the lead of scientist in the new fields of psychology, neurology, and then neurobiology. Philosopher stopped assuming that consciousness was separate from the human mind, and eventually assumed that it was in fact a product, or byproduct, of the mechanics of the human mind. Thus, we see the emergence of such philosophies as Ayn Rand's Egoism, or Leo Strauss's dumbass whatever (can't think of it right now). Egoism is not a philosophy based on a perception of consciousness, it is a philosophy based on an understanding of certain aspects of our behavior... it is a quasi-philosophy. These quasi-philosophies are not based on the perception of a universal truths or constants, they are no more than justifications for allowing certain behaviors to govern our actions. And this is the failure that we are seeing all around us: capitalism isn't wrong, but capitalism based on Egoism is; democracy isn't wrong, but democracy based on Egoism is.

And this is my problem with the modern perception of philosophy, over the last century philosophers began to assume that consciousness is a product of our minds, and now that we have discovered - exhaustively - that the mechanics of our minds do not explain everything in our consciousness, they want everyone to believe that philosophy is finished. Mr. Brooks, and everyone else, just because one philosophy turns out to be wrong doesn't mean all philosophy is over. We are not at the end of philosophy, we are at the end of quasi-philosophy; we are at the end of the short century long detour in philosophy that misplaced the origins of our consciousness. I have 14 cents in my pocket that says we will now be returning to True Philosophy - where we are equal to more than the sum of our parts. Any takers?

Have a nice day. C:)

A Simple Question

Does God want to be worshiped?

If God does want to be worshiped, what does that say about God? And if God does not want to be worshiped, what does that say about us?

I can't help but to think about all the actors, musicians, and others that are all over the media; the ones who want to be worshiped seem immature and very insecure, and the ones that do not want to be worshiped hide from the public.

Just wondering.

Have a nice day. C:)

The Metric Circle Revisited

So, those of you long time readers might remember my little metric circle thingy a couple of years ago. Even though I wrote it back, I knew something wasn't right about it and it has been gnawing at my brain aver since... until just recently and now I am happy and can let it go.

I had the structure wrong. I simply rearranged the current circle structure to work on a base-100 system instead of a base-60 system. I needed to change the structure all together (what an idiot!). So, instead of what I had back then:

"The basic unit of measurement for a Metric Circle is the "circle."
1 decicircle (dc) is 1/10 of a circle. There are 10dc's to 1 circle.
1 centicircle (cc) is 1/100 of a circle. There are 10cc's to 1dc, and 100cc's to 1 circle.
1 millicircle (mc) is 1/1000 of a circle. There are 10mc's to 1 cc, 100mc's to 1dc, and 1000mc's to 1 circle.
....And so on, down through all the metric prefixes."

That was bad... what it should be is:

On our current circle the top starting position is both 0 and 360 degrees. On a metric circle the top starting position would be both 0 and 1 circle. Then, everything less than 1 circle would simply be parsed down in a standard base-10 fashion. For example, what we now know as 90 degrees would be .25, 180 degrees would be .5, and 185 degrees would something like .5155.

Yeah, yeah, I am certain that is seems confusing and more complicated now, but I am also certain that it is more consistent and far more accurate than the current circle... and a million times more logical than something like UTM (Universal Transverse Mercator) coordinates.

Anyway, I know this means nothing to you all, but it's a load off of my mind.

Have fun. C:)

The Holy Triangle

When I was in college studying Forestry at Colorado State University, there were three classes that I dubbed the Holy Triangle. I called them the Holy Triangle because, in their purity, they stood absolutely opposed to one another, but were all completely necessary to our education. Those three classes were Forest Ecology, Forest Economics, and Silviculture. (Silviculture is known as "the art and science of growing a stand of timber", but for our purposes "the meat and potatoes of the science of forest management" will suffice.) We forestry students were not the only students who had to take the Holy Triangle. In fact, most students in the College of Natural Resources had to take these three classes... and that is where the lesson began.

In the Fall semester we all sat through Forest Ecology and enjoyed the touchy-feely interrelationships between forest elements that is ecology. But in the Spring, we all moved to Forest Economics and Silviculture, and without fail there were more than a few students who got angry at the professors; as if it was their fault economics is so cold and calculating; as if it was their fault that management is so goal oriented. It seemed - from my biased perspective - that only the forestry students understood that it was the purpose of these three classes to teach us things in their pure form, and it was our duty as free thinking humans to find our own balance, our own point within the triangle the three classes outlined, and apply what we had learned in a way that expressed our own understanding.

The significance of this is that I am always asked why I do not vote (in elections - I do, however, vote with how I live my life), and the simple answer is that none of the candidates or political parties represent my views; simply put, our political system is lacking a point in the triangle. We have Community Ecology (liberals) and Economics (conservatives), but we have no party that represents The Science of Governance. Truthfully, on the locus between Ecology and Economics, Democrats and Republicans exist pretty close to center, while parties like the Greens are further left and the Libertarians are further right. As a Forester, I have, in the past, stomped my feet and declared myself to be dead center in the balance between ecology, economics, and management(with management on top), a place called sustainability, but after some experience I now know myself to be a little above and a bit to the left of center; a bit more interested in the Science of Management. Politically, I am no different... I do not care about the size of our government so long as it is structured well and successfully and efficiently achieves its' stated goals. And, I do not care about any specific laws or policies so long as they reflect the will of a majority of the citizenry and does not assume my involvement as mandatory.

I am no different than any other American, or person for that matter. I will roll with the punches and make do with what is put in front of me. If I am a part of the majority I will lend my hand to achieve our goals, and if I am a part of the minority I will politely step aside and let the majority give it their best. However, I see that the structure and processes of our government have become corrupt or flat out broken, and I see that the effect of this is a elite minority with increasing influence. Eventually, if history can be trusted, the corruption will become complete, and the ruling minority will blame the majorities passivity for its failure and endeavor to try and force the majority to engage in the pursuit of their goals.

The evolution of civilization is propelled by the battled between tyranny and freedom... with tyranny being minority rule, and freedom being majority rule.

** This is a repost. It was first posted on January 17th, 2008.**

Have a nice day. C:)

Hoover and Roosevelt Were Both Wrong

Of course President Hoover was wrong... what kind of dummy does nothing in the face of a crisis? But, it is my perspective, that President Roosevelt was also wrong by putting too many regulations in place that had the effect of making people too complacent. It wasn't even 40 years before those regulations began to unravel under the pressure of corporate lobbyists. And, here we are again.

I think we would have been far better off if we had one law that said anyone who wants any kind of debt, from a credit card to a mortgage, has to take a class on personal finance. Just like it is with driving and hunting... and many other things.

Education, not regulation.


Have a nice day C:)

Good Gambling vs Bad Gambling

Good gambling is games of chance where only the people who choose to be part of the game can lose. Casino's are the general example of this... only the people who sit down at the blackjack table can lose the game.

Bad gambling is games of chance where people who are not involved in the game, who might not even know the game is being played, can suffer losses resulting from the game. The only example of this anyone should ever need is the stock market.


It seems to me our country has had it backwards for so long; we have outlawed good gambling and allowed bad gambling. Now, I'm not against publicly owned companies - exactly the opposite really. However, it is clear that speculators are killing us. Thus, if I were king (and again, I use the 'IF' as a courtesy to you all) I would make it a law that shares could only be traded at a price measured from the real value of the company (i.e. the real value of the company divided by the number of shares available.). Currently, shares are traded based on their perceived future value, which pressures executives to do nothing more than to grow the "perceived value" of their companies. And, if you study a little Game Theory you will find that the need to deceive grows exponentially with every deception, and before you know it you end up with companies that have no real value at all but are selling shares at $300 a pop. If the price of a companies stock was pegged to the real value of the company, then the executives would be pressured to grow the real value of the company. A person investing in a company that has it's stock pegged to it's real value would be investing in the future of the real company, and not just the future of the perception of the real company. It would also get rid of speculators and make our economy a million times more stable.

But, that is just my crazy bald guy perspective.

Have a nice day. C:)

A Brain Whooping

Imagine, if you will, fish swimming in the ocean millions of years ago. These fish are very simple creatures; they have no sensory perception except for a very simple nervous system that, being the cutting edge of evolution (for their time), had a few nerve cells in their skin giving them a little information about their environment. It wasn't much information, the fish simply felt something like pain when the water temperature wasn't good for survival, because the greatest threat these fish had at the time was the super heated water where lave flowed into the ocean. So, these fish would be swimming along and they would come to a thermal vent or lava flow and the water would get hot. Since the nerve ending were new, they haven't been fully adapted yet, so some of the fish would not feel the change in water temperature because the nerve endings weren't working and they would keep swimming forward and die, some of the fish would feel the pain and not react and die, some of the fish would feel the pain and react by swimming faster forward and die, and some of the fish would feel the pain and react by turning around and swimming the other way. It is obvious that the last fish would be the only ones to survive and reproduce (and never mind about the fact that fish that didn't feel the pain or react survived by following those that did would have survived and reproduced which would have enforced the gene for schooling up... blah blah blah.... it is not important to my point here.) thus allowing the fish to take another step forward along the evolutionary path.

Now, consider (this is a completely separate image, which will be combined with the first one to form a third image shortly) a complex piece of gadgetry such as the iPhone. We can assume that the use of an iPhone would depend on the ability and understanding of the individual; that is, a person who has never used a telephone would consider the thing a fancy brick, a person who only had experience with phones and cell phones would use it only as a phone, people who had experience with phones and computers and the Internet would use more of it's features, and people who had experience and understanding of phones and computers and Internet and PDA's would be most likely to use all of it's features. It is true that anyone could learn how to use the thing over the long term, if they chose to... but we are about to combine this idea with the first image which is about initial reactions so that doesn't matter here.

The third image is about the human brain. The human brain evolved to it's current state after we already had the five senses. Thus, our perception of the universe is completely restricted to these five senses. I argue, as you well know, that we all have a sixth sense that is our ability to feel emotional energy - emotional energy being something of a separate dimension of consciousness in our universe that were are barely aware of - and our emotional and conscious experience and understanding dictates how we react to our exposure to this energy (some might call that emotional maturity). So, imagine that are evolving in to an environment that has this energy all around, and sometimes its strong and sometimes its weak (or maybe it goes in and out like tides), and imagine that we are visited on occasion by a force - be it God, aliens, or something else - that could focus and use that energy to communicate and actually showed up one day in our atmosphere to do just that. These individuals, from their long experience, see that our near future is in question and they try to help us by giving us advice, but they do it in their language, which is not in soundwaves, but emotional energy. Some people wouldn't feel it, they would just go through their day wondering why people were acting so weird all of a sudden. Some people would feel it but fight it by taking a pill or locking themselves up in a small room. Some people would feel the energy but not understand it and let it be used as a rationale to do all those nasty things they never allowed themselves to do; rape their neighbor or punish their brother for something they did forever ago. Some people would feel it and understand it as a message, but they would trust the message. And some people would feel it, and know it to be a message and trust the message and choose to use it to their advantage. Then we might see that the people most likely to survive the coming turmoil are the last people of this list, those who feel, know, and trust the message delivered (and those who might not have felt it or understood it, but followed those who did.)


Now, my brain is truly whooped.
Have a nice day. C:)

Communicating With Emotional Energy

Imagine a cave about three hundred thousand years ago. In that cave dwelt a pack of prehistoric hominids. Now, these early hominids didn't have any formal language, but they did communicate; they used grunts and other primitive sounds to communicate their needs. This simple communication evolved by repetition of shared experiences. For example, when a certain male in the pack got horny he made a certain grunt as he set out to fulfill his need. Eventually, everyone in the pack learned what that grunt meant and responded according to their own needs. And, as time passed, mimicry of successful behavior established in that pack that certain grunt to mean horny. How the system works is that the sound wave travels from the mouth of one individual and into the ear of another. The individual that hears the sound reacts to the memory, which is a mental image, making a sound/image pairing, of what that sound meant in the past.

Today, I would argue that most people have the ability to receive and transmit emotional energy, but in terms of emotional communication we are no more advanced than those early hominids. We are capable of transmitting the energy, but only when it is evoke by a direct need. People in our lives will transmit an emotion and we will react to it... over time we develop a memory of the feeling of that energy, which is also mental image - an emotion/image pairing. From my perspective, It is mostly these images that are our dreams. When we fall asleep in front of a television set, our brains try to make sense of the sounds coming into our ears and give us very weird dreams. So too, our dreams are our brains trying to make sense of emotional energy that it is receiving. Sometimes the signal is strong and sometimes the signal is weak. But, more confusingly, sometimes the signal is our own and sometimes it is from someone else.

What makes it difficult is that the mental images we all have are from experiences, and all of our experiences are different. So, if a lawyer has a dream where they are standing naked in front of all their colleagues, we could guess that they were feeling insecure and unprepared. But, if a stripper had that same dream it wouldn't mean the same thing. However, there are many people who recognize the naked in front of colleagues dream and that is because of the fact we are living in the same cave and have very similar experiences.

So, the long and short of my perspective here is, if we ever wanted to begin communicating more effectively with emotional energy, people would have to parse through their mental images that they know are associated to emotional energy(e.g. dreams) and begin to develop and understanding of the emotional energy/ mental image pairs that we had in common with others. That is, to figure out which emotions evoke what mental images for me, and then find people who share the same understanding. Now, there will never be two people who share all the same emotion/image pairs, so it must start with just the few that some people can find in common.

My brain is empty now... I'll be back when it fills back up.
Have a nice day. C:)

Believe It

In a healthy society, people cannot all believe the same thing. A person who wants to be a good accountant has to have a belief set that is different than a person who wants to be a good salesman. An accountant with the same belief set as a good salesman will end up in jail, and a salesman with the same belief set as a good accountant will starve.

If I were to attempt a prediction of the distant future by looking into my glass of apple juice, I would say that people's religious beliefs will slowly become centered around their professional perspectives and experiences, instead of their cultural and political history. In fact, I think they have already started.

Have fun. C:)

The Evolution of Organized Crime

Consider the evolution of the cheetah and the gazelle. Over the thousands of years, they both pressured each other to run faster and faster. On one hand, the cheetahs would catch all the slow gazelles; then, in turn, the slower cheetahs would starve because they couldn't catch anymore gazelles. And round and round it went until they were both running over 60mph across the Serengeti.

Now, consider a similar interaction between organized crime and law enforcement. Only with these two critters the battle is not about speed, but size, complexity, and influence. It started on a street corner, where a couple of criminals had to hide from the flatfoot cop on the beat. Then, the criminals learned how to bribe the cop and were able to spread to a several blocks. As the crime syndicate grew, local government hired more cops forcing the criminals to figure out how to bribe all the cops... But, then the pressure of efficiency made the criminals to realize that they didn't need to bribe all the cops, just a few of the cops and a few judges. Then, the state government started spending more money to ensure that growing crime syndicate was being confronted, and the crime syndicate responded by moving it's corruption efforts to the state level.

This cycle went round and round until it was the crime families versus the federal government. At which point they learned - in Las Vegas - that it was better to be a corporation, to get rid of their hitmen and hire lawyers instead... And through that avenue they began to corrupt the federal government. It is the same thing that we can see in all the old mafia movies, just at a larger, more complex scale.

And, if you think that the mafia just disappeared in the late 70's and early 80's because the FBI out maneuvered them after so many decades of fighting and evolving... then I would say that you are the most naive person on the planet.

Have a nice day. C:)

Fear As A Fulcrum

Back in 2001 our government passed The Patriot Act. It was a bill that was over a thousand pages of confusing and obfuscating language that no one read and very few could understand. But, they voted on it and passed it because they had plenty of fear to use as a fulcrum. Politicians and pundits were on the television and radio 24 hours a day, selling the bill like used car salesmen. Then, after the bill passed and people had more time to parse the language, they realized what a mistake it was.

Recently, we have seen the Bailout Bill. Another bill over a thousand pages that no one has read and has been sold to the American people like and old Yugo. Let me be perfectly clear in saying that I don't care about the policy - I personally believe the government needs to do something about this economic situation. However, to use fear as a fulcrum to sell an unknown bill is insulting. The American people are being, if not already have been, conditioned to accept that they should not be included in the process of governance; that they should not expect to be able to read or understand any of the bills that go through congress. The American public is being conditioned to simply accept the opinion of their favorite public figure... regardless of their political persuasion. I am certain that this is not a grand conspiracy, but a natural erosion in the structure of a society. Nonetheless, the next step is to do away with the need to sell it to the public at all.

Now, the drums are starting to beat on how we need to nationalize the banks. And, most likely, in one months time there will be another one thousand page bill in congress whose goal is just that. The air waves will be full of politicians and pundits selling the idea that the need to nationalize the banks is an emergency, but no one will know all the details of the bill because no one will actually read it. It isn't hard to see that the only time the politicians do anything anymore is when there is enough fear to use as a fulcrum.

Have a nice day. C:)