I was reading an article the other day about self-esteem and it talked about happiness as being man's ultimate goal, that self-esteem is crucial to happiness and that self-esteem all begins with the feeling that you are worthy of living.
Yeah, sure, like bugs all feel worthy of living and they've been around millions of years longer than we have and will probably be around for eons after we have extincted ourselves. But we're not bugs, you say? Oh, no? What then are we? We walk around this planet like we're big shots for awhile and then -bingo-we're gone forever. For eternity, no more. Nothing. And what are we when we're here? Even some of those who claim to have insight say that we're nothing but dust, from dust we came, to dust we shall return. That should give us a pile of self-esteem. Yeah!
And we are so dishonest. We have this very special brain, we say, with a way of thinking that's better than than every other living species' way of thinking. There are maybe 30 millions of species and we are numero uno, we think. That's where we've placed ourselves. Top of the heap! Why not? Can any other species solve algebraic equations? O recite an alphabet backwards? Or fly to the moon? We must be great!
But let truth be known...we don't know one thing more than the tiniest bug with the tiniest brain about life itself: What's the point of it all? How'd we get here? Who sent us here? Why are we here? Where do we go when we leave here?. We just love thinking about all these "deep" things, when truth be told we don't know know know the answer to any of them. Not think or believe or imagine or dream, but know know know.
And with regard to this wonderful brain of ours:
* it gives us the power to choose, and we frequently choose not to use it
* we often confuse facts with fiction
* we make logical flaws and fallacies, errors and mistakes
* we believe beliefs=reality
* we think because we want it to be so, it is so
* we live as if all of the above are not true.
Animals, on the other hand, except maybe for a lemming or two, are evolutionarily programmed to always do what is the right and best thing for them to do!
We study philosophy and psychology and sociology and theology and most of us wind up in mindless, uninspiring and unsatisfying work, suffering from despair, disappointment and disillusion. Happiness is our professed goal but it is the rooster that crows each morning.
We've come up with open heart surgery and kidney transplants and drugs drugs drugs for every human ailment, disease and condition, real or imagined, and our life expectancy is 75 years...the turtle's is 100 (do they have shell transplants?) and it's a whopping 220 years for the deep sea clam. We wouldn't last ten seconds in a fight with a big cat, a polar bear can smell its prey 20 miles away and we can barely tell which way the wind is blowing. And despite pesticides of deadly force, it is the cockroach that is winning the war...and it and not us that would survive a nuclear holocaust. Some numero uno!
We talk up a good storm about justice and virtue and decency but in fact no two of us would define any of those terms the same way, nor agree how they should be applied, nor in fact do we usually think of them when making decisions in our lives. We often say one thing and do another. Power corrupts, we say, but we want it; money is the root of evil but we'll do most anything t get all we can; we preach humanity but when push comes to shove, we often treat humans like... like, bugs.
It's all a joke, isn't it?
Friday, June 12, 2009
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
YOUR EMINENCE
The error in the concept of eminent domain begins with its name. Neither the word "eminent", meaning prominent or preemptive, nor "domain", meaning territory over which absolute dominion is exercised, properly applies to the government and your private property. The Founding Fathers were dead wrong when they granted the government the power of eminent domain in the Constitution.
Your inalienable right to life inextricably includes your right to acquire, use and dispose of property as you and you alone desire. My alleged needs...the public's alleged needs...have NO proper claim on your property. Your rights cannot morally be made the subject of a forced sale AT ANY PRICE. The government, as is true for everyone, must deal with through your unique human power: your power to choose. To deny you a choice to sell your property or not, is to remove you from the human race and dump you into the animal kingdom. Where there are no rights.
I am tired of hearing the constant and inappropriate sanctification of the Founding Fathers. Their idea of centering our country around the sovereignty of the individual, rather than around a group or the government, was enlightened. And daring. For that wisdom alone they are deserving of honor and praise.
But they were not omniscient nor error proof. They countenanced slavery, they relegated women to second class citizenship, they attributed our rights to an unknown, unknowable god rather than to our visible and knowable nature. And they erred by granting the government the power to alienate our inalienable rights via misnamed eminent domain.
Your inalienable right to life inextricably includes your right to acquire, use and dispose of property as you and you alone desire. My alleged needs...the public's alleged needs...have NO proper claim on your property. Your rights cannot morally be made the subject of a forced sale AT ANY PRICE. The government, as is true for everyone, must deal with through your unique human power: your power to choose. To deny you a choice to sell your property or not, is to remove you from the human race and dump you into the animal kingdom. Where there are no rights.
I am tired of hearing the constant and inappropriate sanctification of the Founding Fathers. Their idea of centering our country around the sovereignty of the individual, rather than around a group or the government, was enlightened. And daring. For that wisdom alone they are deserving of honor and praise.
But they were not omniscient nor error proof. They countenanced slavery, they relegated women to second class citizenship, they attributed our rights to an unknown, unknowable god rather than to our visible and knowable nature. And they erred by granting the government the power to alienate our inalienable rights via misnamed eminent domain.
Sunday, June 7, 2009
THE ETERNAL QUESTION, ANSWERED
The most frequently asked and unanswered question in the world is: "What is the meaning of life?" It is sometimes asked as "What is the purpose of life?", and though the words are different, the question remains at its core the same. "What is it all about? Why are we here? Is there a substance, a significance, to our lives beyond what we can see?" are all the same question. Who hasn't wondered about the meaning of life and felt somewhat dismayed and lost in the absence of a clear cut answer?
I began my quest for an answer by examining what people do...unique things that are done by humans, and humans alone...in the hope that the meaning of life may be found in the doing of life. Here is my list:
We discern beauty in the Universe.
We fashion our own identities.
We contemplate the unknown.
We poetically and musically express our feelings.
We care for other species.
We invent and create new beauty.
We celebrate.
What, I wondered, what the world be like without us, without the glorious arts and spirituality and devotion and honor and romance...and candlelights and helping hands and smiles?
Man is traditionally thought to be the last Creation for it is only man that perceives the world in all its splendor. There would be no rainbow without a human eye to see it, a human heart to adore it, a human soul to be exhilarated by it. Without man, things would be only what they are...a tree, a cloud, a waterfall, a sunset. With man, they become exquisite things of grandeur, and wonder, evoking feelings of significance and importance to existence...and to the treasure of the moment.
The answer to the eternal question is clear:
I began my quest for an answer by examining what people do...unique things that are done by humans, and humans alone...in the hope that the meaning of life may be found in the doing of life. Here is my list:
We discern beauty in the Universe.
We fashion our own identities.
We contemplate the unknown.
We poetically and musically express our feelings.
We care for other species.
We invent and create new beauty.
We celebrate.
What, I wondered, what the world be like without us, without the glorious arts and spirituality and devotion and honor and romance...and candlelights and helping hands and smiles?
Man is traditionally thought to be the last Creation for it is only man that perceives the world in all its splendor. There would be no rainbow without a human eye to see it, a human heart to adore it, a human soul to be exhilarated by it. Without man, things would be only what they are...a tree, a cloud, a waterfall, a sunset. With man, they become exquisite things of grandeur, and wonder, evoking feelings of significance and importance to existence...and to the treasure of the moment.
The answer to the eternal question is clear:
THE PURPOSE OF HUMAN LIFE IS TO
EVOKE THE MAJESTY AND MAGNIFICENCE
OF THE UNIVERSE...
AND IN THE PROCESS ILLUMINATE
ITS OWN GLORY
EVOKE THE MAJESTY AND MAGNIFICENCE
OF THE UNIVERSE...
AND IN THE PROCESS ILLUMINATE
ITS OWN GLORY
Saturday, June 6, 2009
A CALL FOR FREEDOM
Twi judicial rules:
Under the 5th Amendment to the U. S. Constitution, no person shall "be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself."
The judicial subpoena power allows a judge to order someone to testify in a case involving another party if that person's testimony is thought to be relevant to the case.
So a person may be forced to testify against others but not against himself. From where I sit, those two basics of American jurisprudence are clearly contradictory.
The classic reasoning given for the rule against self incrimination is that it precludes a government from using abusive kangaroo court tactics to obtain confessions and convictions by making those confessions unreliable and inadmissible. But if that reasoning is valid, then it ought also be applied to preclude the government from using abusive tactics to obtain subpoenas.
And if subpoenas are believed to eliminate the abuse problem, why doesn't it also do so in regard to self incrimination?
Interesting, too, that our system excludes spouses from having to testify against each other. Justice, apparently, is not as socially important as happy marriages. Other family relations and friendships are not so protected and vulnerable to the subpoena power.
It is argued by some that no one with relevant information regarding a case involving a third party could have any moral reason to withhold such information...that the failure to testify as to known facts could contribute to an injustice being perpetrated in the courtroom. and make the person refusing to testify a contributor to that injustice. If that is so, which it appears to be, why does that argument not override the 5th Amendment? If we advocate, and herald the glory of, justice, should we not want it for ourselves as well?
The resolution of the self incrimination/subpoena contradiction is this:
We are each free and the government has no right to force us to do anything other than as punishment for a criminal conviction. ANYTHING.
Freedom is an absolute, or we are not free.
No moral goal can be obtained at the cost of our freedom, no matter how noble, how desirable, that goal may seem to be.
The government solution to every perceived problem must be made with the protection of our freedom, and not the abuse or limitation of it. No exceptions.
The subpoena power must go.
Under the 5th Amendment to the U. S. Constitution, no person shall "be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself."
The judicial subpoena power allows a judge to order someone to testify in a case involving another party if that person's testimony is thought to be relevant to the case.
So a person may be forced to testify against others but not against himself. From where I sit, those two basics of American jurisprudence are clearly contradictory.
The classic reasoning given for the rule against self incrimination is that it precludes a government from using abusive kangaroo court tactics to obtain confessions and convictions by making those confessions unreliable and inadmissible. But if that reasoning is valid, then it ought also be applied to preclude the government from using abusive tactics to obtain subpoenas.
And if subpoenas are believed to eliminate the abuse problem, why doesn't it also do so in regard to self incrimination?
Interesting, too, that our system excludes spouses from having to testify against each other. Justice, apparently, is not as socially important as happy marriages. Other family relations and friendships are not so protected and vulnerable to the subpoena power.
It is argued by some that no one with relevant information regarding a case involving a third party could have any moral reason to withhold such information...that the failure to testify as to known facts could contribute to an injustice being perpetrated in the courtroom. and make the person refusing to testify a contributor to that injustice. If that is so, which it appears to be, why does that argument not override the 5th Amendment? If we advocate, and herald the glory of, justice, should we not want it for ourselves as well?
The resolution of the self incrimination/subpoena contradiction is this:
We are each free and the government has no right to force us to do anything other than as punishment for a criminal conviction. ANYTHING.
Freedom is an absolute, or we are not free.
No moral goal can be obtained at the cost of our freedom, no matter how noble, how desirable, that goal may seem to be.
The government solution to every perceived problem must be made with the protection of our freedom, and not the abuse or limitation of it. No exceptions.
The subpoena power must go.
Friday, June 5, 2009
WHAT CHANGES TIME HAS WROUGHT
I have been thinking lately of how life has changed since my childhood some three score and eighteen years ago. Many changes...high speed travel via jet supersonic planes, expansion of worldwide human contact via television and the Internet, the explosion of many social constraints, and more...are readily visible and significant. But what is of interest to me is a much greater subtle change that has taken place, a consuming change with seemingly endless manifestations and Earth-shaking effects .
It is thet transformation of the world from a mind-centered, contemplative, spiritual focus to that of a body centered, physical, sexual one.
Think of learning. When I was a child, studying the ways of ancient tribes and peoples was of interest in and of itself. We wanted to know all we could about those that had come before us...they were our ancestors, our history. And we wanted to know about their lives and the civilizations they had created not because it would help us to get a job and make more money and acquire more things... but to fill a hunger we had in our minds to learn all we could about precious life and the beautiful world we lived in. The payoff for knowledge was in our souls not our pocketbooks.
Human virtues of honor and respect and compassion and benevolence and honesty and justice were of paramount value because each individual life was of paramount importance. We cared that others were well. We stooped to lend a helping hand. We smiled in recognition of those we passed on the street --recognition that the glory of human life related us. And whether one believed a god had created all life, or not, was not the issue. Human life was considered to be holy, in its secular meaning of worthy of devotion and respect.
And because of that, we dealt with each other differently. We talked with each other. We wrote letters to each other. Telephones were answered by humans, not machines. And we listened. What other people knew was something that we might benefit from knowing, what other people believed might be worth our considering.
The music we enjoyed was mostly soft and melodic, with words that expressed feelings of tenderness and beauty. The dances we danced were joyful and loving. Today, the music is blaring, raucous, with words of anger and unrest. The dances are sexually explicit gyrations meant to provoke and inflame. The physical rules.
We know why the use of drugs in our society is rampant. It is because the quick temporary physical fix drugs may offer is seen as of greater import than the inevitable long term mental anguish and despair the drugs bring with them. The physical outscores the mental.
Success in life in the past was measured by how well a life had been lived...how honorably and nobly and humanely a life had been lived. Wealth and celebrity and power were not the measure of a man, as they are today. The size of his heart was!
I forever believe that what distinguishes us from all else is our minds and our souls. They are deserving of primacy in our lives. Again.
It is thet transformation of the world from a mind-centered, contemplative, spiritual focus to that of a body centered, physical, sexual one.
Think of learning. When I was a child, studying the ways of ancient tribes and peoples was of interest in and of itself. We wanted to know all we could about those that had come before us...they were our ancestors, our history. And we wanted to know about their lives and the civilizations they had created not because it would help us to get a job and make more money and acquire more things... but to fill a hunger we had in our minds to learn all we could about precious life and the beautiful world we lived in. The payoff for knowledge was in our souls not our pocketbooks.
Human virtues of honor and respect and compassion and benevolence and honesty and justice were of paramount value because each individual life was of paramount importance. We cared that others were well. We stooped to lend a helping hand. We smiled in recognition of those we passed on the street --recognition that the glory of human life related us. And whether one believed a god had created all life, or not, was not the issue. Human life was considered to be holy, in its secular meaning of worthy of devotion and respect.
And because of that, we dealt with each other differently. We talked with each other. We wrote letters to each other. Telephones were answered by humans, not machines. And we listened. What other people knew was something that we might benefit from knowing, what other people believed might be worth our considering.
The music we enjoyed was mostly soft and melodic, with words that expressed feelings of tenderness and beauty. The dances we danced were joyful and loving. Today, the music is blaring, raucous, with words of anger and unrest. The dances are sexually explicit gyrations meant to provoke and inflame. The physical rules.
We know why the use of drugs in our society is rampant. It is because the quick temporary physical fix drugs may offer is seen as of greater import than the inevitable long term mental anguish and despair the drugs bring with them. The physical outscores the mental.
Success in life in the past was measured by how well a life had been lived...how honorably and nobly and humanely a life had been lived. Wealth and celebrity and power were not the measure of a man, as they are today. The size of his heart was!
I forever believe that what distinguishes us from all else is our minds and our souls. They are deserving of primacy in our lives. Again.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
THE FABRIC OF SOCIETY
I
and YOU
and YOU and YOU
and YOU and YOU and YOU
are a society
which has no greater rights
no greater powers
no greater entitlements
than do
I
and YOU
and YOU and YOU
and YOU and YOU and YOU
and YOU
and YOU and YOU
and YOU and YOU and YOU
are a society
which has no greater rights
no greater powers
no greater entitlements
than do
I
and YOU
and YOU and YOU
and YOU and YOU and YOU
Monday, June 1, 2009
I SUSPECT
I SUSPECT most television reality shows are not totally reality, but are manipulated by show producers, when deemed propitious, to increase the number of viewers and advertising revenues.
I SUSPECT the amount of self-esteem a person has directly correlates with the amount of courage he or she has.
I SUSPECT that most Americans still believe America is a democracy where majority rules, when that form of political system is nothing more than bullyish mob rule.
I SUSPECT that the price that has fallen the most during my lifetime is the price at which most people would sell their souls.
I SUSPECT nothing distinguishes people more than their love of, or lack of love of, mathematics.
I SUSPECT the human species will one day be extinct, made so by cataclysmic nuclear miscalculation.
I SUSPECT the reason why there is no reason logical reasoning is not taught in our public schools is that if there were a reason not to teach it, that would be the most powerful reason to teach it.
I SUSPECT some of us have died and don't know it, which is the way it is, after all.
I SUSPECY one day soon sex will have had its day and man's prime desire will be chocolate lattes topped with whipped cream.
I SUSPECT if there is another dimension to which we go after we die, it does not have automated phone calls.
I SUSPECT caveman had the best of it -- no jobs, no money cares or concerns, no shaving, no traffic, no alimony, lots of fresh air and sitting around bonfires, and the freedom to spend abundant time communimg with nature and contemplation.
I SUSPECT that spanking a child is one of the vilest human actions since it teaches a child that violence is an appropriate way to achieve goals, that prior proclamations of love are of little value, and it fails to teach the child what the child needs to know: why the actions that spurred the spanking were improper.
I SUSPECT that worrying about every little thing in your life ultimately gives you something important to worry about: your mental health.
I SUSPECT that many of us don't know what our lives are all about because they aren't.
I SUSPECT most people say both "I love you" and "Go to hell" far too quickly.
I SUSPECT that one day cats will evolutionarily come to realize how smart they are and rule the world, which they already do in some households.
I SUSPECT the amount of self-esteem a person has directly correlates with the amount of courage he or she has.
I SUSPECT that most Americans still believe America is a democracy where majority rules, when that form of political system is nothing more than bullyish mob rule.
I SUSPECT that the price that has fallen the most during my lifetime is the price at which most people would sell their souls.
I SUSPECT nothing distinguishes people more than their love of, or lack of love of, mathematics.
I SUSPECT the human species will one day be extinct, made so by cataclysmic nuclear miscalculation.
I SUSPECT the reason why there is no reason logical reasoning is not taught in our public schools is that if there were a reason not to teach it, that would be the most powerful reason to teach it.
I SUSPECT some of us have died and don't know it, which is the way it is, after all.
I SUSPECY one day soon sex will have had its day and man's prime desire will be chocolate lattes topped with whipped cream.
I SUSPECT if there is another dimension to which we go after we die, it does not have automated phone calls.
I SUSPECT caveman had the best of it -- no jobs, no money cares or concerns, no shaving, no traffic, no alimony, lots of fresh air and sitting around bonfires, and the freedom to spend abundant time communimg with nature and contemplation.
I SUSPECT that spanking a child is one of the vilest human actions since it teaches a child that violence is an appropriate way to achieve goals, that prior proclamations of love are of little value, and it fails to teach the child what the child needs to know: why the actions that spurred the spanking were improper.
I SUSPECT that worrying about every little thing in your life ultimately gives you something important to worry about: your mental health.
I SUSPECT that many of us don't know what our lives are all about because they aren't.
I SUSPECT most people say both "I love you" and "Go to hell" far too quickly.
I SUSPECT that one day cats will evolutionarily come to realize how smart they are and rule the world, which they already do in some households.
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