No time today for working myself into a lather. Nope. This morning I’m cleaning out corners and posting bust bunnies. I collect them, you see …
Although the following almost reads like verse, it’s actually the search engine parameters that led people to this blog over the last two days … see graphic for proof of just how weird some folks are:
Search
baby octopus
girl panties
sex girl panties boxers
“sam parnia”
sandra hanks
anne dickinson wine
tearsscraps for mans
expat seychelles
i am not trying to resuscitate my youth i just happen to be crazy about big tits
opinions against adoption
poems about ejaculation
tiny girl panties
paradisepreoccupied
crying is ok for men poems
sam parnia aware results
nomad
plastic bbobs
johnny g spinning vocabulary
large schlong
a man is good in ruins
a man is a god in ruins
putting on my big girl panties
tits pointing up
meaning of scrabbel
teenage pedofiles
And now for some of my words by the meter ….
This one just popped out this morning … thanks to Robbie …
The Sacraments
Water drip
Salt to lip
Hand that baby over
Tiny room
doom and gloom
all that’s just to cover
tongue to host
holy ghost
Quite the cool maneuver
Pick a name
now you’re tame
Don’t contain your fervor
Troth to plight
wedding night
doesn’t bind a lover
Finished toil
unction oil
No, you won’t recover
In a grave
no one saved
Now, finally, it’s over
Here’s something that’s been hanging around for quite a while:
Cleo, Queen of Denial
It’s dark, they say
but, no,
it’s light
that’s how before me sits the sight
of gems and riches passed compare
and look!
that wall has seen repair
he’s false, they say
but, no,
he’s true
that’s how before me grand he grew
solid, strong and faithful through
and see!
his life begins anew
he’s drunk, they say
but, no
he’s sleeping
that’s how I sit here without weeping
works so hard, he needs his rest
and so
it looks I pass the test
And, just for fun …
Legends in Their Own Mind
There’s no such thing as a man who fishes
insisting I eat filling dishes
There’s no such thing as a flapping git
freaking out ’bout getting bit
There’s no such thing as a guitar man
any star living so far, and
there’s no such thing as someone’s lover
who hopes I never blow his cover
There’s no such thing as an Italian
who thinks he could be called “The Stallion”
There’s no such thing as an army man
whose life lay in another land
There’s no such thing as a drummer boy
who finds in Jesus all his joy
There was the one who took my breath
but, fuck, he ended up with Death
No … all were no more than a dream
that in my waking moments scream
“Please keep it all a mystery!”
No problem, Loves,
you’re history.
Today’s topic is biocentrism … and, yes, I’m out of my fucking mind even beginning to go there on a Saturday morning in November, especially after an evening involving wine … and starts with its seven principles:
1. What we perceive as reality is a process that involves our consciousness. An “external” reality, if it existed, would by definition have to exist in space. But this is meaningless, because space and time are not absolute realities but rather tools of the human and animal mind.
2. Our external and internal perceptions are inextricably intertwined. They are different sides of the same coin and cannot be divorced from one another.
3. The behavior of subatomic particles, indeed all particles and objects, is inextricably linked to the presence of an observer. Without the presence of a conscious observer, they at best exist in an undetermined state of probability waves.
4. Without consciousness, “matter” dwells in an undetermined state of probability. Any universe that could have preceded consciousness only existed in a probability state.
5. The structure of the universe is explainable only through biocentrism. The universe is fine-tuned for life, which makes perfect sense as life creates the universe, not the other way around. The “universe” is simply the complete spatio-temporal logic of the self.
6. Time does not have a real existence outside of animal-sense perception. It is the process by which we perceive changes in the universe.
7. Space, like time, is not an object or a thing. Space is another form of our animal understanding and does not have an independent reality. We carry space and time around with us like turtles with shells. Thus, there is no absolute self-existing matrix in which physical events occur independent of life.
Got that? No … me neither.
I’ve been giving this thought since learning about that whole particles need observers to do much thing, chicken/egg/cart/horse thinking that shakes my brain like a rattle in the hand of Insane Demon Baby.
It’s this article in the Huff post that handed the noise toy to the toddler-from-hell-living-in-my-head this morning, luring me in by speaking directly to me in the opening sentence:
Why do you happen to be alive on this lush little planet with its warm sun and coconut trees?
Why, indeed.
Although the bit about the coconut trees is nothing but overkill, the Why are you here? question is one I ask often, although usually framed differently: What the fuck do you think you’re doing? … How the fuck did you end up here? … Now what?
Although those questions-posed-to-self are often self-focused, I do ponder the point of me in the greater sense … What is the point of me and him and her and them and those thingies over there? … and the article puts the little in little ole me:
How did inert, random bits of carbon ever morph into that Japanese guy who always wins the hot-dog-eating contest?
In short, attempts to explain the nature of the universe, its origins, and what’s really going on require an understanding of how the observer, our presence, plays a role. According to the current paradigm, the universe, and the laws of nature themselves, just popped out of nothingness. The story goes something like this: From the Big Bang until the present time, we’ve been incredibly lucky. This good fortune started from the moment of creation; if the Big Bang had been one-part-in-a-million more powerful, the cosmos would have rushed out too fast for the galaxies and stars to have developed. If the gravitational force were decreased by a hair, stars (including the Sun) wouldn’t have ignited. There are over 200 physical parameters like this that could have any value but happen to be exactly right for us to be here. Tweak any of them and you never existed.
Okay, so I’m a statistical probability as remote as my coconut tree sprouting legs and jogging on the beach … and so are you, neener neener neener.
Or not.
Indeed, according to biocentrism, it’s us, the observer, who create space and time (which is the reason you’re here now). Consider everything you see around you right now. Language and custom say it all lies outside us in the external world. Yet you can’t see anything through the vault of bone that surrounds your brain. Your eyes aren’t just portals to the world. In fact, everything you experience, including your body, is part of an active process occurring in your mind. Space and time are simply the mind’s tools for putting it all together.
Biocentrism states that nature does not exist simply to be used or consumed by humans, but that humans are simply one species amongst many, and that because we are part of an ecosystem, any actions which negatively affect the living systems of which we are a part, adversely affect us as well, whether or not we maintain a biocentric worldview. Biocentrists believe that all species have inherent value, and that humans are not “superior” in a moral or ethical sense.
There is no doubt my dog’s version of me varies greatly from mine, as does mine from hers, and since both she and I exist on the same plane … or veranda, as is the case at the moment … each reality is as valid as the other.
I find the notion of biocentrism in both cosmology and ethics more than interesting, but it falls short for me, lacking just a bit of the imagination it would take to move it just a smidgen beyond the biology that gives the theory its name.
It’s consciousness that seems the point, the indefinable, unmeasurable dimension of consciousness, and it’s biology that limits our capacity to fully grasp what must be accessible when the biojar that contains consciousness is eventually jettisoned.
As Einstein put it:
“A human being is part of a whole, called by us the Universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
Although there are plenty of peeps whose consciousness is suspect … yeah, they watch Fox News … it’s still the elephant in every room — the invisible, densely-packed-empty-vacuum, infinitely there-and-not-there-always-never powering the deus ex machina life inserts to cause all to lose the plot, yet save the day after day after day.
In the case of that ‘particles need observers’ deal, it’s not the fact that eyeballs are aimed in the general direction, it’s that consciousness is, and as Ray Charles proved beyond doubt, functioning eyes are no requirement for soul.
Much like a tortoise is not the shell, yet defined by it … since without a carapace it’s either dead or not a tortoise … we are not our biology. It does define us and, like the tortoise, it also CONfines us.
Einstein again:
“My feeling is religious insofar as I am imbued with the consciousness of the insufficiency of the human mind to understand more deeply the harmony of the Universe which we try to formulate as “laws of nature”.
It’s the limiting nature … biology … of the human mind that makes so illusive the far reaches of consciousness, not the other way round, and it’s the consciousness that makes everything else, including the biology. It follows, then, that we are more than our physical form. We’re like tequila … whether it be rotgut or nectar de dioses … most of our potential is wasted while in the bottle.
What’s the difference between a theoretical physicist and me?
For starters, in the last third of my life I’m writing a book about wild sex, but can only dream of getting a grip on mathematical formulas, while today’s premier theoretical physicist … also of a certain age … publishes volumes based on complicated math, and can only dream about wild sex.
I would never presume to have anything in my head that comes anywhere close to the vast stores of knowledge the professor carries around. The man is a genius whose dumbing-down for the masses even gives me a massive headache.
I have read “A Brief History of Time” … many times … yet still can’t even begin to wrap my head around a black hole, those massive light-gravity-time suckers that he not only understands, but can prove.
Nope. I’m a simple poet; a writer of fluff and nonsense and speeches and status updates, a mere mortal handicapped from birth with a math aversion.
So … there are some differences.
But, what’s the same? We both dream. And we both think. We both ponder.
And one of the things we ponder separately in our parallel universes … his being the rarified atmosphere of academia, while mine is this island … is time.
Over the past days I’ve been watching all the YouTube vids available on the Professor, the topic of time and his theories on traveling through it and have come up with another difference between us.
Professor Hawking sees time travel as an eventual possibility given the physics involved and future potential for building the sort of equipment necessary to take advantage of the laws of the universe and travel fast enough to hit the groove of time’s warping.
I see it as a sure thing for every one of us as soon as we manage to get rid of the sort of equipment that makes it impossible.
Although I have no doubt that he’s spot on with the numbers, it seems the Prof is missing the point … or, rather, making a point that will end up being rather pointless, which is, after all, what theoretical science is often about, adding to the wealth of knowledge humans can mull.
One thing science knows is that the law says nothing in the universe can travel faster than light; Hawking puts this well within even my grasp when he clearly signposts 186,000 miles per second as the universal speed limit. Interestingly, anything approaching that speed has funny things happening to time, and as Einstein so succinctly put it with his E = mc2 thingy — go that fast and you’re no longer you, but the energy of you, which is kind of the same, but different. Go just a bit slower and you’re still you, but what passes for a year in some places happens in a week.
The equation E = mc2 indicates that energy always exhibits mass in whatever form the energy takes. Mass–energy equivalence also means that mass conservation becomes a restatement, or requirement, of the law of energy conservation, which is the first law of thermodynamics. Mass–energy equivalence does not imply that mass may be “converted” to energy, and indeed implies the opposite. Modern theory holds that neither mass nor energy may be destroyed, but only moved from one location to another. In physics, mass must be differentiated from matter, a more poorly defined idea in the physical sciences. Matter, when seen as certain types of particles, can be created and destroyed, but the precursors and products of such reactions retain both the original mass and energy, both of which remain unchanged (conserved) throughout the process.
Yeah … headache stuff, but stick with me …
So … mass / energy. What are we? At the moment, both, and that’s where the time travel thing goes tricky. Check this:
“The brain is the ‘local’ creator of time, space and space-time as our special maps of reality we ‘observe’ and participate in” (Catalin et al., 2005). “Time is a fundamental dimension of life. It is crucial for decisions about quantity, speed of movement and rate of return, as well as for motor control in walking, speech, playing or appreciating music, and participating in sports. Traditionally, the way in which time is perceived, represented and estimated has been explained using a pacemaker–accumulator model that is not only straightforward, but also surprisingly powerful in explaining behavioral and biological data. However, recent advances have challenged this traditional view. It is now proposed that, the brain represents time in a distributed manner and tells the time by detecting the coincidental activation of different neural populations (Hitchcock, 2003).
Linear time “past-present-future” is psychological time. Physical time is run of clocks in a space. Motion that we experience through psychological time happens in space that is timeless; past, present and future do not exist in space. There is no physical time existing behind run of clocks.
Somethings to think on …
The brain creates time. Space is timeless. “Matter, when seen as certain types of particles, can be created and destroyed, but the precursors and products of such reactions retain both the original mass and energy, both of which remain unchanged (conserved) throughout the process.”
And the kicker: Time is a fundamental dimension of life.
Yep. There’s the key to time travel … kick the life habit.
The body of knowledge gathered from Near Death Experiences, a misnomer since the peeps reporting back were not near death but dead, suggest the limits imposed by our biology.
A recent study by Dr. Sam Parnia (despite his acknowledgment that he was initially a skeptic), shows that such patients are “effectively dead”, with their brains shut down and no thoughts or feelings possible for the complex brain activity required for dreaming or hallucinating; additionally, to rule out the possibility that near-death experiences resulted from hallucinations after the brain had collapsed through lack of oxygen, Parnia rigorously monitored the concentrations of the vital gas in the patients’ blood, and found that none of those who underwent the experiences had low levels of oxygen. He was also able to rule out claims that unusual combinations of drugs were to blame because the resuscitation procedure was the same in every case, regardless of whether they had a near-death experience or not. According to Parnia, “Arch sceptics will always attack our work. I’m content with that. That’s how science progresses. What is clear is that something profound is happening. The mind – the thing that is ‘you’ – your ‘soul’ if you will – carries on after conventional science says it should have drifted into nothingness.”
Although Richard Dawkins would disagree with my self-evaluation, I consider myself an atheist. Dawkins, you see, considers us nothing more than our biology, when I see our physical form the least of us but having more to do with science than anything god-given.
What the heck, heh? It’s a Jedi master that sums it up in my book:
Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter.
Okay, Yoda is very much not Stephen Hawking, and the limits of the imagination that created him still have that future depending on flying machines. (We’re hooked on gadgets, we are … and I’d blame it on being a boy thing, and could be right about that. Look back at visions of the future past and recognize that we’re not getting around in flying cars, but we ARE connected by the millions, and what comic book ever had Skype superheroes?)
Machines are still where the mind goes because we’ve yet to get a grip on the fact that when the mind goes we have no need of the bloody machines. We are no more our brains, nor our brains us, than our hearts are the repository of our love.
Given the brevity of the human lifespan, it’s no wonder that the idea of traveling through time during it captures the imagination. Truth is, though, I suspect, that it’s old hat to us as we bounce around in time and space, but beyond our capacity to recall … seeing the home movies we have of vacation from flesh and bone only run in our sleep.
Another Sunday presents with Pope poop … how kind of the old git to continue to religiously supply me with fodder.
Today, he’s in Spain on one of his most blatant panderings yet, a mass at the Sagrada Familia, a church that’s been under construction for 128 years and won’t be completed until 2026.
The Sagrada Familia was designed by Antoni Gaudí (1852–1926), who worked on the project from 1883 and devoted the last fifteen years of his life entirely to the endeavour. In 1882, prior to Gaudí’s involvement, Francesc del Villar was commissioned to design a church on the site. He resigned a year later and Gaudí was appointed the project architect, redesigning the project entirely. The project is scheduled to be completed in 2026. On the subject of the extremely long construction period, Gaudí is said to have remarked, “My client is not in a hurry.”
Apparently, that’s no longer the case. Me thinks Old Ben has an agenda.
Only 14.4% of Spaniards regularly attend mass, and legal changes to allow divorce, gay marriage and abortion have caused concern to the Church.
Yeah … that might be it.
Plus, since the church doesn’t give a peseta toward the construction, the fundraising ops are good, too.
Jordi Bonet Armengol, the current chief architect, said he hoped the Pope’s visit would provide the boost needed to finish the construction, which is funded by private donations and visitors’ fees.
“He will bring a message of spirituality and it’s a stimulus to finish the work,” he told the Reuters news agency.
And, of course, being a church and all, Catholic at that, is has to be about the money … none of which dribbles from the bursting coffers in Rome.
Visitors can go into the Nave, Crypt, Museum, Shop and up the Passion and Nativity towers. An entry fee of €12 for adults, €10 for students, and €8 for children (prices as of July 2010) is payable for the Nave, Crypt, Museum, and Shop. Access to the towers (Nativity Façade and Passion Façade) is now only possible by lift (€2.50) and then walking up the remainder of the tower, over the bridge between the towers and descent via the opposite tower by spiral staircase. Previously, visitors were able to walk up the towers for free. As of August 2010, there will be a new service of fast entering. Visitors can buy their tickets at any Servicaixa ATM (part of ‘La Caixa’) or on the internet at servicaixa.com. They will get a code with which they can enter the Temple via a fast line. The service has a fee of €1.30 extra.
Construction on Sagrada Família is not supported by any government or official church sources. Private patrons funded the initial stages.Money from tickets purchased by tourists is now used to pay for the work, and private donations are accepted through the Friends of the Temple.
I’m not saying it’s not worth the price of admission … it most certainly is. The building is impressive, a melting toffee of religious iconicity that, along with other Gaudi structures, defines Barcelona.
You think the guy would be grateful for all the free shit he’ll be enjoying in Spain, but with all his usual grace he instead chooses to walk in swingin’ …
In Santiago de Compostela on Saturday, he warned of an “aggressive anti-clericalism” in Spain which was akin to that experienced during the 1930s.
The comments were a reference to the civil war era, during which Republicans killed thousands of priests and nuns, and burned churches.
Whoa … hold the fucking phone! Does he really have the nerve to bring THAT up?
After the army revolted against the Republican government of Spain in 1936, Franco quickly rose to be the leader of the insurrection, which was supported by the Catholic Church. Franco’s propaganda presented him as a modern Catholic Crusader: “The analogy was given the sanction of the Church on 30 September by the long pastoral letter, entitled ‘The Two Cities’, issued by the Bishop of Salamanca Dr Enrique Pli y Deniel. The Church had long since come out in favour of the military rebels but not hitherto as explicitly as Pli y Deniel. His pastoral built on the blessing given by Plus XI to exiled Spaniards at Castelgandolfo on 14 September in which the Pope had distinguished between the Christian heroism of the Nationalists and the savage barbarism of the Republic. Pli y Deniel’s text quoted St Augustine to distinguish between the earthly city (the Republican zone) where hatred, anarchy and Communism prevailed, and the celestial city (the Nationalist zone) where the love of God, heroism and martyrdom were the rule. For the first time, the word ‘crusade’ was used to describe the Civil War.” The text was submitted to Franco before being published.
Any reason you can see for the Spanish to be a bit peeved?
It wasn’t just the athiest anarchists and socialists that the Catholic Church wanted Franco to slaughter: anyone who even believed in democracy was executed: “Indeed, the Republican will to resist was kept alive only by the fear born of Franco’s much-publicized determination to eradicate liberals, socialists and Communists from Spain.
So, here’s Old Ben, old enough to remember well where the fuck that “aggressive anti-clericalism” started, spouting off his warnings amidst his fundraising. What an asshole.
Not counting soldiers on the Republican side actually killed in the fighting, the probably total of executions carried out by Franco was in the vicinity of 2 million.The Catholic Church not only did not make any effort to stop the slaughter. Priests reported citizens who had not attended mass during or before the Civil War; that in itself was enough to result in execution.
Yes, those numbers may be disputed … the WIKI cites only 500,000 executions with other dead tacked on here and there … but there’s no doubt about the church-sanctioned murder and brutality that was Spain in those years.
Today, however, folks will show up in droves … and, yes, there is a cattle reference there — mooooo … to watch the spectacle of on old man in a dress hold up what he says is a piece of a dead guy’s flesh in an unfinished building to pull in some bucks while attempting to gloss over yet more disgusting behavior and bitching at everybody at the cost of millions.
‘Tis the season to be jolly over a wide range of holidays celebrated by loads of people in various points on the globe and things brighten up considerably after the ghoulish glee of Halloween in the US and Dia de los Muertos in Mexico as the lights go on in India.
The name Diwali is itself a contraction of the word “Deepavali”, which translates into row of lamps. Diwali involves the lighting of small clay lamps (diyas) (or Deep in Sanskrit: दीप) filled with oil to signify the triumph of good over evil. During Diwali, all the celebrants wear new clothes and share sweets and snacks with family members and friends.
I did my bit today by stopping into the Indian-owned shops I frequent with wishes for a Happy Diwali and was treated to big smiles, lovely whiffs of incense and a gander at more-than-usually elaborate alter offerings. The Hindu temple in town will be hoppin’ tonight!
Unlike in the Christian world where only one version of any given holiday is deemed acceptable and all those pagan vestiges like putting trees in houses and hunting for colored eggs are considered mere fluff, those of various beliefs embrace Diwali for a host of different reasons.
Where the Hindus in some regions spend their holiday worshipping Lord Ganesha and mark the marriage of Lakshmi to Vishnu, those in Bengal dedicate the festival to Mother Kali, their goddess of strength.
The Jains use the occasion to celebrate the moment Mahavira attained Nirvana:
Diwali has a very special significance in Jainism, just like Buddha Purnima, the date of Buddha’s Nirvana, is for Buddhists as Easter is for Christians. Lord Mahavira, the last of the Jain Tirthankaras, attained Nirvana or Moksha on this day at Pavapuri on Oct. 15, 527 BC, on Chaturdashi of Kartika, as Tilyapannatti of Yativrashaba from the sixth century states:
Mahavira is responsible for establishing the Dharma followed by Jains even today. According to tradition, the chief disciple of Mahavira, Ganadhara Gautam Swami also attained complete knowledge (Kevalgyana) on this day, thus making Diwali one of the most important Jain festivals.
For the Sikhs, the lights have a glow all their own:
Diwali is a Hindu festival of lights that was appropriated by the Sikhs to celebrate the release from prison of Guru Hargobind, the sixth Guru, from prison in 1619. The Golden Temple was illuminated with lights to welcome the Guru home, and Sikhs continue this tradition by lighting lamps on Diwali each year. The Golden Temple is illuminated with thousands of lights.
There are, of course, roots trailing all the way back to the earth, as all religions to if you follow the path far enough:
Deepavali marks the end of the harvest season in most of India. Farmers give thanks for the bounty of the year gone by, and pray for a good harvest for the year to come. Traditionally this marked the closing of accounts for businesses dependent on the agrarian cycle, and is the last major celebration before winter. Lakshmi symbolizes wealth and prosperity, and her blessings are invoked for a good year ahead.
No matter what the specific focus of worship, there’s a shared perception of Diwali that I find … well … illuminating:
In each legend, myth and story of Deepawali lies the significance of the victory of good over evil; and it is with each Deepawali and the lights that illuminate our homes and hearts, that this simple truth finds new reason and hope. From darkness unto light — the light that empowers us to commit ourselves to good deeds, that which brings us closer to divinity. During Diwali, lights illuminate every corner of India and the scent of incense sticks hangs in the air, mingled with the sounds of fire-crackers, joy, togetherness and hope. Diwali is celebrated around the globe.
So, Happy Diwali to all! No matter what your belief may be, light and good deeds deserve celebrating!
Where to start? That’s a tough one this morning because this story in the Huff Post is wonky on so many levels. Of course, it was the headline that drew my attention: Retired Chaplains Come Out Against DADT Repeal, Citing ‘Religious Freedom’.
Sure, I knew pissed off was coming, but I am surprised that I can still be surprised by the complexity of convolutions possible when minds warped by religion put bent thinking to words. I’m in no fit state for eloquent this early on a Saturday in paradise, so you’ll be settling for the annoying sound of sarcasm dripping.
Before wading in, however, let’s start by watching Bill Maher deliver a new rule.
Done? Good.
Moving right along …
Dozens of retired military chaplains say that serving both God and the U.S. armed forces will become impossible for chaplains whose faiths consider homosexuality a sin if the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy is thrown out.
…
“The bottom line is religious freedom,” said retired Army Brig. Gen. Douglas Lee, one of 65 former chaplains who signed a letter urging President Barack Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates to keep “don’t ask, don’t tell.”
Amazing how the word “freedom” is deemed to have so much oomph when it follows “religious”, ain’t it? It’s ever-so-much more vital that bigotry is allowed to flourish than pushing for any recognition that what consenting adults get up to in the privacy of their own pants in no one’s fucking business, is it?
Of course, we’re not just talking run-of-the-mill clergy here, but those dedicating their careers to serving the military. Hm.
The Southern Baptist Convention, the Roman Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church in America, the Presbyterian Church in America, and the Rabbinical Alliance of America have issued statements or written to the Obama administration this year with their concerns that repealing “don’t ask, don’t tell” could force their chaplains to choose between serving God and serving the military.
Now THERE’S potential for a quandary. Salute, or genuflect? What is the chain of command? Wonder if that’s ever come up before … like … hm … maybe when sending troops out to kill and be killed over some bullshit tale of WMDs?
The Orthodox Church in America, for example, condemns homosexuality and mandates that the appropriate action its ministers should take toward gay people who seek counseling is to steer them to repent and renounce the gay lifestyle.
“If such an attitude were regarded as ‘prejudice’ or the denunciation of homosexuality as ‘hate language,’ or the like, we would be forced to pull out our chaplains from military service,” the church informed the Pentagon in May.
I’m thinkin’ more along the lines of dishonorable discharge, actually … and maybe a lawsuit.
Anyone who can make a living passing the plate and the pap for the armed forces should damned well know how to keep their yaps shut; loose lips do more than sink ships, so GET OVER IT!
Can’t let this bit of hypocrisy by:
The Catholic Church likewise deems homosexual behavior a sin.
“This means that Catholic chaplains must show compassion for persons with a homosexual orientation, but can never condone – even silently – homosexual behavior,” Archbishop Timothy Broglio said in a June letter calling for “don’t ask” to remain in place. Broglio leads the Archdiocese for Military Services and is the church’s chief liaison to the military.
Oh, paaaaallllllleeeeeeeease! Since when, Archie? Your unit has been silently condoning, dodging and covering for priests jumping into any old fox hole for a long, long time, so shut the fuck up.
And get this:
Every officer in the military, including chaplains, is evaluated in an annual report. One criterion is whether the officer supports the military’s equal opportunity policy. If gays and lesbians are included in that policy, careers of chaplains who criticize homosexuality could suffer.
WTF? IF gays and lesbians are included? That suggests that they are not up til now, even under DADT, which I have to assume means that the confidentiality of the confessional hasn’t been a happening thing. Wonder what the catholic god who made that rule has been thinking. Probably understands that he’s been outranked.
The hint of the century
Consider this
The slip that brought me
To my knees failed
What if all these fantasies
Come flailing around
From the Huffington Post, this, from David Briggs titled, “An Inconvenient Truth: More Religious Freedom Means Less Religious Conflict”, starts off the day.
Citing info in a new offering from Cambridge University Press, The Price of Freedom Denied”, Briggs makes the point well that ramming religion down the throats of anyone is a very bad idea with horrific consequences.
The more severe the levels of religious restriction, the greater the risk of violent persecution, the authors found. Forty-four percent of governments interfering with the right to worship had more than 200 cases of violent religious persecution; only 9 percent of countries with freedom of worship had similar rates of abuse.
And I will add … or NOT to worship … a point he’s not making, but I so am.
Hate crimes motivated by a religious bias have been reported to the FBI in nearly all 50 states for every year in the 21st century. In 2006, there were documented reports of one person being killed, 178 assaulted and 718 properties damaged or destroyed due to religious bias.
Although this article focuses mainly on the Ground Zero Mosque and stuff about zoning, my thinking goes more toward those not even included in those numbers, the kids who were literally bullied to death with religion granting the right to bully at the same time the right to love is denied.
Like it or not, religious nut jobs, you do not get to win this one. Really. Just because you’ve imbibed the anti-whatever Kool-Aid does not mean anyone else has to take even a sip.
“We don’t have a law against offending anyone’s sensibilities,” said political scientist Anthony Gill of the University of Washington. “This is just the messiness of democracy.”
You’d think the religious would be most in favor of religious freedom, but that is never the case. So convinced are they of their “rightness”, everyone else MUST be wrong, and that translates to running up their own asses and spending a whole load of time in the dark. Slinging shit is the logical outcome.
Seems the lack of light has so many missing so much of the actually point …
“The clear message is that even though religious freedoms are inconvenient, they’re the very thing that diffuses religious tensions,” Finke said. “Their religious freedoms are my religious freedoms.”
religion
re-li-gion [riˈlijən] noun: the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, esp. a personal God or gods
From a Roman Catholic priest dripping water on my tiny brow as an infant, to the forced placing of tabs of LDS on my pre-teen tongue, to Jehova’s Witnesses disturbing afternoon delight sessions and beyond, attempts to shove religion down my throat have come often in my life. Thanks to a rather thick skin, an agile mind and a father who found it all more than a bit ridiculous, I managed to get by without swallowing the Kool-Aid, no matter what the flavor.
I don’t simply consider myself non-religious, but anti, and as any student of just about any bit of history can account, there’s good reason to take aim at the faithful when accepting blame for horrors is the target. (Check out the data here for a look at the part religion had played in genocides in just the last 60 years.)
Yesterday’s post addressed issues of religion-inspired hatred and its present-day deadly impact on people who happen to love folks with similar equipment and provided some insights from really smart guy Frans de Waal that, alongside discussions happening in my world these days, have me thinking about what might be the reverse of “religion”.
Of course, the religious would suggest words like ‘evil’, or ‘infidel’, or ‘unsaved’, or ‘headed for hell on a rail’, or simply ‘damned’, while others might put forth ‘atheist’ or ‘secularist’ to fill in the posed blank.
Dr. de Waal proposes that the possibility of a blank at all is not likely:
Any framework we develop to advocate a certain moral outlook is bound to produce its own list of principles, its own prophets, and attract its own devoted followers, so that it will soon look like any old religion.
As often happens when I’m seeking info, it presents, as it does today in this article in the Huff Post that echos the good doctor’s thoughts without meaning to.
The author, Chris Stedman is a self-proclaimed “atheist promoting religious tolerance and interfaith work” … a designation I find confusing.
His take seems to be that atheists are somehow bound to spend time and energy trying to talk people down from their religious … what? … perch? … pedestal? … pulpit? … whatever … and convert them to atheism.
Sure, there is Richard Dawkins, vociferous and strident and poster child for what Stedman … and others … refer to as “Evangelical Atheism”, but compare the number of Dawkins in the world with the legions of bishops, elders, imams, priests, missionaries and others proselytizing the length and breadth of Planet Earth and you can’t help but come back with the idea that touting un-touting is a rather lonely endeavor.
Stedman says otherwise, but without attribution, so I’m not sure where this comes from:
When a large and vocal number of atheists say that their number one goal is convincing people to abandon their faith, it comes as no surprise that our community is construed as extreme and aggressive.
Personally, I’m a big fan of going toe-to-toe with those carrying the cross of luring people to accept Jesus Christ as their personal trainer … or whatever … as both the arrogance and the dangers involved in doing that just piss me off. This has much to do with recent events that have me drawing a line in the sand and trying on the idea of fighting intolerance with intolerance, being a bit frustrated with all the other cheek turning us non-believers are famous for. Being “construed as extreme and aggressive” actually sounds okay to me. After all, if you wanna end war and stuff, ya gotta sing loud.
Which brings me back to the Stedman piece:
“I may lose all of my credibility for saying this,” I said with a chuckle, “but I have zero interest in talking people out of their religious beliefs. The only religious beliefs I take issue with are ones that infringe on individual freedoms — for example, when someone’s religious belief informs their conviction that I, as a queer person, should not be free to marry whoever I choose. But their belief in God, when it does not contribute to actions that inhibit my liberty, is of no concern to me.”
EXACTLY.
Who gives a flying fuck what someone else holds dear as a belief? I couldn’t care less if folks think dancing naked around a pile of mangos will assure them of fruit in the afterlife … if wishing upon a star will grow them wings … if imagining a bit of stale bread to be some dead guy’s skin … go for it! Think of something wacky and live your life according to your wackiness. Just don’t screw around with anyone else’s whack unless you’re invited … and it’s a party … and your own doesn’t depend on getting theirs to match yours. Oh … and you’re not making a few bucks out of the deal.
Where Stedman loses me, however, is where he approaches that line Dr. de Waal so aptly defined … where what results comes out looking “like any old religion” … in other words, here:
It’s just a hypothesis, but I wonder if fewer nonreligious people would actively try to dismantle religious communities if we had a more coherent community of our own. Perhaps if we spend less energy negatively “evangelizing,” we’ll find ourselves well positioned to reach out in ways that build bridges instead of tearing them down.
He suggests reaching out to religious liberals and moderates in efforts to work together, an idea that feels like missing the point.
For starters, where’s the common ground between people who believe that the world began 6,000 years ago in the Garden of Eden and those who know that’s just stupid? Okay … maybe those people aren’t religious liberals. Maybe moderates understand the science behind geology and astronomy and evolution and have somehow modified their take on just how literally the bible should be interpreted, and if that’s the case, what is there to talk about?
If one side of the table sees homosexuality as evil incarnate and the other side is gay, where’s the starting point for discussion? If the religious group has no problem with what and who the gay group does in the privacy of their own pants, what’s the issue?
Religious liberals and moderates who keep their thoughts to themselves, support the rights of others, care for their kids and don’t kick the dog are pretty much like the average, everyday secularist, so the only reason I can see for trying to get some sort of coalition going might be called politics. I’m okay with that, but it also misses the point.
“Active dismantling” is appropriate when the fact is that religious fuckwads go out of their way to ram their warped agenda down and around the necks of any- and everyone. Their methods range from the devious — It’s our duty to save you from damnation — to the militant — God hates fags! — and pervasive. They’re also panicked by the idea that people may begin thinking for themselves, so bloody aggressive in their manipulation of hearts and minds.
Here’s a disgusting example of that manipulation … a video sent by a church to junior high kids to get them to save the souls of their classmates:
Shocked? Revolted? Horrified by the minds that would put that together for CHILDREN? Deeply concerned about the kids who had that dumped upon them? I certainly hope so …
When was the last time you had a secular humanist or atheist even so much as knock on your door to tell you you’re doomed, doomed, I say! (Or even: You’re an idiot.) … please read this pamphlet? That happens like almost never … and when it does, it’s only to make a point … like the guys in this video.
There’s also the issue of smarts. Anyone who actually believes the bullshit fed to them by any religion insisting that they own the rights to all right, that every other idea that can occur to anyone is not only wrong, but inherently evil, has to be either dumb as a shovel or capable of a disconnect to rival Sybil and therefore not a good candidate for any position that could make any difference to anyone under any circumstance.
Building bridges can be a nobel undertaking, but not always possible. When the divide is so wide the other side can’t even be imagined, much less seen, it’s often better to mind the gap. Of course, if the other side starts lobbing grenades, throw ’em back!
Yeah, yeah … it’s bad form to discuss politics and religion in polite company. Shoot me now, but I’ve never been able to take either of those issues off the table no matter how well behaved fellow talkers may be, even though I’m well aware of how pointless debate on the topics always is.
Up until recently, my world has been mainly peopled by those whose biggest religious difference amounted to disagreements over how god-like they were … or weren’t, that being closer to my view. Lately, though, the potential scope of the divide created a rift valley that makes the one in Africa seem no bigger than the gap between my two front teeth … a cute little trademark (I’ve been told) that only becomes inconvenient when I bite into hot pizza.
Of course the debate rages and rears its ugly head one hell of a lot lately. Much of the blame for the spate of suicides amongst gay teens lately can be laid directly at the genuflected knees of the christian self-rightous, and the Tea Party race to pull the US back to 19th century thinking divides the country in ways that are hard to follow, much less absorb.
No idea why it’s taking three paragraphs to get to the point of this post, but this article from the NY Times is what I’m all about.
Written by one of my personal heroes, Dr. Frans de Waal, and titled “Morals Without God?”, it says it all brilliantly, making and substantiating points I consider unassailable on evolution and altruism, on religion and logical reasons for, and on atheism in its various manifestations.
Take for example Dr. de Waal’s observations on the deeper meanings of “inequity aversion” in chimps … a process whereby chimpanzees don’t like it one bit when things aren’t fair:
According to most philosophers, we reason ourselves towards a moral position. Even if we do not invoke God, it is still a top-down process of us formulating the principles and then imposing those on human conduct. But would it be realistic to ask people to be considerate of others if we had not already a natural inclination to be so? Would it make sense to appeal to fairness and justice in the absence of powerful reactions to their absence? Imagine the cognitive burden if every decision we took needed to be vetted against handed-down principles. Instead, I am a firm believer in the Humean position that reason is the slave of the passions. We started out with moral sentiments and intuitions, which is also where we find the greatest continuity with other primates. Rather than having developed morality from scratch, we received a huge helping hand from our background as social animals.
I find it interesting that hardcore atheist Richard Dawkins shares at least part of the view held by christians that postulates humans are born flawed, although his idea of gaining redemption has more to do with socialization than baptism and salvation.
Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish.
Frans de Waal disagrees and gives evolutionary biological arguments in favor of our species having more good going for us that we realize.
Even though altruistic behavior evolved for the advantages it confers, this does not make it selfishly motivated. Future benefits rarely figure in the minds of animals. For example, animals engage in sex without knowing its reproductive consequences, and even humans had to develop the morning-after pill. This is because sexual motivation is unconcerned with the reason why sex exists. The same is true for the altruistic impulse, which is unconcerned with evolutionary consequences. It is this disconnect between evolution and motivation that befuddled the Veneer Theorists, and made them reduce everything to selfishness. The most quoted line of their bleak literature says it all: “Scratch an ‘altruist,’ and watch a ‘hypocrite’ bleed.”
Then later in the article:
Mammals may derive pleasure from helping others in the same way that humans feel good doing good. Nature often equips life’s essentials — sex, eating, nursing — with built-in gratification. One study found that pleasure centers in the human brain light up when we give to charity. This is of course no reason to call such behavior “selfish” as it would make the word totally meaningless. A selfish individual has no trouble walking away from another in need. Someone is drowning: let him drown. Someone cries: let her cry. These are truly selfish reactions, which are quite different from empathic ones. Yes, we experience a “warm glow,” and perhaps some other animals do as well, but since this glow reaches us via the other, and only via the other, the helping is genuinely other-oriented.
The idea that god separates us from the animals and makes humanity human, meaning that without a god people would revert to savagery … or never would have left it … is addressed very well, right after this quote from Al Sharpton that echos a wide belief in religious circles: “If there is no order to the universe, and therefore some being, some force that ordered it, then who determines what is right or wrong? There is nothing immoral if there’s nothing in charge.”
Similarly, I have heard people echo Dostoevsky’s Ivan Karamazov, exclaiming that “If there is no God, I am free to rape my neighbor!”
Perhaps it is just me, but I am wary of anyone whose belief system is the only thing standing between them and repulsive behavior. Why not assume that our humanity, including the self-control needed for livable societies, is built into us? Does anyone truly believe that our ancestors lacked social norms before they had religion? Did they never assist others in need, or complain about an unfair deal? Humans must have worried about the functioning of their communities well before the current religions arose, which is only a few thousand years ago. Not that religion is irrelevant — I will get to this — but it is an add-on rather than the wellspring of morality.
Nope … it’s not just you Doc!
Even Martin Luther King Jr. … a man of the cloth and professionally religious … appeared to understand that we’re equipped the at least some of the right stuff when he said, “Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness,” although he may well have gone on to insist that can only be done under certain well-dictated formulas.
I get it that ignoring the science is a huge part of the system that keeps the faithful from questioning, as Dr. de Waal puts it: Deep down, creationists realize they will never win factual arguments with science. This is why they have construed their own science-like universe, known as Intelligent Design, and eagerly jump on every tidbit of information that seems to go their way.
What I don’t get is how that continues to happen in a modern world with high literacy rates. Sure, we once filled in the gaps of our knowledge with fantastical fairy tales … that was a function of language … but eventually learned that the world is round, that thunder isn’t anyone yelling at us, that smoking really isn’t good for a body and where babies come from.
We’re nowhere near the end of our learning, but it is interesting how some choose to cherry-pick what science they buy and what gets rejected out-of-hand. Our brains are bigger than those of other primates, (but don’t have any extra parts, so it’s plain enough our relation), yet they seem to have a better handle on what it takes to form and maintain cohesive societies with no need of some dude sitting in judgement to keep them from annihilating each other and the world around them. We started at the same place, so where did we screw it up?
It’s a human thing, as Dr. de Waal points out: Humans are so sensitive to public opinion that we only need to see a picture of two eyes glued to the wall to respond with good behavior, which explains the image in some religions of an all-seeing eye to symbolize an omniscient God.
We strive for a logically coherent system, and have debates about how the death penalty fits arguments for the sanctity of life, or whether an unchosen sexual orientation can be wrong. These debates are uniquely human. We have no evidence that other animals judge the appropriateness of actions that do not affect themselves. The great pioneer of morality research, the Finn Edward Westermarck, explained what makes the moral emotions special: “Moral emotions are disconnected from one’s immediate situation: they deal with good and bad at a more abstract, disinterested level.” This is what sets human morality apart: a move towards universal standards combined with an elaborate system of justification, monitoring and punishment.
So, that’s what it’s all about: justification, monitoring and punishment. That says a mouthful, don’t it? It takes a human to us/them, and doesn’t that just work out so well. Not. Why anyone would choose to deny common roots with non-human primates is as puzzling to me as why some insist that homosexuality is a choice without wondering why anyone would jump into that very difficult life. Apparently humans on the whole need to relinquish person responsibility, need to judge and be judged and base actions on results.
I leave the summation to Dr. de Waal:
I take these hints of community concern as yet another sign that the building blocks of morality are older than humanity, and that we do not need God to explain how we got where we are today. On the other hand, what would happen if we were able to excise religion from society? I doubt that science and the naturalistic worldview could fill the void and become an inspiration for the good. Any framework we develop to advocate a certain moral outlook is bound to produce its own list of principles, its own prophets, and attract its own devoted followers, so that it will soon look like any old religion.
I can just hope we eventually evolve to be a bit smarter ….
I’ve lost my chirpy cheerfulness
and don’t know where to find it
Checking headlines daily
leads me elsewhere in my mind, it
sets me wondering the point and
checking corners all behind it
for some reasons or some rhymes, at least
that just might be combined, it
comes out lacking every time, though,
and I do not dare malign it
The news just proves the world is fucked
Even I can read that sign. Shit.
“Loving the Damned”
Hell fire’s a burning
for those who’re not turning
toward some dude in sandals
(Do fire up some candles!)
Some dead, bearded Jews
with weird taste in shoes
Started, way back, a movement
that, although a cool groove, meant
Some thousand years later
“grace” gets granted to haters
of all who don’t follow
those footprints so shallow
I do see the point
of those “sent” to “anoint”
all these legions of sinners
since each score makes them winners
in some book that addresses
what they think the mess is.
It’s just too bad the scripture
often means “We’ll just rip yer
a new one, because
we’re not buying your picture.”
So for for those who might love me,
yet think they’re above me,
(as if “right” is exclusive)
I don’t make no excuses
I say no to a saviour
and trust that my behavior,
although loaded with drama,
will pay off in my karma.
I cannot be saved,
my road is well-paved
with years of experience
completely engraved.
If it’s deep in a heart
that that sets me apart,
that hell fire’s my fate,
there’s no reason to wait
for this monster to rear
since I know I would hear
“You’re wrong, Luv, it’s over
We’re finished, my dear.”
A collection of my short stories:
I'm in this one, too ...
And I'm in here, as well ...
Paradise Preoccupied 