From a River of Blue Cement to Joining the Skin Heads

River of Cement Through Drought  Stressed Grass

I love curves, especially of industrial materials since there is a built in contrast, man's industrial shapes tend to be linear and regular and nature's curved and irregular.  So curved and the more undulated the better, a side walk or highway is the better.  Yes, it takes more materials to get from A to B with a snaked road than a straight one, and rapid environmentalists will cry "waste", and governments will cry "we can't afford it---the cost will go up 7.89%".  But it should be clear by now with the chaos that engulfs us more each day, that we might as well enjoy the journey.  We clearly have no idea where we are going, but we can be certain it will be a wild ride.  So am I suggesting that the way to cope with Chaos is to enjoy it?  Well, fellow homo sapiens sapiens, in fact, I am.

Many of you are howling in protest right now:  "Yea, right enjoy madness and watching everything fall apart?!!".  Well, we don't have many good choices right now.  The forces causing the multiple breakdowns we are witnessing are many, powerful, and out of our control.  And that's just the ones we have identified.  Seems like every month or two some brilliant person identifies another.  Just about the time I get used to the idea that our entire government is corrupt, both parties, and for at least three decades, I learn and experience that Texas (my home state and where I live) will soon run completely out of water and the drought may last 4-8 lifetimes as it has in the past every thousand years or so.  Then the NEWS tells me that a top leader in the Kansas State government has been praying for Obama---the President of the United States and good human being trying his best to do the most demanding task since Lincoln during the Civil War---AND he shared his bizarre misuse of religion with his Republican colleagues in the Kansas house---AND none of them reported it since it was done in December.  "The whole damn world has gone crazy" (a lyric by Taj Mahal 20 years ago) pops into my head.  

There are so many things "WRONG" with this, I'll reiterate the most obvious.  First, this man is mentally ill and suffering greatly.  What a horror to live thinking that problems will solved by the death of another.  The only moral and ethical justification for killing is self defense or in defense of loved ones you believe will be killed unless the perpetrator is killed first, and frankly, that is impossible to KNOW.  You kill under those circumstances, and the society may sympathize with you and you may not be punished, but you will never know for sure.  O'Neal has had no contact with Obama so the one justifiable reason to wish for someone's death is impossible.  Jesus of Nazereth taught two primary principles "Love your fellow man" and " Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."  (O'Neal is from Kansas so I assume he is a Christian.).  Then, those who knew failed to report his actions to law enforcement, also failed to help him get medical help.  In Texas those words earn you a mandatory trip to a state mental hospital for a 72 hour evaluation, when that information is presented to a judge by a physician.  That assumes he refuses private psychiatric care.  AND those who knew of the act of treason are accessories by not reporting it to law enforcement.  In this case the FBI investigates; they investigate ALL threats to kill the president even from mental patients.  I know all this because I spent the last 8 years of my medical career working at the State Mental Hospitals in Wichita Falls and Vernon (which is Forensic).

Some have voiced that prayer is private and religious and therefore protected by law.  That is true and I support that in principle.  But when you share your "prayer" with a crowd of people and beg them to join your effort, it is no longer private and the prayer has intentfully made it public, it starts to have a flavor of conspiracy.  How do we know O'Neal didn't have a plot planned to kill the President?  We don't, until the situation is investigated, and there is considerable urgency to finding out since the assassination of a President would be an event that could  cause a shooting revolution.  He seems to be one of the few stabilizing factors in the government, and the world in general.  You may well despise his politics, but to argue that the assassination of a President is a good thing will go nowhere with me, except I may suggest you belong with the Skin Heads.

We've gone from the aesthetics of curves inspired by a photograph of a blue side walk and dead grass, to joining the White Supremists in a page or so.  Hope you weren't bored...

Mo  

"When I'm 64"  dob: 1-31-48

January 31, 2012

Mitt Romney Red Alert

Clash Man vs Nature

Mitt Romney scares the hell out of me. I knew a lot of Mormons when I lived in Seattle, and they are the most rigid and intolerant group of people I have ever known (except for the Jehovah's Witnesses). Romney is a high priest in the Mormon church, and his first allegiance is to their mission to take over the government and turn it into a Mormon Theocracy. And their grand goal is take over the world. How can he pledge allegiance to uphold the Constitution which specifically states the dangers of mixing church and state??? He can't. At best his allegiance is divided.  But I don't believe that for a minute.  His first and strongest commitment is to the Mormon Church and it's goal which are clearly stated: take over and convert everyone.  It may sound far fetched but as President his influence would be highly magnified.  There are already a great many Mormons in the government, especially in the CIA, where there missionary work makes them ideal candidates for CIA missions.  I think the over used "wolf in sheep's clothing" fits remarkably well to describe Romney as President.


He and all the members of his church are traitors in my eyes. And in the 19th centuries their REAL "christ", Joseph Smith and his brothers were killed in one several wars with the US Government. So, they are not opposed to violence in their mission to convert this entire nation, to a way life very similar that in Spain at the time of the Spanish Inquisition. You would be forced to swear that you no longer believe in "Your" Jesus of Nazareth, but the version as taught by Smith. Radical religious groups are much more dangerous than radical political groups because they believe that killing infidels will take them straight to heaven. There is no negotiating with radical religious groups; you either join their faith or they kill you.  Israel has done some nasty things to the Palestinians; but how do you negotiate with groups like Hezbollah and Hamas, who sole purpose in life is to destroy Israel and all those who support them (that means us).

Rippin It Up Fantasy

Justice System & the Plasticity of Memory

The Foggy State of the Legal System

For example, our legal system is based on psychological principals and the Christian idea of "free will", which are just plain wrong.  The US has the highest incarceration rate in the world.  And we make no attempt at rehab, because we don't understand why people misbehave.  The gold standard in trial for capital crimes, is the victim identifying the perpetrator.  Extensive research has clearly demonstrated that our memory is very plastic.  Every time we remember something, we change it a little bit.  It's very similar to how software makes more and more mistakes the longer you use it, because after each use a couple of errors are made in the code as it is re-written onto the hard drive. Eventually enough mistakes are made during the recopying process, that the software makes mistakes.  The parallel in human memory is that when asked a question about the past, we recall the details of the event incorrectly.  We all do this.  Some of us are better at recopying than others (make fewer copying errors), but we ALL make errors to some degree.  There are ways to get some idea about how POTENTIALLY accurate a person's memory may be; but, since we all make mistakes, it makes no sense to ALWAYS believe the physicist with a PhD and an IQ of 160 over the janitor who didn't graduate from high school and has an IQ of 100.  In fact, the human memory is so bad about remembering details of events in the distant past, there is little reason to believe either one of them when questioned about events 15 years ago.  In legal matters, other sources of information should carry more weight than that of a "witness" in cases where events in the distant past are important.  This is the OPPOSITE of the way the current legal system operates.

So it is with the human brain.  Humans, especially the victims who are so emotionally distraught at the time of the assault that they are not paying much attention to the perp in the first place, are actually terrible at identifying the attacker.  Study after study show clearly that victims can identify the perp no better than random chance.  Yet many innocent people, mostly black men, spend their lives in prison, when the only evidence was the victim's ID.  The accused  may have solid alibis, like collaborated proof  that they were in another state at the time of the assault, and a jury will still render a guilty verdict.  There is such pressure to find and punish these perps that from DA to jurors, the rules of law are stretched and bent until reason plays no part in the outcome.  The racist in us wants to believe that the Black man did it.  It's the easy way out for everyone involved, except the innocent accused.  We pretend that there is objectivity in the court room, but there is not; and ,there is certainly no justice.  Anyway, this is the kind of thing I blog about, so give it a try; and, if you like it spread the word: www.biologybehaviorchaos.blogspot.com . So let's get a dialogue going !
Mo

A further comment: please do not assume that I am implying that neuroplasticity is a wholly negative characteristic.  In fact, some major breakthroughs in treating mental disorders have been discovered and put into practice based on this principle. One of the best examples is the work of Jeffrey M. Schwartz, M.D., a leading researcher in brain disfunction. He has been a forerunner in the diagnosis, treatment, and etiology of obsessive compulsive disorder* for decades. He has developed a behavior modification treatment program that not only relieves the patient's profoundly disturbing symptoms; but, over long periods of time, actually produce physiological changes in the brain. Dr. Schwartz's work has raised hope in the medical and neurophysiology communities that other forms of biochemical brain disorders can be treated using this same approach based on this characteristic of the neuroplasticity of the human brain.

* the common concept of OCD is that it is little more than annoying patterns of repetitive behaviors such as compulsive hand-washing.  This was well portrayed by Jack Nicholson in the movie "As Good As it Gets".  However, these OCD individuals are plagued by profoundly disturbing, intrusive thoughts, such as a macabre, recurring thought that they should jump out in front of the next bus that approaches.

For a comprehensive review of this fascinating subject, see The Mind and The Brain by Jeffrey Schwartz.

Where Do We Go From Here?

The End of the Road

Where do we go now?   Part of a dialog with Dave on January 23, 2012; first written

as a response to his comments on Flickr.

Dave, again, your points are valid and well expressed.  I find these issues so compellingly interesting that I wish I could spend all my free time discussing and exploring them.  In order to be prepared to make ethically and practical decisions about specific issues, I feel strongly that we, or whoever is involved in making these decisions, start with basic issues of human values, needs, and the historical context of what systems have been tried in the past, and an objective (as possible) evaluation of how successful or unsuccessful these systems have been.

For example, I think we can agree that what we refer to "liberal" thinking, it can at its extreme lead to a welfare state.  The ultimate example is Communism as practiced in Russia or China.  In those countries the opinion of the individual was disregarded. Therefore a hardwired desire to be rewarded if one works harder and/or is more gifted is ignored. In such a case, the individual feels a growing resentment towards the state because no matter how hard he/she works, the compensation remains the same as those who are lazy.   This has proven, historically, to produce a complete failure.  The economies and every other measure of a society's progress (art, literature, scientific discovery etc.) have been such miserable failures that people live at a subsistence level, except for the government officials who manage to circumvent the "rules" (everybody is treated and rewarded equally regardless of what they do).  The daily worker’s attitude in Russia was famously described by the slogan: "They pretend to pay us and so we pretend to work."  Thus, the end result is the rich vs poor stagnation that was the standard of the aristocracies of the middle ages.  So, too much government doesn't work.

Rainbow Waters in Ladybird Lake

At the other extreme, no government, complete "laize faire" leads to a society where the strongest and most privileged (those born smarter and physically stronger and/or into families with wealth), end up taking everything from the weaker and less fortunate, who are then functionally slaves, even though they have been called different names in different cultures at different times (peasants, serfs, lower class, etc.).  That doesn't work either, as seen in many modern societies like Iraq, Libya, and a host of others.  Eventually, the elite become lazy, take their positions of superiority for granted and stop being more productive that anyone in the masses.  Simultaneously, after a few generations the lower class get sick of no reward for their efforts, and the automatic rewards of anyone with a certain last name, and rebel. When talk and promises eventually fail, violence breaks out and a bloody civil war ensues.  Usually, the rich win, but not always.  Still, the pattern is very predictable and repeats itself ad nauseum.  This is simple tribalism, the most basic form of organization of the human race, only it involves larger numbers of people and better weapons so people die faster.  This has come to a dead end because technology has developed to the point where the use of our best weapons will result in everybody dying. No one wins. 

Bad NEWS

You Crossed the Line, Now the Consequences

Bad NEWS You are Going to Loose

To: US Congress, their supporters, and lord and masters: The Super Rich

Written February 4, 2012                            Amended: February 5, 2012

Well, now comes the bad news.  You and all those who are trying to take over this country by defying the Constitution, silencing and then disposing of the troublesome middle class, are going to loose.  The forces that think they are in control and motivated by money and greed have made the classic and fatal mistake when they "think" they are in control: you have vastly underestimated the strength of the "enemy".  This is the first rich vs. poor revolution in history where the "poor" (including the shrinking but still powerful middle class) is just as well educated,( smarter than the rich lawyer in congress) and armed to the teeth. Thanks to the NRA, the public has military grade weapons (and a stockpile of ammo) that are superior to that of the police who have restrictions on the weapons they can use.  So "the party in control" passionately opposed by the majority of the American people who are smarter and just as well educated, greatly outnumber your police puppets (who in Austin side with the citizens), and can respond to anything the plodding government tries to do because of the superior skills in using information technology through the internet.  Your leadership is weak and not resourceful.  The leadership is already directionless because President Obama has outwitted them and tricked them into supporting, and voting for, 2 of his pieces of legislation.  It was only 5 months ago that Harry Reid, Majority Leader of the Senate announced that they were in control and if Obama was for a piece of legislation, they would vote against him (with of course no consideration for the American People.)  So, Harry is busy eating crow: and, will have several more servings as the GOP flails about trying desperately to secure their control and shut up the opposition.  Acting out of panic and desperation will result in a comical series of ill-conceived measures that will be crushed like the pathetic attempt to limit the use of the internet, which was taken care of by the 99% due to barrage of letters to Congress : the bill was crushed by a vote 10:1. The Senate wisely postponed the vote of their version of the internet restriction bill "indefinitely".  So, how are you going to win this “war” of taking away the peoples’ rights?

You didn't even think the middle class would protest much; but, would just stay home and watch the 1% take over and destroy Medicare and end all government support for public services, only funding the military in order to protect American economic interests anywhere in the world. By the way, the rest of the world already thinks of us as “bullies”. The tremendous respect we had enjoyed and deserved since WWII was totally destroyed by GW Bush who killed hundreds of thousands of Muslims in a totally unjustified war in Iraq, in addition to killing thousands of Americans.   Did you notice that the media never reported casualty figures for “the other side”? After all, they were all “infidels” to the fundamentalist Christians and deserved to die, since they were going to hell anyway for not believing in Christ as their Lord and Savior.

From the Work of Marshall McLuhan to the Eminent Hard Fall of the GOP, Part 2

Treason as clearly Stated in the Constitution. These groups that would take over our government and turn this country into a Theocracy defy the Constitution and the rights of every American, and have the audacity to think that their 15% can and should tell the rest of us what to do. The likely Republican candidate for president is Mitt Romney, a leader in one of several groups that advocate Treason (he is a Morman who have the most dysfunctional and controlling families I have ever met.)  They are appropriately referred to as a sect and have many parallels to the Taliban, rigid Islamic fundamentalists who want a return to the practices of Islam in the 700’s.  The only difference between the Taliban and their American counterparts is their use of violence to enforce their wishes on others. In the West we already have a terrifying example when Church and State are integrated and intolerant:  the Spanish Inquisition which made it a crime, punishable by death, to hold any other religion.  The Spanish “invented” torture and “terrorism” during this reain of terror.  They were successful, they killed or ran off the Jews who were the brains behind every aspect of Spain's prominence in science, trade, military power, navigation etc.  After the Inquisition, Spain’s power and influence dropped rapidly and they have not been heard from since.

I hate to break the news to the GOP, who four short months ago announced that "we are in control and if Obama is for it (an issue) then we are against it, and vote it down", but you guys are going down, soon and hard. Their approval rating is 17% only 2 points above the % of the radical right; and Obama's approval rating is 40% and rising. Obama has a huge lead in funding and Romney is no match for Obama in a debate. The leadership vacuum in the GOP is pathetic, when a man like Rick Perry even merits consideration as a presidential candidate. The nationally televised police brutality ordered by Mayor Bloomberg in NYC, who made up reasons to disperse these peaceful demonstrators, which they have a right to do as stated, again, in the Constitution, have pushed a lot of moderate Americans off the fence into the Obama camp. I could go on but if you haven't gone to sleep, in a few short months, Obama has gone from "he hasn't got a chance (GOP assessment) to front runner by a wide margin, and will continue to widen as the GOP and their sad leadership continue to make mistake after mistake.
Look where TV has taken us...
Mo



Political Summary Starting with the Work of Marshall McCluhan, Part 1

Political Summary starting with McCluhan’s  predictions from "Understanding Media, the Extensions of Man” (c.1960)

January 17, 2012

  

In response to an image on Flickr which depicts a forest scene with a TV floating in the air with an image of the same forest on the screen:

            I love the implication here, TV has become "the truth";  even to the point that when we are in a natural environment, we "believe" the TV before we believe the environment  that we can and are experiencing with our own senses in the present. This is a perfect example of what Marshall McCluhan (a Canadian futurist at McGill) predicted in the late 50's. His main work was "Understanding Media: the Extensions of Man".   

McCluhan points out, as bicycles, cars, and airplanes are extensions of our feet; electronic media( TV, radio, computers )are extensions of our nervous systems to the point that the inputs far overwhelm, on a daily basis, our evolved capacity to cope with such massive amounts of mental stimuli. Thousands of generations of homo sapiens lived their entire lives without a single new bit of information. That is until methods of mass communication began with writing about 10,000 years ago; and, then exploded with the invention of the printing press in 1440 by Gutenberg, which made extraordinary (for that day and time)  a one hundred fold increase in the ordinary persons' acsess to new information.

McCluhan's main point is about mechenasms that we use to cope with this overwhelming onslaught of data. This is to ignore or block most of it out by primitive defense mechanisms like denial and avoidance. Being unconscious of this process makes us very vulnerable to unconsciously make poor choices about what data we avoid or deny. It is clear that in the past forty years this is exactly what has happened. The weary family returns home from an overly stimulating environment at work and school. They all plop down on the couch and "tune in to whatever is on the TV". Truly, TV is, in effect ,a narcotic for the masses. They ignore each other and stop or avoid helping each other with their problems.

It's no wonder that politicians with devious and nefarious ambitions have been able to take complete control of the government from county/city to Congress, as the majority of people who used to pay attention to politics are now totally distracted by fantasy programs on TV.
Now, as we awaken from our unconscious denial and avoidance, we find that the superrich and control freaks (anti-social personality disorder) have completely taken away our constitutional rights and freedoms, and left us with a system based on fear, greed and corruption.

Our new "rulers" now arrogantly assume that they are  in control; and ,there is nothing the middle class (the one major factor preventing their total unopposed power)  will not allow them to do. (they can ALMOST do that now).
But the Lion (the rebellious spirit that is fully alive and potent)  in us is waking up.  The  so called “99%” that have been abused and neglected for 2 decades are seeing the direction we are going. They are disturbed and furious at what they see.

The internet that makes all knowledge available to anyone at any time or place, has opened the world's eyes to the plot to destroy our democratic republic and replace it with a midievil type aristocracy, with 3% of the superrich residing over the remaining 97% who will become wage slaves. The 99% is furious to see the future from the Radical Eyes of the Radical Right whose main goal is to overthrow the Government at every level and turn it into a fundamentalist Theocracy. This plan as endorsed by several radical “Christian” groups, would be a nightmare for generations to come. Such religious rigidity and  persecution was the main reason many of the Founding Fathers ancestors immigrated to the infant colony at great risk and with uncertainty.  That is why the founding Fathers put so much emphasis on Separation of Church and State.

Mo