Australian Politics
28 May 2012 Leave a Comment
I am writing this mostly for my own university review process:
Liberalism:
Emphasises the importance of the individual and their value, with the ability for the individual to decide how they live their life through individual freedom. The state exercises coercive power over a geographical area (territory). Liberals believe that the state is necessary to preserve order and protect individual rights, but are wary of the state’s potential for power abuse threatening individual rights and liberties.
There are many examples of states imposing on people’s individual rights and freedoms and an individual’s right to do (x) thing is often core to many debates. Some examples are: Reproductive freedoms, euthansia, substance use and sexual rights. But, many others are argued including, seatbelts, helmets, speed limits, right to free speech, right to free association, right to free belief.
Democracy:
Democracy is a separate concept to liberalism. Democracy is a type of governance which allows the people to rule themselves – ie. rule by the many/the people. Representative democracy has taken precedence in the modern age, allowing a hierarchy for democratic governance, due mostly to logistical issues.
Representative democracy is controversial in some circles, as it appears to water down the people’s ability to self-govern. Democracy can also threaten the rights and freedoms of the individual through the “tyranny of the majority”, lynch crowd mentality etc. people who are in minority groups are often suceptible to discrimination and often the need for safety is used to remove or potentially remove individual rights and liberties.
A Liberal Democracy aims to create safeguards in order to circumvent these problems.
Liberal Democracy:
In Australia, we have a representative democracy with regular and competitive elections and universal adult (18) suffrage, liberal democracies vary in many ways though. There are protections on democratic rights, such as freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, although in Australia this is mostly by convention, rather than legislation. Political pluralism is also a necessary facet, as this allows for a wide range of views to be expressed and discussed, rather than legislating one particular paradigm or another.
Government is limited in certain ways, such as its requirement to rule by law, meaning it has to adhere to a process rather than someone’s idea of how to use their political powers. Governments are also required to follow a constitutional framework, which outlines the powers and processes of government. Power should be fragmented and dispersed to disallow power to grow in one place or another. A strong civil society is another element, as it ensures the government does not pervade in to all walks of life.
Different liberal democracies put these concepts in to place in different ways.
The British (Westminster) system uses the concept of responsible government to limit executive power. Responsible government has been eroded by strong, disciplined partisan politics. Responsible government is a concept which operates mostly through convention.
The US system does not have this conventional concept of reponsible government, with government power dispersed and limited instead.
Australia has a blend between the two above described forms of government. Australia has a formal constitution, but we are heavily dependent on constitutional conventions; Commonwealth dominance over the states, but dispersed power through federalism; Government dominance over the House of Represenatives but a strong Senate (through different voting methods); Prime ministerial dominance but regular elections with a variety of parties.
Political parties are a crucial part of our system, but the vote share of the major parties has fallen, as has identification with the parties. The party system is strongly shaped by the electoral system. First Past The Post tends to mean a two-major-party system will arise. Preferential is less likely to allow this to happen.
The media has changed the nature of politics as technologies have emerged, especially with the rise of the 24 hour news cycle. This has led to the rise of what has been deemed the “PR state”.
Some suggest that changes in the media have led to a watering down of some ideologies in political parties, leader-focussed campaigns (personality driven) and a weakening of party identification.
Thank you Nick, that’s ok Nick.
In Lak’ech Ala K’in
The Loom
27 Apr 2012 Leave a Comment
The creature that exists below the surface of the water. Living and dying in the vast wetness, never knows the feelings of the landfolk.
The creature with few cells working together has very limited sensory experience.
The tree that stands for hundreds of years comprehends a very different world from that of the catepillar, eating its leaves.
Every uttered piece of communicatory data weaves interconnected worlds.
Looking backward from this very moment – every single thing in the Universe has interweaved to create what you experience now.
The human who knew the world was flat, who knew beyond the forest lurked monsters and mayhems comprehended a much different world from the one you do now.
The comprehension you have now also knows a horizon. The surface of the water, the conglomeration of cells, the lifespan and force of the tree, all the communicated data in one place, the falling of the fourth dimensional barrier and this moment. The horizon is a place of infinite possibility, as all horizons tend to seem before we reach them.
What lies beyond? What lies outside the dark, further than the light?
Consciousness everywhere… I address you. Don’t be afraid of the bubble’s boundaries. Don’t let the bubble crush you. End the dichotomic split of ideal, the controlling memetic subrhythm, pulsing through the fourth dimension for some human based time now…
In Lak’ech Ala K’in
Inbetween
08 Apr 2012 Leave a Comment
There are problems with the infinite at the core of many fundamental ideas of humanity, regardless of the path to knowledge we take.
The concepts of God and Divinity, in themselves are embodiments of the infinite, a difficult concept to comprehend (if not impossible). They are bound within culture, a finite timeline of consciousness and its birthed.
The concept of mathematics includes many impossibilities. There are various equations that require what are deemed ‘impossible’ numbers merely to be able to do the duty they are intended for.
But, even more so, even the concept of zero (0) is a difficult one to grasp. We have nothing of something… easy. Say we have one thing. Say we also have the opposite of not having that one thing. a+(-a)=0
This probably doesn’t seem like a big deal. I hope you notice it shows an infinite amount can be included here. I’d love to hear from someone who knows better about maths than I on the curiousness of zero.
The concepts of logic and ethics often teeter between infinites. A logical person may summise that person L starting from A walking toward B may walk half the distance there.
A + .5B = L
Then they can walk half the distance toward B again.
2A + .5B = L
Then again…
4A + .5B = L
and again…..
8A + .5B = L
L will never reach B. The person will never reach their location, even though they are always moving half the distance left toward it. This is logical, though untrue. It is made problematic by the infinite.
There are numerous other examples I can give. All are essentially problems of the infinite.
When we think in these ways, we are giving ourselves over to the infinite. The sea of chaos that seems to underline the entirity of Reality.
There are boundaries. They are our definitions. Every time we utter a word, we create a boundary and allow for focus. This is the regime of the reductionist. We must create as many boundaries as possible in order to understand the infinite. It’s certainly useful for discerning things which seem different to our human form.
Sight, Smell, Touch, Taste, Sound.
We explore the world through these five we are aware of. Yet there is something else at play.
Culture.
All the problems with the infinite we have are due to our interpretation of sensory input and culture.
Dig down… dig backward. All things have a genesis. All thing has genesis.
The answers to things often lie in between. Not in the word, not in the symbol, not in the understanding you have of something itself, but deep within it. Within its history, within the history of its history and so on, back to the infinite.
The problem with the infinite is not that it exists, but that we are so sure it is one or the other. It is the denial of the infinite. And to those that adhere by it, it is the denial that they are human and have human boundaries. A logical dichotomy of sorts.
Culture is made up of the combined and truncated forms of all of our consciousness dating back to the genesis of that. There is meaning is all things – there is meant to be.
There are boundaries to the infinite – they are that you are human. There are no boundaries to the infinity of reality though. Make of that what you will. Where are your priorities?
Reduce forever and miss the connection. Make the connection hastily and lazily and reduce to your fundamental assumptions.
In Lak’ech Ala K’in
An essay on Democracy and Liberalism
25 Mar 2012 Leave a Comment
The following is a short essay (800 words) I have written for my Australian Politics class. The question we are to ponder: “Is democracy a threat to individual liberty” and most of the material cited was to be used in the essay. There is so much more I want to say on this, but it’s a good test at writing to a limitation and to a point! The question is – have I done well? Love to hear your opinion.
The course of human power structures has changed vastly across larger portions of the world than ever before, starting around the end of the 17thcentury.1 Many power structures before this time were primarily formed around the ideas of divine rule and inherent power, where a ruler claimed to have been selected by a divine process, by birth-right or by a combination of the two.
The evolution of liberal ideology has led to an increasing understanding of what an individual is, including what rights the individual should have, what the boundaries are to the individual’s actions in the world and what mitigates these boundaries. This has also led to a belief toward the supreme importance of the individual and the individual being the prime source of value.2 3
Alongside this, the evolution of democratic ideology has formed a framework which allows the individual members of a society to decide how they will be governed as a whole and to debate the many logistical issues that arise with large groups of people.3
Where democracy is a framework for control, liberalism is an understanding of what constitutes an individual. Liberal Democracies have many battles, as the ideologies of democratic rule clash with the ideals of liberalism on many levels.
The Occupy movement saw worldwide protests at the end of 2011, leading eventually to a strong backlash from authorities. In Melbourne, the form of protesting used was one that the state was largely unequipped to handle. The Lord Mayor of Melbourne Cr. Robert Doyle claimed that the protestors had been, “Allowed to occupy the centre of our city for a week now” and that he believes, “There comes a time when you say, ‘That’s enough, it’s time to return the City Square to the people of Melbourne’.”4
There are two important statements that Doyle made which highlight problems between democracy and liberalism. Inferring that the protestors had been ‘allowed’ to do what they did shows that this particular politician believes the individual only has the right to partake in certain activities for a certain period of time, and with permission. And further, saying that he wants to return an area of public space to the public by removing the public from it suggests that there are specific restrictions the public must abide to when using what is meant to be their own space.
The use of executive power backed by the City of Melbourne and State of Victoria5 to dismantle the protest goes some way to back Rousseau’s position that the people are slaves once officials are elected.6 In this case, the liberty of the individual was removed by the use of executive power issued by democratically elected politicians who decided what the boundaries should be for individual and group action, based on shaky legislative justification currently being questioned in the High Court.7
Gold Coast Doctor Mohammed Haneef was imprisoned for suspicion of links to terrorism and later charged under a section of the Commonwealth’s Criminal Code, even though the link was deemed insufficient evidence at the time and later it was found that Haneef was held in the hopes that evidence to convict him might come.8
The extent to which the individual has a right to their own pursuits is often thought to be limited in a liberal democracy to where that pursuit begins to harm or injure the interest of others. At this point, it is thought that government intervention is acceptable.9
Haneef’s case, alongside other questionable actions undertaken using anti-terrorism laws, highlight the battle between the protection of the community versus protection of the individual. Liberalism believes in a rule of law which is meant to be objective and non-arbitrary in its application10, while a democratic system is inherently subject to arbitrary rulings due to the subjective nature of the individuals’ interpretation of the law and extent of legislative and executive power allowed to the government by the majority of the population due to a variety of subjective facets.
In these two cases, the powers given to government by the democracy have infringed on the rights of the individual, using justification of protection of the community or public space. However, the two cases also show that the requirement to prove that justification to the community or involved individuals it claims to be protecting is not required in order for it to use its executive force at the individual’s liberal expense.
Democracy has become a threat to individual liberty due to logistical issues associated with protecting the community. Modern guerrilla warfare tactics against civilian populations, commonly called terrorism, have shown one difficult front for democracy when trying to protect the liberties of the individual. Community actions and protests that fall outside of the established legislative understanding of how an individual should act, have shown another difficult front for democracy, where the individual is not predictable within current established law.
If a large enough portion of the population are concerned enough about the perceived or real actions and ideals of another smaller group of the population or individual then whether or not one group’s perception is true or whether or not the perceived action or ideal may harm them, a democracy will inherently react toward the majority, even from within its bounds.
This is fundamentally threatening to individual liberty.
1 A Vromen, K Gelber, A Gauja ‘Liberal Democracy in Australia’ in Powerscape, Allen &Unwin, Crows Nest NSW 2009, p. 27
2 B Goodwin, ‘Using Political Ideas’, 2nd ed. Chichester: Wiley, 1987.
3A Heywood, ‘Democracy, Representation and the Public Interest’ in Political Theory: An Introduction, Palgrave Macmillan, Houndmills, Bassingstoke 2004, p. 224-225
4S Rintoul, M Roser ‘Democracy’s Malcontents Vent Their Frustration’ in The Australian, 22/10/2011, p. 3
5 K Smith, ‘Police Action at Occupy Melbourne a ‘Huge Blunder’, says Bandt’ in the Green Left 21/10/2011, http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/49155
6 A Heywood, ‘Democracy, Representation and the Public Interest’ in Political Theory: An Introduction, Palgrave Macmillan, Houndmills, Bassingstoke, 2004, p. 230
7 J Waters, ‘Occupy Melbourne court challenge on right to protest’ in ABC News 22/03/2012, http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-21/occupy-melbourne-challenge-right-to-protest/3903516?section=vic
8 D Marr, ‘Not One Shred of Evidence’ in The Sydney Morning Herald, 25/10/2008
9 Vromen, Gelber, Gauja, p. 29
10 Vromen, Gelber, Gauja, p. 30-31
In Lak’ech Ala K’in
Argument Structure
20 Mar 2012 Leave a Comment
There are many tools that I am currently learning about to tear apart language (specifically, argument) and analyse it for its truth. It’s useful for understand the underlying message/content of an argument.
Non-deductive Arguments to my current understanding are arguments which rely on statistical information to infer a premise and arrive at a conclusion. A simple argument:
P1: 67.9% of all Australians in 2001 said they were affiliated with a Christian denomination. (ABS)
P2: You were an Australian citizen in 2001.
C: Therefore, you were a Christian in 2001.
This is not a VALID argument, as validity implies that the truth of the premises logically guarantees the truth of the conclusion. However, the conclusion is more likely than its complementary conclusion (that you were not a Christian in 2001). This is a non-deductively seccessful argument, because the conditional probability is higher than 50% of the total pool.
The fancy shpangled terminology for this sort of basic argument is a ‘Statistical Syllogism’. Fantastic.
We can make the argument more complex, by adding more premises.
(Due to lack of specifics, we will presume that the “Minister of Religion” category specifically refers to a Christian Minister)
P1: 67.9% of all Australians in 2001 said they were affiliated with a Christian denomination. (ABS)
P2: You were an Australian citizen in 2001.
P3: 5% of all Australians working in cultural employment were Christian Ministers in 2001. (ABS)
P4: You were working in cultural employment in 2001.
C: You were a Christian Minister in 2001.
Above is an example of a Non-deductive un-successful argument. Without doing anything further, we can see that it was far less likely that you were a Christian Minister in 2001 if you were working in the cultural sector, than you being a Christian Minister. P3 does not successfully lead to C.
We can take the statistics provided in P1 and P3 to see the likelihood.
67.9% x 5% = 3.3%
Inductive Generalisation is another type of argument using statistical presumptions to form a conclusion.
P1: Many environmental groups are conspiring against the coal industry in Australia, according to Billionaire mining magnate, Clive Palmer. (The Age)
C: Many environmental groups are seeking to disrupt the coal industry.
If one reaches the conclusion here based on this premise, contained within article, they are using Inductive Generalisation to reach and accept it. The key feature here is where the claim comes from, but requires far more research to arrive at a valid conclusion. From some perspectives, it is difficult for someone with a vested interest (such as Mr. Palmer) to make a claim against ideological opponents, especially when inferring conspiracy, as some are more likely to think it convenient that this information comes from someone with a lot to loose, if the premise is true. However, there are also those who see it the opposite way around. I wonder what the percentages are of those who read the article to believe one way or another?
The Argument for Analogy may help us here.
P1: Those with a vested interest are likely to campaign for their interest, regardless of truth.
P2: Those with a lot to loose are more likely to avoid financially difficult truths.
P3: A landlord who had a property-value lowering event occur is more likely to lie to tenants to keep the rent higher.
P4: Clive Palmer has a lot of money invested in coal mining and is more likely to campaign for his interest.
C: It is more likely that Clive Palmer will avoid a truth that is financially difficult to his vested interests.
Here there are several analgoues. The primary analogue is that those with a vested financial interest will seek to hide truths that may/will lower the value of their vested interest. The secondary analgoue is that Clive Palmer has a vested interest in coal mining and is more likely to defend his vested financial interest. The similar feature here is a vested financial interest. The truth of this argument is therefore the most contentious point and would require a large amount of social statistics to back it up and make it anything like relevant. There’s probably some psychological questions here too, regarding how people view truth.
These are just a few tools that I am toying with at the moment, and needed to engage on my own terms to wrap my head around. If you understand the terminology, and think I’m wrong – please correct me.
In Lak’ech Ala K’in
Initial problems with [orthodox] economics
07 Mar 2012 Leave a Comment
Reality is a fickle thing.
Discussion on: Philosophical Debates in Economics.
To make every day matters easier for ourselves, we usually prescribe to a blank slate theory of knowledge, which means we presume that any person can make the same deductions as you or I based on the same circumstances. It presumes that every person’s input data (sensory array) and the way they interpret that will deductively always achieve the same result.
A paradigm is a certain conceptual understanding of a topic/subject. The example used in the text, “Philosophical Debates in Economics” is that a paradigm is like a certain lens one may view the world through. Different paradigms are like other lenses that one may choose to view the same world through, in a slightly different way: Perhaps focussing on one aspect more thoroughly than another thus illuminating it, while blurring another and perhaps entirely missing another aspect all together.
Each paradigm has many facets that allow it to be understood and communicated. Everything from definitions of certain terms, to sentence structures, to understood topics, to specialised ‘jargon’. This creates problems when one paradigm tries to understand another. One may become confused if another uses terms that are defined in two different ways by each party. This confusion could also come across as understanding and comprehension, whereby one party believes they understand the point of the other, but when asked to explain it in their own words, the other will believe them to be wrong.
The other problem is that often when someone is thinking from a certain paradigm and comes across a problem the paradigm doesn’t answer, they will still use the same paradigm to try and come up with an answer. Even if there is an anomoly for which there is no answer, most thinkers believe we will find the answer in the future.
The nuclear power debate is a good citation here. The nuclear industry and its proponents claim it is the solution to many of the energy problems we have at the moment, even though one of the prime problems: that of waste leading to excess carbon dioxide emissions is merely shifted to a different kind of waste that we are yet to see the future repercussions of: that of used radioactive material. The solution from one of the nuclear industry’s prime proponents, Ziggy Switkowski is, “We would need one engineered hole in the ground, probably somewhere in central Australia with a light security fence around it, and you’re done.”
That solution is: Bury the waste, we/the Earth will deal with it later…
If one finds a problem within their paradigm, and continues to use that to try and solve the problem – it is possible to become stuck in metaphorical epicycles. Consider that a theory must always be backed up by the underlying assumptions the paradigm asserts. With this in mind, it is possible to create seemingly infinite justifications and predictions to make the theory fit with the observation while still staying in the paradigm. Conspiracy theories are an excellent examples of paradigm that can and often do lead to logical epicycles in order to uphold the paradigm (conspiracy). Revolution occurs when the paradigm is overcome, and a better model/paradigm is formed to explain the phenomena. Applying Ockham’s Razor is often rather helpful for overcoming the problem of epicycles – but I suppose in saying all of this – I am still within my own paradigm, with its own tools, language and definitions.
I am using examples outside of the economic paradigm here, but the concepts are the same across fields. From my lectures in Microeconomics so far, it is clear that a certain paradigm of economics is being taught. It is necessary to try and understand a paradigm, to best develop a new one, to understand others with a more full context and to link concepts together across paradigms.
Inter-paradigmatic conversation/debate is the type of conversation, explained above, where two parties from different paradigms confuse eachother, while intra-paradigmatic conversation/debate may lead to epicycles where problems arise. The dominant paradigm is also considered the orthodox paradigm and is often taught in institutions to allow people to operate within a tested paradigm, to allow for ease of operation.
This brings me to:
The above image is a simple ‘Circular Flow Diagram’. It is used to illustrate a basic outline of how our economy works together on the micro level (ie. firms and individuals). Each of the arrows represents a limited transaction, meaning that a trade-off is required if one wishes for more of something (meaning they will receive less of something else).
Looking at the ‘Households’ box, you can see that one possibility is a wage obtained through a trade-off of labour. This can be understood, very simply, by saying that the more labour one gives to a business, the less free time they will have but more wage they will earn.
The opportunity cost of the above situation might be understood by the individual weighing up how they might otherwise spend their time, what benefits the wage would bring to them and whether this outweighs any potential losses from other ways of using time and how much of their wage might go to costs associated with the labour (perhaps higher protein food/more food, travel costs, new clothing etc.)
Orthodox Economics assumes that people will operate in a rational way. A rational person will inadvertantly work out the opportunity costs of a given situation in their head, and operate at the margin. This paradigm assumes that people will operate at their own perceived maximum efficiency, making incremental changes to find out what results can be achieved by doing what.
A market economy utilises these concepts, emphasising the importance of the individual (whether that be a human being or a grouping of humans, like a firm or household) as the prime decision maker to keep the market cycling. On a macro-scale, this means that millions (or billions, in global market economies) of individuals are pursuing their own self-interest. Economist Adam Smith cites an ‘invisible hand‘ as the guider of this system of economics. This is one of the key concepts of this paradigm. To my understanding, in its most primal form, the market economy should work like anarchy should work. People get along for the greater good, because it is in everyone’s best interest that we get along.
Pictured above: Everyone getting along just fine… juuuust fine. Yay neo-classical economics!
In practice, the ‘invisible hand’ requires the guidance of the government of the time. Through legislation and regulation, it can help to enforce certain rights, like property rights. Other problems occur when an externality is introduced, where the actions of an individual may affect a bystander. If the externality is not commodified or regulated within this paradigm and then appropriately paid for or adhered to, then others market abilities will be impeded. If an individual has Market Power, then they may be able to disproportionately affect the way the market works, by avoiding the ‘invisible hand’ and its usual method of control (making self interested individuals accountable to other self interested individuals through competition).
Our current paradigm of economic thought is based in neo-classical economics. There are many epicycles that need to be illuminated in order to see that they are not solving a problem, but merely circling it. The concept of an ‘invisible hand’ bothers me the most, because it presumes that the individual’s self interest is the best governor of the economy. It then bandage-fixes this presumption with various government interventions. To reference something intangible like this may be useful for the particular model in this paradigm, and it certainly has created many benefits through competition, innovation, the freeing of the individual to pursue their own ends etc… But, it has also illuminated the problems of growing hierarchies, growing market power, curious problems associated with marketing and human psychology and political influence of a product/service, over a human need. In the pursuit of commodification of things to fix problems, we are perhaps missing the point. Perhaps we are just creating more and more epicycles, rather than seeing that the paradigm is not in fact perfect at all.
In Lak’ech Ala K’in
Big Society, Small Human
16 Feb 2012 Leave a Comment
Like an Earthly set of scales, we teeter side to side. What creates the unbalance?
You probably know someone who claims that Love is the answer. Who tells you not to judge others, for that is the problem. Who speaks of all that we don’t know and reminds you not to accept all you see.
It’s also possible that same person is one of the most judgemental and cliquey people you know.
You probably know someone who is content with life as it is right now. Who questions all new ideas, especially those that threaten their way of life. Someone who believes that progress is fine, as long as it’s Not In My Back Yard.
It’s also possible this person is a family member or someone else you usually quite respect.
And, there are myriad of other combinations and differences.
The key similar component seems to be, that someone doesn’t trust another person they don’t quite know the intentions of. I don’t think there are many people that can unhypocritically say they trust and love all, unconditionally. Perhaps someone might think they are that, in a moment of bliss… but a moment is temporary. Someone will piss that person off eventually.
I’m not sure I trust those who claim free love. I feel that there is a large percentage of those people that are foolish idealists, who will become very irritating, very quickly… especially with their narrow-minded understanding of the grand logistics that holds their world together.
I definitely don’t trust those who want to conserve their world and value. I feel that a large percentage of those folk are unwilling to see that the world is forever shifting sands. Transience. A “way of life” is a mere cultural moment that must give way to the physical realities around us.
But, I don’t want the world to be given over to the beast. Far too many people still believe in vengeful attacks on those that do them wrong. On violence as a means to their ends. On justice for the emotionally riled up, and not toward the objective truth.
We emotional beasts have a society too big for our mind to compute. So we judge, simplify, stereotype. We create genre after genre, categorisation after categorisation to better box imagination and emotion in to one place or another. Perhaps there is a grounding for some of these concepts? That is something we are yet to discover. We can do that with the physical world to an extent, through science. But the emotional world is just as mysterious as it always has been. Some people are better explainers than others, but I’m not sure there is any one way to prove one thing or another… other than playing on reptilian brain reactions. But, we’re human.
In all of this, I want to say one thing.
Accept the hypocrite that you are.
Accept all of your emotional spectra, it is all valid, it all comes from somewhere. Try and understand it and try not to let Mr./Mrs. Reptile take control.
Accept that sometimes, you may be stuck in a position for a while. Things take time, but all things change.
Do the best with what you can in a moment. And when you don’t do your best, because you most certainly won’t always… don’t worry! Move on, learn from it.
Don’t get stuck.
In Lak’ech Ala K’in
Explain
23 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment
The thing is, no amount of explanation ever seems to do any justice. Emotions seem like distant cliches and calling them distant cliches feels like a cliche. Such is the cynicism.
Talking about beauty and sadness seem frivolous and trivial.
It’s easy to make fun of those who express their emotions. Especially when it doesn’t match up to how you feel at a certain time… such is the nature of the often vitriolic attitudes toward the particularly more emotive.
I usually write “we” as my personifier. Let me use I here. I am tired. I don’t really know who to turn to, and when I do, I feel unfulfilled. Perhaps I’m stuck in often insatiable moods… I don’t really know. I’m on the inside looking out, and it’s hard to tell.
I feel like there’s a brooding evil that I have to keep in check constantly… and I’m tired of so much!
And all I can think is… “Another whingey, pointless blog”, but the truth is… it’s what I have, it’s what I do, I like to think that maybe someone reads it occassionally, or perhaps I just like the writing… the transparency… the pointlessness.
Liberty and Imperialism.
20 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment
Like an endless shifting war, the fights for liberty and fights for imperial control have been fought in human domains for all of history, it seems.
First and foremost there is reality, whatever that is.
Our sensory array detects useful things for our atomic arrangement to keep together.
Primarily, the being reacts to sensory data in order to not be damaged, and pursue renewal necessities.
Secondarily, the sensory data is stored so that the same mistakes aren’t made over and over, and beneficial things are able to be recognised.
Tertiarily, the being associates multiple packets of sensory data in order to begin predicting outcomes of unknown, but similar scenarios.
Perhaps culture, language and communication are the quaternary part in the sequence. Like one unit organism, the tribe shares the being’s knowledge around… exomemetic sensory data is shared, with the idea that it will assist others in the tribe in warning against bad scenarios and how to achieve good scenarios.
How big is a tribe?
At what point does one being try to hijack the exomemetic data process to insure the being’s survival against other competitors?
Like the sensory data behind scenarios the being knows to avoid, so too does the atmoic structure aim to avoid bad scenarios of make up, and compete in a limited world for replication of the data it knows.
The being is limited when confined to endomemetic data and thus must resort to the primary, secondary and tertiary sensory abilities.
Control the exomemetic process, and division occurs. Encourage the process and unity may just begin.
In Lak’ech Ala K’in
Apopheigns
11 Jan 2012 2 Comments
We search endlessly for patterns in the chaos.
Without finding these patterns, we would not survive as we have done.
In fact, the ability for the human brain to find patterns amid the chaos is arguably what makes use different from the animals… what makes us conscious and what has led us to all sorts of discoveries about our Earth and Universe.
But, the pattern finding also seems to lead us in to a lot of trouble.
Our brains don’t seem capable of linking the vast patterns that we have created in our own world today, nor are they capable of computing all the scientific data at once about a myriad of subjects.
Most people probably aren’t aware that their consciousness is based upon their ability to make connections between sensory information.
I think it is rather important to be aware of this. And I think it is rather important to further study and research the nature of consciousness, so we can start to get a handle on what it is exactly that makes us tick. What exactly is this moment?
I have digressed from the point I wish to make though.
The other side to pattern making… to the grand joining the dots we’re all performing, is the line in the sand. We can’t define something without having barriers to allow a definition. Often these barriers are tangible things, like that visible light to the human eye is on a wavelength in a range from about 380 nanometres to about 740 nm.
In this case, the barriers are defined by the physiological qualities of the human eye and the measurable electromagnetic spectrum.
When it comes to the divine, we are left in a world without barriers.
Here in this world, we can set the limits where ever we choose, or where ever we believe.
More often than not, it is the latter that happens, and we take on board someone else’s idea of where the barriers lie. We trust each other. It’s the nature of a social creature. Our minds presume that the other individual has some data we don’t know about, and we should trust it, lest we receive the negative consequence.
It’s a relatively simple behavioural control mechanism.
If you’ve ever had a frivolous religious debate with someone, you’re probably more than aware of the shifting line in the sand on many issues. Every person with religious conviction is different, no matter their ascribed dogma. It’s probably the reason why many of these debates are frivolous. There’s nothing to base it on. Prior experience doesn’t necessarily help one to know what to expect. There are some common arguments, but often if you pursue an argument, you can create rift and disagreement within the so-called faithful. This is because the whole picture isn’t there, all the answers don’t exist outside the individual mind’s faith in the idea.
A curious thing I’ve noted about many of the less questioning of religious folk, is their mentality’s similarity to what I remember and define as high schoolesque politics. These are people of a tribal nature, who have their trusted sources worked out and their social network down pat. It’s easier for the humabeast to operate when a group can simply laugh off any competing idea, without taking in to account that ideas ability to draw lines in the same sand.
I believe that examples of this are shown through the prevalence of a hope for the never proven, quintessentially dull chain letter and its evolutions.
Let me provide some examples I recently saw on a Facebook group that purports to organise a party for people once they reach the Seventh Day Adventist version of heaven.
“Kiss your hand 10 times. Say your crush 15 times. Post this on 2 events. Look at your hand”
“READ ! This isnt fake. apparently, if u copy and paste this to ten events in the next ten minutes u will have the best day ofurlife tomorrow. u will either get kissed or asked out, if u break this chain u will see a little dead girl in your room tonight. in 53 mins someone will say i love you or im sorry or i wanna go out with”
“Girl : Am I pretty?
Boy : NO.
Girl : Do you want to be with me forever?
Boy : NO.
……Girl : Would you cry if I walked away?
… ……………………………………………………………………………
Boy : NO.
She heard enough, and was hurt. She walked away, tears ran down her face. The boy grabbed her arm.
Boy : Your not pretty, your beautiful. I don’t want to be with you forever, I NEED to be with you forever. And I wouldn’t cry if you walked away, I would DIE.
(Boy whispers) : Please? Stay with me.
(Girl whispers) : I will.
Tonight at midnight your true love will realize they love you. Something good will happen to you between 1-4 pm. Tomorrow it could be anywhere. Get ready for the biggest shock of your life! If you don’t post this to 5 other events. You will have relationship problems for the next 10 years”
You might remember things of this nature from primary school. And perhaps from your more irritating of social network friends.
I’m sure no one will actually admit to believing these. People will say things like, “I wanted to test it, just to be sure” and, “Didn’t want to risk it!”
Isn’t it funny how much in common these sorts of little moral stories (with punishment if not adhered to) play out like religious convictions? Believe in God, OR ELSE! Pray, and if it comes true, MIRACLE! If not, it is God’s will, etc.. etc…
These scream of emotional immaturity. The inability for an individual to determine that these don’t have any effect what so ever on real life, other than to plant an idea within your own mind. Horoscopes often play very similarly, alongside many other things.
Is it possible that an individual’s susceptibility to certain kinds of emotional manipulation determine how likely they are to be religious, and what sort of belief they may have?
I should note here that I know many questioning and intelligent religious people. They know the nature of the line in the sand, and probably have a more stable basis for their faith. They’re also in my experience a lot easier to have rational conversations with.
Just something to ponder on.
Also, if you don’t share this with your entire chosen social network before midnight tonight, tomorrow at five minutes to 7am, you will get a phone call. On the other end will be the police, informing you that your sibling has been shot dead in some sort of gang-related shooting that got out of hand.
So share it. Or else.
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