Category Archives: Feature

Am I Alive?

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Here is a simple question. Is your consciousness solely a by-product of biochemical processes?

In other words, is your awareness of the world and who you are, simply a condition of electrical and chemical interactions between cells?

This is a very simple question. It’s the simple answer that reveals enormous problems. Yes, or no.

My consciousness is considering the ramifications of either answer right now. Don’t mind me. It’s just some chemicals sloshing about. But consider – the answer, yes or no, is important. If known with certainty, the answer to this simple question would topple many fundamental assumptions we currently entertain. Either way it goes. And most of these fundamental assumptions we do not consider. In grossly simplistic terms, do we have a spirit? What does it mean to be conscious?

If our consciousness is a by-product of chemical interactions, there are few compelling reasons that we should also have a spirit. If I feel joy as a result of something I hear, it’s just chemicals flowing around in one area, which trigger a blob of chemicals in another area which creates a “sensation” (whatever that is) of joy, which in turn triggers more blobs of chemicals in another place which may bring back memories to my consciousness of similar joyful things, in whatever region of the mass of neurons in which the consciousness actually manifests.

However, if our consciousness is spiritual in nature, how do we explain the oftentimes profound alteration of our conscious state through brain injury, biological diseases, or chemical alterations? If we have a spirit, how can our personalities be so radically altered by physical changes to a materialistic brain?

These issues may seem purely academic, with little importance in our daily lives. But the issue is significant. Both science and religion exert tremendous force upon our lives. When considering the nature of consciousness, each “team” plays by a completely different rule book, and their game effects us all both directly and profoundly.

For example, brain drugs are now prescribed to people of all ages, even children, with alarming frequency. These drugs represent a major portion of pharmaceutical profits. They are backed by science and the belief that consciousness is, at least, in large part a materialistic process. But if we believe our consciousness is purely biochemical, why not throw chemicals at our biology? Doing so, we can alter our state of mind to happily accommodate any feelings or perceptions we have of the world, or ourselves. We can alter our consciousness to be content with any stimulus or situation. In essence, we can engineer a paradise for ourselves that is completely independent of anyone or anything in the external world. If we are simply biochemical, why not have this bliss?

Well, for one, the people handing out the drugs could get away with murder. But so what? Isn’t some notion of morality and ethics dangerously close to spiritual considerations? I admit there are possible reasons why not, that do not require us to have a spirit. For example, if we all were engineered happy and content regardless of our environment, we might find ourselves soon extinct as a species. Why does it matter that a plague kills everyone? We are happy. Perhaps there is some biologically hard-coded imperative for survival. If we have engineered ourselves into happiness, have we engineered out this imperative? This could be a valid reason to avoid engineering our biochemical consciousness that is not dependent upon having a spirit.

But even this raises a question toward the spiritual. Is our biological imperative toward survival an imperative for only our own survival, and not necessarily the survival of other people? It would seem so. If many other people were to die, there is less competition for food, for mates, and less chance that I will be killed by someone else. Though rational, this is not how most people think. For some reason we find it important that other people should live, instead of die, even when they are not part of our “pack”. Perhaps we feel this way because mirror neurons in our brain somehow allow our consciousness, whatever that is, to place ourselves in the position of others. And because we can imagine ourselves in another person’s shoes, we choose to want them to live, rather than die. Of course, this argument skips the whole problem that we simultaneously know that we are not that person, yet still choose that they should live. That argument relies upon us having, at minimum, empathy. Who knows what combination of cell types and chemicals would cause our consciousness, in whatever grouping of cells it lives, to experience empathy. But maybe empathy isn’t a feeling. Maybe it’s a purely mathematical phenomenon.

One of the largest problems science faces when trying to explain consciousness is providing an account for consciousness in the first place. Is consciousness inside our brain? Where is it? Does it simply manifest itself somehow as a combination of all biochemical processes which occur in the brain? Would our consciousness exist if we had no body, other than a brain, nor external senses? You see, it is one thing for us to affect consciousness in some physical way, but it is quite another to actually pin it down.

The prevailing wisdom of science says that consciousness does not exist, in and of itself, but is rather an illusory result of electrical and biochemical processes that occur within the brain. What we consider our self, or our consciousness, is really an illusion. Our consciousness is just a systematic and recursive material, or mechanical, process that results in some meta-state that we imagine we experience, which we call consciousness. But really, this consciousness is nothing more than a plethora of mechanical processes occurring, which give us the illusion.

To some, believing this explanation turns us into little more than zombies who wander about doing our mechanistic things. You might appear conscious to me, but really you are a mass of predictable mechanics. I must confess there are times when this seems true. But is it the whole picture?

In the West we have a long history of separating the mind from the body. Our thoughts, and therefore our ability to reason, are dependent upon our ability to sense and observe the world. Our mind, which most agree is the seat of our consciousness, is dependent upon our body to provide the sensory input we use to consider the questions of science, and even questions of our own consciousness.

One of the first questions we must ask is, why would this mechanical process have a curiosity about its own consciousness? Is it another biological imperative related to survival that has trickled up over centuries of evolution, that makes us curious in growingly abstract ways, as our brain power develops? I wonder, also, at what point during our evolution, did consciousness, or our illusion of it, spring into being? Are dogs and cats conscious? It is evident to me that they do, at least, have something equivalent to mirror neurons. Or are they just different models of a machine?

But if we believe that consciousness is an illusion, then what, exactly, is being tricked? Is it an illusion that fools itself?

Something rationally critical breaks when we say that consciousness is an illusion that rises up from materialistic processes. But we can fix that. If we say that consciousness does, in fact, exist, and that it is not an illusion, but is solely dependent upon materialistic biochemical processes in the brain — that works. In this sense, consciousness really does exist, but not without our physical gray matter.

This seems far more likely to me than consciousness being an illusion. But it does little to explain how our consciousness comes into being from these material processes. The best explanation I have heard claims that the brain operates in an electro-chemical “loop”. When it operates above a certain frequency, we have consciousness. Below that frequency, we do not. Perhaps it is just a matter of putting all the materialistic pieces together, and eventually we will have our answer about the nature of consciousness. Or, it may be that we are only side-stepping and delaying the inevitable problem: trying to tie the metaphysical to the physical.

But what is metaphysical about having consciousness arise from something material? The same question confronts the science of artificial intelligence. How can something intangible and unphysical, like consciousness, be created from a machine? Their answer? Well, we find ourselves back to the original, predominant scientific position: that there really is no such thing as consciousness — it is mere illusion. By saying this, science does not have to confront any questions about the metaphysics of consciousness. Consciousness just doesn’t exist. Our sense that we are conscious is an illusion. Then here I am again, fooling myself. Or my consciousness. Or whatever. Brainsss!!

Another way to consider the problem is to return to Descartes. The one thing I can say with certainty is that I have consciousness. Anything I learn beyond this comes to me through my senses which may be wholly inadequate to determine any true reality. In this scenario, our consciousness becomes the most fundamental thing in the universe, while all other things are speculative. There is something comfy in this manner of thinking, but it is also an isolating and wholly inadequate position to explain consciousness.

In a similar vein, we might say that consciousness is our spirit which inhabits a materialistic body. In this, we are back to dualism, and we also cannot easily explain why our consciousness is altered by physical changes to our brains. It just doesn’t work.

So, if we look at big score board so far, it appears the spiritualists lag far behind the materialists — yet of the materialists, the ones supporting a true existence of consciousness, rather than some illusion of consciousness, are ahead. OK. Now let’s give the spiritualists some game.

Let’s think of our life, clear back to childhood. Remember how different you were back then? Imagine how different you were, all along the way of your life, up until where you find yourself right now. Some people can’t believe the things they used to believe. It’s almost as if you were another person. But you weren’t another person. You were you, all along the way. It still is you. But you’ve changed. Your consciousness has changed. It’s evolved. You perceive things differently, yet still the “essence” of what makes you, you — it’s still there. And it’s the same. This is one quality of our observed experience of consciousness that materialists will have a difficult time resolving satisfactorily. Not only do we have a current sense of self, but we also have the sense of a meta-self that has always remained in place throughout our life’s experiences.

In many ways, the older civilizations of the world, such as India, have dealt with the concepts of the spirit in relation to science for far longer than the West. Their philosophical works are an interesting read. Interestingly, a good deal of their philosophy deals with an integration of the mind and body, including through such practices as yoga. Yoga seeks to bring the mind and body into a harmony. It does not treat the mind separately from the body — they are one organism, and that organism is you. They take it even further, though. The mind may have many thoughts and ideas running around within it. The practice of yoga seeks to still that chaos in the conscious mind. In their terms, the content of the mind is constantly changing. However, the context of the mind is unchanging. This contextual representation of consciousness is what we might call a spirit, and it sits beyond both the mind and the body. In this way, if the mind or body is damaged, the spirit remains, while life remains. This is true, even when our mental consciousness appears radically altered — the content of the mind can change, but the context of the mind does not.

In this way, the essence of who we are, or our spirit, escapes the logical problem associated with having a notion of spirit in the event of brain damage. In other words, just because our behaviour or personality changes after physical brain damage does not mean that the essence of our spirit is changed. It is only the mental processes that are changed, much like a broken bone. This escape trick is no worse than the escape trick of saying that consciousness is only an illusion. It also explains how we maintain an abstract sense of self despite radical changes to our consciousness over time, even though the natural acts of learning.

If we can look internally, which is, of itself, another argument against illusion, we can actually get a hint of the difference between the content of our thoughts, and the context in which those thoughts occur. Similarly, most people in the world believe in reincarnation, where after death, and before we were born, we were someone else, or even something else. We might have been male or female. We might have been a dog, or a spider. In each of these, the content of our minds would change. However, the context would always be us.

As rigorously as many scientists rail against any notion of spirit, claiming access to tangibly provable and all-encompassing knowledge, it is somewhat ironic to hear, so often coming from them, this notion that we humans are “star stuff”, and, in essence, the universe trying to understand itself. Perhaps they mean this purely mechanistically. Why would the universe seek to understand itself? Is that mechanical?

Who knows? I like the idea, though. Unless I just seem to like it. But maybe that’s enough. It certainly isn’t going to keep from exploring more. And it’s certainly not going to cause me to just patently accept all sorts of things that stem from people believing one way or another on these issues. Perhaps that makes me a squeaky cog in the great cosmic zombie machine. Perhaps it damns me. I just want it to be an honest game. And this game is far from over.

So Simple

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Epiphany: a word I never knew until my mid-twenties. Perhaps your whole life is one big epiphany until you reach your twenties.

Sudden realizations of a profound truth, triggered by something commonplace we notice, where some simple, even unrelated thing, sparks an inner revelation. A startling truth, so obvious by its nature, that it is difficult believing you never realized it before, until the moment of that epiphany.

I think a lot of us are having those lately. DJ explained epiphanies to me, many years ago. Before that, I know I had them, but never knew it.

An epiphany doesn’t have to be spiritual. You can have an epiphany in science, as surely as science can lead to an epiphany.

Epiphanies are usually very personal experiences. It is never talked about, but I think whole societies can have epiphanies together, as a social unit with each other, too.

Once you have one, you can never go back to seeing things the way you once did. It is another bite of that apple. Paradise is lost, yet another paradise appears, up ahead. There are all kinds of paradises.

We have personal paradises, and we have collective ones. Sometimes they are at odds with each other. That is where leaders and followers play out their games. Perhaps if this is considered fully, it will be an epiphany for some.

Life moves toward the wider – the more all-encompassing. Is that my life, your life, or our life?

This is where the leaders and followers play out their games, in a hierarchy of unexamined pragmatism. Where doctrines are followed without understanding the origins upon which they stand, or even if they stand upon anything solid. The game field, where penetrating questions are dismissed as useless or naïve, and so never addressed. So often we find that even following epiphanies, everything remains the same.

But does it truly remain the same? When you have an epiphany about the world, or your life, your foundations change. You become fundamentally altered, even when your routines might continue unaltered. But when those routines are at odds with the revelation, friction and disharmony results. And when this happens, it is routine that inevitably must break. Theories must be altered. Prevailing wisdom must be rewritten for all our collective future. Somehow, our nature compels us to regain a harmony between what we have become, and what we continue to do.

This is the game, with all the leaders and the followers. It is being worked out. Everything is important. Especially life. All of it. More than anything. There is no higher ground, and we each stand upon that same ground. This is worth far more money than we could ever fabricate.

Who can say otherwise? Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?

The demons sought to destroy everything good, to rule and dominate all things. The gods, as aspects of the nature of existence, fought against the legion of demons. The gods prevailed against all but one, the great demon Raktabija.

From each drop of Raktabija’s blood spilled in the battle, a thousand new demons sprung. It was not long before the gods were overwhelmed.

In desperation, the gods appeal to Ishvara, the embodiment of the principle of the universe. From his and her third eye, the goddess Kali is born, a whirling multi-limbed dance of death and destruction who rips through the demons, destroying them all and drinking their blood so that no more spring forth.

This leaves Raktabija powerless and his assult is defeated. But Kali, mindless in her dance of destruction and fueled by the blood of demons continues shredding all in her path, across all worlds, even the gods.

Seeing this, the god Shiva, the embodiment of the universe, lays down in the path of Kali. As Kali steps upon the chest of Shiva, which is the container of the spirit, the realization through the embodiment of the universe, of all existence bursts into her mind.

The enormity of this epiphany causes her eyes to go wide and her tongue stick out, and she stops her maddened and destructive dance. Some claim she transformed into a child to weep.

Science Funding and the Survival of Spirit

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Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell

The better parts of ourselves, even collectively, continue moving forward despite any terrible things others might do. Even as we work to correct any wrongs that are committed, it is important to remember the great and wonderful accomplishments of which we are equally capable.

Some of us believe that money and power should not hold such a central focus for the aspirations of humanity. We believe that the universe itself and our mysterious existence within it is an incomparably better focus for our energies. If there is such a thing as “trickle down”, our better understanding of the principles that define our fundamental reality offers far more to humanity than green paper, numbers stored in bank computers, or the elevation of some individuals who might impose rule over us. If leaders, distant from the realities we all face, are what we must have, my hope is that these leaders learn to rule with a subtlety which enshrines the more noble aspects of our nature rather than our more gross and primitive instincts like greed and territory.

Above is a picture of the Mars Rover “Spirit”, one of two ground-roaming probes we sent to the planet Mars more than four years ago, in January of 2004. They were expected to survive for 90 days. Today, almost five years later, they are still operating, sampling soil and rocks from various terrain and analyzing the chemical composition of the Martian atmosphere as it changes across the Martian seasons.

Some day we might all travel to Mars, just as people traveled to America from Europe on transatlantic ships. We know that Mars used to have water, and still has vast polar ice caps. We currently have several probes both on and orbiting Mars, continuing the exploration. Plans are in the works to send people within the next few years, who will utilize the natural resources we have found to sustain themselves. At this point, humanity will have taken its first real step into inhabiting a far more vast and wondrous universe than we have ever known. What becomes of territorial boundaries, in this?

Spirit, for all these years, generates its power to function by harnessing the light of the sun. But as you can see, Mars is very dusty; an almost powdery dust. If the solar panels get too dusty, no sunlight can be absorbed. But Mars also has many, many dust devils that whirl constantly about, across the landscape, which have, through a happy accident, worked to keep the solar panels clean. It was not just chance that helped these rovers perform their mission so well. The scientists and engineers took their time to design and build good stuff, and do it right. Monetary budgets can wreak havoc with good science. More than half of all “budget” missions NASA has farmed to private sector corporations have failed. However, the missions built in-house at NASA have a stellar success rate.

Interestingly, NASA does not blame private sector corporations for their failings. Instead, they blame the US Navy. Apparently the US Navy produced a report many years ago that suggested private sector companies can do the same work the government can, only much cheaper. Somehow, this report has become gospel. Now, private sector companies, as an unspoken rule of government funding, receive only this fractional allocation of money to get the same job done. And where NASA projects are concerned, this can be disastrous. Most likely, this is true with any leading science-based projects.

Ah, but mortgage lending bankers and assorted usurers need their Christmas bonuses. Just so we know, we could have completed 1,000 comparable Mars missions with this money. Or built 20 more space stations. We could even have started another war! Actually, it would have been nice just to have a tiny fraction of that money to complete the space station we already have, to its original design.

It makes me a little curious. Which costs more money: the wasteful habits of scientists who work in government and academia, or the necessary profits that private companies must produce both for themselves and their shareholders?

It’s an interesting question, with more than few ramifications. It’s not a simple one. What money-people might call waste in an academic setting can lead to unforeseen revolutions in both science and for all humanity — even for all other species on the planet. The big answers we get, the answers that are truly revolutionary, usually happen unexpectedly, hitting us square atop the head from out of the blue. It is nothing something you can pre-plan. This is true for both large, collective issues as well as our own private, individual epiphanies.

And what happens when we channel all of our money into companies whose business is making more money? Why would our money ever leave that corral? Of course, there are appearances generated, intended to lend credence to their purpose. But taken as a whole, the vast majority of the money never leaves that corral. No discovery and curiosity exists in that corral. Only greed, hoarding, self-gratification, and a lust for some abstract notion of power. Any benefit to humanity is merely incidental. Giving our money to money-people is the true waste of money, despite what money-people say.

I wonder what would happen if we gave our money to NASA, who could then hire whole generations of scientists in many disciplines, devoted to their passion of uncovering the nature of our existence. I wonder what would happen if we gave our money to doctors and biologists whose passion was understanding how our bodies work and keeping them healthy. In other words, what would happen if we made our hearts and minds the focus of our energy, instead of money?

In a few days, on November 29th, the orbits of Mars and Earth will position us on opposite sides of the sun. This solar conjunction will block all communication with Spirit for approximately two weeks. Winter is also fast approaching on Mars. The rovers will be commanded to sit still with their solar collectors aimed at some hopefully optimal position to collect enough sunlight to keep them alive through the winter. Spirit is barely finding enough energy to stay alive even now, before the onset of winter, after a recent, large dust storm dirtied much of its panels. Hopefully another little devil might find its way by, to do some accidental cleaning for us.

Right now, the power is so low in Spirit that it keeps switching into a safe mode in an attempt to protect itself. It stores its discoveries for several days at a time, and only speaks to a satellite orbiting Mars via its low power antenna. This satellite then speaks for Spirit, relaying its discoveries back to us. Spirit’s only hope for survival is to avoid its instincts to enter safe mode. Today, NASA is trying to shut down all the distractions so that just a bit of warmth might remain to see it through.

The Bridge of Vibrating Objects

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More often than not, there is difficulty communicating between people. We have established languages, with vocabularies representing conceptual objects that we string together in a feeble attempt to lift our consciousness from ourselves and offer it to another. Some people claim the vocabulary of our language shapes our thoughts. Others instead claim that our thoughts wrestle with the clumsy limitations of linguistic representations for expression. What we do know is that our consciousness exists as certainly as another consciousness, and the avenues between them are a wilderness of language-constrained train wrecks.

In physics, the laws governing our existence are expressed as mathematical objects. We do not question whether our existence must, necessarily, obey laws. We assume that reason exists, in at least some form, at all levels, even within chaos. We tie the concept of chaos to randomness, and by doing so, we constrain existence, at least in part, with our mathematical objects. This may be a preconceived bias which limits a broader understanding, but it does impose definitions that we can utilize and manipulate within our framework of pseudo-certainty, that is a mathematical representation.

Language is a similar construct. As creatures with unique consciousness, we vibrate the air in defined ways that represent, more or less, the consciousness we are currently experiencing and wish to communicate to another consciousness. However, each consciousness exists in relative isolation from any other, much like parallel universes could be, and any communication of information between islands is fraught with potentials for error. For example, a word might not be understood in the same way on each island, or a string of words may have differing connotations that have arisen from the other consciousness’ history or bias. An even more challenging issue is the fluidity inherent within the island of each consciousness that is, by its very isolation, patently distinct within its own experiential awareness that changes, sometimes even radically, over time.

Objects we create (words or phrases) that are meant to be shared between islands have nowhere to exist, except within whatever space it is that we might label a mutually agreed-upon landscape of language. There is no metaphysical cathedral that houses the canonical truth of each object we have created, except, indirectly, by our further mutual agreement to imbue selected people with the responsibility of maintaining them, which is itself, fraught with peril. It is something, though. And it is a wonder we can communicate at all, particularly in the more abstract.

Mathematics has an easier time, at least within its foundations. The number “2″ is well understood within our intersubjective landscape. Any misunderstanding or argument between islands about the number “2″ would almost certainly be specious. This is an object that can reasonably be considered safely canonical. Even though it does not exist. I have never seen a “2″, in and of itself. But I have seen the curvy numeral written down many times, and have even determined a quantity of 2 for various things. I know — I lead a wildly abandoned life. But I would be hard-pressed to actually show you a “2″. That’s because it isn’t a thing, but rather a representation of an abstract concept. It is not really physical. Addition and subtraction are also abstract concepts, applied to other abstract concepts. As we’ve discussed earlier, mathematics is an abstraction, tied to the physical in only the most tenuous of ways through the concept of quantity. This has proven to offer us great benefits, but it can also hinder us when it is believed as a canonical representation of the totality of our existence. There is no basis for such an assumption, despite stacks of mathematics on paper.

It seems the human being is prone to adopt beliefs. This is how scientists, even physicists and mathematicians, can believe in God without violating the sanctity of their disciplines: because their disciplines arise from belief, they are accustomed to belief. The only difference between religion and science is the voracity of their self-consistency and their openness to new perspectives. These are constant challenges where religion, more often than not, falls short. But so does science. And like religion, science usually falls short when the canonical caretakers of the holy objects become more interested in their own personal perpetuation than their sacred duty toward humanity and the purity of their calling.

However, these are callings that are far removed from the more humble life we each lead as we return home at the end of the day. At home our concerns turn toward foraging for food, our feelings for the people in our lives, or having a comfy, warm bed in which to dream. While mathematics is removed from us and defined with rigor, the language of our time spent more at rest is sloppier, and is often downright messy. Some would like to bring the certainties of religion or science home with them in an attempt to impose comfort upon the messiness they might otherwise experience, but these are usually vain attempts. The messiness bleeds through. Something about us is wider than any discipline can contain. We are not entirely defined by the dominance of objects created within the outside world. We are aware of our island-hood, and the world we perceive externally is not, precisely, the sum of everything that we are, or might be. Even when we try to impose its order upon ourselves, our gut knows the difference. We will go into the applicability and validity of the discipline of psychology and neuroscience in subsequent pieces.

Language, that is extended to us from our culture, is the defining bridge to the external world. Our senses are also a bridge, but they lack any objective definitions without language. Our senses merely allow us to perceive and experience the external world. Language helps define common sensual experiences between us. The difficulty arises from the fact that our awareness is separated from the awareness that exists within other beings, and the only way we have to bridge these islands is a rickety structure composed of words. This is, perhaps, part of the appeal of mathematics — it is rigidly defined with only a small propensity for misunderstanding and error. However, mathematics is incapable of representing the spectrum that is the diversity within our inner lives. Though less prone to error, its vocabulary is utterly inadequate. We appear to be stuck with the uncertainty and error of language between us. And as an interesting aside, it is also fascinating to note that our understanding of these more pristine maths are formed through the messiness of language and what those words conceptually represent. But we’ll steer clear of that messiness for now.

Our inner experience is rarely what other people perceive. The inadequacies of language are not the only cause. Because of our uniquely individual craziness, we do not always construct language that is a true representation of our inner experience. Also, sometime we hear language differently than was intended, either because of that same uniquely individual craziness within ourselves, or the clumsiness of the person constructing the language toward us. And this is with truth as the backdrop. If we bring in the possibility of deception, we bring a wrecking ball into an already precarious and delicate environment. Unfortunately, for one reason or another, this is all too common and is the source of a great deal of the confusion that permeates our society. Deception is always willful, even when it is simply a will to ignore or disregard the validity of some known or perceived truth. In many ways, this is the worst deception of all. Silence, indifference, or disregard allows deception to perpetuate and flourish. It is selfish, and almost always meant for one’s own perceived benefit.

But what is selfishness, other than a word? How is it possible to say that selfishness is bad, when each self is their own isolated island? The answer is simple when you realize that other islands exist, and are every bit as important as your own. There are lots of people like you, living on their own crazy, isolated islands. Even when they claim they are not. Particularly when they claim they are not. And in that, paradoxically, even though we are completely isolated, we are all in the same boat. If I’m not mistaken, I think that some form of love might fit in well just there. And though love can be considered selfish, it also, paradoxically, is the furthest thing from selfishness. Isolation is, intrinsically, a lonely existence. Though some religions try, they cannot command love between islands. And deception always results in isolation. If connections are to occur, each island must, through its own self-awareness, become aware of its isolation and seek to bridge that isolation in ways that are not based in deception. Or instead, remain in isolation. Anything else is a power play through manipulation.

If a sense of mutuality can exist between islands then an awareness of isolation also exists. Some means will be sought to create bridges in the interest of that mutuality. But if a keen awareness of the isolation between islands exists, how can one possibly avoid having a more passionate response that necessitates creating the most intimate connections possible? Though this situation is rare, here we must take care to balance between the negative forces that stem from desperation and panic, against the far more positive and powerful forces that such passion can engender as a motive for the fulfillment with all its benefits of unity. And even this must be balanced against the necessity of distinction, from which the true beauty and strengths of humanity’s genius emerges. This is the beautiful aspect within the darker nature of Existentialism.

It leaves me asking, as I look out upon the world, what is really important? Between each of our islands, what bridges have we built, or allowed to be connected to us? In what ways does mutuality currently manifest itself? Is it truly proven that deception results in isolation? Does it matter to our isolation if we are the ones deceiving, or the ones being deceived? And the most difficult question of all, why does this state seem to remain, in perpetuity?

I suppose that our self awareness is one thing, while our interactions with the world is another. This is inherently deceptive. Perhaps we must do, to get what we want. It is the exchange of one price, at the cost of something else. I suppose it all depends upon the value we place on one thing or another. And now, I feel like I’m caught up in the mathematics of economies. It is an intriguing symptom.

In that warm, comfy bed of mine, though messy, I had a dream the other night. Some people say I was experiencing random firings of neurons, while other say I was “sifting” through the day’s information. Nobody can say much about the particles. I only know that I had a dream. There was a large, flat landscape seen at a distance, like the world. It ground was a reddish-brown, cracked, clay desert at twilight. Lots of people were walking about in between plastic outcroppings in the plain that were shaped like rounded tombstones, but had brightly-glowing and colorful neon symbols that flowed in pleasant designs. They densely covered the plains while people walked amongst them, absently avoiding collisions with these colorful objects. All our interactions flowed through them, yet we always avoided touching them. Circles were always the most prominent design on the tombstones.

None of this was unpleasant. However, it did make me feel a little like a radio controlled robot, and I knew that everyone else was feeling the same thing. Mountains were off far along the horizon. We knew we were a colony, of sorts, and there was nowhere else to go. As Burroughs would say, “The theater is closed.”

But I woke up and decided to write this anyway. I feel compelled. It might be love. Or maybe religion. But then again, nothing is certain. Right?

Just a bunch of words, tenuously tied to the intimate experience of our unique existence. You can see such awareness in some people. Others might never get there. Still others are terrified. It’s not easy, with such awareness, being deceptive. Unless you are completely ruthless. That is effective evil. And it exists. It is a purity of self-interest.

Mutual interest does not just happen as a by-product of self-interest. Mutual interest strikes deep into the chest. It is undeniable. It is a function of awareness. And that, in my belief, is the mountain to whose heights we must aspire. Any other basis is petty and inevitably mean.

Watch Your Money, Quicker Than the Eye

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Magicians and magic shows no longer have the aura of mystery and intrigue they once did. Even sights appearing impossible are met with near indifference because we know there is a simple, reasonable explanation behind it, even when that reason is unknown. We are aware of our ignorance, yet are intelligent enough to understand that our ignorance does not give a magician any true magic.

The magic performed by magicians is usually a combination of diversion, distraction and sometimes even mentalism. This is performed upon we, the spectators or participants. This magic is an attempt to cause us to believe things other than the truth, so that the magician can benefit and we can be entertained. These magicians are also sometimes called illusionists. When they succeed, we believe things that have no basis in actuality. We believe things that are untrue. We believe false things.

Some people claim that everyone’s beliefs are equally valid. Where illusionists are concerned, this would mean that false things are true. If the illusionist is very good, true things might even be false. But when we go to a theater to see an illusionist, we enter a context where we expect illusion. In that context we can easily maintain our sense of what is true and what is false. Here, we expect that what we see and hear will be carefully choreographed to assault our sensibilities. We expect to be tricked. And because we have purposefully entered this known context, we are protected against trickery. We know that our ignorance will be exploited toward an end. That’s what we paid for. And in this context, it can be entertaining.

But what happens when we meet the illusionist outside the theater context, in the world where we know true and false with inherent certainty? In the theater we are vigilant, intently watching for any sign that might reveal the truth behind the illusion. In the theater we watch for the sleight of hand to be careless, giving up its secrets. And even when we discern no trickery, we are convinced from the onset of trickery. But in the streets, in the world outside the stage, few maintain such vigilance. We are a happier, more trusting people, in the world, that is a stage.

It is remarkable how we have come to create ideas and institutions collectively. Our social interactions at all levels depend completely upon shared beliefs. We evolve socially through collectively determining and agreeing to what is true and false, and to a lesser extent, though just as importantly, what is right and wrong. This process of collective determination is what gives rise to a society. And it is from this process of social formation, both ongoing and adaptive, that a sense and even framework of social justice emerges. As John Rawls says in A Theory of Justice, “If men’s inclination to self-interest makes their vigilance against one another necessary, their public sense of justice makes their secure association together possible.”

The trade and skill of illusionists rests primarily in the subterfuge of generally accepted truth. Perhaps there is an equally valid private sense of justice that can tip the balance of self-interest between people in favor of a certain group, who can, in turn, bring about even more secure associations between members of a society. A private, or hidden sense of justice. Of course, in the light of truth and reason, such obscure reasoning cannot hold. However, illusionists do not deal in the light of truth and reason. Their tools are distraction and deception, to cause the untrue to appear true. And they accomplish this quite reasonably. In fact, they depend upon reason.

But as we know, even well-reasoned things can be shown untrue, given enough devotion to the process of reasoning and the discovery of related truths. Reasoning is simply a process of logic. It is an empty pursuit without at least some objects of truth pulled from our collective baskets. Even with truth as our motivation, the more empty our baskets, the less likely our reasoning will be sound. The fuller our baskets, the more likely our success becomes. Illusionists have very full baskets. They are full of truth. However, their baskets also contain a a good many illusory objects. The tricky part is, these illusory objects are not necessarily false, nor true. They are illusory — a distraction. With these illusory objects in their arsenal, their process of reasoning can be formidable, because most of us don’t feel like carrying big, heavy baskets around with us. We carry just a few things in our baskets to help us along our journeys. And this helps us to think, well, if this person over here has all these many objects in their basket of reason, they must know what they’re about. I’m just happy with my little basket. So sure, I’ll believe it — I’ll play along.

I’m going to give you some objects for your basket. If you already have them, good for you. I know with certainty that at least five of you do, and two of those have some wildly screaming and thrashing eggs in there, too. Now you can both go hopping around pointing and shouting at everyone, “told ya so!” to your heart’s content. Just be careful what eggs you drop into people’s baskets, otherwise you’re not much better than the illusionists.

The last piece I sent out dealt with more humanistic aspects of our current financial situation. Many people were surprised that the trillion dollar bailout actually passed. Some of the more savvy wonderers question where we find this kind of money, to give to Wall Street. I can just imagine Scott growling, “we gonna pull it out of our ass!?” Well, pretty much. But not us, really. Treasury Secretary Paulson will tell the The Federal Reserve to pull the money out of their ass. We’ll just be going into further debt. There’s his signature, right next to George Washington’s face. The credit crisis, and we’re going further into debt to the bankers as well. You should see the interest they charge!

Paulson On Dollar

But wait, you ask, isn’t the Federal Reserve part of the government? Well, no. And yes. It’s one of the illusory eggs in their basket. The US Government does not create US money. The Federal Reserve is a collection of 12 regional banks around the country that are privately owned. The Federal Reserve can create money with a few keystrokes. Our government does not create any money, except for small coins from the US Mint. The Federal Reserve also controls the credit markets, which are currently in turmoil. The only ties these private bankers have to our government is a small board of finance people who oversee The Federal Reserve. These people, much like Supreme Court Justices, are appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate, only with 14 year terms. They generally outlast multiple presidents. However, after Bush’s election, some of the board members resigned their terms early for some reason, and the board is now filled with Bush appointees. They include bankers involved in the economic scandal, and economists of the Chicago School of Economics, of Milton Friedman fame. If you’re interested, you can read more about the Milton Friedman economic ideologies that first took firm hold during President Reagan’s administration.

By far, the majority of Americans do not know that the Federal Reserve is a privately owned central bank. Other banks own these banks, as do other people, both Americans and foreigners, and foreign banks. When US dollars are printed, we simply go into debt to these banks and begin paying interest. They like it when we give a trillion dollars to Wall Street. They also like it when they get to buy up other Wall Street banks, or other failing institutions. During the Great Depression, they planned ahead the takeover of the majority of US farms through mortgage foreclosure, where farmers instead became tenants upon their land. They also like taking out savings and loan companies, and any non-national banks. They like very much being able to control money, even as far as being the ones who create it from nothing. And they love war. We entered into the Great Depression almost immediately after their creation.

The Federal Reserve is far more a Wall Street institution than it is a US Government institution. The same holds true for the Bank of England, and most other European central banks. Their interest is not for the welfare of the people. Their interest is profit for themselves and for their constituents. They can take advantage of economies in our good times, and they can take advantage of economies in our bad times. They can also manipulate and steer the economy into trends of their choosing, while utilizing this foreknowledge. As such, all times are good times for the people behind the central bank. In fact, they rely on the “business cycle” of ups and downs, even the extremes of bubbles and depressions.

When these bankers create money from nothing, it appears in their banks. Then, they loan out this money and charge interest on that loan. Until recently, banks would loan out 10 times  more money than they conjured. Now, in large part due to Treasury Secretary Paulson’s efforts before he came to Treasury, these financial institutions loan out more like 30 times the amount, and collect interest on it all. They also foreclose when companies or people can’t pay.

So there you have a few big eggs for your basket. When you know this, and rationally consider our economic situation, it’s not at all such a crazy-seeming situation. It is all very sensible. It is also all very predictable when you are privy to the detailed financial reports of Wall Street, which we are not, after so much deregulation. These bankers can operate in relative isolation from any scrutiny.

Our nation’s history is filled with struggles between private banking and government. Several times in our history the US Government has created its own money. The Federal Reserve was, I believe, the third instance in which money creation powers were handed over to private people. It was created in the early 1900′s and shortly after its creation we entered the Great Depression. Like now, massive credit lending was the rule. During this time of massive debt, the Federal Reserve reduced the money supply, so there was no money for people, businesses, smaller banks, and farmers to pay their debts. Foreclosures were rampant. Like now, even though the major banks are infused with money, they are not releasing it.

Some people speculate that the business cycle is related to the Federal Reserve pushing money out into the country, then finding a way to get it for themselves. This is the boom/bust cycle. Other people claim that the Federal Reserve acts in the interest of all people, not just the bankers who comprise the Federal Reserve. These people view the Federal Reserve bankers as a benign and stabilizing economic force. It is a pretty egg.

Several US Presidents have fought against the private ownership of the nation’s central bank, as have many other prominent people. The history is quite fascinating. Thomas Jefferson even warned against any private individuals having such power over our money supply. He claimed that freedom would not be possible, since it would create two governments, the stronger of which was in the hands of a few private interests.

The history of privately owned central banks can be traced back to England in the 1600′s, with the founding of the privately owned Bank of England. Even before this, struggles existed between monarchs and the goldsmiths who produced coin and had a powerful influence. They also could manipulate the money supply. One king decided that he would control the money, and crafted a stick with markings that represented monetary denominations. Even though gold coin still existed, these sticks were the only thing the king would accept for payment of taxes. As such, the sticks were in demand, much to the chagrin of the goldsmiths. However, their coins still held value. The goldsmiths simply found it far more difficult to manipulate the kingdom’s economy.

Our President Andrew Jackson when asked what his greatest accomplishment as President was, replied simply, “I killed the Bank”. By this he meant the Second Bank of the United States, which was our second privately owned central bank. It was a terrible battle, though, between the President and the US central bank. The bank even provided Jackson’s political opponent with millions of dollars to help defeat Jackson. This spurred Jackson to take his campaign to the road, to the people — the first President to do so. His campaign slogan was “Jackson and no Bank”. Jackson was re-elected. The chairman of the US central bank, Nicholas Biddle, threatened to plunge the country into a depression if the government did not renew his bank’s authority:

“Nothing but widespread suffering will produce any effect on Congress…. Our only safety is in pursuing a steady course of firm restriction – and I have no doubt that such a course will ultimately lead to restoration of the currency and the recharter of the Bank.”

The US central banks called in loans and restricted the money supply, making no new loans. The credit market was effectively closed. Unemployment soared. Businesses failed. The banks foreclosed on property. And the US central bank started giving money to members of Congress for their campaigns. Newspapers began printing stories lambasting President Jackson, blaming him for the depression. President Jackson was even censured by Congress. But remarkably, Congress was unable to override President Jackson’s veto, which effectively shut down the US central bank. After this, Biddle was investigated, refusing to turn over any financial records. He died, with many civil lawsuits still pending on their bank. Andrew Jackson killed the Bank.

It was in 1835 that the Second Bank of the United States was closed. Also in 1835, President Jackson managed pay off the national debt, after having removed US deposits in the central bank in 1833, moving them instead to normal banks. This was also the year that an assassination attempt on President Jackson failed, with both guns misfired. It was also the only time our national debt was paid off completely.

Then, in 1913, the new privately owned Federal Reserve bank was created and handed back the money power. You know the story from there, don’t you? I’ll leave it to you to find your own new eggs for your basket, if you like. Oh, ok. One more egg. Both the first and second national banks were partially owned by the US government. We gave the bank 20% of its cash, for a 20% stake. The bankers then loaned themselves the money to buy their shares in the bank. And they started making loans of far more cash than they actually had. It’s a good scheme, isn’t it? Unfortunately, if any of us tried it, we would go to jail.

Which brings up an interesting point. What is money? When you ask business owners how much their business is worth, you’re always given the same answer: it is worth whatever someone is willing to pay, that sounds good to you, too. Money is much the same, particularly since it is no longer backed by anything real. If we agreed to it, hairs our our heads could be money. I’m certain the Hair Club for Men would be elated. Money is something we agree to. You can print your own notes, if you like. Last I checked, it is perfectly legal. However, if you are going to exchange products or services, you still must pay taxes, in the money of the realm. Somehow it is very appealing to think of a group of people coming up with their own form of money, just measuring how much they do for each other, in a simple, nice and open manner, free from illusionists. Taken even a step further, it’s just nice being able to do things for people. I wish that worked all-around.

But again, in case you’re still wondering what is going on in our economy, I’ll use a simple analogy. Baby, it’s just that the vacuum cleaner has been turned on. It’s a giant one, and the collection bag sits in the homes of a fraction of that top 1% of the people in the nation who already hold the majority of our nation’s wealth. All the rest is illusion. And so is my analogy, to a small extent, since the central banks of nations are interconnected.

From here, if you still have any interest, check out the World Trade Organization and the International Monetary Fund. Pay attention to what is going on in countries like Iceland. Those poor people — I really feel for them. I hope so much that they find their own freedom and independence after the storm, though. I hope also that we all can gain some sense.

There is also a very long documentary on this subject out there. It’s about three hours long, but it’s packed full of good information, from a very irritating narrator. Money Masters, I think is what it’s called. Yes, it shows up on Google Video. It’s worth a look. It was made in 1995, and I’ve verified much of its content, though I can’t say with certainty about the whole thing. It smells of conspiracy theory. Just keep in mind that sometimes truths we don’t know can smell like a silly conspiracy theme. Personally, I don’t believe it’s a conspiracy. It’s just well played business, devoid of ethics. It’s the golden cow we worship, and the illusionist’s diversions.

Just look at them go! And while you’re at it, be vigilant. See if you can spot the “invisible hand”.