Archive for February, 2009

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LIFE in the UNIVERSE: The Odds of Actually Being a Being, Here

Saturday, February 28th, 2009

I meant to put this paragraph in the little summary of Quantum Enigma, but somehow forgot. Random mistake, predestined? God knows.

Physicists Kuttner and Rosenblum write on page 198:

Though there is as yet no accepted theory for that minuscule split second before quarks and electrons came into existence, there are constraints on how the universe must have started.

To produce a universe resembling one in which we can live, the Big Bang had to be finely tuned. How finely? Theories vary.

According to one, if the initial conditions of the universe were chosen randomly, there would be one chance in 10 to the 120 (that’s one with 120 zeros after it) that the universe would be livable.

Cosmologist Roger Penrose has it vastly more unlikely: The exponent he suggests is 10 to the 123.

By any such estimate, the chance that a livable universe like ours would be created is far less than the chance of randomly picking a particular single atom out of all the atoms in the universe.

Can you accept odds like that as a coincidence?

Wow. That’s, ah, small. Why is it so hard for humans to tangibly feel those inconceivable odds? In other words, why don’t we walk around all day with a dumb smile on our face, just shaking are heads in wonder and breathing it all in and out, deeply?

Oh yeah, we have to work.

Then again, maybe the whole human aspect of religion/spirituality/mysticism/Theism is created by an undercurrent feeling of said mystery. These theories/emotions are natural superimpositions on our unlikely arrival.

Maybe.

Maybe not.

But man, I have to remember to love more, to be more love, to be more gracious, to have more gratitude. Oh I love ya!

Pete xox

Posted in History, Human Nature, Science, Spirituality, posted | 2 Comments »

QUANTUM ENIGMA would be NO ENIGMA to GREAT MYSTICS—Just Part of the Cosmic Dance of Consciousness

Thursday, February 26th, 2009

I finished reading Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness, by Bruce Rosenblum and Fred Kuttner. They did a great job, I think, admirably doing what they set out to do. The book is inspired, informative, courageous, and accessible to the lay person (moi). Their punch is measured but not pulled, and I appreciate their dilemma, let alone the enigma.

I know I’m seeing Quantum Theory through my own lens, but I can’t tell you how much it resonates with Eastern thought (Vedic—Hindu Metaphysics—in particular, with flashes of Buddhist mind (manas) stuff as well).

A few final (of many) great moments. From page 155:

Quantum mechanics forces us to accept that the Mechanistic Newtonian view of the world [and thus could you not throw in the genius of Darwin's view, also?]—and the intuitions fostered by it—are fundamentally flawed…

[I]t is also fascinating to explore what Nature seems to be telling us.

As [Physicist] John Bell [of Bell's Theorem] says:

Is it not good to know what follows from what, even if it is not necessarily FAPP ["for all practical purposes"]?

By FAPP, they mean scientists being able to do quantum physics while ignoring the virtually undeniable confrontation of Quantum Theory and consciousness.

Bell goes on:

Suppose for example that quantum mechanics were found to resist precise formulation. Suppose that when formulation beyond FAPP is attempted, we find an unmovable finger obstinately pointing outside the subject, to the mind of the observer, to the Hindu scriptures, to God, or even only Gravitation [some paths in the Vedas would say Gravitation has consciousness, has beingness]? Would that not be very, very interesting?

Scientists with the courage to say such things are so inspiring.

And this monster from Niels Bohr:

[T]he apparent contrast between the continuous onward flow of associative thinking and the preservation of the unity of the personality exhibits a suggestive analogy with the relation between the wave description of the motions of material particles, governed by the superposition principle [let's say in infinite places at the same time], and their indestructible individuality.

It is as if, with observation, we ‘collapse’ to individuality. Before that, we are infinite possibilities. And in fact, even as individuals we are infinite possibilities (don’t get me wrong, I have no idea what this means, either).

The Bengali 15th century Vaishnava mystic Caitanya (Shay-tanya) said this: “We are inconceivably, simultaneously, one [with everything, the Supreme] and different [distinctly individual].”

Rosenblum and Kuttner repeat over and over and unabashedly that (pg 201):

“…if you take quantum theory seriously beyond practical purposes, it has baffling implications. It tells us that physics’ encounter with consciousness, demonstrated for the small, applies to everything. And that “everything’ can include the entire universe.

Copernicus dethroned humanity from the cosmic center. Does quantum theory suggest that, in some mysterious sense, we are a cosmic center?”

They finish the book with, in my opinion, just the right, beautiful emotion (at least for me!).

Most physicists will dismiss the creation of reality by observation as having no significance beyond the limited domain of the physics of microscopic entities. Others will argue that nature is telling us something, and we should listen.

Our own feelings accord with Schrodinger’s:

“The urge to find a way out of this impasse ought not to be dampened by the fear of incurring the wise rationalist’s mockery.”

Man, I love that. I’ll keep that in my heart, Dr Dawkins—whose greatness is not denied.

When experts disagree, you may choose your expert. Since the quantum enigma arises in the simplest quantum experiment, its essence can be fully comprehended with little technical background. Nonexperts can therefore come to their own conclusions. We hope yours, like ours, are tentative.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
—Shakespeare, Hamlet

I loved this stuff, this book—and their honesty and intellectual courage. And I love to be in awe—as the “real” world spins crazily into a black hole bail-out—at the wonder and mystery of it all, love, consciousness, me, you, us.

Time for dream sleep. Lots of love,

Pete xox

Posted in Courage, Creativity, Human Nature, Science, Spirituality, posted | 1 Comment »

Teaching Tips For Little Minds and Big Minds: Noam Chomsky on Education

Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

BIG MINDS

I was glad when I read science may have finally found some evidence that old brains still have some plasticity left in them—which presently includes my brain. Hopefully there is some ability to expand on some level with age beyond the confines of a four lane highway and a Winnebago. After all, the gas mileage is an environmental disaster

Either way, even without science’s stamp of approval, the brain will do what it does—which is even beyond inconceivable (if you think about it).

LITTLE MINDS

As for little minds, literally countless friends of mine are popping out these wonderful six-to-ten pound beings lately, and I have found the discussion of education—how to educate a child—an ongoing topic rife with unknowing: public school, private school, home school, alternative school. This, of course, is a privilege, seeing as millions of children don’t go to school at all.

I like what legendary linguist Noam Chomsky said about learning in this 1987 interview in Language and Politics (pg 502). He first qualifies his answer by saying he is not an expert in the field of education:

My own feeling, for what it is worth, is that at any level, from the nursery to graduate school, teaching is largely a matter of encouraging natural development. The best “method” of teaching is to make it clear that the subject is worth learning, and to allow the child’s—or adult’s—natural curiosity and interest in truth and understanding to mature and develop. That is about 90% of the problem, if not more.

That’s profound to me, in that, I’ve seen children unwilling to do their schoolwork because they don’t have any idea of how it benefits them, or the value of what they’re learning. What’s fascinating is how difficult it also is for adults to find and offer a compelling argument (outside of duty and fear) as to why the subject should be worked at.

I think a few things might be usefully considered.

TEACHING TIPS: BIG MINDS AND LITTLE MINDS TOGETHER

1) Is the parent or adult sufficiently involved in the child’s learning?

2) Does the parent or adult find the subject (or even the child) remotely interesting?

3) If so, why?

4) If not, well, what do you expect?—unless the child is driven by grades, adult praise, the future and/or their stock portfolio.

5) Can the adult or parent find a way to inspire the child (or anybody else) with a truthful, inspirational, ongoing conversation about the richness/value of the subject and other subjects?

6) If not, and you really tried, and the subject is a waste of time, well, at least you’ll have a touch more compassion for the lazy little bastard.

7) Has the parent or adult even considered or explored the child’s natural learning tendencies?

8) If not, well, what do we expect? We have to open our eyes to both the greatness and the limitations of anyone we’re truly interested in. If we don’t, maybe we need the courage to admit we’re not really interested in that person (which would account, if we were honest, for a great deal of the frustration).

9) Finally, if after being truly worked at, none of the above help, maybe you have a deadbeat child.

10) It looks like military school for little Eddie.

9) and 10) were just sort of for fun. Anyway, being childless, I say it all with humility. I haven’t got a clue. But learning is such a great thing.

Lots of love to you,

Pete

Posted in Creativity, Human Nature, posted | 2 Comments »

THE INVASION, brought to you by OMISSION, and PEPSI, and so on

Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

I wrote this awhile ago, but forgot to post it.

THE COMPLETELY FREE PRESS (ie no press at all)

Remember a few years back when journalists were not allowed to venture outside of the protected Green Zone in Baghdad to report on the massacres in Iraq?

Recently [well, a couple of months ago now], the Israeli Defense Forces were not allowing journalists into Gaza, to report on the massacres there.

Months before that, I believe Robert Mugabe wouldn’t let the press into Zimbabwe during the crackdown. Interesting company.

That damn television footage of carnage in Vietnam, paraded across the average American’s dinner time, inciting revolt, changed everything.

I read recently in an article on Gaza this line from legendary war correspondent Martha Gellhorn. It felt important:

“If [a journalist] can do nothing positive, to make the world more livable or less cruel or stupid, he can at least record truly, and that is something no one else will do, and it’s a job that must be done. It is the only revenge that all the bastardized people will ever get: that somebody writes down clearly what happened to them.”

SPINNING OUT OF CONTROL

People with the money or the power can put so much resources into PR, and PR is so undeniably powerful in shaping opinion and manipulating what we buy, both physically and emotionally—including the news.

On one level, it’s curious that in a ‘free market’ we’re allowed to market at all using props outside the product’s inherent use. In other words, using, say, the sexy woman who comes with the Ford Pinto (okay, not the Ford Pinto) or the happy clown who comes with the fast food meal from hell, when clearly (yet not subconsciously clearly, clearly) these props have zero relationship to the products they support.

How strange it is that any war-like group, be it the IDF or the Hamas militarist, or the American military in Iraq, or whoever, can ever be allowed to not let the press into an area, when the press, or a section of the press, would be willing to enter said area.

You’d think that upon hearing this restriction on reporting, and knowing civilians like ourselves are likely being massacred, countries with a so-called ‘free press’ would non-violently rise up in protest—particularly with the massacres our taxes pay for.

In itself, isn’t the forbidding of reporting not a sort of false advertising? A means of spin by omission? Because while that censorship happens, the press continues to report something.

FULL MARX ON THE SEPOY REBELLION

As a note on trivia, or perhaps a trivial note, in 1857 in India, there was what was called the Sepoy Rebellion (the Great Rebellion)—the uprising of Hindu and Muslim soldiers against the British invaders. The British counter-attacked with such total force that, supposedly, Delhi, a city of I think one hundred thousand people at the time, was cleared completely. It was Karl Marx of all folks who, in the New York Daily News, lambasted the British press for a dearth of coverage of British atrocities.

And to punish the British further, Marx wrote Das Kapital, which would-be Marxists actually had to try to slog through, just to be au courant and sexy to free-thinking women at the turn of the century.

Picked up an old dusty copy once. Couldn’t read a page. But I do wonder what ol’ Karl would say about the bail-out today?

Keep lovin’,

Pete

Posted in Activism, History, Human Rights, India, Politics, Social Awareness, posted | No Comments »

NORTHROP FRY UNBUTTONED: What A Great Canadian

Tuesday, February 24th, 2009

And I say that very loosely, because we are so much more than our nationality. In fact, I’d say ultimately that’s not us at all. Either way, Northrop Frye is great, period.

I’ve been flipping through Northrop Frye Unbuttoned: Wit and Wisdom From The Notebooks And Diaries, selected by Robert Denham, and Fry’s comment on the Last Judgement made me laugh (I was looking for this for my friend Tim today) pg 166, Last Judgement:

[The Last Judgement is] The miserable bureaucratic parody of religion that says that all those who are not good enough for heaven must be bad enough for hell, when it’s so obvious nobody is fit for either.

Now that’s funny, and probably true (speaking eternally).

And here’s another one (pg 238, Reason):

I used to think of people who never believed anything except on evidence or reasonable deduction therefrom as materialistically minded. Now I just think of them as stupid. That looks from the outside as though I were getting bigoted & provincial, but I know I am not, or if I am it doesn’t matter.

Classic. God, ol’ Norrie makes me laugh and think, and see the beauty of laughing and thinking.

Lots of love to you,

pete

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KEEPING YOGA ETERNAL AND UNIVERSAL

Tuesday, February 24th, 2009

I can’t express how much I agree with the following article called Yoga piracy: India shows who’s the guru:

India is going all out to save yoga—a 2,000-year-old art of righteous living, from western pirates.

Instances of self-styled yoga gurus claiming copyrights to ancient ‘asanas’, especially from the West, is now becoming rampant.

This has made 200 scientists and researchers from the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and Union health ministry’s department of Ayush join hands to put on record all known yoga postures and techniques that originated in India.

You would have thought centuries of colonization would have been enough filling of the coffers. Maybe the West is subconsciously bitter they didn’t bludgeon to death the indigenous culture of India altogether—alas, not by a long shot.

You’ll recall that after America invaded Vietnam, the result being 3.4 million deaths in Indochina according to Robert McNamara, and the war finally came to an end, America shortly thereafter imposed a decades-long embargo on that country—evidently for defending themselves.

Similarly, for democratically electing the ‘wrong’ government in Palestine, civilians have been murdered en masse, brutalized ad nauseum, and collectively punished ad infinitum. And this is not an apologetic for their own extremist, and extremely mad leaders.

Just a little solidarity for my sisters and brothers.

But back to beautiful yoga (and more of my sisters and brothers), it must be doubly annoying to Indians and real yogis everywhere when they see Indian ex-pats also copyrighting ‘yoga’ (ie Bikram etc).

Call me Yogi Barely, but that’s got to be bad karma.

We’ll end up having to send a donation for doing a back bend. What about variations on namaste? Are those up for grabs, too?

This should be called Bechtel Yoga. The Bechtel Corporation, for the record, pushed hard to own all the water in Bolivia—even the right to collect rainwater. In return, Bechtel finally got ran out of the country by enraged campesinos, and the first ever indigenous leader, Eva Morales, was elected.

McDownward Dog, anyone?

I’ve got to say, the sight of McDonalds in Bangalore disgusted me. Actually, it disgusts me everywhere else, too. Why isn’t it illegal to simultaneously torture animals, mistreat workers and poison children? Maybe when they’re all together they cancel each other out.

I think the final lines of the Yoga article are wonderfully conclusive:

Experts say yoga has become a $225 billion market in the West, leading to foreign quack yoga instructors claiming patents over `asanas’ at random. Nearly 16.5 million Americans practice yoga and spend about $3 billion a year on yoga classes.

What a world. You know, the asanas make a person more flexible, but a true yogi will only bend so much before, well, let me quote the Bhagavad Gita (4:42): “Armed with yoga, stand and fight.”

The full article is here.

Jai yoga! Vasudaiva Kutumbakam, lots of love, keep the breath calm,

Pete xoxo

Posted in Activism, Economics, Human Rights, India, Spirituality, posted | 2 Comments »

EPIGENETICS: SINS OF THE FATHER PASSED ON

Monday, February 23rd, 2009

Funny how sometimes when you write about something, you start to see a lot about it—or maybe it’s just in the zeitgeist. But this piece was on CBC news about epigenetics.

Talking about the ‘hereditary’ effects of child abuse:

The team of scientists found early child abuse changed the expression of a gene that is important for responding to stress…

The study is the latest in the growing field of epigenetics: how our environment, including the social trauma or chemical substances, affects how our genes do their job and ultimately how they affect behaviour.

But as I pointed out in a previous blog, the following is my fear, as the Pharmaceutical companies salivate…

“The implications at this stage are you want to identify these people and then probably offer them some sort of intervention,” said study co-author Moshe Szyf, an epigeneticist in McGill’s department of pharmacology and therapeutics.

The goal, Szyf said, would be to find drugs that could reverse the changes [drugs, what a surprise!], but researchers don’t yet know how to do so.

That statement above, of course, makes me feel nauseous at its simple-minded assumption from such myopically brilliant people. Fundamentalists of all sorts, it seems to me (and I have my own fundamentalist leanings!), tend to see exact equations to solve problems, as if the epigenetic difference is the whole key—and switch that and all will be normal. Of course it isn’t the whole answer. Not by a long shot.

In fact, we seem to be an increasingly medicated world, which might be reason to question the effectiveness (but not the economics) of those medications.

The human being is subtle, and infinitely complex, and a thousand other systems within the body and brain will also be altered by stress, or whatever other environmental factor. Not only that, those systems will also have tried to adjust to the situation. Where are they left? Who is the being being altered? Well, what difference does that make if humans are nothing more than a big vat of chemical reactions?

Man, that upsets me—because no one individually lives as if that is true!

A drug may help of course—and drugs obviously do help in certain psychological situations, to be sure. But I felt immediately upon reading about epigenetics that one of the first things scientists would think of and want to do is find a new drug—a panacea, a cure all—and that appears to be true. This hardly makes me insightful—it is the way of Big Pharma and our medicated world, with a disdain for things holistic, subtle.

Heck, for all we know, extensive breath relaxation techniques over time may also change epigenetic markers, and that is self-directed, self-exploratory, wonderful for a thousand other reasons, and would effect the entire body/mind complex, not to mention a pharmacologist’s funding. Plus he’d have to expand his Weltanschauung (worldview).

Ah, but that may reduce the amount of medications we take.

If one hates things spiritual, try the Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness for a scientific mind opener. The relationship between genes and behaviour is vital, but what about between behaviour and consciousness?

We know so much and we know so, so, so little.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, then are dreamt in your philosophy.

Anyway, I know we’re all just tryin’ to do our dharma. May everybody feel a little less emotional pain, and a lot more joy, love, community and freedom,

Pete

Posted in Human Nature, Science, posted | No Comments »

CORNY, MAN: Swimming Against the Current (Ideology)

Friday, February 20th, 2009

Michael Phelps, of course, has been dropped by Kellogg’s for smoking dope. Fair enough. A clause is a clause, I guess.

Now first off, the fact that Phelps could have drank 28 beers and passed out in his own vomit and kept the sponsorship is mildly instructive.

But the big hypocrisy is this: the fact that, because they offer money, Kellogg’s can actually hint that their breakfast cereals—corn flakes and frosted flakes!—might do anything other than promote virtually empty calories and type II diabetes is the real crime. And I know Michael Phelps eats a ton of junk food, but still…

Here are the ingredients:

MILLED CORN, SUGAR, MALT FLAVORING, HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP, SALT, SODIUM ASCORBATE AND ASCORBIC ACID (VITAMIN C), NIACINAMIDE, IRON, PYRIDOXINE HYDROCHLORIDE (VITAMIN B6), RIBOFLAVIN (VITAMIN B2), THIAMIN HYDROCHLORIDE (VITAMIN B1), VITAMIN A PALMITATE, FOLIC ACID, BHT (PRESERVATIVE), VITAMIN B12, AND VITAMIN D.

Okay, so there are a few vitamins, and evidently it’s kosher (on the Kellogg’s website), which I think means the cow didn’t bleed all over itself at the moment of slaughter. Great, it just suffered for the months prior to the slaughter.

See, this shite food is yet another corn product. And high fructose corn syrup is just the worst for type II diabetes and general ill-health.

This corn craze is crazy. Corn fed to cows pathologically ravages their stomach lining. There was a time when cows were actually grass fed. And corn is subsidized intensely in the so-called free market world, meaning cows are communist. Heck, Phelps’ bong was probably made out of some corn product. And Phelps, given his diet, is probably three-quarters corn.

Corn flakes. Frosted flakes. Marijuana? If anything, marijuana is a gateway drug that leads to junk food. That’s why I don’t smoke—it might lead to Cheezies. Why isn’t really crappy food illegal?

And it’s not as though elsewhere, outside of arresting 20 million people for marijuana, we humans stress excessive love and/or nutrition for our fellow citizen: in hockey you can punch somebody in the face repeatedly, with a bare fist and get only a five minute penalty; you can take steroids up the yin-yang in baseball (okay, that’s supposedly illegal, now); you can take enough hits to the head in football to be a bumbling mess in your forties, but you can’t, well, you know…

But man that guy can swim. Imagine if he ate well and wasn’t constantly stoned. He’d probably be a basketball player.

Take care of your beautiful, beautiful body,

Pete xoxo

Posted in Activism, Food, Goofy, Human Rights, War on Drugs, posted | No Comments »

SURVIVAL of the SICKEST: Passing On a Big Mac, in more ways then one

Thursday, February 19th, 2009

Dr Sharon Moalem gives a simple definition of epigenetics. We actually know the first part part about the importance of a pregnant woman’s good health on the health of the baby, but now we know a little more of why (pg 156-57).

[I]f you’re trying to get pregnant, you really should think twice before you bite that Big Mac—once for your own waistline, and once for your potential child’s [and once for the brutalized animals, the corn-fed beef, the mistreated workers, the increased heart problems, Type II diabetes, the addiction to corn products and corn syrup, the fast food garbage waste and the absolute lack of love or good intention that went into the food etc etc—but enough about me].

Before you get the wrong idea, this isn’t to suggest some Lamarckian idea that a fat parent is going to have a fat child because the child will inherit the weight problem his or her parent acquired.

But this is to say that new research is rapidly changing our understanding of how, when, and whether genes express themselves—that is, how, when, and whether the instructions in a gene are carried out.

A series of groundbreaking research over the last five years has shown that certain compounds can attach themselves to specific genes and suppress their expression. These compounds act like a genetic light switch, essentially turning off the genes they attach to. And—here’s where it gets really interesting—the research shows that environmental factors, like the food we eat or the cigarettes we smoke, can flick the switch on or off.

This research is changing the whole field of genetics—it’s even launched a subdiscipline called epigenetics…

Being a gene isn’t all it’s cracked up to be anymore.

That’s pretty clear, and fascinating.

Here’s lots of love and good genes xoto you and your off-spring,

Pete

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JARED DIAMOND

Thursday, February 19th, 2009

A 4 minute video with Pulitzer Prize winning civilization-scholar Jared Diamond (Guns, Germs and Steel and Collapse) discussing the direction towards decline or recline the US may or may not go. Unsurprisingly, he says a lot depends on the choices the so-called “elites” make and the pressures they’re under to make change.

For example, dykes in New Orleans were not built, despite warnings, largely because the wealthy live high on the hill, as it were, and the poorer folks—being a largely segregated city, a danger for a civilization’s ongoing success, evidently—lived right in harms way, should the water break through, and break through it did.

By comparison, Holland (with everybody in harms way), has built state of the art dykes to diminish the likelihood of such a disaster.

The clip is here.

My immediate recommendation: get rich! No…uh…increase and build community by being kind to everybody, seeing them as sisters and brothers. At least that’s immediately doable—and see where that leads.

Lots of love to you, and yours,

Pete

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