And To All a Good Night

http://kunstler.com/blog/2010/12/and-to-all-a-good-night.html

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Evolution

An important step in evolution is to develop the ability to make decisions based on reason, logic, and empirical study, with no readily available environmental indicators or context.

Most of us need environmental (read: from our surroundings) feedback to impel us to act, otherwise the inertia of our current actions and way of life carry us blindly forth.
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You can perform a task by relying on a system. If your system is good enough, you can perform the task better than everyone else.

In doing this, you are placing the value of winning above the values of freedom and chance. It comes down to your goals. The difficulty of the task also matters - if it is too easy, the system robs the task of its meaning. If the task is difficult enough that the system cannot dominate the task, meaning (fun) persists.

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Quote

"Either we are alone in the universe or we are not - both ideas are overwhelming."

What do/would the world's religions have to say about this?
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Teddy Roosevelt refused to allow his children to 'go around' a challenge - they had to go over or through them.

Is there a better test of character ?
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This Century

Did our parents and grandparents have confidence they were bring children into a brighter future? If so, for many people this feeling no longer resonates.

Uncertainty of the sustainability of our current way of life and standard of living means our decisions are tinged with doubt.

Yet, a feeling of risk and the need to work hard to realize our visions likely makes us better humans.
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If we are animals, it seems perfectly natural for people to fear each other, and to react with aggression (fight) or withdrawal (flight). However civilized we want to be, instinct can rule.

The more varied our experience (real or imagined?), the greater our flexibility and tolerance for the unknown.

The ability to watch oneself is the ability to change.

http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com

Surely if you hate and fear the "good" as much as the "bad", they both occur quite evenly!

When people reveal themselves (as artists inevitably do), they move us forward, positively.

Gord Downie Interview

http://exploremusic.com/exclusives/a-guided-tour-through-the-grand-bounce-with-gord-downie-himself/

Something for nothing...

Is the order of the day. Coke Zero...all the coke taste with zero calories. Fucking right!

What's in it? If not food...

***

Amazing how much better it feels to create things of value and ingest food of value.

***

The Z List is a new social networking site for the edgier, club oriented 18-30 crowd... yourself included possibly. The creator of the site says it rewards people for having the most pictures, hits, etc because everyone wants their 15 minutes of fame. Everyone wants to be noticed by someone they don't know.

The ego gets a slight jolt from this type of energy. Something like:
A: Hey it's you, the guy/girl with the most pictures on Z list! What's your name again?
B: Yeah fuck I was up all night for the past week scanning all my old pictures, going out every night and making my friends take pictures of me... Just made the cut-off time for the contest."
A: Wow, pretty busy eh.
B: Yeah well when you're famous it comes with the territory.

Grandfather God

I accidentally typed in "ticketmaster.ca" and this is what it took me to:

http://grandfathergod.com/

Through experience we learn that good things come from bad, and bad come from good. We learn that life is un-judge-able, and that balance seems to permeate all things (though from micro to macro scale this balance can be difficult to see).

So I theorize that the physical contraction of our world (in the form of downscaling buildings, infrastructure, and systems) will coincide with non-physical growth.

Throughout my life (and for decades before) the 'developed' world has consumed and constructed without much thought, and this obsession with all things material - sex, consumption, power - has come at the expense of hearts and minds.

The tide is turning, and hopefully the physical suffering of contraction will for many be accompanied by a spiritual and energetic renewal.

A child without a family, place to live or sleep, roams. He or she does not stop for long, for the body's needs constantly beckon. The freedom of having nothing to do is fully tempered by the fear of endless survival. To be able to stop, sit, relax, is paradise. On those rare occasions, the spark of hope is born. Injustice is found everywhere, as people and things surround the empty human vessel, who is skilled now yet wholly unworldly in their eyes. Their heart is closed, it cannot be touched after breaking so many times.

Yet, in time, there is found to be a presence that exists, always. A person learns the patterns, the patterns give way to growth. A child is forged by their cage.

Kunstlercast 108: The Virtual Realm vs. The Authentic

Crary (host): How do you think this emphasis on the virtual realm affects the tangible realm?

Kunstler: Well, there's been one overall effect that we have not come to grips with as much as we may like it or find it appealing, or find it ingenious...it's just not good enough. And we gotta stop kidding ourselves that virtual life is as good as real life. And you know, what it's doing is it's impoverishing us.

...

Kunstler: I'm very conscious lately of the difference between having my head stuffed externally with other people's thoughts and ideas and conversations, and having my own conversation in my own head with reality and imagination.

Crary: What do you think the effect of having all this instant gratification through the internet has had on our society and what is it leading us towards?

Kunstler: I think it makes us very impatient and I think it makes it hard - it's turning us sort of into ADD nation... Of people who cannot keep their minds on a task long enough to see anything through. And it may be what's responsible for so much of the political discord that we're now suffering through - this inability to think through and address problems like the healthcare dilemma, the taxation and finance and fiscal dilemma, etc.
...
The diminishing returns of this kind of extremely advanced and refined technology is that you end up in a situation where - I'm sorry to be crude - But ah, you've got a whole nation now that's kind of mentally masturbating for huge amounts of time every day. You know I don't think that people need to be "productive", in the sense that - you know we're not termites, we're not slaves, we don't need to be making stuff and doing stuff and achieving and accomplishing stuff constantly, but you know we do need to get some things done and there are some things involved in the makings of culture which are extremely engaging and important but which require sustained attention.

Running with the Devil - Bellshit

The Bell Canada Saga continues... the past doesn't matter, as I would prefer to forgive Bell for all their previous transgressions against me and the rest of humankind. Not to mention the collateral damage done to pets, plants, and other living/non-living things due to violent rage at the hands of one or more of the following experiences: Bell's automated system (the lovely Emily), "english" speaking CSRs from India, their ability to charge $ for nothing, their ability to keep your $ they took, and/or their simple deceit.

My latest personal experience is an example of the last - simple deceit. I'll recount by paraphrasing the conversation:

Me: I'd like to bundle my internet and TV services.
Bell: Ok, do you have your TV account #?
Me: Not at the moment, I have misplaced my wallet [which was true].
Bell: Ok, well then you'll probably have to wait until your first bill arrives.
Me: Why?
Bell: Because we need your account # in order to bundle the services.
Me: Well can't I get it from the TV department?
Bell: They cannot give out that information.
Me: Then what's the point?
Bell: Please hold a minute sir, while I speak with my supervisor.
Me: Ok. [2 minutes]
Bell: Hello sir, thanks for holding.
Me: No problem.
Bell: Ok, here's what we can do. I will transfer you to the TV department and maybe they can give you your account number, and then we can bundle.
Me: Ok, great. Also, can I sign up for e-billing so I don't get paper bills.
Bell: Sure, hold on... ah apparently the system won't let me do that so I'm going to transfer you to billing, and then the TV department.
Me: Ok, thanks. [5 minutes - in the meantime, I find my wallet]
Bell (same person): Hello sir, the billing dept. says you have to wait until your service starts, and then you can change it.
Me: Ok that's fine. By the way, I found my account # so can we bundle the service now?
Bell: Sure, of course we can...[silence]... Ok sir, your TV and Internet services are now bundled.
Me: [pause]. So you don't need my account number?
Bell: No. Your services are now bundled.


What the fuck? So all along she could have bundled the thing, but insisted that I get my account number and if I didn't have it then they couldn't do it. But when I find my number, she doesn't even NEED it? What was the point? I'm guessing that Bell is hoping that I will forget about it, or that they will make a little tiny bit more money in the prorated meantime? I don't know. It's just the beginning of Bellshit, bullshit's corporate cousin.

Thoughts from last night:

Think about the consequences of the end of cheap, abundant energy, and the inevitability of natural disasters that will cause immense suffering for humans. The party truly is ending, and as the booze runs out, we realize that there are too many people at the party. Some will have to leave (die), and most will have to sober up - fast. It will be a reckoning - a reconciliation of the balance sheet.

This all makes sense on many levels (which aren't really levels). Religiously obviously (at least in the book of Christianity).

Spiritually/meta physically/logically because it (and other cultural/societal/social "ills") is a step in the evolution of humans. Like the child who turns on the stove, touches the burner, and gets burned, we too must go through our growing pains. We must learn to crawl before we walk and run. In geological (read: real) time, humans are a blip. We just got here. We are infantile, and we are acting like it. Sure there have been humans who have acted maturely (recognized the fundamental unity of all things in existence) in some ways with regard to how they treat their environment and each other (natives possibly), but even these groups - likely all groups - display primitive values and behaviours in many instances. The same can be said for most people alive now.

So we must not be surprised or maudlin about our fate or the fates of others. We are simply growing up, and it takes time. For the good of the species (and the rest of life), this "house cleaning" must happen. I may die, as may you. But in the end, we as a group, of individuals inherently equal yet aesthetically diverse, will be better for it. Do not lament our struggles, do your part - for you and your genes are more malleable than you know - to join the wave of progress, progress in the grandest, most unselfish sense: the true progress of life.

One might question this argument thus: Why are we special, compared to the Mayans or another like group? I think we can assume that human knowledge has historically been cumulative. In other words, we know more now than they knew then. While this may not be true for all individuals, as a group it holds. We do learn from our ancestors mistakes, however slow the process may seem to our poorly calibrated sense of time.

Today:

I watched most of "Crude Impact" today. A strikingly ironic thought occurred to me during the movie:

The industrial world has developed and its people have become fabulously rich (relatively speaking to the rest of the world) thanks to cheap access to thus far plentiful resources, at the expense of the envioronment and quality of life for people in undeveloped countries. The energy has fueled a population boom. Carrying capacity of the earth is being approached. Natural disasters, more starvation, disease, wars for resources, and so on, are going to cut down the population. Eventually (barring nuclear world holocaust), the earth will get a population close to equilibrium.

My ironic thought is this - the people who have benefited and who have caused this situation, have in the process turned themselves into people who should not be saved. And the people who have missed out on the energy bonanza - the poor - are probably for the most part salt of the earth type people who would give you their fattest calf. I'm thinking about the people in Korphe, Pakistan who Greg Mortensen helped. On the other hand, for the people who don't deserve to be saved, I'm thinking of rich, egotistical elite types who bitch their disgust about being in the highest tax bracket, causing them to lose all their "hard" earned money. Hard earned? Wineing and dining, expense accounting, burning up the atmosphere, and for what? Because they love the thrill of moving large sums of money around, shoving coke up their nose to stay awake because they work such long hours. So yeah I guess you are working hard, because the guys in the level above you did the same thing and you have to do the bitch work for them, pay your dues, and then you're in the club and you too can enjoy the privileges of the "next level", whatever it is. I don't care.

So not only will the poor people suffer the most due to climate change, resource wars, etc., but they are the kinds of people who we want to exist when the world regains stability. The ability of the rich assholes that exist now to survive, will just contaminate the future world with an even more concentrated quotient. Fuckin A!

Commercial Watch #1: Subaru Outback

7pm
Spoof on informercial selling snack bowl. Screen starts to crack, then tv is ripped down to reveal guy holding axe with his silver SUV in the background. He marches back to the vehicle, gets in and drives away. Voice-over talks about how maybe you should get out more, and the versatility of the vehicle.

Message: You should get out more, go drive around in the woods. That would be good for you, you know, get some fresh air. Don't park at the edge of the woods and walk in, no DRIVE into the woods. Also, this car is so versatile that well, it's natural setting of course is the forest, but you CAN use it in the city. Crazy. We aren't telling you where to drive, but just get out more and use more gas. You know, drive to the mall, go on the highway, or if you're in the city, drive to the corner store. Heck, this thing is so versatile you can just TAKE IT FOR A DRIVE.

7:10 pm
Wendy's new blue burger. Blue cheese, applewood smoked bacon - applewood? Apple trees? I don't know. Fresh beef obviously. Cut to a guy wearing a sweatband, jogging suit - a runner, obviously - about to bite into his very own blue burger. Just found the stats for this beauty: 680 calories (360 from fat, of which it has 40 grams) and 1,390 mgs of sodium.

John Francis TED Talk

Laura has the video on her blog (lobock.blogspot.com)

He says that our environment is "us", the people. Which is partially true in a literal sense, but in a more important sense it's very true. The important sense is that we are only going to treat the environment with the same amount of respect we have for each other - all people. This is so because people live - almost - everywhere. Therefore, if we respect and love our fellow humans enough to respect their environment (the place they depend upon for their existence), that environment will be protected and sustained.

Soup recipe

Pasta e Ceci from happy box top on Vimeo.

Human conduits

"Truth comes into the non-seeking mind fresh and alive.
It is not something you can carry with you, accumulate, or hold onto."
- Adyashanti

All beings are conduits of life. Not creators. We are the vessel, not the driver. The non-seeking mind is hard to fathom. Because we search only in the realm of the senses, we think we should be looking for something we can see, hear, touch, taste, smell, etc. Something that's "there".

As he says, the truth is "there", but it's not something you are holding onto. When you stop seeking, you find it. When you are free from all outside influences (and inside influences - taken from the outside world), you stop seeking. The seeking is the result of desire, desire which is based in sensory experience.

Desire nothing. Life will flow through you with force.

James Howard Kunstler - See new link

Link to his site. Look around there are many podcasts.

He can help you pull your head out of the sand.

People who say they do not believe in god are essentially saying nothing. Their words have no meaning. I say this because the notion of god is predicated on existence. If nothing existed, there could be no notion of god. Therefore, god IS existence. So a human who says they do not believe in god is saying: "I do not believe in the existence of anything, including myself." Obviously, this cannot be true because to say something you have to exist.

Alternatively, they could be saying that they do not believe that life or existence has any implicit or explicit purpose or meaning. In my opinion this must also be false because if life holds no meaning or purpose for an individual, they kill themselves because their existence is absurd. Why exist for no reason?

I suppose you could exist for no reason, and we do operate on some level with this understanding because we cannot hold ourselves responsible for our own existence. Self birth is not possible.

However, in our daily life, to live, we must take responsibility for our own life. This is a truth that I don't think can be refuted. Every animal or other thing that survives through action must take responsibility for their own existence, or they perish. Now, this is not true for the severely disabled, who must have a caretaker or they will surely wither away, but that is the exception, not the rule. And I don't think we are moving towards a future where nobody takes responsibility for their own existence.

So where does that leave us? Well, to my mind, our notion of god is flawed. You have to decide whether everything (including your own actions) is random, or nothing is random. Either way, the ideas of good and bad luck cease to exist. Luck is a purely subjective illusion, where the truth is that nobody can say with cetainty what is good and what is bad luck.

However, this is contradicted by our feelings, and our inclinations towards pleasure in place of pain. The majority of people are drawn towards things that make them feel good, and move away from things that make them hurt or feel bad. This indicates that there are innate aspects of our existence that drive us.

If existence has decreed that we should seek the good and the pleasurable, THAT is the motivation of human life (a part of existence as a whole), and that implies meaning. If a person is suffering too much for them to bear, they die - either through conscious or subconcious action. If existence were totally and wholly random, meaningless, we would seek pain and pleasure with impunity. But we don't.

Now, Schopenhauer would say that our suffering gives us meaning, and he is right in the sense that pleasure and pain existence on a continuum that, though difficult to pin down the extremes of, surely exists. We recognize the pleasure through the comparison with pain and suffering.

What does this have to do with anything, here and now? Well, I think that our habits of attributing good and bad labels to events, people, and ideas are flawed to the core. It presumes some knowledge of the absolute. The world is finite in the physical realm but you can vaguely say that the spiritual realm is infinite. Love resides in the spiritual realm, and love is infinite. Existence is infinite, a concept which we cannot hold in our minds.

Love is the only possible meaning of existence, and the universe is unfolding in the direction of expanding love. It is a heavy burden to think that we as individuals can have an impact on the rest of existence, and as Adyashanti says (I'm paraphrasing) "if we knew the impact we had on the world it would crush us". This, I'm guessing, is why people prefer to believe that their actions are meaningless and that they cannot alter themselves. For altering yourself, changing, is the only way to effect meaningful change in the world around you.

In the end, I don't think it IS easier, IF you can glimpse the freedom that comes with the acceptance of your "self" being representative of the bigger "self" - all of existence. In this I mean that feeling as though one is a legitimate part of existence, that one belongs and fits, is so freeing because the pressure is lifted. The pressure that one percieves comes from messages that surround you, messages from people and institutions, who impose THEIR beliefs and ideals on you, and expect you to conform. When a person fundamentally accepts their right to exist and that they belong within existence, FULL STOP, their perspective changes and the pressure to conform in any way is removed. This is freedom.

The beauty of this is that when you recognize the freedom and you live according to it, the world around you changes. This is the immense power we all hold within ourselves, but which goes unrecognized by many people. This is why they need external belief systems - of which they "must" accept every tenet and humanly created rule - to TELL them how to live.

Everyone "knows" how to live, until they are corrupted by other people who tell them what is "RIGHT". Unfortunately, this set of rules and beliefs inevitably creates what it seeks to prevent - suffering and pain. Due to the ability of ANYone to say - "here's the truth, this is what "god" wants, if you do this, you will get what you want, etc."

When you let go of all your pressures, you realize that what YOU WANT is exactly what you are uniquely suited to do, because you are a part of an existence that is moving in the direction of love. You end up doing what you love, every day.

The world is burning

Not necessarily with fire, but with people's lives being destroyed. Do we really live among people who are engaged in human trafficking? I have no idea, but I'm guessing there are at least a few people in Canada who are involved. Line up at Tim Horton's. Table next to you at McDonald's. I'm not trying to predict where these people eat but they probably go to the grocery store too. They should be shot on sight.

Am I out of line saying that? I don't know. I'm not trying to play god here, but I don't see why people who buy and sell other people as commodities deserve to live.

It sounds like I think I deserve to live, but I don't. No one chooses their life, and deserving is a stupid word I think. But it's hard to draw a firm line anywhere in the sand when it comes to people and the suffering they inflict. It's happening all the time, everywhere in the world.

So what can be done? You have to bring the darkness and put it in the light. It's the only way to destroy it. You have to find the people who are doing this, and for fuck's sake, aren't they doing it in broad daylight? I mean, why traffic a person if you're not going to use them as a hooker etc. Don't hookers need clients? And aren't those clients NORMAL FUCKING PEOPLE who live in your neighbourhood?

I'm just wondering, if the news reported: "Today, the RCMP shot and killed 3 more who were found to be running the Toronto branch of the Worldwide Human Trafficking Federation..."

Who would complain? I mean, these people have mothers, fathers? Really? I know they do, but it blows my mind. Wouldn't they have some conflicting feelings if they saw that news report.

I can't get into the head of the human trafficker. How do you rationalize that? Well, let's see, I'm going to take this Haitian (or wherever) child, and sell it to Mr. X. What he does with them is none of my business, it's purely a business deal. Obviously they know what is going on here. Everyone involved has to know exactly what is happening.

To me, that is such an incredible absence of empathy, it's hard to imagine. Especially because human traffickers are not Former Victims of Trafficking (sorry Hunter). Or are they? I don't know. Maybe it is like the child who is beaten by their dad and they grow up to be a child/wife beater like their old man. I doubt it.

If it's not, if these people are simply business people who have such a desire for money (or inability to make it in other ways), they are the perfect picture of the darkest roots of humanity. I'd say lower than Hitler, because Hitler was blinded by his ideology, his beliefs. These people have one god - money. Hitler likely loved the German people. He just hated Jews so incredibly much but he hated them because he thought they were holding back the people he loved.

The traffickers, on the other hand, would sell anyone to make a buck. They would inflict a lifetime of physical and psychological damage on another, for what? Nice house, cars, food, transport, freedom. Other stuff too but the point is made.

You really get an indication of the extent to which spirit can vacate a person. I mean the complete absence of love. Could they have love and still do this? Could they have a family and feel feelings of love towards them? HOW? Every person shipped, every child sold, is to their parents what the trafficker's kids are to them. How is that missing from their mind?

What am I missing? The self hatred that must occupy that space in the trafficker's heart is so vast.

Future glimpse

When all the exotic animals are dead and gone, and only stuffed artifacts remain, the deceased collector's descendants will sit in their houses with their taxidermed hand-me-downs. A curious friend might ask what some of the former beings are called. As the years go on, the answer will undoubtedly become 'I don't know'.