Think and Emote?

Can one think and emote at the same time? In my youth I was instructed by a teacher: “You cannot think and emote at the same time”. Until recently I gave that instruction little thought, but prompted by recent terrorist acts and inflammatory political speeches, I have reviewed my own past and the changing social attitudes I have witnessed in my lifetime. My teacher’s separation of emotion and thought as coincidentally incompatible, have many examples in my own life. They have impacted the full expression of my potential and I am ashamed of them. History too has many examples of which we should not be proud, and have limited the potential of the human race. Passion has many faces, including religious fervor, physical attractions, hate, and extreme dedications to narrow causes. Being caught up in one or more of these chemically induced states is not only seductive and directive, it overrides a portion of one’s thought processes. Being filled with religious fervor makes one receptive to directives offered by those capable of arousing compelling emotions. It is not thought that is displaced by emotion, but reason. Emotions narrow one’s perspectives, pushing reasonable evaluations made using wider world views aside. Being convinced emotionally that non Christians were less than human allowed the Crusaders to slaughter thousands with differing perspectives without compunction. The Crusaders had their focus narrowed by repeated emotionally intense instructions and rituals and were freed from a sense of guilt and disgust for their actions by having their actions absolved, in advance, through ingrained emotionally misdirected responses numbing them to the carnage they caused. Humans have several susceptible sensitive areas where emotions, when evoked, can override reason. Sex is the most obvious, followed closely by tribal and survival responses. In early humans reason played a lesser role in both individual responses and societal arrangements. Impulse, instinct and emotions acted as primary guides for survival. As societal arrangements became more complex more protective and more productive, reason became more important and began covering innate emotional survival instincts with a thin veneer of constructed societal norms. All of us have these susceptible, thin applied areas of self control in our response repertoire. They are evolved attributes that have brought us successfully through a long period of conversion from animal instincts to our present state. The societal veneer that directs our behavior today, however, is learned. It is implanted after birth and must be instilled in every individual if that individual is to successfully integrate into society. We are born with only a few tribal / family behavior and compassionate instinctive responses. The rest must be taught by example and instruction. When we fail to instill this veneer of societal integration and fail to reinforce it with wide word views and logic, strong enough to resist emotional calls for misdirected behavior, we create displaced individuals and become susceptible to despots. A sense of history, a basic understanding of geography, a basic understanding of government and societal organizations, an appreciation of language, a basic view of comparative religions, a basic understanding of economics, and a basic understanding of science and technology are necessary prerequisites for reason to resist subversive appeals to our primitive emotions. Unfortunately, ideologies, polite exclusions and disclaimers have purged curriculums in private, parochial and public schools of these basics and made societies, vulnerable to the seductive call of narcissistic megalomaniacs. By dissolving the thin layer of protective logic with caustic rhetoric these despots are able to tap into our primitive emotions and alter our individual prime directives. “Fear your government”, “Hate the Jews”, “All Muslims are terrorists”, “Only Christians are moral and can be trusted”, and many other appeals are made chipping away at the thin veneer of logic and understanding that sustains our modern global civilization. Is it possible to think and emote at the same time? It depends! It is a matter of choosing between, ancient beliefs or discovery and education, between reason and peace or emotion and confrontation. Do you want to return to the 15th century’s religious conflicts, or struggle to support a modern civilization? Compassion and love are emotions we value, but they will only survive if we are not afraid to face truths beyond dogma, and allow reason to prevail. You can give your children a gun and teach them how to use it, or you can give them a sense of self worth and teach them how to reason.

An alternate explanation for dark stuff

Alternate Explanations for Dark Stuff I understand why Einstein inserted an extra term into his general relativity equation to keep the universe static. He simply didn’t like the idea that the whole universe could be a variable. If he were alive today I doubt he would like the idea of dark matter and dark energy any better, and I have to agree. We are basing a lot of our latest theories on assumptions we have come to accept as facts, more specifically, “the speed of light as a constant” and “mass/gravity equivalence”. Not being a mathematician, physicist or cosmologist I can think outside the box with impunity and, unfortunately, out of necessity, but, without peer reviews to worry about, and having not been indoctrinated, I can wander around outside the box and look for new perspectives, something I’m good at after three marriages and five careers. Starting with dark energy, (ironically discovered using a space telescope named after the astronomer that first identified galaxies as objects outside the Milky Way that were all receding from each other), we now see the galaxies furthest from the creative moment moving away faster than those nearer in. Our conclusion is that the rate of expansion of the universe is accelerating. We use the red shift of light to measure our observations and confirm them by measuring luminosity from Cepheid variable stars and type 1A novas. In short we are using light as our standard of measurement and are confirming our results by measuring light. Light is all we have. At the center of all this measuring and confirming is an assumption, “the speed of light is constant in a vacuum and has always been traveling at 670 million miles per hour”. But what if light is a variable? On one of my trips around the outside of the acceptable scientific theory box, I noticed that one side of the box seemed shorter than the others. All of the sides conveniently had a light yardstick taped to them that I could detach and use. I used each yardstick to measure its corresponding side and found all sides the same, but when I used a yardstick from a different side I got different results. The light yardsticks looked alike but when I compared them, they were of different lengths. I also discovered gravitational anomalies that were affecting the length of the light yard sticks and thanked Einstein for making the relationship between light speed and gravity clear. I tried explaining what I had found to the scientists inside the box but they didn’t want to accept the idea of a universal gravitational coefficient that decreased as the universe expanded making light yardsticks from a more condensed universe shorter that the light yardsticks we use now. If the speed of light is a variable, our measurements, both of red shifts and luminosities, are skewed and are deluding us into thinking the universe is expanding at an accelerated rate, making dark energy an unnecessary construct. Getting nowhere with an alternate explanation for dark energy I resumed my outside the box explorations and encountered two unusual spinning black tops, (like those children play with). Both tops were in a vacuum, one was tiny had a weak gravitational pull and a slow spin rate. The other was large had a huge gravitational pull and a higher spin rate. As I watched the tiny black top a gas cloud drifted by and began to be drawn in toward the toy. As the gas gathered tighter around the top, the gravity at the center increased and the spin rate at the center increased faster than the spin rate of condensing particles further out until the gas was all gathered and the spin rate stabilized into an orbital curve typical of most solar systems with distant objects orbiting slower than objects orbiting closer in. Then I turned my attention to the large black top as it flipped on its side, as tops do when their spin rate slows, and began to spew gas out of both its polar axis creating a pinwheel of gas and condensing materials rotating in concert with the top. Both tops were now at the center of miniature galaxies. One of the mini galaxies grew from the outside in. The other grew from the inside out. One rotated as a planetary system, but the other mimicked what we observe in the rotation of spiral galaxies. Could it be that the mysterious super massive black holes we are finding at the center of nearly all galaxies did much more than form from in-falling gas and debris, and instead, early in the creative evolution of the universe, were exploding pieces of the singularity forming galaxies from the inside out, secondary sparks of creation, like the last dazzling spark display at the end of a fireworks show. I’m not even going to try to present this idea to those inside the box, but it is one way to explain away dark matter. I have another explanation for Inter galactic dark matter but I’ve been told to stop walking around the box of secured ideas. As a tribute to Einstein I am calling my theories, Lambda 1 and Lambda 2

The Art of Philosophy

The Art of Philosophy I entered college naive and uninformed. Other than the Bible, which no one read, there were very few books in my family’s house. I knew little about history, was the world worst speller, had read almost nothing of significance, and had no idea what I was choosing when I selected an introductory course in Philosophy as a last resort to meet credit requirements. I expected the course to be a boring account of ancient Greek and Roman blogs and, in part, I was right. But there was more to the course than I expected. The recorded dialogues of Plato and Socrates, and the writings of Aquinas, Spinoza, Locke, Hegel and others contained interesting concepts that began popping up in other courses unrelated to philosophy. Philosophy seemed orphaned when science became more inductive than deductive and followed science’s lead and split into many disciplines but I continued to take philosophy courses and continued to have my perspectives adjusted and broadened. I searched for an all encompassing definition for the collage of thoughts collected under the academic discipline called Philosophy but never found one that satisfied me. My career choices after college were more adventurous than academic, but philosophical concepts stuck with me and resurfaced often. I now see philosophy as more of an art than a discipline and have my own definition. Philosophy to me is; “The Art of creating useful insights and perspectives by explaining the obvious” How we look at something is just as important as what we look at. This is true even in something as static as mathematics. New branches of mathematics, from number theory to tensors, are the result of a new or adjusted perspective. The same holds true in most areas of human knowledge. Which window we use to view our surroundings frames and limits our impressions and we have many windows to choose from. I see the philosopher as a guide, taking people from window to window, pointing out obvious differences in various views. The philosopher is an artist that uses words to paint perspectives and create questions that linger in those exposed to each new view, questions the philosopher prompts but rarely answers. Hemlock anyone?

Evangelism. Its dangers and degrees

Degrees and Dangers of Evangelism Faith is described in the Bible as, “a commitment to things unseen”. But the things to which one commits have to be explained and learned before one can commit. If one does not know of Buddha’s teachings they cannot follow Buddha’s advice. If the writings of Joseph Smith have not been explained the Mormon faith cannot be followed, similarly the teachings of Christ or Mohammad cannot be followed until one has been exposed to the tenants of the faith and indoctrinated. Faith requires commitment and for any “body religious” to survive it must recruit, it must “evangelize”. Even monasteries reach out to recruit and train future monks as a way to insure the future of their spiritual sanctuaries. Evangelic messages all have common elements in spite of divergent beliefs. They all proclaim their faith to be the only true path to a relationship with a god and immortality. Hidden in any evangelic message is the statement that; “ you are missing the truth, need to be corrected or informed, and it is my duty, according to my faith, to challenge your beliefs, or lack thereof, and save you from your delusion.” This need for the religious to challenge other belief systems is innate in all evangelical activities. It creates deep lines of distrust between groups of people trying to live together in assemblies created by other forces, like, geography, migration, and war. In this sense, the evangelical, no matter how sincere and peaceful their intent are creating dissent, and the level of dissent is directly proportional to the emotional level of their evangelic activities. The sacred directives of the world’s dominant religions all contain directives for confrontation that clearly distinguishing between true believers and infidels, the faithful and all others. These directives are in the Torah, as Abraham is directed to destroy all others to make room for the twelve tribes of Israel, In the teachings of Christ as he excludes the uncircumcised as unworthy of Gods grace, In the papal bull of Pope Nicholas V declaring slavery appropriate for non believers, and in the Koran as it declares death to the enemies of Islam being a responsibility to be rewarded. Human history is filled with wars and genocides generated by evangelical fervor and only recently has Man’s evangelical confrontations been set aside because a few wise men followed the advice of John Lock in his 1688 “Letter Concerning Toleration”. John Adams, Samuel Adams, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, Benjamin Franklin, and others, after much debate, brought the colonies together by putting aside their many religious differences and establishing the first secular national state. Under this arrangement matters of state are settled by reasoned debate without religious tenant interventions and the state in turn is restrained from interfering in church matters and is pledged to protect the right of all citizens to choose their religion without coercion. Most European countries have now adopted this separation of church and state as beneficial to both the state and religious freedoms and, until recently, our wars have been over other ideological differences. But, evangelical levels have once again risen to a dangerous level and coupled with our newly developed mass media communications and internet capabilities are inspiring radical acts and, in our desperate response to terrorist acts, we are undermining our greatest bulwark against such ideological intrusions, “The separation of church and state”. Faced with a militant form of evangelism the faithful in the US have responded politically by inserting protestant Christian beliefs directly into government through gerrymandering and well financed primary elections. These covert evangelical political campaigns are as dangerous and divisive as any other evangelical effort and have the potential to undermine our constitutional system. If they succeed, the religious loose the protection of the secular state they have undermined and their dominant position will be forcibly challenged by secular and other belief systems. The goal of Isis is to create a religious war. The most foolish thing we as free people can do is to give it to them by undermining our secular government traditions. The irony of young Mormon missionaries from the US being injured in Brussels by radical Muslim missionaries exposes an extreme difference of evangelical method but identifies similar evangelical goals, (go abroad and recruit). Evangelical efforts can be passive as in leaving the windows of a church open to allow passers by to hear the sermon, Indirectly active as having a quiet religious discussion at Starbucks, active as in passing out literature, knocking on doors, or sending missionaries to other countries, or militant using intimidation, imprisonment or execution. Any form of evangelism, religious or other, establishes a “we” / “you” distinction that is divisive and dangerous especially when individuals or other groups of believers are told their beliefs are false and need modification. Evangelism is a social irritant of significance and the “good” the evangelist assumes they are doing may actually be a major cause of violence and suffering. A rational discussion of differences where compromise is an option is the alternative the secular state offers to irresolvable differences in tenants of faith. Isis will be with us as long as hypnotic religious diatribes continue to turn rational individuals into emotional robots, and until we understand how religion is able to override reason we won’t understand the radicalization process and can’t defend against it. Religion and science have been at odds since serious investigations into natural processes began, and serious investigations into the effects of religion on emotional responses and survival instincts have been off limits as a breach of god’s connection to man, but god’s connection has either been subverted or misunderstood as benevolent. It is time for the leaders of the faithful and the leaders of citizens to begin a serious dialogue regarding their relationship and the common danger we face from a subverted evangelical missions ability to disrupt and destroy what the common efforts of Man has built.

A Dark Dilemma

Scientific theories are descriptions, they are not explanations. Scientific theories develop slowly and only a few create new and useful perspectives, evolution and relativity are examples. Successful theories impact more than just the direction of scientific research. They also alter perspectives within the general population. Successful theories give us a sense that we have arrived at final answers but new discoveries repeatedly make us question even the most established of scientific paradigms. The measurement of galactic movements, starting in the 1930’s, created such questions and has prompted new theories, especially regarding gravity. Gravity has been elusive in our efforts to match it with the other three basic forces of nature. The recent discovery of a ‘Higgs’ particle renewed our hope that we might be close to a unified theory and help us explain the galactic movements we are observing, but finding a large new atomic particle has also created new questions. Newton described the movements of stones falling to the ground, artillery shells curving in flight, and planets orbiting the sun as the result of an attractive force between particles of matter. Einstein described the same movements as the result of matter curving space. Both men used innovative mathematics. Newton used the calculus, Einstein used tensors and complex curves. Both men assumed that matter influences motion, Newton by having matter act on itself, Einstein by having matter alter the geometry of space. Einstein’s relativity replaced Newton’s mechanics and the curved space theory of Einstein has proven more accurate than Newton’s mechanical description by reconciling the planet mercury’s observed orbital discrepancy and by predicting altered paths of light passing near massive objects. Neither theory now accurately describes movements at galactic scales and, with only one macro attractive force in our conceptual repertoire, (gravity) we continue to use it to explain the anomalous rotations we continue to observe in galaxies and clusters of galaxies. Unwilling to question Newton or Einstein we calculated how much missing matter would be needed to cause the strange rotations we are observing. The result of our inverse analytical calculations is a massive amount of invisible matter surrounding small galaxies made of visible matter. Choosing to explain the anomalous rotation of galaxies by additional gravity and with no way to explain gravity without matter we have concluded that an invisible form of matter has to be the cause when all we really know is that galaxies don’t rotate as we expected. As a result we have focused our research on finding and identifying missing dark matter, but there are other ways to explain the observed errant galactic movements. In 1983 Mordehai Milgrom formalized a modification of Newtonian dynamics that describes the anomalies observed in galactic movement as natural variations in gravitational and accelerative forces acting on galactic and larger associations of matter. His predictive formulae also accurately describe the movement of double stars, satellite galaxies, interacting galaxies, and accelerative forces. Unfortunately scientific research has momentum coupled to long term research grants and commitments that can sidetrack promising theories like “MOND”. The anomalous rotation of galaxies was first noted in the 1930s and has been studied in more detail ever since. The idea of hidden matter producing additional gravity is not new, but the name “dark matter” has appeal and attracts media coverage and research funding. The Modified Newtonian Dynamics Theory applies to the same observed galactic phenomena but without any dark postulates. Unfortunately MOND doesn’t the same media appeal. Our conceptual universe was once filled with visible matter, four basic forces and nearly empty space. In the dark world of science It is now filled with, 68.3% dark energy, 26.8% dark matter, and only 4.9% visible matter, which implies, that after more than two thousand years of exploration, we understand less than 5% of what is going on around us. Searching in the dark for matter and forces hidden from us we are reaching beyond current conceptual limits and beyond our most basic assumptions. MOND offers us an alternative that keeps us in the light without the need for dark energy or dark matter and brings closer to reconciling gravity with the other forces of nature. Our primary sense is vision. Visible light has always been our most important portal into the workings of nature. We followed the motion of celestial objects with our eyes noting their movements until we could track and predict their paths. We observed the similarities and differences in living forms, detailing their shapes, colors and behavior in books and paintings until we could explain their similarities as the result of a common trace. We have also developed tools to convert sound and other vibrations into visible curves for analysis. We have invented cloud chambers to study the make up of matter using visible traces of particles too small to see, and have extended our understanding of light to frequencies beyond those available to the eye and now use microwave and infrared light to our advantage. We also symbolize, in symbolic languages, verbal and mathematical predictive descriptions of our observations. Our dependent relationship to light and the pervasiveness of the electromagnetic forces throughout the universe has formed our basic perspectives, shaped our questions, and guided our investigative efforts. Concentrating on (invisible matter) and (invisible forces), instead of re-examining gravity leaves our scientists nearly impotent. Dark matter and dark energy theories find little footing and few experimental options. The MOND theory lets us continue to search in the light and has implications for relating gravity with the weak force and a unified theory. We seem to be searching in the dark for answers that are waiting in the light. My money is on MOND and a few neutrinos for balance.

Attractive or Compressive. What's at the center?

I see the leaf twisting in the air but cannot see the wind, yet I know it must be there. When I stand I feel the weight upon my feet and see the stone drop from my hand but cannot see the force that makes it fall. Sight does not reveal all, and many unseen forces form and direct the dance of matter we observe. We measure and name these forces and predict their results as they interact with matter and with light, but our discoveries never generate final answers. Instead they seem only to generate more questions. Our latest observations have generated questions we have named “dark matter” and “dark energy”, both somehow related to the force we call gravity. As our theorists and scientists seek answers to these new questions, I seek answers to other questions. Specifically; is gravity attractive or compressive, and is there a difference? Before I’m told to put my hand down, as if I were in a classroom asking a dumb question, I would like to explain why I am confused. I have been told by experts that pressure inside a star, or planet, increases with depth below the surface and is greatest at the core or center. This appears correct if celestial spheres are being squeezed into shape from outside, but if they are formed by micro bits of matter attracting each other into spherical shapes it would seem that pressure would increase with depth until the attraction of the matter above begins to balance the attraction of the matter below. If this is the case a zero gravity state would logically follow to exist at the exact center of mass. I liken this to a tug-of-war between the gravitational attraction of mass below competing with the gravitational attraction of mass above. On the surface the pulling team below has the advantage because it has all the players on its side pulling down, but as the tug-of-war rope moves below the surface toward the center of the sphere, the tug-of-war team players systematically move from the pull down team to the pull up team as the mass above increases and the mass below decreases. The deeper they go more and more players switch to the pull up side until they reach the center of the sphere where equilibrium is reached with equal players and equal mass all around creating a stalemate and a zero gravity state. The conclusion that zero gravity and zero pressure conditions exist at the center of all massive celestial spheres seems to contradict many other theories and observations and I remain confused. Is gravity a compressive condition of space acting on matter or an attractive force between matter acting on space, or both? Einstein’s field theories show a connection between matter and gravity similar to a couple arguing about who is in charge. Mass is constantly being pulled around by Gravity. Mass complains but Gravity responds that it is Mass that makes her pull on him. Resolution seems impossible and divorce is not an option. Comments to this blog to help me resolve the paradox of where maximum pressures reside inside stars are welcomed.

When a protest becomes a threat

Confrontations over social issues can take many forms. Peaceful protests, obstruction, intimidation, stalking and violence are all examples. Unfortunately laws do not effectively differentiate between these various confrontational forms. In free societies, laws do not always treat ideological differences fairly for fear of trampling on a citizens right to free thought and speech. In more despotic forms of government protests are dealt with swiftly and sometimes with deadly force. Free speech is an essential element of our democracy and guaranteed by our constitution, but there are limits. Slander is not allowed. Creating panic without due cause is not allowed. Likewise certain activities used as a means to voice an objection or opinion are not allowed. One cannot jamb up a revolving door to a department store because they sell perfume tested on animals, or drop stink bombs onto a construction site because forests are being destroyed. Striking workers however, can recruit surrogates to parade up and down sidewalks with ready made signs, war protestors can infiltrate funerals for fallen soldiers, religious protestors can interfere in gay right activities, protestors can block access to abortion clinics, and neo Nazis can parade with anti-Semitic banners…. as long as these activities are infrequent and of short duration; But there is one ongoing protest that has lasted for decades and is an every day occurrence carried out by the same few individuals who claim their right to free speech excludes restriction because their message is from God. They claim they are free to continually harass, intimidate, threaten and promote harm to others with impunity. Clergy, politicians and lawmakers cower and avoid suppressing these protest activities because this small group has succeeded in drawing the line between what they believe and any modified or alternate view so narrowly that any reasonable attempt to restrict their activities identifies the police or judges as non Christian. These same militant few are treated with kid gloves by police and prosecutors because the protestors revel in anyone’s attempt to control their activities as an opportunity to publically broadcast their obstructionist cause and claim their cause is the victim of state interference in a free expression of religion. Any other continuing protest activity lasting decades and involving stalking, personal threats, invasions of privacy, bombings and killings by a small group of militant evangelists would have labeled them terrorists and been dealt with swiftly but these few radicals have intimidated our leaders and infiltrated government agencies, not to serve the people but to serve a single obstructionist cause. They succeed because their voices are loud and threatening, not because they truly understand or are compassionate. They persist because they have used their single issue to divide our society into believers and non believers and have created a state of avoidance by the law. Ignore them and they will never go away. They have even corrupted our language. Before their decades long campaign of intimidation the word 'choice' had a good connotation. It was at the core of our democracy and morality. Now the word has been turned into a single evil option that cannot be used without their agenda ringing in our ears. I would urge everyone even partially seduced by their rhetoric to go unannounced to one of their protests and pretend you are violating their barrier, or just stand aside and observe. These people are infiltrating your government and slowly usurping your rights, not just as it pertains to their cause but many more. The intensity of one's beliefs does not make their beliefs any more or less true, and this type of militant evangelism is potentially as dangerous as any other radical cause. I would ask those that enforce the law to apply it equally to these obstructionists. A thirty year reign of intimidation and stalking is not a peaceful protest. I would urge the rational clergy to disclaim these religious intimidators and allow others with different beliefs to exist in peace. If you ignore them you condone their approach and will eventually draw their militancy into your churches. We have had enough of religious wars and the deeper you draw the line between those who pray and those who don't, the less likely anyone seeking religious refuge will cross the line.