Stoners Rule

 https://www.samwoolfe.com/2013/05/terence-mckennas-stoned-ape-theory.html

OK,so what to say about this? First, silly fantasies with zero evidence are not theories. They are silly fantasies.

Second, let’s imagine it happening.

Grunke: Hey, man. You know what, man?

Irk:  No. Like what?

Grunke:  Like, like you know we’re wasting our time man.  Like we could be like really super cool, you know.

Irk:  Oh wow, man! That would be like, great, man.

Grunke: All we got to do is like… You know, make stuff. 

Irk: Oh yeah. We could do that.  Like we got these hands. I mean look at these fingers!  They’re really weird and wild!  Bet we could do amazing stuff with them, specially with these thumbs.

Grunke:  That’s right you got it. Like we could make, you know, like art and...and...and sports and like, media and stuff.

Work:  Yeah, yeah let’s do that.  We can do that. But know what?Let’s, let’s go do some hunting and gathering first, cause, I got, like, you know, the munchies.

Thus civilization was born.

In summation, let me note if that I class this “theory” in the same category as the aquatic ape, ancient aliens, or Atlanteans gifting us civilization.  I wonder if the “theorist” was stoned when he came up with this idea.

That Damned Fire Bell Again

https://www.salon.com/2021/10/12/black-flag-understanding-the-trumpists-latest-threatening-symbol/

 Yes, I have said it before but I think this may be the time I mean it the most. Please read this entire article.

The Republican party has turned into an active terrorist organization.  They have declared war on America. They have declared war on our democracy.  They have declared war on the rest of us.

Way back when George Bush was pushing for his insane war, I was standing with my grandson at the DMV and said I was more afraid of Bush and company than I was of the terrorists because they could only kill me while Bush and company could turn me into a slave. I got an awful lot of dirty looks because at that time the vast majority of the American population were eager to go to war. Yes, that same war that we now so bitterly regret having ever gotten into.

Although Junior didn’t make me into a slave because he actually still had a shred of respect for democracy and left office peacefully, Trump has picked up the torch and used it to set fire to our nation.

I can only go back to my history books and agree with Thomas Jefferson. The issue is a different one, but the results I fear will be the same.

> Discussing the question of Missouri's admission to the Union, Thomas Jefferson wrote to John Holmes, "... but this momentous question, like a fire bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of the Union. it is hushed indeed for the moment. but this is a reprieve only, not a final sentence."

- Jefferson to Holmes, April 22, 18201< Quote from monticello.org.

>Trump’s rallies and gatherings continue to celebrate violence and the prospect of revenge — and specifically of "getting even" with Trump's "enemies."

... In one troubling new development, Trump supporters have begun flying all-black American flags, in an implicit threat to harm or kill their opponents — meaning nonwhite people, "socialist liberals," Muslims, vaccinated people and others deemed to be "enemies" of "real America." 

... Black American flags are the flags that mean "no quarter shall be given." They are the opposite of the white flag of surrender.

According to the people on TikTok and the Sun (British tabloid), the black American flag originated in the civil war and was flown by the Confederates.

It means that they will not surrender, will not take prisoners, and are willing to die for their cause. It means they will execute their enemies.

Who are their enemies? Pretty much any non-Conservative. You know, Democrats, Liberals, LGBTQ, BIPOC, and the vaccinated. ...

... And a new poll from the University of Virginia's Center for Politics even suggests that more than 50 percent of Trump supporters want "red states" to secede from the Union. 

... Nance also noted that Cawthorn's propaganda video is thematically similar to the type of propaganda used by Islamic terrorist groups such as ISIS and al-Qaida to radicalize and recruit members.

... I have outlined two major emotional drives: narcissistic symbiosis and shared psychosis. Narcissistic symbiosis refers to the developmental wounds that make the leader-follower relationship magnetically attractive. The leader, hungry for adulation to compensate for an inner lack of self-worth, projects grandiose omnipotence — while the followers, rendered needy by societal stress or developmental injury as, yearn for a parental figure. When such wounded individuals are given positions of power, they arouse similar pathology in the population that creates a "lock and key" relationship….

"Shared psychosis" — which is also called "folie à millions" ["madness for millions"] when occurring at the national level or "induced delusions" — refers to the infectiousness of severe symptoms that goes beyond ordinary group psychology. When a highly symptomatic individual is placed in an influential position, the person's symptoms can spread through the population through emotional bonds, heightening existing pathologies and inducing delusions, paranoia and propensity for violence — even in previously healthy individuals. The treatment is removal of exposure.

Trump and his regime gave permission and encouragement to his followers and other supporters to engage in antisocial and other anti-human behavior on a national scale. 

...As Hussein Ibish warned in a recent article in the Atlantic, "The cancer of political violence is not an endemic American disease. At the moment, it is a Republican disease. No one but Republicans themselves can cure it. Until they do, the violence of the right is only going to keep swelling and crashing. From a Middle Eastern perspective, this is all appallingly familiar."

Label Mania

 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2021/10/01/us/bruces-beach-los-angeles-property-return/index.html

Facebook just told me I didn’t read this article, which I did. I don’t know why it thinks I didn’t. I guess they’re trying to do things right; but they are trying to do  it in a very wrong way.  To put it in other words, computers are stupid and we are forcing them to rule our lives.

Back to the point. 

> "This is what reparations look like," said Bradford, insisting that the county is not giving anything to the Bruce family, yet simply returning their stolen property.<

  This is why I am so offended by the concept of reparations. Everybody means something different by the word. I’m against reparations in the sense of paying reparations as were paid to the victims of internment during World War II.  They deserved reparations because they were the ones who actually suffered. I strongly support the current return of property which had been stolen from these individuals. It was actually taken away from owners improperly and has now been returned to the heirs and assigns thereof.

I don’t call that reparations. I call  call that justice. I call that human rights.

Thankfully, when I read articles which actually specify what individuals mean by the term “reparations”, they almost always end up being basic human rights. So I support most of what people are asking for as “reparations” I’m just not foolish enough to call them reparations.

Most of what has been declared to be white privilege has also been mislabeled. Most of them are not privileges which can be granted or taken away. Most of them are human rights. Those rights have been denied to non-whites but that doesn’t make them a white privilege. It makes them human rights that have been denied.

This is one of the greatest flaws of the left’s positions. Mislabeling concepts makes it easier to criticize them. Label ideas correctly and they are less offensive and more accurate. Both are advantages which should not be thrown away with silly, even stupid misuse of language in order to make some sort of emotional points or gain some sort of emotional advantage in the minds of the language abusers.

What’s more important? Making a stand and flying the flag of your superiority, or winning the battle?

Holy Toenails, Batman

 

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/covid-mask-vaccination-mandates-aren-t-christian-persecution-ncna1278067

It seems that Christians (some of them even in the form of lawsuits) are protesting the requirement to wear masks “because God created us in His image, we are masking that image.”

As the article points out, this will only make sense, ‘When these conservative Christians start mandating nudity, then they might have a claim about not covering up what God has created.’

Maybe these people would accept masks if they were in the shape of fig leaves?

In one particularly interesting case:

> Last year, a Republican legislator in Ohio refused to wear a mask, arguing in a Facebook post that the U.S. was founded on “Judeo-Christian Principles” that include “we are all created in the image and likeness of God.”<

So now we know that God has a face. We are made in the image of God, we have faces, therefore He has a face. Basic logic.

This leads in inevitable conclusion that He has some other parts that I don’t think Christians are entirely comfortable with discussing. Especially when you think of those particular bits and pieces being part of God.

Also, does that mean men or women are created the image of God? Because (surprise Christians!) they are not exactly alike.  Trying to get a picture of God where He has all the appropriate parts to make both males and females and His image gets a bit disturbing.

(Just in case you’re not getting the picture completely, I’m referring to that which Brits often refer to as the “naughty bits”.  I just have a hard time thinking that Christians would be really upset to find out that God had, let’s say, toenails.  Though I suppose nasal hairs might also be a bit troubling in their own peculiar way.)

Poem Visions

Must be in a poetry sort of mood.

 Visions

Heed me 

Hear me 

You who see the unseen

You who hear the silence

You who know the unknown

You who sense the unreal things

That form the structure of the world

Heed me 

Hear me 

You and I

We are then and also now 

We are here and we are there

We are the unreal and the real

We are one with the godhead and with man

Heed me 

Hear me 

We observe and we take part

We are the bond of yes and no 

We are the soul that others lack

We are at the living and the dead

We know the things that others won’t

Heed me 

Hear me 

We are here so they can be

We are what they will not see

We are the life they need to live

We are the ylem that first was here

We are the myth which forms the word 

Heed me 

Hear me 

We are the sight that is too clear

We are the truth they will not hear 

We are the thought that fosters fear 

We are the dark and we are the light

We are the mirror that they must hate

Heed me 

Hear me 

If you will

Poem Night Bird

 A throwaway line from a manga last night got me thinking so I wrote this poem.  It’s pretty much the way it came out of my head with a very few minor changes (change the word “the” to the word “a”, for example).

I can see a few ways I could make it much more structured instead of completely blank verse. But then I’d have to add a couple more stanzas. I like it the way it is, so I’ll probably leave it. Then again, maybe I’ll make a second version. I don’t know yet. Anyway, here it is:

Night Bird

Homeless

Flying 

Through a new moon sky

Flying free

Unfettered

Unbound

Homeless

New moon 

Dark moon

Black sky moon

Moon that is but isn’t

Guide me

Guide me with your darkness

Guide me home again

For I am all alone

Yet Another Isekai

I was an ordinary high school student. Except I was awfully good with my skateboard. Which is why I impressed all the girls by never wearing any safety equipment. Helmets? That’s for wimps who get bullied.

I was so good I invented my own maneuver. I hadn’t even named it yet. At the skate park I showed it off to everyone and it didn’t quite work. Which is how I fractured my skull and died.

Should’ve been the end, right? Only, yeah, it happened to me. Empty white room, funny looking old man. I’m not an otaku and nowhere near a hikkikomori, but I’ve read a few mangas here and there. I got it. I’m not particularly interested in swords and sorcery and magic and all that stuff but hey, better than staying dead, right?

So the old god guy is pretty nice. He  smiles and says “Welcome! You know what’s happening right?”

So I told him I did. I was gonna go on and explain how I was pretty popular with the girls and was a  respected athlete, but he never gave me a chance.

“Well, I’m new to all this! You’re my first one. I got curious about what all the other gods were into, thought I’d give it a try. Read a few manga and now we’re ready to go. Sorry I had to wait till that truck killed you but…”

That’s when I asked him what truck?

He looked awfully confused and asked “You died from a fractured skull didn’t you?”

I told him I did but it’s because I tried my new trick on a skateboard and I guess it was pretty stupid not to wear helmet after all… And that’s as far as I got.

“Oh, no! I’m so sorry! My fault! I can’t just send you back to be dead now. But it has to be a truck! Every manga I read, it started with a truck.” He thought about it for a moment and then he almost shouted,  “I got it!”  He looked at me and smiled, “Don’t worry, I’ll give you your harem and your magic powers and cat girls and everything you’ve ever dreamed of!” He waved his hand  and I was standing in the middle of a street and a truck was coming at me.

I jumped out of the way. And got in the way of a passenger car. Which killed me.

Back in the white room the god was looking confused and a little bit angry. “Why did you dodge?” It’s got to be a truck!”  He waved hand again before I could say anything and I was on a narrow curving mountain road; rock face on one side, steep cliff on the other, and a truck was coming at me.

So of course I jumped. And I hit the guard rail. Then I fell off the cliff. And then I was back in the white room.

This time the old guy was not a little puzzled. Just angry. Very, very angry.

“What’s the matter with you? Don’t you want to be in your wonderful dream world that you’ve always wished you had as you locked yourself away in your lonely little room?”

I tried to explain him again but having died three times in a row was making a little hard for me to talk.

“Let’s get it right this time,” he said sternly. He waved his hand again.

This time I was standing in a forest.  I looked around. Behind me there was a cliff that looked an awful lot like the one I had just fallen down. All around me was, you know, the forest. Trees and plants and stuff. Then there was a shadow over me, so I looked up and a truck fell on me.

Back in the room again. The old god guy looked really happy. “Finally got it right!  I’d have thought that after dying a few times, you’d stop being afraid of it.”  Then he stopped, looked a little thoughtful and said “Of course being a god, I’ve never died, so maybe I got it wrong.” He smiled at me in his kindly old senile god way, and added, “I made it easy for you. Just made a truck lose control, had the driver jump out time to save his life and let it fall down on top of you so you didn’t have time to dodge. Clever, huh?”

I tried to tell him that if he really wanted to reincarnate me, how about just sticking me back in my old world. I liked it there. I was good at it. I was in a good high school. I had a great career ahead of me. I dated a lot of girls. I was a popular guy. But I had just had too many deaths in the last 3 1/2 minutes for me to stop shaking long enough to say anything.

At least he noticed. He told me to calm down and wait a while before sending me the new world because there’s no way I could survive in my current condition. Eventually I calmed down enough to start screaming.

“Why did you keep killing me!? It doesn’t have to be a stinking truck! One guy got stabbed and there was another guy who fell out of his bed and bumped his head and died for no particular reason. But they got isekaied!”

He looked a bit puzzled, “Oh? Guess I haven’t read enough isekai then. I’ll read some more. Thanks for letting me know.  Anyway, you look better, so I’ll let you start your wonderful new dream life you’ve always wished for.”

And then I was in this place.

So, I repeat, I got to admit it’s better than being dead. I mean, what isn’t? But magic is confusing, swords are stabby and sharp, and harems aren’t as much fun as you might think. Just take a little time and  actually think about it for once. I have to live with four incredibly demanding, pushy, selfish little brat girls. Each one wants everything her own way. All they do is fight with each other, except when they unite forces to fight against me, which happens a lot.  

And worst of all, you can’t divorce a harem.

I miss my old life.

First (Second?) Contact

 In many ways first contact actually proved to be quite simple.   It turned out that the scientists and mathematicians were correct. Mathematics was mathematics. Engineering was engineering.  

What worked for us, worked for them. How could it not? Differences in cultural and artistic inclination aside, reality remained real for both species.

Unfortunately, then there were other kinds of communication. Utter complete failure. No matter how hard we tried. No matter how hard they tried. Nothing being “said” made any sense to us and nothing we presented to them made any sense to them.  We couldn’t even begin to guess how they thought and it became clear that they couldn’t do so with us either.

The big breakthrough came when someone finally realized that the answer was not linguists, scholars, or professionals of any kind. It was only when they brought in Martha Murray that  advances were finally made.

In retrospect, it should have been an obvious choice. Instead, it all resulted from the moment when Martha sent in that now famous email that said “Well, obviously this is what they mean.  Can’t you tell?”

Martha, and many millions of others, were very experienced in communicating with alien species and conveying meeting back-and-forth between them. Of course, you all know the punchline. Who doesn’t in our media connected world? Martha was a cat lady. 

Best of all, it didn’t require a person who was obsessed with cats, just a person who has lived with a cat for years and was able to understand and send out effective messages between these two so alien species. In truth, cats and people really don’t fully understand each other and the aliens and we don’t either. Nevertheless, we can somehow convey desire and intent back and forth  enough to get along and even enjoy each other’s company. Homo sapiens and silvestris catus, we owe our peaceful and mutually beneficial alliance with our alien friends to you and your relatonship.

This Ain’t Your Father’s Isikai

 

This Ain’t Your Father’s Isikai

Manny decided that Terkel and Gundar were good traveling companions.  Like any dwarf in a good fantasy world, they were strong and carrying huge packs in their backs was something they seemed not to even notice. That meant he didn’t have to carry much. And they didn’t even mind!

If you had to be stuck in a strange new world, having been summoned by some weird unknown power, it was  good to have friends like these.  

They knew the route. The low level monsters around were scared of dwarves so the journey was as easy as it could be. It was like a vacation. The more he thought about it, the more Manny realized that it wasn’t so bad being in this world. It’s not like he had left much behind. At least he hadn’t left anything behind that he could think of with regret. He was never very popular. Didn’t have any friends. Really wanted a girlfriend but the harder he tried, the more the girls just turned away.

It’s not as if anybody hated him, it’s just that nobody liked him. But now, he was in a fantasy world! Monsters! Magic! Cat girls! He knew what would happen next. 

As soon as they got to the city of Karenthal, The dwarves would take him to register at the Adventurers’ Guild. There it would be discovered that he has amazing magic powers.   He would level up a super high speed, gathering a harem along the way. A bunny girl, no, a fox girl. And a loli who is actually several hundred years old, so she’s an adult, so that’s OK. It’s not really bad at all. I mean she’s older than I am right? Also,  a whole bunch of other girls too.  Finally, all those impossible dreams are going to come true for me!

He suddenly snapped out of his daydream when he thought he heard a certain word muttered from one of the dwarf brothers to the other.

“Uh, hey guys?” He could hardly control the trembling in this voice. Could it be? The ultimate of fantasies applied to him?

The two stopped and looked at him. “Yeah?” Gundar asked in his typical half mutter, half chuckle.  “You need to piss again? You humans! Spend all your time off in the bushes“

Terkel gave a creepy, rather nasty snigger, and added, “That’s what we get for traveling with a human.“

“No! I was kind of listening to what you guys were saying there.” His voice was starting to tremble.

The two brothers looked at each other. It was a very concerned look. It’s intensity set a thrill through Manny. It must be true. They are in awe of being in my exalted presence.

“I knew it! I did hear you say it! That’s why you’re taking me to the city. It’s because of a prophecy, isn’t it?” He was smiling now. He was lost in visions of a great stunningly glorious future featuring him . He was the Hero who would save the world.

“About that,” Terkel paused, made a stiff little gesture of purshing his lips together, stared up at the sky, then looked at a rock nearby, finally scratched his beard as he studied a tree off to the side of the road and then continued, “There’s some sort of a prophecy somewhere. Just can’t remember the details. I suppose, maybe, it might be about you. Possibly.”  He then poked his brother elbow rather sharply with his elbow.

Gundar, looking as vacant as usual, wrinkled his brow, scratched the back of his head and then added, “Yeah. Yeah. I remember some sort of prophecy, or something. They talked about that in like, you know, church.”  When his brother glared at him he looked puzzled for a moment and then added, “Sometimes. Sometimes the priests talked about something like that in church. I think.”

Tetkel nodded and added, “You know priests. Always going on and on about stuff like that. It’s not like anybody listens. It’s just, you know, you got to go to church, right?”

His heart was pounding so hard Manny thought he could hear the ocean in his ears. “It’s about me, isn’t it? It’s about how this guy from another world is summoned and he’s a great hero and he has magic powers in and he’s super strong and all the girls love him and he saves the world and then a noble and he’s rich right?“ The words ran together without any punctuation. To put it mildly, Manny was excited.

The two brothers shuffled their feet, looked up the sky, looked at each other and finally, Gundar shrugged at his older and more intelligent brother. (It should be noted that being more intelligent than Gundar was not a very great accomplishment, but at least, somehow, Terkel had managed it.)

Terkel sighed. It was not a happy sigh. It could, I suppose, be called a resigned sort of sigh. The kind of sigh a ternaged boy gives when he realizes that the love of his life doesn’t even know who the hell he is.

“Look , we  like you. Cause you remind us of us,” Terkel spoke slowly, focussing all his very deficient intellectual skills into trying to pick exactly the correct words.  “See, we don’t got a lot of friends. You being nice to us, that made us feel real good. That’s why we’re taking you to the city. Because it’s nice to have a friend. It’s good to travel with you.”

“And because of the prophecy, right?” Manny wasn’t going to back down.

“Yeah,” Terkel thought about it for a moment and then continued, “There is this sort of, I guess you could call it a prophecy, that says stuff about, you know, somebody saving the world.”

Manny stopped noticing the brothers and even the whole world around him as he gazed off into his future. “And he’s handsome, and overpowered, and super strong, and all the girls just rush to him cause they can’t resist him…“ His voice trailed off as he dreamed he’s beautiful dreams.

Gundar, who, while not terribly bright, was surprisingly sensitive for a dwarf, shook his head sadly. His brother tightened his jaw, straightened up and looked very very determined. “Who knows? What I know is you gotta go register at the Adventurers’ Guild, right?  So let’s get going.”

Manny woke up enough to realize that he was standing in the middle of the road staring at nothing. He had a weird half smile on his face, but he had a new purpose in life.  He looked at the dwarves, his dear friends who were going to lead him into his glory and demanded, “Tell me the prophecy.”

“Don’t remember it,” Gundar muttered.

“That’s right,” Terkel added. “Who remembers all the church stuff anyway?”

The two of them turned and started back on the journey. They stopped after a few steps when they realized Manny wasn’t coming along. They turned to him. He looked at them with that ridiculous smile on his face, but he didn’t move. The brothers looked at each other. “Well, come on then,” coaxed Gundar.

Manny’s smile spread across his face, “Not till you tell me the prophecy.“

Terkel, ever practical, declared “Prophecy don’t mean nothing if you don’t make it happen. We got to get you registered.“

Manny’s a smile turned into a manic grin. “So there is a prophecy about me!“

Terkel started to say something, and then realized he had trapped himself. There wasn’t any way out of it. He glared at Manny, grabbed his brother by the shoulder and pulled him further away. The two of them started talking in very low tones. Manny couldn’t hear a word they were saying but every now and then Terkel would look up and again glare at Manny. Eventually they reached some kind of conclusion and Terkel lead the way back to deal with their human friend.

“The prophecy is a prophecy. It says stuff. You know, somebody, like somebody from another world, does certain things, other stuff happens, the Dark Lord is defeated, the world is saved. Yay. So let’s get going and get it all happening, right?”

Manny walked over to a low rock, sat down on it and, still smiling, said “No. Not till you tell me the prophecy.”

Turkel was getting frustrated. “If you don’t do the stuff in the prophecy, then the prophecy don’t happen, got it?”

Manny just smiled crossed his arms and waited. Tekel got very red in the face and stomped off to kick a few rocks here and there.  It was up to Gundar.  Responsibility was not something Gundar liked. Life was pretty easy for him. He let his brother make the decisions and then he just went along with it. But his brother, once he got into one of these rages, probably wouldn’t be able to speak for a few hours.

“Manny. You know, my brother and me, we were like you said you used to be in your world. Not a lot of friends. And I mean, actually, to be honest, no friends. We like you. And you like us. Isn’t that enough? Can’t we just go get done what we gotta do?” Gundar might not know how to to think very clearly, but he know how to feel things. He felt this particular situation was getting very dangerous. He also knew the prophecy had to be fulfilled.  

Manny said nothing. He just crossed his arms and waited. 

Maybe it was the right thing to do and maybe it wasn’t; remember that Gundar wasn’t the greatest at thinking things through, including the ultimate consequences his actions might cause, but his brother was out of control and someone had to make a decision. So he made one. “Look, if I tell you the prophecy, you promise you’ll go and get registered like we planned?”

Manny said, “Sure! I just want to know all the wonderful stuff that’s going to happen.“

Gondar looked very sad. “No matter what the prophecy says?“

Suddenly, Manny was very worried. “You mean, like it says I get killed? Or something horrible happens to me?“

“Nothing like that,” explained Gundar. “It’s just the prophecy...it isn’t quite like what you think it is.” He thought for a moment while Manny waited in terror.  “You get to go home after it’s all done and our world does get saved and you don’t get hurt real bad or anything.“

“Then why won’t you tell me!” a very worried Manny was beginning to whine.

Gundar took a deep breath for courage and blurted it all out, “The prophecy says a sad clod from other world comes and that he’s not very bright and he saves the world because he makes just the right mistakes and does just the right dumb thing at the right time.”  He looked at the shocked expression on Manny’s face and added, “I’m sorry. We didn’t want to tell you because we knew you wouldn’t like it.“

Many felt like all the times he’d ever done something really stupid and was so ashamed he wished he could just curl up and die on the spot. “What about the girls?“

Having already said the worst that could be said, Gundar didn’t hesitate to add “It don’t say nothin’ about no girls.”

Manny sat for a very long time. Gundar sat next to him. Terkel finally kicked so many rocks that his feet started to hurt and he just stormed off somewhere out of sight.

Eventually the three got it together and they continued their long, sad journey to the fabled city of Karenthal.   There was a prophecy to be fulfilled.

Through A Mirror Darkly

 Bobby has been sending me some interesting links to philosophers/scientists making very interesting points. This is my response to one of those links.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNnIGh9g6fA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWo7-azGHic

Kaufman was very interesting; a bit dense and rushed, but interesting. While I was listening to him I experienced one of those gestalt breakthroughs. As you know, I’ve been puzzling for years and asking, why is it that, in the absence of clear and compelling evidence, highly intelligent individuals insist that they have no free will but they are merely robots composed of biochemical/biomechanical phenomena which were 100% predictable to be exactly what they are today and what they will be forever (or at least as long as the universe exists) at the moment of the big bang?

Since the evidence is unclear at this point (although they keep insisting the evidence absolutely proves that point, said evidence is woefully inadequate to draw a final conclusion) what would compel an otherwise intelligent, even powerful, human being to decide that he has no free will, has no choice, and is not only a machine but a totally unintelligent machine which only manages to delude itself into its belief system, that is, the concept that there is an individual standing there thinking and saying these things.

This is understandable position for a dangerous individual who is causing great harm to society. He could argue it’s not my fault. I can’t help myself. I have no ability to control anything. I don’t even really exist.*  Again, however, this seems a very strange position for a highly respected and influential  member of society to take.  This is all the more true when you look at the passion with which they defend this position. It is not, in their minds, sufficient to believe it themselves or even to share this belief with those who agree. No! They must evangelize. They must spread the good word that none of us actually exist, that we are not real,  that we have no free will and are completely subject to the unfeeling will of reductionist mathematical physics.

As I listened to this presentation, I was suddenly struck by that what should have been obvious from the very first time I asked myself the question. They are true believers. Evidence is not valued by them because evidence threatens the possibility that their true belief just might possibly not be correct.  This is not to say that that belief is necessarily wrong, although, obviously, I think it is.  Instead,  it explains why they are so determined to degrade their own status so as to present themselves as no more conscious or capable of free will than a rock rolling in a stream or a maple seed fluttering in the breeze.

You might ask, why then would intelligent people who are so capable of an unusually large measure of control in their lives be so determined to deny that they have any? What, exactly, is that explanation?  I believe, and this is the greatest insight that occurred to me while listening to this presentation, that this is because they are in fact identical down at the most basic emotional level with the creationists and science deniers.

They do not deny science, to be sure. Yet,  although they are excellent scientists, when it comes to this philosophic issue, they transform into true believers for whom evidence, science, and logic are mere enemies of their deep rooted faith.   Remember that young earth creationists also insist that science is on their side. If you simply Google young earth creationism you will quickly find a large number of articles and YouTube presentations declaring that coal seams prove Noah’s flood or that fossils and even science in general proves Noah’s flood.   It is absurd nonsense, but it is affirmed with the same passion with which of these highly skilled and normally very logical scientists who usually develop conclusions based firmly on the data now devote themselves to contorting the data to fit their preconception.  Again, exactly the way creations do.

The greatest insight which dawned on me today was that the reason for doing this is exactly the same as that of any true believer, including the creationists. It is the need for certainty. We live in a very uncertain, chaotic world. Even that which should be predictable if you know everything is subject to chaos theory wherein even the tiniest variation will make a radical change in the ultimate outcome.  Just as so many people turn to conspiracy theories and blind religious faith in order to gain some sense of sanity and order in our so disordered and unpredictable universe, these scientists are turning to reductionist particle physics in order to create a structure for our universe which, if not desirable, is at least predictable.  As it was in the beginning is now and ever shall be.

Better an unpleasant certainty than the fear of the bleak, dark, and unknown forest, or, as we have all heard so many times, better the devil you know than the devil you don’t.

This has been an issue which has puzzled me so greatly and so deeply for so very long. Why did I suddenly realize it in the middle of Kaufman's talk? I don’t know. I don’t even remember exactly what he was saying at the moment I realized it. Of course, his talk was declaring that there are things greater than mere mathematical reductionism and utterly predictable classical physics, I was thinking about the topic thanks to his insights, but at what exact point I suddenly realized this, I cannot say. Now that I have realized it,  it seems so blatantly obvious I wonder how I could have  been so dimwitted as to not see it from the very beginning. I can only turn as a defense to the brilliant Thomas Huxley who, upon reading Darwin’s theory of natural selection, is purported to have declared “Why didn’t I think of that?”

Sometimes the most insightful and, in the case of Darwin, brilliant insights are blatantly obvious…after someone finally realizes them.

*This also fits with the opening of Sapolsky’s first lecture (which I also enjoyed very much.  I intend to watch the rest of his course).   As he spoke I was struck by the memory of an interesting article I read some years back.  One of the terrifying events of the past, now unfortunately all too common, was when a sniper took over a tower at, I believe, the University of Texas, and began randomly shooting people. As I recall, he was the individual that was the subject of this later article. The point is that an individual, whoever he was, was changing from a highly respected and healthy member of society into something very strange. He eventually did commit murders and I’m fairly certain he was the sniper. After his death it was discovered that he had written a request for an autopsy after his demise. He felt something was wrong with his brain. Surprisingly, or unsurprisingly, the autopsy revealed a large tumor which was interfering with his higher brain functions.

He knew that something was wrong with him. He didn’t know the cause but he could feel his sense of self fading away. He could feel the sense of free will fading away.  As you know, my own belief is that we do have free will but it is very much constrained by our biology and the uncaring laws of reductionist mathematical physics. That is bleak. That is indeed a dark and terrifying forest. However,  there is a light within that forest, and the light is our sense of self, our sense of free will, at our struggle to maintain those against the forces of a universe that doesn’t care about us in any way, manner, or form.