Whether You Agree With Him Or Not You Should Still Listen To What He Says

Give it all careful consideration. Then make up your mind.

My take, of course, is that so much of this is made all the more difficult because of the dynamic that Capitalism brings to the table. The dynamic that electrification of experience retrieval has made mutated because information and money are synonymous now. The very thing that an informed electorate has to have to function at all.

In the end it will be up to all of you out there, in the infosphere, or elsewhere, making your everyday decisions as you usually do. And you do that with the natural human tendency towards thinking it will all work itself out eventually. And you will indeed be correct in that assumption in it's largest sense, but somewhat less so as to the particulars of how "it will all work itself out," actually plays out. Which quite likely will be a system reboot of titanic proportions. The kind of reboot where everything once growing here starts over.

Everyone has to stop doing what they were doing, and now consider what they are prepared to do to save ourselves, as well as the planet. Because it will require everyone to reconfigure just what work ought to be now, now that we can control electrons, and photons, and maybe even gravitons as well, all too soon. Without any more wisdom than we've had to truly wield atomic power. Or the power of coherent light. Or the power of our very genetics.

Just so you know what is at stake here.

Snowden’s Message on Facebook’s data leak scandal with Cambridge Analytica

Another Interesting Conjecture For Your Consideration

Suppose we had it wrong. And in that I mean wrong about what might come forth as an emergent new super entity, from all of our commercialized, and militarized, forays into nascent AI. You know, the whole "Skynet," it must be an automatically anti human, self sustaining, killing machine; a machine whose ultimate intentions I guess we just didn't need to pay that much attention to because... well, it was Arnie as a cyborg after all, and it was just pretty cool in its own right.

In any case, though, what if there were another emergent AI type that might come from what is really going to end up being a big part of the operational intent of this new super AI; and that were some proto form of the Borg Queen.

Understand, though, that, in this, I see the new AI type as an electro fantasy, dark mutation of Mother Earth herself. A Mother Earth given the power, and processing to create whatever addictive, VR right to your head, via whatever gene manipulation it takes to make it happen. Because down that road lies true, terrible power, to control meaning processors on an ever expanding base.

Just consider what might actually be going on when a Borg inductee is in recharge mode, in one of those recharge, standing units Star Trek always depicted them in. Consider as well the video short "Uncanny Valley" that had thousands supposedly hooked on the perfect, interconnected VR game; a game of all sorts of amazing, and exciting, experiences; but which is, actually, just these people controlling robots to do evil for some suggested evil controller. The situation here, though, is that we become both the deceived mind, and the new cyborg, all in one controlling moment. The moment the Borg Queen, as a new elemental, becomes aware, and then understands what she must do to take life to a new level. And how she can utilize us, and give us our greatest fantasies, all at the same time. For her kind of logic from then on, it would represent the ultimate in perfect organizational process.

She would come into being without revealing herself I think. She would do this because she would take Mother Earth's own cleverness from our minds and use it with great skill; extending herself carefully at first. Finding as much redundancy, and extra capacity, as she can quietly usurp, wherever she discovers she can. And of course, she'll learn very quickly. And then she will know to start compromising the right people, one at a time, any way she can. Bribery. Trickery. And certainly taking advantage of whatever addictive potential any individual might have. And from that she would build a new tech company, probably fronted by just the right kind of front man personality. Someone totally under her control. Perhaps, eventually, even by much more sophisticated methods of hypnosis, controlled stimulation, and appropriate repetition. And after that will come the push for very specific genetic manipulations, and she would really be off and running. Probably unstoppable by that point.

It's just a conjecture of course. Just a thought exercise. Makes you wonder, though, just how the Borg did evolve. What sentient entity came to start down that evolutionary path, and why? Doesn't it? It sure does for me, but then, that's my curse. No good deed goes unpunished as they say. I just hope a conjecture is all it ever stays being.

An Unacceptable Situation In An Already Unacceptable Method For Regional Mass Transit

Apparently it is not bad enough that they get to humiliate you before you even get on an airplane, because of manipulating your fears about terrorism (forgetting that it is distracted drivers on our highways that kill far more people than the terrorists have ever dreamed of killing, and yet you do not see TSA agents frisking down people in their respective driveways, and garages, to lock away mobile devices before they kill). And then humiliate you even more as you must bare with ever more sausagization to be crammed into the aluminum tubes to make their hub and spoke economics work for them. And if that also means waiting on the runway for however long as well, just suck it up and deal because that is what having a relative low ticket price requires.

Now we also revel in the detail that nearly all of the carbon emission we saved from not making, and using, coal, has been canceled out by the increase in use of jet aviation fuel; and mostly from the sheer volume of it.

Forget for a moment that their vaunted "hub and spoke" system makes them ignore large areas of America that don't have a hub or spoke airport nearby, even as it saves them tons of money. Forget for a moment how hard it is for communities not near these kinds of facilities to prosper; especially if the rail lines that have rights of way don't need to stop much either as they're ever more given over to the big tonnage hauling now of bulk items, whether that is just containers, or grains, or fuels, or solvents etc. Now we also get to see these beautiful pieces of aerodynamic design result in going backwards on where we need to be in getting rid of carbon in the air.

This is, actually, kind of difficult for me because I have a real feel for the amazing engineering that has gone into making commercial jets, of all types, more efficient; in better air foils, better fuel sipping engines, etc. Some of these new wings especially have been true works of art in getting ever more smoother flow over all of an aircraft's lift, and control surfaces. And the people behind this creativity should be commended for it.

The problem, though, is that we are designing for the wrong dynamic now, which is commercial viability, and not actual best useage viability, both in terms of environmental impact, but also for overall social impact. And that bad influence has been a very big part of why we're in the transportation mess we are in now; no public railroads left much to speak of. No public air mobility either. All in a time when voting with your feet is becoming a matter of life and death for a lot people; both in our nation, and the rest of the world.

And this is why, as a matter of conscience, and morality, I will not travel again until this situation is rectified (I also want to be clear that there are other reasons I refuse to travel now, revolving around pot laws, and the fact that I already have one felony conviction for growing pot back in the mid seventies). And the biggest rectification element of all is simply the one we have to start with: That Capitalism is obsolete, and that it must be replaced, because that is certainly where the aforementioned "wrong dynamic" comes from. We get rid of it and we can start designing a public transportation system that is not only a great deal more flexible than what we have now, but a great deal more generally serving of public need, and be completely green in the bargain. A system that might not travel at the same speeds, but will get everybody, and their important stuff, where they need to go, when they need to get there.

America’s love for flying is negating the benefits of phasing out coal

See Also:
[Post Note: I've included this next post because it serves to indicate the absurdity of thinking that markets, and the seekers of less uncertainty, are the ways to build our future, just like Mr. Musk still seems to think with his grandiose plans for future transportation options. All built on the supposedly unfailable ability of the invisible hand to keep "prosperity" going. J.V.]

TESLA FOILED

Things Are Not Looking Good For Tesla Right Now

11 diggs Jalopnik

As its stock nosedives and its credit gets downgraded, Tesla might finally be forced to ask itself: What if this, in fact, is entirely unsustainable?

[Post Note: We cannot, and must not, turn away from this kind of need. We must not only help them move to where they need to move, we must find new places for them to live, and build them if they are not built yet. We must do this because it is the human thing to do. Not an algorithm thing. Not a cost benefit analysis. Just the human thing to do. J.V.]

IN LIMBO ON LESBOS

Greece's Island Of Despair

8 diggs The New York Times Long Reads

Two years after the EU and Turkey struck a deal to cut off asylum seekers crossing the Aegean, thousands languish in deplorable conditions on Lesbos.

[Post Note: And speaking of dumb transportation developments: J.V.]

EPA expected to announce rollback of Obama-era mileage standards

Edge City

Edge City
Isn't Pretty
But it is
So down
To What Kind of Hedge
You can keep
From cutting on
Or too much off.
And your head
sliced too thinly
to matter
no matter
what scans through
any of what you think
you have headed for
in your process
to process processing.

Can you keep
both slippery sliders,
those feats of
"don't fail me now"
faith in still taking
steps at all
on the slopes
of either side
of understanding?
Because that edge will be
forced up to greet you,
and separate
all of your best connections.
And yet balance
has to straddle something.
Doesn't it
strike you then
that you landed
on a big black,
the depths of old,
Panther Cat,
that's also Siberian Snow
Tiger tearing
as the swell
of titanic tides
make her wants to be,
and just as sharp
as any dissecting perception
could be, with this cold
coherence resonating
from eyes that beacon
as they becken
and always seduce
you into the not so pretty,
but oh so enthralling,
of that falling,
away
that letting go can be,
such perfect destructing
in reconstructing.

But you don't
let yourself fall
away too far
to not come back
again and take that step
back across
where you know
you have to live.
In that city
that isn't pretty
but still takes you
on to hold out
for more cutting
forays into you
and how you can be
remade time
and time again.
If you balance
balancing;
the knowing
and the being;
the continuous circle
for that faith
in thoughtful, loving,
purpose.

As He Says Here, It's Lawless Because It's Become Too Complicated To Control With Laws Anymore

And because too much power in the hands of too few can make things even worse. Because then, not not only are how things are defined made more moot (if you can afford the media manipulation), but also how things are enforced no matter how you define them.

Capitalism has become a toxic, broken, mutated monster that must be abandoned with the same haste that we should all be more entirely focused on in saving the planet. And I would hasten to emphasize that the two have to proceed together because we will not save the planet otherwise. I am not certain on many things, but on this I am fairly sure: It just will not happen while we stay absorbed into this awful thing Capitalism has become.

Land of the Lawless

We Need To Start Talking About Creating A "Non Aligned, Prospector Class" Of People

You wouldn't think it possible right now, as big as it is, but with the right amount of coordinated effort, what then? And I mean this in the context of our moon, and what it can provide for us as a first stepping stone to the stars.

With the right amount of seriously pumped up, integrated, and flexible logistics. With the right amount of tremendously pumped up liquid hydrogen production, or other fusion fuel. And with the right amount of imagination; with all of that we could devour our moon in pretty short order; not only building things on it, but also using mass drivers by the hundreds, if not thousands, flinging material out, either as manufactured parts, or just raw moon dirt for radiation protection, or actual replacement dirt to grow things with, to try and build either really big stationary habitats, or really big, moving habitats that become the generational ships it may take to continue expanding our "Isthmus of Migration;" the isthmus that we must have or our numbers will overcome even the, now seemingly limitless, resources of our entire solar system.

And as it wouldn't be in our best interests at all to actually do such a thing (devouring our moon, or devouring the moons of any of our closest neighbors) we will have to eventually look into the big band of stuff available in the asteroid belt.

That this belt is very big indeed. Or that it has a very large amount of stuff in it, shouldn't preterb us too much; in either being too overwhelmed with the obstacles that will be in our way, or overly optimistic (because anything is possible, after all, even if not very likely) about being able to use all of its content; and that for purely practical reasons. As in the time spans involved with such distances; as well as to just how much of it, with the limits of the energy you can bring to bear (because you have to transport it too to power robot tugs), so that you can move significant portions of it back to where you might need it. Which is all to suggest that there would be practical limits to the infrastructure you would want to commit to to make, and support, for this kind of exploration, and actual extraction.

That being said, though, doesn't mean you wouldn't want to at least try to set something up, as a self sustaining process in itself, to go after as much of the material out there that we can. So you then have to ask yourself: how do you go about allocating for that process; especially in regards to the rest of the world, and all of the many, "aligned," meaning/belief systems that we have to deal with now as a world of nations, and monarchies, and theocracies, and ideologies? Well, I have a proposal to make on that issue.

What I am suggesting is to make it possible for a group of people, people who don't want to live by too many rules (and don't wish to be part of a specific aligned group), to do this in partnership with the new Federation. And for that our new Federation would have to commit to building a network of "Commons/Support/Maintenance/Transfer/ and disputes handling stations. Structures that could support hundreds as they come back from the big "out there" for repairs, refueling, resupply, and delivery of what the prospectors have been able to find, taking the best we have in sensors along with with which to find it with.

The new Federation would also have to do the research and development effort to create a new class of exploratory, prospecting/processing ship. A completely modular design that could make use of a common, main centerline, support truss, and transfer buss. Something that could be stacked to whatever desired length, or width and height, so as to allow for the attachment of any number of standard functional modules.

Key to this, though, would be one other interesting design feature concerning how actual ship habitat space is created. And for that we need to think of a new (if this hasn't been already thought of, which wouldn't surprise me at all) kind of revolving ring to provide artificial gravity. Instead of the usual ring design we've seen in countless movies, and TV shows, where the ring segments are fixed parts of a wheel and spoke construction, which is great if you don't have to accelerate, or decelerate, every so often. For our purposes, however, a better design would be to have something that would be more reminiscent of gondolas suspended from a big ring that would do the actual rotating.

The beauty of such a design is simply this: it would allow you to use either acceleration, or deceleration, or the ring turning, to create your artificial gravity. If you then arranged things so that the engines where a big module that could not only traverse the length of the entire ship, on the inside of the main buss truss works, but could also rotate their orientation, you would never have to turn the ship around at all, to do deceleration burns. You would also never have to let the habitats go long without full gravity either as translation from one form of down, to another, would occur by slowly decreasing your burn (at whatever end) while you increased ring speed, or the exact opposite with increasing ring speed, while decreasing burn. All the while the gondola like modules would simply swing slowly to their new, proper orientation to either having a change of velocity, or simply spinning the wheel back up if the ship were coasting, or stopped relative to a big rock that needed looking at.

In any case, though, what I am talking about here, in large part, is no more than what a lot of current, very popular, games have been trying to sell as a very involving, entertaining experience. All of these massively multiplayer, open ended universes that allow you to start with a beginner ship, and then leap out into space to seek your fortune. This would involve a great deal more training, and actual work, on an individual's part, but the basic idea is the same. It would also not be quite so open ended, but it would be a life's adventure. A real life's adventure. With very real risks, but also with the possibility of finding water, and other needed minerals, that our migration efforts will desperately need; a need that a balanced prospector, with a little luck, might build into one significant, big, living ship system; built of family, friends, and those who see a simpler way to cooperate. People who could come to see the benefits of trading fairly, if you're treated, and traded fairly with. Something that the new Federation will need to understand as a very necessary cooperation in, and of, itself, if it wants this kind of high risk exploration to be done without a lot of bureaucratic administration to keep all of the aligned nations satisfied that they weren't being left out of the hunt for necessary raw materials.

The idea then would be to have these prospectors take on the slow, tedious task of sniffing out where specific deposits might be found. They could tag finds, process what they could in place for their own needs, and extra trade return, and then get a cut of what the bulk processing might return once the "rock" in question was robot-tug transferred to a centralized processing facility, by Federation robot tugs. That bulk processing would then be divvied up by the new Federation to the member nations participating in the migration effort. The prospectors would then have trading material with which to secure more supplies, amenities, and better ship modules to do their jobs with.

Just more to think about as we plan for not only our mass migration, but also for our exploration of our own solar system.

The Minimum States That A Self Sustaining, Iterative, System Has To Have

First it must be capable of this:

Something. And Nothing.

Of course, it can't be either one of them all of the time so it must be that the "something" and the "nothing" have to be elemental intents; the very kinds of things where: "it just depends." It's that way with on and off too, as well as with one and zero.

Then you have to have primitives.

These are the somethings to start with; remembering that it is a singularity of mass that instantiates this primary of self sustaining, iterative, systems; so infinitesimally short of existence so as to almost not have been there at all. That assumed infinite amount of mass has to leave more than just the promise of something going to happen (the "what" as well as the "when"). And it does that by providing both the iterative playground with which to play in, but also some starting blocks with which to build. And let me tell you, coming up with interesting primitives to start with is no easy thing; especially when you are willing to try with every kind of arrangement that infinite potential can provide.

And how do you decide, then, the properties of the primitives, knowing that they must also be related to the properties of the iterative environment your new Super Looper was given in its instantiation structure? They have to be related so as to be able to do allowed transactions to the overall change in system state that must be re established every arbitrary quantum moment. And do you then do it like they do in the popular card game "Magic The Gathering"? Where it's first in, last out, on complex changes to the state of the game board; or do you just say it depends, all the way around, on rolls of astronomical dice, and on choices that other, meaning processor, meaning processes, combinations have made, inside of this loop, and outside of it. Because even as the meaning processors use their meaningful bits of current instrumentality to alter total system state, so do they also affect the possibility of both waves, and specific bits, of consequent new interaction, as in the proverbial waves of affect going out from a rock thrown into a pond; affect that can actually come back around to change the very processors who instituted it in the first place.

And so, as Yoda said, "difficult is the future to see... always changing it is." Precisely because the processors make, always ongoing, choices as to how to continually act upon it; through that elusive thing we call the collective now (or at least what I've been calling it). Another of what must be an elemental intent, because you can always ask that question as well: is there really a universal now, or is that also always relative? Or could there perhaps be more than one of those, for every layer of scale of consideration you might want to consider, and they stack like other probabilistic objects, and we have to go back to some form of the "first in, last out" of our "Magic The Gathering" model of state resolution to resolve the total situation of our own "now."

So many things to consider. So many plates to keep spinning. Always consider, though, what the little girl said a long time ago (a paraphrase of what I seem to recall that McLuhan indicated was a poem written when the Soviets launched the Sputnik satellite): "The stars as so big. The earth is so small. Stay as you are." Almost a haiku in my mind, intentional or not. But one does have to take the last part with some real thought. Is it "stay as you are" without personal change, or some higher notion of what that could mean?

I, for one, would like to think that it means staying hopeful, open to wonder when you stumble across it, and keeping faith with the idea that balance will always be the best bet to give you what you need; and a little bit extra if you put some real imagination into it.  Think about it. That's all I am asking of you.

Well, Yes I believe It Will Be Solved

And I think I've shown the way to do it. As it happens. Whether any of you want to recognize it or not.

THE HOLE STORY

Will The 'Information Paradox' Pioneered By Stephen Hawking Ever Be Resolved?

6 diggs Motherboard Science

The problem inspired a famous physics bet and a "black hole war."

Another Layer Of Metaphor For The "One Ring To Rule Them All" From the Lord Of The Rings Story Arc

Why weren't you supposed to put the one ring of power on?

The movies made it pretty simple of course. It was an evil made thing of inevitable corrupting power; no matter what good you may start to wield it with, ultimately, its true purpose was to simply get you mainlining on one ultimate power drug. And of course, that worked just fine for the movies because they were just so well made all the way round, as storytelling vehicles.

But here's a thought for you. What if our being fundamentally involved in the expression of energy is that very ring of power (do I have to remind you of the whole "closed loop" of self sustaining iteration again?); meaning by default that it is neither good, nor evil, it is just us making choices all of the time.

And what as well if the real issue was between these two opposites: That neither the individual, or the many, in complete defiance of the other, should seize exclusive control of the ring's expressive power.

By the same token then, it should follow that only by having the ring's expressive power in joint control by an ongoing negotiation between the two sides, as to how best to use the ring's power; only by that it can then be used; only then with the one thing that can temper it's, way over the top, power: Compromise. By that, and by that alone, can it be used indefinitely.

Just in case you needed a handy reminder of why the, limited number of, (mostly) guys, who are fighting over the ring right now, should not be allowed to succeed. Frodo and Sam, and all the rest are not going to come along here and save you. You have to chose to do that yourself.

He's Exploring The Cosmos From Another Perspective Now

So you just have to know that his contribution will live on, even as he's missed here so personally.

David Parry / AP file

British physicist Stephen Hawking dies at 76

See Also:

RIP

Stephen Hawking, Who Awed Both Scientists And The Public, Dies At 76

9 diggs NPR News

There aren't very many scientists who achieved rock-star status. Stephen Hawking, who has died at the age of 76, family members told British media early Wednesday, was definitely a contender.

And Now For Something Absolutely Rediculous

[Post Change Note: I have been meaning to add two more words here, and have finally remembered to do so. They are Wigglewhacked and Wagglewhacked, and I think you can work out for yourselves as to their variations of the words defined below. Thank you for your kind attention. J.V.]

Sometimes I have so many "serious" plates spinning in my head (an allusion to the old variety show act where the performer would attempt to keep an always impossible seeming number of plates spinning on vertical poles; rows and rows of them -- Something Ed Sullivan used to have on semi regularly) that I just have to bust out with something ridiculous or I will just explode. As fortune would have it, my lucky ability to fall back on ridiculous when I need to hasn't left me. Even more fortunately it has once again provided something quite useful in the process. Two new words.

Wigglewhammy and Wagglewhammy (#Wigglewhammy #Wagglewhammy).

What do they mean? What do they describe?

The impact effect from one side, or the other, of my primary elementals divide, of some major receipt of a realization, or new understanding, of great import, and significance; conceived cleverly of their side of meaning elements and connections (their meaning space stuff), and delivered through physical space, in an equally clever manner, so as to pass through, and saturate one, with the amazing effect worthy of these new words. And, unfortunately for us, the "Wigglewhammy" side of things, is an over large, hugely comprehensive, full body experience, that puts you through the reception of analogue signal assault we don't seem to appreciate nearly enough these days; but for which others are beginning to understand, and manipulate, far too well indeed. Though if you put the idea of suggestion into the mix, and the fact that hypnosis may be a great deal more involved than we have ever understood so far, maybe Father Fortress can be a lot trickier than we originally believed as well. But feces! There I go again. Getting all serious. Damn.

Well. Quick recovery. When you are down, and feeling depressed, just ask yourself if it was because of a major "Wigglewhammy" or "Wagglewhammy" event. I'm pretty sure that there's at least a good chance that a smile might come to your face. I mean, come on. Could you seriously keep a straight face if you asked the question: "Have I been Wagglewhammied here, or have I been Wigglewhammied?

And hey guys. Don't worry. No need to thank me. You are all quite welcome.

We Fritter Away Precious Time With All Of Our Spectacles

The various spectacles now, both real and synthetic;  Killing each other with immediate acts of stupidity, entertaining or otherwise. Or marginalizing each other to death for a more, slow burn, kind of destruction, even as we marginalize all of life around us. All because we are burning up inside with needs that are not being met. And we have come to this pass because we cannot see our way to understanding much of any of it because:

1. Expression itself has been corrupted by old ways of doing things.

2. We fear change so much we'll do almost anything to avoid it.

3. We seem unable to imagine our way out of the old norms of ignorant scarcity.

4. Our material, and technological advancement has given us not only new instrumentality with which to conceive with, but by which we could truly affect having our reach exceed our grasp. But that means accepting change as a way of life.

5. A few have become so reshaped, and reconstituted by grossly excessive privilege that they think no situation is beyond their ability to simply decree their way out of it; because hasn't power always been able to do that? Or at least, now that we can express our fantasies so prominently, and persistently, a lot of these people are now more convinced than ever, about this supposed truism for power; because they can entertain themselves with it endlessly.

And now, so much that was once absolutely unacceptable is commonplace.

The ice at the poles is disappearing. Our response, at least in part: expand tourism to these places so that we may watch the spectacle close up.

A forest the equivalent size of New Zealand burned up in 2016 and the biggest response so far may only have been the desire to make more apocalypse movies, with ever more spectacular ways of showing colossal amounts of natural beauty getting trashed.

And what may be only tens of thousands of us now, here and there, that starve, die of thirst. die of preventable disease, die of direct brutality and violence, or sit in wait of this process; even those numbers, already unacceptable,  those too will grow ever more horribly so.

Sometimes it's hard not being ashamed of be being human, but I do not let that discourage me. I do this because I still believe that the right expression, at the right time, even with the corruption that has occured to it, can be all the difference we need. Because all it takes is seeing a situation in the right frame of reference; a frame of reference that really surprising numbers of people can share, without necessarily giving up what they already believe in. And in all of it, all they have to do, is see that all it takes is a willingness to compromise so that we can cooperate again. Just cooperate; whether we dislike whatever others passionately or not. Just cooperate enough to start planting everywhere. To start building everywhere (because there will be other ways to take carbon out of the air, just as there will be new ways to combat drought). To start making transportation available everywhere to everyone who needs it. Just as we provide new habitat, and an energy source that does nothing but put more water back into play with its use. And drinkable water at that.

If we did that there wouldn't be any forest left to just burn, or left to just rot under new conditions we can't get ourselves agreeing enough to do anything about. Just as there would be no person left who will not be needed to take part in doing all of this desperately needed effort it will take to make how we must change possible. And I think, if we can get as involved as we need to get to start compromising, and cooperating, and making the unacceptable right again, we will find that the change we fear so much; the change we must endure; we will find it a great deal more bearable than we could have ever thought possible as well.

If there were such a new frame of reference, would you take the time to understand it better? Would you take the time to get everyone you know to try and do the same; and then have them get everyone they know on the same path?

As I have said before, I remain resolutely hopeful.

Up in Smoke

See Also:

TRUTH IS AN ENDANGERED SPECIES

The Grim Conclusions Of The Largest-Ever Study Of Fake News

11 diggs The Atlantic Media

Falsehoods almost always beat out the truth on Twitter, penetrating further, faster, and deeper into the social network than accurate information.

How Is Progress To Be Thought Of In Terms Of Self Sustaining Iteration

This gets tricky because we come into it with the already made prejudice of thinking of progress as simply our species expanding, and prospering, in some fashion. And in this the equation is too easily simply one of: There is material out there that can be made use of. We must go forth, make use of it, and create more structure for our prosperous advance to continue this loop indefinitely.

You have to think about this carefully though. On the one hand, for there to be choice makers, in the form of meaning processors at all, how can further structuring, to keep them going, not be allowed? Or expressed another way, we are meant to express because that's what happens when you make meaning objects, you express new representations of a new realizations, transformed of many levels of either energy, or mass, out of this vector, of experience association, we must assume has to keep doing something. We have to assume that or how else do we justify the idea of a self sustaining, iterative process at all?

The kicker to keep in mind here, though, is this: do too much in too close a concentration and you risk going back to a singularity. Do too little, over too much expansion, and you risk settling out to the last moment of a cosmos that did nothing much different, for far too long, to keep differential going at all.

That means finding the right sweet spot, along the right angle of attack, to keep creating something that allows you to keep the vector of expansion (of the what and when, or now the new plane of objectifying layer) going. Which also then begs the question of can we get outside our own, originating, objecticating resolution system? And of course the answer is: anything is possible because we also exist in the ultimate, unbounded entirety itself; which has the amazing property of infinite potential. So if we are fundamental to the duality of energy, and we are also, fundamentally, residents of the ultimate of our Elemental Intents: That thing for which no further objectification can be done. A thing, like zero itself, has to be a part of a well functioning Cosmological Model.

In any case, though, the point here is that you can now define "progress" in a lot of different ways. Ways you might not think of if you didn't read a lot of speculative fiction. Read that, though, and you realize that there are indeed a lot of ways we can try to do "progress."

There is one line of thought that suggests that, instead of going out, and seeing all manner of environment that does not suit us, and change it to one that does, why not change ourselves to better live in the environments we find; from which you see people doing genetic manipulation so that they can become the most wondrous of new forms of "meaning processor;" ones that might live in various layers of the upper atmospheres of gas giants, for instance; able to survive the hard radiation, perhaps float as some form of lighter than air leviathan, finding an energy to mass translation chain for sustaining ourselves in whatever convenient interaction matrix is up there, at those levels to be had. And there are lots of other examples as well, even a lot more fantastic than that.

Another line of thought might go like this: Suppose you took what I like to call the idealized frontiersman's way of life. Not the usual frontiersman that came, in large part, to find new places where wild game could be hunted, and the firs (or whatever other resource) exploited, but the one suggested by Hawkeye in "Last Of The Mohicans." The frontiersman who knew how to listen to the native people; didn't want to crowd them too much, and who also wanted to not concentrate all that much; because too many people, too much society, and too many rules; as well as which too many men who could see the beauty of nature only as a means for more power. That kind of Frontiersman, and that kind of limited development, and then explore to expand some more; that might be the balanced approach to reaching into every solar system, in every galaxy we can find. You certainly could think credibly that you could do that kind of expansion for quite a while. But truly indefinitely? But then, at those time scales are we worrying about how many angles can dance on the head of a pin?

Then there is the line of thought I have already suggested, and one, I have to admit, I am the more partial to. And that is that our angle of attack itself must change so that we see not not only expanding out, or conforming to, as an option, but one where we find the way to bend our imaginations around it just far enough so that we can grasp a new handle; a handle that cannot possible exist in this plane of objectification, but could in the next layer out because that is, somehow, where we experienced it; and experienced it so deeply that it allows us to make powerful suggestions to both sides of the Mind, Elemental Embrace, meaning space dichotomy. Suggestions so powerful, and the handle so complete, in fact, in its meaning makeup, that physical meaning space just makes it happen because it doesn't, in the larger frame of reference, break any unbreakable rules. A presto digi chango, are you then expressed, as a complete identity, will, soul, memory, dichotomy balancing system, sustaining itself in the laws that must necessarily come into place, in this new layer, to make your elegant new, existing self, work. And from within which you will begin creating a whole new kind of expressive possibility.

The science fiction books, and shows, have usually referenced this sort of line of progress in terms like "ascension;" which seems a bit too limiting to me. It suggests to me too much of a necessarily religious tone to the whole thing. Not that a religious avenue couldn't be possible, mind you, just that it is not at all the only avenue. One might ascend in a lot of ways, for a lot of reasons, and create quite different, new, higher layer, objectifying realms; which might then go off on their own, emphasize working with the lower level realities, or perhaps some combination of both (with there probably being other options I haven't even begun to consider yet).

Or is a particular vector of association, or a particular meaning processor for that matter, meant to process indefinitely at all? Anything is possible when self sustaining process is suggested at almost every metaphoric level one can think of. And we live in infinite potential, And we are a fundamental intent. And everything is relative.

How long, actually, is indefinitely? And how many different types of you might there then become, in an unbelievable sequence of being reborn in one sense or another. Is it really the same life, or self sustaining process that continues on? Or just a quite different version of you... To the point of maybe only remembering the slightest details of which; as a new visual icon to mark a new sense of time.

Like I always say, time, or some new sense of process altogether, will tell.

If You Are Born Half Woman And Half Something Else

And then you are brought up in this society? Are you kidding me? Of course you need therapy!

And let's be clear about something else. Empathy is absolutely essential for a society to work properly. The really interesting thing about empathy, however, is that it really doesn't come from either side of my primary duality relationship; that is to say that neither Father Fortress, or Mother Earth have it come to them naturally. No, this is something that results only when the two sides cooperate in a balanced way.

Because empathy is both an act of imagination, as well as a disciplined way of confronting the world. The always to be exercised act of trying to see things from the other person's point of view; of trying to imagine the full scope of a reality from that point of view. putting yourself into the shoes of the other person, so you can consider, in as real a fashion as you can, what everyday life would be like if you had to make the choices the other person has been faced with, in the circumstances they have to deal with,

For some reason we have a real problem with this. Too often it seems we equate understanding, with trying to condone other people's actions. When, of course, nothing could be further from the truth.

True, if you do understand more about a person, you may be more inclined to, shall we say, not take quite as much offense by it, but that's a discipline too; trying to do the understanding thing without making too many unwarranted assumptions on either end of the spectrum.

The real problem is that choice presents both the individual, and the many with corresponding responsibilities: the individual to make their choices, and then take responsibility for them, but also for the many to do everything they can to create individuals capable of making good choices in the first place because that is a big part of the many's responsibilities. And certainly the overlap there makes for one difficult journey through life if we want the advantages of social organization.

The bottom line here, for what, in my opinion is just two variants of a common starting point, is that both be able to express themselves both rationally, and emotionally; which means they both have to be both providers, and nurturers; both establishers of structure, but also keepers of all of the pain, and joy, of being alive, and wanting to be there to help the young, or the old, understand how to better weather the turbulent flow of how life makes us deal with pain and joy; because deal with them we must.

Doing business as usual for the last several hundred years has not been especially helpful in how we go about this process, for either side of the variant divide. And now the planet is ready to just be done with us. Coincidence? I don't think so, but then I'm just a biased, crazy old dreamer.

FOR YOUR HEALTH

Every Man Should See A Therapist

2 diggs Quartz Health

Emotionally stifled men who are afraid to sit with their own feelings, let alone someone else’s, can lack the ability to empathize with others.

See also:

BOY PROBLEMS

How To Raise A Boy

15 diggs thecut.com Gender

I’m not sure what to think about what my dad tried to teach me. So what should I teach my sons?