Thursday, December 20, 2012

Proposing an experiment

Crazy/evil/stupid/angry/etc people kill people -- but with MUCH GREATER EFFECTIVITY and EFFICIENCY when they do it with GUNS. Unless you have a pen that shoots bullets or lasers (wow I want on...oh squirrel!!), I volunteer, in the spirit of theory experimentation, to stand 10 feet in front of you have you point your mightier-than-the-sword pen at me and kill me without approaching me thus demonstrating that there's no need or sense to limit who can have access to guns and as to which type of guns they can have access to (those with Death Notes, scientists who can conjure mini black holes, and assassins who can throw pens with deadly speed and accuracy not allowed in this experiment). I think I got my crazy stupid cowardly ass covered, but if you still managed to...man that would be something to see before the world ends.

Saturday, October 13, 2012

Of cavemen present, future, and past


Musing back on Plato's allegory of the cave, my thoughts have been reflecting round this old realization that truths beyond some human society's current capacity, willingness, or ability to perceive are irrelevant and the exercise of "educating" a many of these ultimately futile.
Many a man, enlightened by discoveries of new truths -- nay, by the curtain unveiling of more dimensions of the ever existing universal facts, has been deemed a lunatic or worse branded a heretic for speaking of things most are not yet ready to hear.

Society has only ever moved forward on any issue (the earth being round, "witchcraft", abolition of slavery, women's rights, etc)  when finally more and more people are seeing/perceiving in the same context the things discovered; when the "lunatics" have achieve a critical amount of mindshare and are starting to threaten things that are currently accepted as "normal".
For society to continue progressing, it is better then that we learn not knowledge per se but the ability to perceive, understand and accept new information while distinguishing falsehoods in between.  More than anything else, what must be taught and practiced is razor sharp, uncompromising, and if necessary "blasphemous" (er, ok "Galilean-Copernican era") application of critical thinking.

Enacting anti-blasphemy laws, as being proposed to the UN, even if well intentioned discriminates the truth.  It will instead protect falsehoods, proclaimed as dogmas by those who benefit, from scrutiny and rebuke.  It, as in Plato's allegory, will put a chain on our necks and orient us to a wall of shadows that will become the only source of what which will define our perceived reality.

Sunday, September 09, 2012

The modern world and it's 27+ million slaves.

Any modern self-styled philosopher (all philosophers are self-styled) has at one time or another tackled the question about freedom. Are we really free? What is true freedom? Where does it begin and end? In the course of this exercise one may have dealt with concepts such as bondage thru desire ("We are enslaved by our wants"), or mental slavery through dogma ("Religion is like opium"), or entanglement based on our fears ("What's between you and success is fear").

 I for one have never really considered on the literal concept of slavery. In the age of social media where the world is highly interconnected, it is hard to conceptualize the idea of how in a world with so much freedom real slavery still exists. One immersed in a free and liberating environment such as the Internet can completely be oblivious to the fact that there are areas in the world where people lack basic freedom; that there in the fringes of modern society real affliction against basic human dignity is inflicted by those who cannot fight back.

As human beings we should disdain slavery; nay, we should be angry! Angry that such a situation exists. Angry that people are enslaving fellow people for the sake of profit. Slavery's eradication from our society is something each and every one of us should actively pursue. Take action!


Below is the Ted video that brought this topic to my attention:
Another video about the topic: