Why?

We hear it over and over from the youngest of our ranks... but I think it might be one of the most critical words ever spoken in any language...

"Your intelligence is protecting your ignorance. In science we must not think that 'things are as they are' and that an intelligent person is one who discovers this fact. In science, we must treat our knowledge of events as a form of ignorance. Then we are free to ask, 'Why is this as it is?' For example, we are told that we should never pour water on acid. If we learn this piece of information, it may allow us to appear intelligent. But we are in fact ignorant. And unless we learn 'why' we should not pour water on acid, we will invite disaster. For one day, knowing the fact but not the 'why,' then we would never have made this error. In science, then, we must always understand causes and effects and know the 'why' of things. Otherwise we are ignorant with facts." --Unknown High School Science Teacher

---Me.

Tis the Season

I normally have to sleep with a radio on (I’m a light sleeper, and if there isn’t a constant noise, then I wake up every time the building settles), and generally I have a cadre of radio stations that I switch to hoping to find the one that has the least amount of commercials that scream in the middle of the night.

But, I am noticing, it’s become the season where my choices are getting markedly limited… and not because of commercials…

Because of Christmas music.

Two of my stations are now 24/7 Christmas music stations… I’m left with the two Public radio stations and one “Normal” radio station.

It’s not even December… One of the stations was holding a contest for their listeners to “Guess” when they were going to be 24/7 Christmas music…

November 15…

The problem I have is that as I grow older, I start to get a little more bitter toward Christmas every year… the luster is wearing thin... very thin.

I’m not a Christian, so the Christ part of Christmas is really a non-issue…

Which just leaves Mas…

Mass purchasing, Masses in the malls, Masses of commercials urging me to buy everything I can and give it to my loved ones to prove to them that I love them… Mass Hysteria…

Which isn’t what Christmas is all about.

But that’s what is left…

Oh, and Christmas music… 24/7.

---Me.

Our own harshest critiques

I was thinking about a picture of my father the other day. It was at a friends' wedding, and he had just picked up a plate of food when the picture was snapped.

I will admit that it isn't the best photo ever taken of my dad (He has had professional headshots taken of him), and the candid nature of the picture adds just a dash of surprise to the photo itself.

But it still looks just like my dad.

He hates it. And when I was about to scan it in as part of "Operation Digital Family", he really wished I wouldn't include the photo as it's not the most flattering picture of him.

My mother was the same way, but markedly more militant about having her picture taken. Thus, after her death, we found surprisingly few pictures of the person whom we loved so very much.

So it is that I now ponder how we view ourselves and just how interesting it is that we have such difficulty with pictures of ourselves.

Pictures are reflections that remind us of the person we love... but so often we feel that it is a representation of the person we love, not a reflection...

I wonder, is that because we are so close to ourselves that we feel there is nothing to us but our representation? That we are nothing more than our Avatar? Sort of a twisted "Forest for the Trees" issue?

Do we really feel so shallow to ourselves that we feel we are nothing more than the picture we present?

I wonder what it will take for us to realize that the picture may be worth a thousand words, but it's the words that really matter...

---Me.

Sometimes a Strip is just a Strip

“Cargo cults believe that Western goods or cargo, first encountered through missionaries and explorers, are created by ancestral spirits. They have been known to build airstrips in the jungles in the belief that planes would land with cargo” ---CNN.com, Nov 3, 2005 in an article about New Guinea arrests for “Sorcery”.

This particular article fascinates me. Here is a group of people who believe that God sent Cargo to the jungle to help the people of these villages. I could go on for a long time about all kinds of things.

But what truly intrigues me is; what was your first impression about this “Cargo Cult”? Was it “Those people are insane”?

Would visitors from another world think the same thing of Judeo-Christianity, Buddhism or Islam? Or would they simply smile and say, “Yes, we have also believed in Allah all along”?

That would be interesting.

Now, here’s another thing to ponder: What will happen to the people who are building this “Sacred Temple to the Gods of Thunder that Bring Forth Cargo” when they realize they are simply building a Landing Strip?

What would educating them do to them? Would there be mass suicide? Could these people live knowing that their spirits are nothing more than a conglomeration of aluminum, oil and a handful of humans just like them?

Could the rest of us?

What will happen to us as a society when –If possible- we ultimately create life in a jar? When we learn (If applicable) that life is nothing more than a mechanical function of the universe we live in?


Would it indicate that the Divine creation of life was always just a Landing Strip in disguise?

Or -more alarmingly- would we then become Gods ourselves?

Or would God stop us from being able to do this?

No matter what, we’ll know the answer soon, as this moment is hovering just on the horizon…

Something to ponder...

---Me.