Brule and AIRO - Buffalo Moon

Just Do It

How do you feel about the things you do? Everyday things like washing dishes, mowing the lawn, going to work. I have discovered long ago that how you feel about doing those things is irrelevant. You must just do them, and do them with mindfulness.

I learned this from "Water Bears No Scars", by David Reynolds.

This book introduced me to Morita therapy, and literally changed my view of how to relate to the tasks that I had to do. I used to "hate" doing this or avoid doing that because of how I felt about the task. Morita therapy led me beyond these feelings and into an active and full participation in the task.

It has the additional benefit of combating minor depression, by having the student focus fully, mindfully on the task at hand. It says that if you are fully aware of the task that you are involved with, you cannot be depressed.

Basically, Morita therapy aims at building character. Character is developed by behavior, by what one does. Decisions, the basis for action, become grounded in purpose rather than influenced by the flow of feelings.

While it recognizes emotions as a rich type of experience and a valuable source of information. They are just not used in determining what's needed in the moment.

By taking constructive action, grounded in objectivity by the "what is" of a situation, helps in achieving a full and meaningful life.

Visit http://www.todoinstitute.com and http://constructiveliving.org

Georgia Guidestones

This post concerns the intolerance that some (often religion leaders) have for Reason. Also, I have found that unfortunately it's often the crudest people who have the loudest voice.

The Georgia Guidestones are granite monument in Elbert County, Georgia, USA. A message comprising ten guides is inscribed on the structure in eight modern languages, and a shorter message is inscribed at the top of the structure in four ancient languages' scripts: Babylonian, Classical Greek, Sanskrit, and Egyptian hieroglyphs.

In June 1979, an unknown person(s) under the pseudonym R. C. Christian hired Elberton Granite Finishing Company to build the structure.

A message consisting of a set of ten guidelines or principles :

# Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.
# Guide reproduction wisely - improving fitness and diversity.
# Unite humanity with a living new language.
# Rule passion - faith - tradition - and all things with tempered reason.
# Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.
# Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.
# Avoid petty laws and useless officials.
# Balance personal rights with social duties.
# Prize truth - beauty - love - seeking harmony with the infinite.
# Be not a cancer on the earth - Leave room for nature - Leave room for nature.

The Guidestones have become a subject of interest for conspiracy theorists. At the unveiling of the monument, a local minister proclaimed that he believed the monument was "for sun worshipers, for cult worship and for devil worship".

In 2008, the stones were defaced with polyurethane paint and graffiti with slogans such as "Death to the new world order."

Prelude - After the Goldrush

From long ago . . . 1974. Not even Neil Young did it better (imo).

What Americans Like, but . . .

Americans like science. Overwhelming majorities say that science has had a positive effect on society and that science has made life easier for most people. Most also say that government investments in science, as well as engineering and technology, pay off in the long run.

While the public holds scientists in high regard, many scientists offer unfavorable, if not critical, assessments of the public’s knowledge and expectations. Fully 85% see the public’s lack of scientific knowledge as a major problem for science.

A substantial percentage of scientists also say that the news media have done a poor job educating the public. The scientists are particularly critical of television news coverage of science.

While scientists express frustration with the public, there are some significant points of agreement between the public and the scientific community. Majorities of both groups point to advances in medicine and life sciences as important achievements of science.

However, when it comes to contemporary scientific issues, there are often differences. For example, while 84% of scientists say the earth is getting warmer because of human activity such as burning fossil fuels, just 49% of the public agrees.

So what's to be done? Truthfully, not much because people would rather be entertained than informed.

There are gold mines of knowledge in Wikipedia, TED, Nova, Earth & Sky, National Geographic -- just to name a few.

But when it comes to having the TV remote in their hands, it's time for sports, mindless contest shows or cultist opinion programs.

(Extracted from this article, except for the closing opinions which are mine.)

His Motives

I go to the train station in my evening commute home.

Once or twice a week, there is a man there yelling from the Bible. There is a strident cadence in his voice as he reads from a much highlighted text. There are yellow, pink, blue and green markings covering each page of his large study Bible.

There is neither love nor hate in his voice. Just a seeming forceful exorcism.

I have wondered whether he is trying to remove the demons from the world or from himself. He is not wanting to lead anyone to "salvation"; nor does he preach God's higher glory.

It seems to be a wail against some past "sin" of his, and he is asking God for forgiveness. I hope he receives it.

Penguin Cafe Orchestra

I've enjoyed the PCO since the late 1980s. I take their music on my walks, and find that if each step is a beat, you get a nice workout. Much of their music is light and whimsical. Enjoy.

Belief and Knowledge

People are not naturally skeptics, wondering if a single one of their beliefs can be reasonably preserved. They are dogmatists, angrily confident of maintaining them all.

We should be skeptics with regards to our beliefs, unless we have been privately convinced they are true and worth having.

The idea is not to have the courage of our convictions; it's to have the courage to challenge our convictions.

I've often said that believing in something, anything, is easy. It requires nothing but belief. If I were to believe that it will rain tomorrow, but all weather patterns and pressure systems say that it won't, then all I have is my belief. Only when tomorrow comes, and brings no rain, will I rationalize the event and justify my belief.

Though I may be proved wrong, my belief was correct.

Of course, that's not the way to a rational and objectively lived life. Yet people cling rather than prove; deny rather than become open; believe only rather than do the mental legwork to know.

What do you believe only? Do you have the courage to challenge it, or are you angrily confident?

Windmills, Baby, Windmills

This energy thing isn’t just about global warming!

In a world that is adding one billion people every 15 years or so the demands for energy and natural resources are going to go through the roof. Therefore, energy technologies that produce clean power and energy efficiency is going to be the next great global industry, and the United States needs to be on board.

No longer can we only be interested in polluting our way to prosperity.

The U.S. is now home to only two of the ten largest solar photo-voltaic producers in the world, two of the top ten wind turbine producers and one of the top ten advanced battery manufacturers. That is, only one-sixth of the world’s top renewable energy manufacturers are based in the United States.

Sustainable technologies in solar, wind, electric vehicles, nuclear and other innovations will drive the future global economy. We can either invest in policies to build U.S. leadership in these new industries and jobs today, or we can continue with business as usual and buy windmills from Europe, batteries from Japan and solar panels from Asia.

Imagine how poor we would be today if U.S. firms did not dominate the top 10 Internet companies. Well, if we don’t dominate the top 10 Energy Technologies rankings now, there is no way we will ever come from behind. No way.

(An article by Thomas Friedman was a source.)

Buedi Siebert - The Light Dance

I discovered Buedi Siebert's music this week, and had the fortune to find this great slideshow, put together by Kim Russell. Enjoy both, and check out Buedi Siebert -- you'll be glad you did.

The Four Marks of an Educated Person

See how you fit in the educated person category:

1. He speaks and writes clearly and precisely. No matter how much information he has stored away, he's not educated until he's able to use his mother tongue with grace, precision and clarity.
2. She has a set of values and the courage to defend them. Knowledge and experience have given her the capacity to discriminate not only between right and wrong but between the trivial and the significant; between that which is cheap and that which has integrity.
3. He tries to understand his society and how it differs from others. He views these differences with compassion and respect. Whereas the uneducated man sees them as evidence of his own superiority, regarding the customs of others with condescension or contempt.
4. She looks squarely at the world and its problems, always with hope. She neither rejects nor fears the complexity and dangers of modern live, but accepts as her responsibility the task of making order out of complexity, opportunity out of danger.

Did you qualify on all four accounts?

1,000 Words

Of the 1,000 most frequently used English words (click here), regardless of education most people use only 403 words in nearly 80% of their daily conversations.

So whether you're a PhD, an office worker or a waitress, your basic spoken vocabulary is about the same.

To me this means you could speak any language with comparative ease by learning only about 400 words.

The words most used are: the, of, and, a, to, in, is, be, that, was, he.

These provide one-sixth of a person's vocabulary.

And the first 30 to 40 words on the list constitute over half a person's everyday speech.

Here again you can see how easy it would be to get along in a foreign language, if we know which words to learn and how to hang them together.