Tag Archives: evolution

Dithering on the Wine…..

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Ffolkes,
Circumstances have conspired against me today, and will have an effect on this Pearl, so I’m notifying y’all ahead of time to tread carefully. I’m putting this together in  hurry, and won’t have time to watch for the sharp edges that can be formulated. Normally, I will edit my material for such obstacles to comfortable reading, but I won’t have time today for that, so you are on your own…. just handle it gently & all should be okay… they usually don’t bite without provocation..

Later this morning I’m taking off to go stay at my friend’s house overnight….. I’ll be spending the most time away from my house in over a year, so it’s got me all in a dither (hence today’s title…. it’s actually connected, sort of…. in a way…. kind of….maybe….) I hardly know what to do with myself…. it’s a damn good thing I have coffee, or I’d be completely discombobulated….. which is such a great word, I don’t think I mind being it, as long as I get to use it in a sentence…. That means that when I pull myself together, I will be fully combobulated, right? Gads! I love English….

All that being said, let’s dive right in & see what I can come up with in the midst of all this rush…. Shall we Pearl?….
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“But Aristarchus of Samos brought out a book consisting of certain hypotheses, in which the premises lead to the conclusion that the universe is many times greater than that now so called.  His hypotheses are that the fixed stars and the sun remain motionless, that the earth revolves about the sun in the circumference of a circle, the sun lying in the middle of the orbit, and that the sphere of the fixed stars, situated about the same center as the sun, is so great that the circle in which he supposes the earth to revolve bears such a proportion to the distance of the fixed stars as the center of the sphere bears to its surface.” — Archimedes, The Sand-Reckoner, Third Century B.C.

I love reading about the early days of scientific inquiry. One of the most telling points, though, lies in examination of this kind of discovery. It is clear that Aristarchus was proposing a new thought for the time, one that Archimedes relates as being opposite to the currently held beliefs….. This idea, though radical, had the advantage of being true, but even with that, it did not become commonly known until the same theory was proposed, and proved, by Copernicus, many centuries later. (Even with its proof provided, it was challenged by those famously tolerant, self-appointed guardians of public morality, Catholic Church officials, the Pope’s myrmidons, who were gleefully busy killing knowledge, and lots of people, with the The Grand Inquisition just about then….)

My point here is one that I could belabor, but let’s cut to the chase…. the people who run the churches in the world, along with their co-conspirators, the beloved ruling class, make it a habit to try to stifle any new scientific knowledge that is published anywhere in the world, if it appears to be contradictory to what they would have you believe. Back at the time of Archimedes, just after the beginning of the first millennium of modern history, this kind of knowledge was slow to spread, with the spread being further slowed by the priests as much as they could.

Today, we are witnessing much the same, but now the controversy is over the theory of evolution, and global warming. Both of these concepts are under attack by the powers that run the churches, and by the government. Neither of these two entities can afford for these ideas to become common accepted knowledge, for they bear serious implications about the presence or absence of a diving being in the universe, a subject upon which they will brook no argument.

Accepting either one of these theories will mean accepting both, for they are intricately connected, and the churches cannot allow that. They cannot have people actually believing that they are responsible for their own actions, that we are NOT the crown of creation, and that human nature absolutely MUST change in order to keep these fools from killing all of us, an event that is made certain, if we don’t heed the call……

gigoid has spoken….
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I died for beauty but was scarce
Adjusted in the tomb,
When one who died for truth was lain
In an adjoining room.

He questioned softly why I failed?
“For beauty,” I replied.
“And I for truth,–the two are one;
We brethren are,” he said.

And so, as kinsmen met a night,
We talked between the rooms,
Until the moss had reached our lips,
And covered up our names.

Emily Dickinson

Not bad for a quick-find…. it even kind of fits in with today’s ambiance, I think…. Onward!…..
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“I used to sit on the banks with a raft and watch the water roll lazily by. One day I pushed my raft into the shallows of the water and found the water moved swifter than I thought, but my raft was actually a little rowboat. Then, after some time, I rowed my little boat into deeper water. There were great storms, mighty winds, tremendous waves, and sometimes I felt so alone. But I have noticed my little rowboat is now a mighty ship manned by my friends and loved ones, and beautiful calm seas, warm sunny days, and nights filled with comfortable dreams always double after a storm. Now, I could never go back and sit on the bank, in fact, I search for deeper water. Such is life when lived.” — B D Gulledge

I’m not going to go into any long discussion here, as I believe this has adequately described how I feel about life. It goes along with another thought, to wit: ” You can live life like a turtle, pulling back and hiding whenever threatened, and always going slowly to avoid risks. Or, you can live like a tiger, and head out into the day to see what it will bring for us to discover, meeting the challenges with courage and skill” (from “Rite of Passage” by Alexi & Corey Panshin).

To me, this point is so clear, that I can leave this right here, and know that you have understood what I am saying….. So, how will you live Life?…. Sitting on the banks, or wandering the wide oceans? Will you live as a turtle, or as a tiger?….. The answer only matters to yourself, but it MUST be answered, so consider well your choices….. Shallow and safe, or deep and glorious?   It’s your choice, but you MUST choose….
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All things considered, this isn’t bad. Thrown together in half the usual time, too!  Hmm….. makes me wonder a bit if I need to trim down the daily process, so it runs faster like this all the time…. Nah! I like to procrastinate, it comes naturally to me, and since there is no actual deadline, we’ll stay with the random, time-tested methods from now on…. In the meantime, y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you…..

—
Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Dozer

Kowabunga!

A fight for four pies….

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Ffolkes,
Blood poured down my face from the gash above the eye, annoying but not yet blinding. I slapped a surgiskin patch on it to keep it clean, and keep the blood out of my visor, and wondered how I would live down giving myself the only injury in a live engagement…. I spied a helmet peeking over the fence across the courtyard of the abandoned building, and squeezed off a couple of quick rounds in the general area to let them know I wasn’t asleep.

Now I’m really mad; listening to the DI dress me down for banging my own head on the lander door wasn’t what I had anticipated for my return to quarters after the exercise. I had hoped to catch some extra Z’s, as I’d been boning for the psych strategy test tomorrow, but my clumsiness had ensured a visit to a smarmy, sarcastic medic, followed by the opportunity to hear the dulcet tones of Sergeant O’Brien in full chewing mode……

Enough…. I’m tired of O’Brien, and he hasn’t opened his mouth yet…. Goes to show I shouldn’t let myself write before going to bed…. it always comes out strange when I look at it in the morning…. Either that, or I need to finish one of these little stories when I write it. Oh, I hate when I get all logical on myself….. I’ve had fun before. This isn’t it.

This is getting me nowhere, so I’m going to just get on with this morning’s dive…. Pearling sounds safer than anything else I can think of right now, so…. off we go, then…..
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“Evolution is as much a fact as the earth turning on its axis and going around the sun.  At one time this was called the Copernican theory; but, when evidence for a theory becomes so overwhelming that no informed person can doubt it, it is customary for scientists to call it a fact.  That all present life descended from earlier forms, over vast stretches of geologic time, is as firmly established as Copernican cosmology.  Biologists differ only with respect to theories about how the process operates.” — Martin Gardner, “Irving Kristol and the Facts of Life”, — The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 128-131

Although this is a very clear, concise statement of facts, it fails to account for one piece of evidence that, while seemingly contradictory, actually is proof of its overall relevance. This is the mathematical certainty that the average intelligence of the species is declining over time; I’ve presented this proof previously, and so will not go over it in its entirety now. But, like with the evidence of the Copernican theory, it has been firmly established, so we must, as a species, find some way to overcome our own intransigence.

Our own competence at killing other life forms has propelled our species to the top of the food chain, at least by all appearances. In doing so, we have removed many of the challenges to our survival that had been a check on how fast we increased our numbers. The removal of these limiting factors has allowed us to breed without restraint, which is why we have negated the normal laws, and applied the special laws of peripheral relevance that are dumbing us down.

We breed so fast that reality can’t kill us fast enough for us to get smarter; the number of lower intelligence members of the species has grown to the point where the number of births far outstrips the number of deaths, and the process continues to spiral down, down, down, toward the bottom of the gene pool….

So, if it seems to you that things are getting crazier, and that more stupid stuff keeps happening all the time, don’t panic…. you are right. It IS much crazier than before, and stupid stuff will continue to happen, right up until our species’ name gets called to board the train for extinction… the same train we have sent thousands of other species on to their demise…. SIGH…..

“No matter how cynical you get, it’s impossible to keep up.” — Lily Tomlin
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Against the assault of laughter nothing can stand. — Mark Twain

One of Mark Twain’s most attractive features as a writer was his grasp of common sense. Here is an idea that all of us know instinctively is true; all of us have observed, at one time or another in our lives, just how powerful laughter can be when used against evil.

This is knowledge so ubiquitous that it has been overlooked in today’s political world, and is not used nearly enough to suit me. I think we should, instead of criticizing and degrading folks like Mitt, and Newt, and others of their political ilk, we should just greet everything they say with a burst of sheer delighted laughter, and just point a finger while howling and holding our stomach. I think it would do wonders….

Imagine, if you would, a large room full of average American folks, in their everyday dress, sitting quietly in their chairs,waiting for their hero to come smile and talk to them, just as if they mattered. Instead of hecklers, placed throughout the crowd at strategic points, are people with a well-developed sense of humor, who will proceed to laugh uproariously whenever the candidate makes some outrageous statement, which usually doesn’t take long….

I think, with good timing and the right lines, we could eliminate quite a few of these bozos, embarrassing them so heavily they’ll never show their face in public again…. Well, we can hope, can’t we?  And if nothing else, laughter is good for the soul, so they say…. Let’s see if it can’t be useful in creating a new political landscape, shall we? Personally, I look forward to applying this technique in the coming months leading up to November…..
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Inner State

Bereft, mind empty
none remains real or true
The page is alone.

gigoid

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The text above is from “Dune” by Frank Herbert; the image was found on Facebook. If you try repeating this to yourself when afraid, you will find that it is quite effective, not in reducing fear, but in getting past the fear. I speak from experience in this, having first read this when I was in my teens, and then used it innumerable times in my work with the mentally ill…. Most simply put, it works….
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If you are not the poet, perhaps you can be the poem. — Smart Bee

It has happened…. I couldn’t find a suitable pearl, in just under two hours of searching. I was thorough, I think. I visited two different websites, and checked out a number of categories at each, all to no avail. I’ve developed a callous on my index finger from hitting the “next” button on my database of quotes, and keep seeing the ones I’ve used in the last few days. Naturally, since I used Shakespeare as a subject just yesterday, a good 40% of what I was forced to go through was more crap from his quill…. Murphy at work….

So, we have an unprecedented event today… I’m giving up until tomorrow…. What I have already done will have to do….. Disgusted I am, but resigned as well….
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So be it. I’m not going to consider this a loss; I’m going to think of it as an evolution. That way it will be a challenge, and I can approach it just like any other logical problem. Of course, that’s no guarantee of success, but will serve for the nonce to get on with the day. Considering how the first four hours have gone, it promises to be interesting, in all the senses of the word…. Y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you…..

—
Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!