Random Thoughts

Cold Fog Fire.

2011-09-07T23:19:00.001-05:00

I am fascinated. I spent much of the evening watching colorful dancing flames of fog on the surface of a mirror.
While soaking in a hot tub of water, I happened to put my foot up near a mirror on the wall. The air was cool and dry and just a little drafty.

Warm moist air rising from my foot caused a little patch of fog on the mirror. But that warm moist air was mixing with the cool dry air that was moving about the room. The result is fog forming and evaporating so fast that it danced like flames, or aurora borealis.

I could even blow at it and fan the flames. By changing whether I blow over warm wet legs or from the dry side, it either makes the flames bigger or smaller.

By lining up my foot just right so it blocked direct light from the lamp, I could see colors in the flames. The fog on the mirror was so thin that it caused a diffraction effect that was always changing colors.

Life is everywhere. I feel privileged to have been given a way to visualize yet another of the countless invisible dances going on all around us all the time.

Analogy for government debt.

2010-12-13T23:05:00.002-06:00

I often contemplate the concept of government debt and how absurd it seems to be; yet every level of government seems to borrow money for its projects. Now the federal government is in such debt that failure is inevitable.

I hear the arguments that it is no problem, we owe that money to ourselves. Then i contemplate that we still have all the roads and schools and factories and stores that we had yesterday. They don't evaporate over night. What's wrong with book keeping that says we owe money to ourselves for all that stuff?

It is about false promises. Some day we will have to face the disappointment of not getting what was promised to us.
Here is an analogy to help understand it...
Let's follow a young couple who buys a piece of land to start a farm. They start with virtually nothing and work hard to create shelter and food. Eventually they build barns and houses, productive fields and workshops. They have lots of kids, hire lots of workers. They all grow into multiple generations on this productive farm.

For big jobs like barn raising, everybody chips in. People are told that if they help raise the barn, they will be well cared for (medicare) when they are old. To keep them working on the next project, they are told that they will get a certain amount of free food (social security income) when they are old. Those promises are so easy to make that they over extend themselves. When the time comes to make good on that promise, they find that the farm is just not productive enough to take care of all those non producers. People become extremely disappointed when the promises that they have relied on are not kept.

The farm wants to build another expensive project. It needs everyone to put time into it. You have been putting your spare time into creating a buggy. The farm says that if you put that time into their project now, some day they will give you even more help building that buggy. (That is the same as saving to buy a car. They borrow your savings and pay interest.) Well, that was so easy that they make the same kind of promise to many people. Pretty soon the farm simply doesn't have enough manpower to help everyone. A whole bunch of people thought that they had stored wealth; the promise of help getting that buggy built. They are very disappointed to find out that the promise can't be kept.

As the farm starts to realize they can't keep their commitments, they start to play all kinds of games to hide the problem and keep people's confidence. Those games eventually only make the problem worse. When people begin to realize that everybody else is beginning to realize the scam, they all scramble to get their promises fulfilled first. The whole situation gets very noisy.

Our federal government is very close to that stage. We who think that money in the bank is safe, or that the government will be able to do anything useful for us may be headed for huge disappointment.

2010-10-24T23:23:00.003-05:00

In the future, Columbus will be celebrated less and Darwin will be celebrated more.

Civilization will be getting smarter due to being better connected. That means we will see some things more clearly.

Looking to the past, we will see that Columbus is not a good role model.

Looking farther into the past, we will see that all the universe, from the tiniest sub atomic forces to vast clusters of galaxies, is a result of ongoing evolution. Darwinism isn't just for biology anymore.

The physics of Attitude

2010-10-18T00:05:00.005-05:00

The answer to whether the cup is half empty of half full depends on momentum. Do you see the cup is filling or emptying? Momentum is basic. Momentum is everywhere.

You could consider momentum as the 5th, 6th and 7th dimensions. No definition of a particle's location in physical space is complete without defining the time, spatial co-ordinates in 3 dimensions, and speed in each of the 3 dimensions. In many ways, where it is going, and how fast, is just as important as where it is.

In a person's mental and social space there are many more dimensions, but the concept still works. In each of those dimensions, where you are going is just as important as where you are.
Your direction is your attitude.
How well you apply your attitude is your speed.
How much of you is moving at that speed is your momentum.

Attention metaphore

2010-09-24T23:16:00.004-05:00

Lately we have been weighing the pros and cons of our campus being the center of a television show. The extra attention it would bring to our company and its mission would be both good and bad.

I have often said that attention is the currency of life. The root of the word currency is current; a flow.

This morning I realized that attention is very much like a current. It flows. It brings vital nutrients and carries away waste. It can power and motivate things. Just like fire or any other useful tool, its power for good is balanced by its power for destruction. Small currents and large ones can both be useful, but as the current gets larger, it becomes more dangerous.

So, if we were to suddenly find ourselves in the midst of a flood of attention, we would have to be prepared to handle the extra flow. Have deeper ditches and higher bridges; more solid foundations, larger pipes, bigger rocks, etc.

If we are well prepared, we can use that current to generate useful power. Any current beyond what we can safely handle should have a safe overflow path.

Playing the scales: Regenerating Reliability

2010-08-28T16:26:00.004-05:00

The rules change when you change scale. Little kids can do things that adults can't. Ants can do amazing things that humans can't. A little go cart can turn on a dime. A battleship is famous for being very slow to turn.

As our little business grew and eventually became a big business, we constantly had to learn new rules. Just about every time we started to get a handle on how to operate, we found that our existing techniques didn't work well anymore because we were bigger.

I became fascinated with just what things change when you change scale and what things stay the same. It helped develop a huge appreciation for how nature evolved critters of different sizes, and why they ended up with the body styles they have.

When we delve even deeper, past physiology and down into the underlying physics, a recurring pattern starts to show. It seems to me that at the lowest level of existence I can currently fathom, life starts out digital. It exists in a very noisy environment so it's first priority is to repair itself and make reliable copies of itself. As its population grows, the sum of many life units creates flows and capacities that function in analog form. Eventually some of the analog functions become stable and robust and complicated enough that they find ways to repair and copy themselves. Their organization has become digital.

The new level of digital units become very stable and successful and therefore proliferate. The huge quantity of them once again creates analog functions at a new scale. They also become building blocks that combine in ever more complicated ways. Eventually some of those functions learn to repair themselves and make copies, becoming digital, robust and prolific.

In this context, the term "digital" means a limited number of stable states.
Protons, electrons, neutrons seem to be digital. Next scale up is atoms. Perhaps the next scale up is biological cells. Then stable groups of cells that function as one unit (like animals or plants).

Persona masks and the big social brain

2010-08-08T22:17:00.004-05:00

Yesterday, Ian was showing me a toy robot that had a mask for a face. He made a statement similar to "The mask IS the brain". That rang a bell deep inside me that is still resonating. It connected some dots that helps form a picture of the human condition.

We are all wearing masks. We selectively show only small parts of our selves to others. We wear different masks in different situations, and when dealing with different people.

We are all neurons in the big social brain. In a brain, each neuron connects to many others via synapses. The intelligence in the brain is in the weights that are assigned to each synapse. Each mask we wear when dealing with other people is a collection of weighted synapses. Just like a neuron, we each have thousands of those synapses. We have been growing the big social brain ever since we first learned to communicate selectively.

What makes humans so different from other critters is the extent that we communicate. That is what drives innovation; so much so that communication (our social interaction) has become the dominant force in our evolution. It has shaped our brains and parts of our body (such as our larynx). It has become less important how fit the individual is, and more important how fit the big social brain is.

Recently the social brain has had explosive growth in connectivity. Internet, cell phones and automated communications (like Google crawlers) are making the big brain millions of times more intelligent than ever before in history. This has to have incredible outcomes that are hard for us little neurons to fathom.

Hang in there. The next few decades are likely to be the most exciting in history.

Male sexual cycles

2010-07-25T19:45:00.004-05:00

There is little info published about male sexual cycles. They seem irregular and confusing. This entry is an attempt to sort some of them out.

Online research tells me that men have a cycle of high and low testosterone that runs about 30 days. Beards grow faster during certain parts of the cycle.
It is overlaid with another weaker testosterone cycle that runs about a week.
Testosterone level is also raised by sexual activity, winning competition, exposure to new women, food and other things.

Then there is the ejaculation cycle. Sexual energy, tension and fluids are all discharged at ejaculation. Then they build up again, rising like a sawtooth waveform that suddenly drops again at the next ejaculation. Normal frequencies for that cycle run about once per day during teens and twenties. As you age, the frequency gradually drops to 1 per week or two in your 50s.

Overlay all these cycles, add the events that modify the cycles, and you have a nearly unpredictable waveform. However, it is useful for a thoughtful guy to understand these patterns within himself.

A better economic system

2010-01-09T01:27:00.006-06:00

I used to think that real estate taxes were the most unfair in the world. Eventually I realized that they are actually very fair. We individuals must pay the public an annual fee for the use of a piece of property. If there were no such taxes, rich people would end up owning all land and most of us would be serfs.

I just read a chapter in "The Tau of Abundance" about money and interest. It twisted my head. It is forcing me to try to see with fresh eyes from outside of a culture and financial system that all of us are immersed in.

It lead me to contemplate the concept that real tangible property rights shouldn't be treated any different from intellectual property rights. Ownership of money and goods should eventually time out and revert to the public.

Because it doesn't, in the US CEOs get 400 times the average workers pay. The richest 1% own 34.6% of all private wealth. The wealth gap keeps getting bigger because we allow people to keep assets forever. Then, like feudal lords, they charge us (their serfs) huge percentages of our income for the privilege of using that property.
(The average household pays about 18% of disposable income just to service debt.)

A MORE FAIR SYSTEM...
We could tax people based on assets that they own. For example...
If your net worth is 100% of the median net worth, you would pay 1% of your net worth as tax.
If your net worth is 200% of median, you pay 2% tax.
If your net worth is 5,000% of median, you pay 50% of it as tax.

The dynamics of this tax method are fascinating...
This lets you be substantially better off than average, but not by ridiculous factors.
It also decays wealth at a fair and reasonable rate, keeping an incentive to work hard while preventing undue concentrations of wealth.
It lets you pass a reasonable amount of wealth to your kids, but prevents situations like Paris Hilton.
To get large capital, a company would have to be owned by large numbers of stockholders, or be a co-op or non profit.
Later maybe we will explore how this would reduce debt and lead to lower total taxes.

Empowering dream

2010-01-04T19:17:00.003-06:00

Running around naked
war decision
flying, playing with kids

We were working on a river; a common theme lately. So common that I can't sort out the river details of this dream from other river dreams.
The setting is a kind homestead/campus/resort. Lots of people there, very much a sense of family and small community.

The work evolved into a council. We were preparing for some kind of war. It was coming. It was inevitable. At some point in the meeting, we decided "Wait a minute! We are in charge here. We can just say NO to war." It felt good.

Next scene we were doing homestead and resort type things around the campus; playing and working. I was so used to being naked that I was running around doing my regular meetings and work and playing without even realizing that I was still naked. Pretty much nobody cared. It was freeing to be honestly me. Eventually an in-law was stressed out by my nakedness and I started to feel naked.

Next scene I was playing with kids. Trying to surprise or impress them by flying around; jumping to their treehouse or attic fort. This was a little different from my normal flying dreams. Instead of being infatuated with the fact that I can fly, it is just matter of fact. I have accepted it and I am not afraid to show it as I play with the kids. They weren't terribly impressed either. They just accepted it.

The common theme seems to be acceptance of who I am, and the powers that go with that.

Another building Dream

2009-12-25T00:51:00.003-06:00

The phone woke me up in the middle of a dream, so it was easy to remember. In character, this was a somewhat unremarkable dream because it was processing concerns that have been on my mind lately. The interesting part was the setting.

It was a rather large building overlooking a valley. Hunt Technologies occupied the ground floor. We were no longer involved with Hunt Tech, but they were the amiable neighbors below us. Our current business was having a meeting of about 20 salesmen and managers on the main floor. I was concerned that the sales people didn't fully understand some basic principle of their job.

Wrapped around our business space was a school that was operating successfully. We apparently had been instrumental in founding it. I was currently mad at Lynn for donating another $120,000 to it without even consulting me.

The building is quite the metaphor for our current life. Hunt Tech is both beneath us and supporting us; sort of a foundation. The view over the valley is reminiscent of where I grew up and of Hunt Tech's location. Our current business is just beginning to get sales oriented. A school is wrapped around our current business, not the center of it, but much of the outer face of it.

Dream about house.

2009-11-30T20:56:00.003-06:00

When you dream about exploring a house, it usually means that you are exploring yourself.

Last night I found myself in the basement family room of a big old house that was reminiscent of my parent's house in Fargo. Walking out the door of the family room you enter a little ante room made of old bricks. To your left is the door to Dad's shop. I had gone that path countless times before, but as I glanced left into the shop, for the first time I noticed there was a door straight ahead too.

The path through the doorway straight ahead goes down a short hallway, then expands into a large underground urban area of residential and artisan shops. Further down it gets wider and more commercial, with handy stores for anything I might need. I am thrilled to discover that my house is closely and conveniently connected to this whole community.

Dreaming in blue

2009-10-24T20:05:00.002-05:00

This morning while I was still dreaming, I began to realize that my dreams were basically in black and white with certain features highlighted in blue. At some point I started to realize that this was weird and wondered what was going on.

Then I thought; maybe this a communication technique. Maybe something inside me was trying to get a message to my consciousness. As soon as that thought became conscious, there was a rapid fire series of pictures with blue highlights; too many to absorb. Kind of like someone excited at finally getting your attention and then talking so fast that you can't follow them.

Some of the pictures looked like DNA sequences, highlighting interesting segments. I waited too long before writing this down so many of the other pictures have faded. I hope there are more such communication opportunities.

New board member?

2009-10-24T19:38:00.004-05:00

Yesterday I was lying face down on the massage table. Karlene was almost done; doing the final touches on my shoulders. Suddenly I was clearly viewing the scene from above the table. Next to Karlene, to my right was the spirit of an old black indigenous woman with long white kinky hair.

Seeing her as I did from above and behind her left shoulder, her hair was most prominent, and I could only see her face as an outline; a caricature of an old crone with a rather bulbous nose.
At a glance she looked like a shaman or a witch, very old and wise. She was mostly spirit. Whatever body may have been under the long kinky white hair was nondescript.

Suddenly she jumped inside of me.

That move was unexpected, but welcome. I feel that her skills are needed as the next phase of life unfolds.

Well said

2009-10-05T23:43:00.000-05:00

The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth.
Niels Bohr

Good clean fun

2009-09-07T21:55:00.002-05:00

Nahni and Oscar after a nice Labor day picnic and swim

2009-09-07T21:53:00.000-05:00

2009-09-07T21:52:00.003-05:00

Nahni and clay showing that basic toys are the most fun.

Hugs and tears all around

2009-08-23T11:23:00.001-05:00

Kate drew her last breath at 10:57 this morning.
No one has ever had more loving people to spend their last hours with.

Sent from my iPhone

More songs

2009-08-22T18:58:00.001-05:00

There was laughter, but the tissue box was passed around a few times
too.

2009-08-22T18:54:00.001-05:00

You would need a wde angle lens to see half the people in the room.

Family crowd

2009-08-22T18:52:00.001-05:00

Everyone gathered in kates bedroom while Joe serenades with his guitar.

Are microbes God?

2009-08-20T07:27:00.002-05:00

Classical characteristics attributed to God
Omnipresent; God is everywhere
If we define space as it relates to life as the biosphere, certainly everywhere there is life there are microbes.

Omniscient; God knows everything
Within the biosphere, microbes are the first to know just about anything. Certainly they know when a sparrow dies.

Timeless; Always was, always will be.
The extent of time as it relates to the biosphere started with microbes and will end with microbes long after "higher" life forms are gone.

Lives within you
90% of the cells in your body are not yours, they are microbes.
In some ways our bodies are vehicles designed to serve microbes. We are their cities.

So, have a little respect for the bacteria and fungi and viruses.
"What you do for the least of us, you do for me."

Birthday present

2009-08-14T17:55:00.001-05:00

Last night as Lynn and bigdog went for a swim, they suprised a skunk.
Now it is bath time at the beach.

First emailed blog entry

2009-07-25T23:50:00.001-05:00

Who is this guy?

Patterns: A day in the life of... Life

2009-07-18T05:22:00.007-05:00

The molecular citizens of the primordial soup learned how to get along. They discovered it took less effort, they could be more comfortable, when they arranged themselves into certain patterns. They were even more comfortable if they made copies of themselves, creating a new level of social interaction, and thus more control over their environment. As they discovered these new concepts, they probably weren't aware that they were following an ancient pattern. These concepts had been discovered, and followed, many times before at levels smaller than they were concerned with; the levels that created them.

Eventually, some groups of citizens figured out that they could control their environment better if they put a wall around themselves. Walling off some private space, defending turf, turned out to be a potent concept. It allowed the groups inside to work closer as teams, with little interference from the natural chaos outside. Those teams got efficient. They became ever more sophisticated. The walled in areas became busy cities; each busily engaged running their internal machinery to help them survive better.

Surviving better means conquering space; wrestling it from the chaos and taming it so it can make you more comfortable. The space these cities operated in was a primordial soup of organic chemicals. To conquer it more completely took more size and sophistication than any one city could muster. Soon the cities got together in teams. As they organized, each city became a cell in a much larger machine.

It was efficient. These multi-cell machines developed into tools that could capture nutrients and process them to feed the many cities inside. It turns out that a really rich form of nutrients can be had by raiding other cities; so the machines developed offensive tools to chew up other cities for food. Then of course they had to develop better defense; not only from the chaos, but from the many other competing organizations. A new kind of space was born; competition from other multi-cellular organisms.

Even in our language, we often refer to head space, or cyber space, or the space that a certain business is competing in. It turns out that every time a new idea or type of organization proliferates, it creates new space. Then there is both co-operation and intense competition for control within that space.

More than you think

2009-07-01T05:30:00.002-05:00

Paul Hunt is wondering if we (our physical bodies) are merely the fruiting bodies of a vast network of cosmic connections... sort of like mushrooms are merely the fruiting bodies of a vast network of fungal connections.

Time to write

2009-06-29T20:53:00.002-05:00

I used to have time to write.
I not only wrote on this blog, but I wrote on the HUG blogs and took hours for each entry to choose and edit photos.
What changed?
What am I doing with that time now?

New blogs

2009-05-26T22:27:00.003-05:00

Ryan has a new blog where he sends photos straight from his G-phone. It is kinda fun.

He is using the same phone to post notes and photos about shop projects on the HUG shop blog.

Cat is alive and well; going to college while raising kids and sometimes blogging.

Travel log 4

2009-03-03T13:23:00.006-06:00

We picked up a car in Austin and drove North.
(A Hyundai Sonata. The XM radio is really nice on super long trips.)
The urban driving and an hour of freeway was about all I wanted of crowded, fast and sterile. We turned right at Waco and headed into the great tangle of small rural highways.
Ahhh! Much nicer!
Much better feel for the countryside and the people.

Around dark, we started calling local bed and breakfast listings. The first one explained that her husband did the gourmet cooking and was out of town, so the breakfast wouldn't be its normal splendor. Then she explained that the best room was the loft and she would have to go vacuum out the infestation of lady bugs that congregate there daily. That sounded interesting, so we stayed there.

Saturday was quite a day. We had breakfast in Athens and Lunch in Paris. (Paris is where Lynn's biological father was born, so we toured the local museum to get a feel for the times and place where he was raised.)
In the afternoon we drove through mountains and national parks in Oklahoma, ending up in Forth Smith Arkansas.
The same winter storm that just went through Minnesota extended all the way to South Texas. It was cold and icy all around us. We had to put on our coats, but I keep wearing my sandals without socks. (Hey, It helps prove we are from Minnesota.)

Sunday we took more back road hill country. Nightfall found us in Branson Missouri.
Branson is like the clean midwest version of Las Vegas. It has countless theaters and shows and other tourist attractions. The first thing I noticed is that little country roads suddenly turn into big freeways as they get close to Branson.
Branson's population (in the 2000 census) is about 6,000 people, but it has about 40,000 hotel rooms.
The first thing we found out is that most of them are empty. We are a bit early in the season, so we kind of have the whole place to ourselves. Pools and hot tubs and exercise rooms are all ours. The butterfly palace was all ours. (That was very nice.) Hotels are cheap and restaurants are happy to serve us.
It took us a while, but we finally found a really pleasant hotel, Hotel grand Victorian. It is sooo much nicer than the others. I really wish we had found it a couple days sooner.

They serve afternoon tea here.
Then on to more exercise, sleep and shows, for tomorrow we travel north.

Travel log 3

2009-02-26T22:15:00.007-06:00

I told Ruth and Nathan that they run a very fine bed and breakfast, and I will tell all my friends.

I had a nasty clogged sinus the first few days here, but that seems to have melted away with lots of sleep and some regular application of hot sun.

Today we had lunch at a gorgeous restaurant that sits on a cliff 450 feet above lake Travis. Deceptively big. Good food. Great view. Looking down on the multi-million dollar mansions in the hills reminded us of a view you might see in Italy.

We finally have a thin framework of a vacation plan. Rather than fly home, tomorrow we rent a car and drive home. We have a whole week to drive 1,174 miles. Google maps tells me that 17.5 hours of driving will be about getting to Minneapolis. The rest of the 168 hours will be goofing off and finding little personal places of interest, such as bed and breakfast, theater; who knows? We have our GPS and iPhone to help us ferret out the interesting stuff.

I am personally excited about the sensory deprivation tank and massage that we will be trying out in Minneapolis next Friday. Ninety minutes of sensory deprivation might be an interesting trip all by itself.

Travel log 2

2009-02-24T08:32:00.003-06:00

I am serenaded by countless different kinds of birds as I wake up this morning. I had forgotten how pervasive birdsong can be when you are in a place where the temperature makes it possible to have an open window.

We are at Ruth and Nathan's house in rural Austin; catching up on some sleep and sunshine. As I write this, a dozen mini deer are grazing within a stone's throw in the back yard.

Travel log 1.5

2009-02-24T08:15:00.001-06:00

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is now a play, billed as the most fantastic staging since The Lion King. Ruth and Nathan were so impressed that they bought us tickets. A few hours after being in Minneapolis we find ourselves in a fantastic theater in San Antonio. Inside, it looks like an outdoor theater. The ceiling is a big dome that looks like the night sky; at least 10 stories high and complete with stars and moving clouds.

The play had very good acting and music, but the staging was fantastic. Any number of times I laughed and even got tears in my eyes because of the novelty and clever magic in the staging.

Monday we saw some of the old missions (now owned by the national parks service.) It is fascinating to see how and why they lived there, and how they built the 3 foot thick walls. Lynn was so impressed by the 23 minute movie about the people that she bought a copy.

Now we are in the Austin area. The temperature will hit 80 today and it feels good to walk in the sun. We still haven't had to rent a car. That will come later.

Travel Log 1

2009-02-24T08:00:00.000-06:00

We couldn't force ourselves to make plans. This trip had to unfold as the spirits guide it.

Saturday we leisurely visited various family members in the Brainerd lakes area; then we stopped in at the Brainerd airport and asked the price of a one way ticket to Texas. The good folks at Northwest-Delta said that last minute tickets always cost a lot. They then quoted us a totally outrageous price. We decided to drive.

We had gone less than a mile when we decided to stop at the cel phone store. Lynn traded in her ancient Nokia for an iPhone. This gave me a toy to play with while she drove. Soon it had taught us that plenty of airlines love to sell tickets at the last minue for a iny fraction of the price of Northwest-Delta.

We stayed at Embassy Suites (at a very good price) and set our alarm clock for 4:00 am to catch a Sun country flight. Even as we were going to bed, we couldn't bring ouselves to make a reservation. Things went smooth as silk. Got tickets cheap and upgraded them to first class for a reasonable price.

In Dallas we decided to hop a flight to San Antonio. That was twice the price of the flight from Minneapolis to Dallas, but everything went smooth as silk. We caught the very next flight (on standby) and made it to San Antonio before 11:00 am.

Lynn's parents picked us up and we had a great time.

Big TARP

2009-01-28T18:19:00.002-06:00

The Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) is 700 billion dollars that our government is using to cover up our economic ills.
It got me wondering; how much could we cover up with $700 billion worth of tarps?

A decent 6.5 ounce heavy duty tarp runs about 12 cents per square foot.
$700 billion will buy 5333 billion square feet of such tarps. (Maybe more. You might qualify for a quantity discount.)

Even without a discount, that is 351,997,245 acres of tarps; one acre for every person in the nation.

With an average of 4 people per household, every household in the nation could give up their troubled mortgage and use their tarp to build a really cool tent about the size of a city block.

Sounds good to me.

A possible alternate reality

2008-12-29T18:47:00.008-06:00

The news today was talking about rebalancing our budget to have less military and more diplomatic efforts. That raised the question...
How many diplomats can we buy for half of the military budget?

Google to the rescue...
Half the US military budget is more than 250 billion dollars.
We want our new diplomats to be effective, so we will give each one a $5 million dollar annual budget. That works out to 50,000 new diplomats and their teams.
There are 195 countries in the world.
That is 256 new diplomat offices in each country in the world.

That is a lot of well connected persuasive people spending 1.28 billion dollars in each country.
If they are active, dedicated and hard working, I bet they could have a heck of an effect on our relationship with each country.

Our half sized military would still be the largest in the world by a huge margin, but it wouldn't have much to do.

Anchor

2008-12-26T10:12:00.000-06:00

Without the anchor that holds the string, the kite can't fly.

Culture is such an anchor.
Technology is another.
They are some of the things we love to hate because they are so coercive and demanding. They are also the wind beneath our wings; foundations upon which we build better, smarter, more interesting lives.

My awesome power

2008-11-30T18:47:00.002-06:00

There is an old spanish proverb that says
Habits are first cobwebs, then cables.

As they get stronger, habits can certainly trap you and be very hard to break. But habits are also who you are. They are your personality and your skills.
Another analogy would be...
Habits are first pathways in the woods, then superhighways.

Our neural system, the holder of our habits, is plastic. It is always being reshaped by what we do. It is fun for me to realize that, by having the patience and persistence to form new habits, I can constantly reshape who I am.
What an awesome power!

Time; friend or foe?

2008-11-02T14:23:00.006-06:00

We have a love/hate relationship with time. Each life is given such a tiny piece if time that we hardly get a chance to learn how to make friends with it.

Time is the most powerful thing in the universe.
It can work for you and/or it can work against you.
Its most powerful attribute?: Time is relentless; it just keeps on happening.

Our lives are so short that we keep chopping time into little pieces so we can get a lot done. We tend to under appreciate the other way of getting a lot done... As long as time keeps happening, set it up to work for you more than against you.

I'm trying to learn how to prioritize things in my life to help make time more friend than enemy.
A lot of it starts to sound like good old fashioned advice that we love to ignore...
Never pay interest
Have others paying interest to you
Don't be impatient about buying stuff
Reduce situations where things are decaying, rotting, or any other situation where things constantly get worse.
(A stitch in time saves nine)
Create more situations where things are drying, curing, ripening, soaking, or whatever makes things better.
Build my capital by setting things up so that time creates food, energy, comfort and friends.

Cosmic thoughts filled the night.

2008-10-13T09:36:00.004-05:00

Last night, I felt compelled to watch a bunch of videos about parallel universes and 11 dimensions. It came on the heels of a lot of reviewing a radical insight about how the universe might work that came to me 2 or 3 years ago.

Among other things, it accidentally explains the origin of inertia, gravity, dark matter and dark energy. It also points out how we have many dimensions; parallel, orthogonal, and every angle in between.

Something is welling up inside me that feels like those insights will play a practical part in some upcoming design decisions.

Lynn just pointed out that she has been having cosmic thoughts all night too; portals and light travel. That is interesting because most of my night thoughts were about photons and how light travels.

Imperial empire?

2008-10-12T22:12:00.006-05:00

OK, it's bugging the heck out of me so I need to rant a bit.
I was listening to a talk about school lunches; how lousy they are and how much money we don't spend on them. She mentioned that we spend huge amounts of money every day for prisoners, but not for our kids.

I looked up how much money we actually do spend on prisoners and re-learned a bunch of nasty statistics.
: The US has 4.6% of the world's population but we have nearly 50% of the prisoners.
: What's worse...
Department of corrections data show that about a fourth of those initially imprisoned for nonviolent crimes are sentenced for a second time for committing a violent offense. Whatever else it reflects, this pattern highlights the possibility that prison serves to transmit violent habits and values rather than to reduce them."

Add to that the fact that our military budget is substantially larger than the rest of the world combined, and we have to ask...
WHO ARE WE, REALLY?

The war on drugs is one of the major causes of our high prison population. If we could stop our war mentality and focus more on a justice mentality, we would need far fewer drugs, and prisons, and international unrest.

Lesson of the week; Justice

2008-10-05T06:35:00.003-05:00

Justice, revenge, punishment, rehabilitation, correction, deterrence equity, fairness

Every once in a while I try to understand justice. What do we mean when we say "justice"?
I think our civilization is confused by the concept of justice.

I met a spirit

2008-09-25T21:26:00.002-05:00

During a massage, while I was floating in other dimensions, I met an entity who explained to me that she was the spirit of a complex and populous world. I was even seeing images of a very busy citadel, full of many interacting forms of life.

As we conversed, she explained a little about how every civilization has its own spirit. How diverse her population was. How the ruling class is outnumbered 10 to 1 by the helper class. She said, "We are very much alike, you and me."

The meeting illustrated and underscored the facts that I had been talking about only a few hours earlier. Our body consists of 100 trillion cells. Of those, less than 10 trillion have our dna. The other 90 trillion cells belong to other life forms; bugs that inhabit our body, doing the basic work that keeps us alive.

It was kind of a fun trip.

Perfect Rant

2008-09-25T21:24:00.005-05:00

Perfection is an evil spirit that, if not used carefully can devour happiness.
Perfection is the enemy of good.

I never thought I would write an essay putting down the concept of perfection, but here I go. I was raised with the concept that striving for perfection was (mostly) a good thing. As a young man I struggled with the concept and definition of perfection.
I tried to achieve perfection in my crafts. It drove me to work harder, but it never made me happy, because it never was truly achieved. Over the years, I observed that some of the best perfectionists were also alcoholics who were struggling to keep their life together. Eventually I picked up the hints that perfect is an ego driven fantasy. Perfect is a narrow point of view.

What is better than perfect; more practical, more productive, more mature, more inclusive?
Excellence. The careful balance of the many dimensions that enter into any real life challenge.
Willingness to make mistakes in the pursuit of that excellence.
Dedication to truly getting better.
Accepting that you are getting better.
Sticking to it.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Striving for excellence motivates you; striving for perfection is demoralizing. ~Harriet Braiker

A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault. ~John Henry Newman

Nothing that is complete breathes. ~Antonio Porchia,

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack in everything,
That's how the light gets in.
~Leonard Cohen

Use what talents you possess; the woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best. ~Henry van Dyke

Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without. ~Confucius, Analects

When you aim for perfection, you discover it's a moving target. ~George Fisher

You see, when weaving a blanket, an Indian woman leaves a flaw in the weaving of that blanket to let the soul out. ~Martha Graham

A good garden may have some weeds. ~Thomas Fuller, Gnomologia, 1732

I cling to my imperfection, as the very essence of my being. ~Anatole France (Jacques Anatole François Thibault), The Garden of Epicurus, 1894

If attention is the currency of life, why?

2008-09-23T09:35:00.003-05:00

That question popped up (It may be the first time) while I was easing into the bathtub.

Guest Editorial

2008-09-20T20:45:00.002-05:00

original story from la times

Dear United States, Welcome to the Third World!

It's not every day that a superpower makes a bid to transform itself into a Third World nation, and we here at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund want to be among the first to welcome you to the community of states in desperate need of international economic assistance. As you spiral into a catastrophic financial meltdown, we are delighted to respond to your Treasury Department's request that we undertake a joint stability assessment of your financial sector. In these turbulent times, we can provide services ranging from subsidized loans to expert advisors willing to perform an emergency overhaul of your entire government.

As you know, some outside intervention in your economy is overdue. Last week -- even before Wall Street's latest collapse -- 13 former finance ministers convened at the University of Virginia and agreed that you must fix your "broken financial system." Australia's Peter Costello noted that lately you've been "exporting instability" in world markets, and Yashwant Sinha, former finance minister of India, concluded, "The time has come. The U.S. should accept some monitoring by the IMF."

We hope you won't feel embarrassed as we assess the stability of your economy and suggest needed changes. Remember, many other countries have been in your shoes. We've bailed out the economies of Argentina, Brazil, Indonesia and South Korea. But whether our work is in Sudan, Bangladesh or now the United States, our experts are committed to intervening in national economies with care and sensitivity.

We thus want to acknowledge the progress you have made in your evolution from economic superpower to economic basket case. Normally, such a process might take 100 years or more. With your oscillation between free-market extremism and nationalization of private companies, however, you have successfully achieved, in a few short years, many of the key hallmarks of Third World economies.

Your policies of irresponsible government deregulation in critical sectors allowed you to rapidly develop an energy crisis, a housing crisis, a credit crisis and a financial market crisis, all at once, and accompanied (and partly caused) by impressive levels of corruption and speculation. Meanwhile, those of your political leaders charged with oversight were either napping or in bed with corporate lobbyists.

Take John McCain, your Republican presidential nominee, whose senior staff includes half a dozen prominent former lobbyists. As he recently put it, "I was chairman of the [Senate] Commerce Committee that oversights every part of the economy." No question about it: Your leaders' failure to notice the damage done by irresponsible deregulation was indeed an oversight of epic proportions.

Now you are facing the consequences. Income inequality has increased, as the rich have gotten windfalls while the middle class has seen incomes stagnate. Fewer and fewer of your citizens have access to affordable housing, healthcare or security in retirement. Even life expectancy has dropped. And when your economic woes went from chronic to acute, you responded -- like so many Third World states have -- with an extensive program of nationalizing private companies and assets. Your mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are now state owned and controlled, and this week your reinsurance giant AIG was effectively nationalized, with the Federal Reserve Board seizing an 80% equity stake in the flailing company.

Some might deride this as socialism. But desperate times call for desperate measures.

Admittedly, your transition to Third World status is far from over, and it won't be painless. At first, for instance, you may find it hard to get used to the shantytowns that will replace the exurban sprawl of McMansions that helped fuel the real estate speculation bubble. But in time, such shantytowns will simply become part of the landscape. Similarly, as unemployment rates continue to rise, you will initially struggle to find a use for the expanding pool of angry, jobless young men. But you will gradually realize that you can recruit them to fight in a ceaseless round of armed conflicts, a solution that has been utilized by many other Third World states before you. Indeed, with your wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, you are off to an excellent start.

Perhaps this letter comes as a surprise to you, and you feel you're not fully ready to join the Third World. Don't let this feeling concern you. Though you may never have realized it, you've been preparing for this moment for years.

Why live resiliently?

2008-09-15T22:25:00.003-05:00

Resilient Living isn't just about surviving the storm.
Resilience also lets you dance in the rain.

Non bondage

2008-08-16T08:38:00.000-05:00

Let us live gladly! Quite certainly we are free to do it. Perhaps it is our only freedom, but ours it is, and it is only phenomenally a freedom. 'Living free' is being 'as one is'. Can we not do it now? Indeed can we not-do-it?
It is not even a 'doing': it is beyond doing and not-doing. It is being as-we-are.

This is the only 'practice'.
'All Else is Bondage; Non-Volitional Living' - Wei Wu Wei

August Rush

2008-08-12T10:31:00.001-05:00

August Rush is a very well done movie. We watched it for the first time last week. I was surprised by how much it connected with me. It might be the only movie that brings tears to my eyes even when I am just mentally reviewing it.

Last night I watched it again. This time in a dark room with big surround sound. It affected me even more because I could see the threads of the story intertwining much earlier. During some scenes I could scarcely breathe.

This movie is not tense or sad. It is the sheer beauty, the excellence of how it is written and executed. But the tears come from deeper. The story is about a musical prodigy and cosmic connections that run through music. Most of us feel those connections. I feel them strongly when I am creating. I have always found tears in my eyes when I spontaneously whistle or play an original tune.

Ever since I have allowed myself to purposely explore the occasional drive to be tied up, my appreciation for beauty and cosmic connections has grown stronger.

Naked truth

2008-08-03T13:09:00.002-05:00

There is a part of the human body that is specifically designed by God and nature to hang loose in the open air. All the animals and many aboriginal humans quite naturally accommodate that design. Civilized humans don't.

We are so bound up in our hung-up culture that we can scarcely appreciate how good it feels to let our bodies respond naturally to the temperature and the wind. If everyone was comfortable with letting it all hang out, we would have a lot less fungal and yeast infections, and a lot less hang-ups.

What will you become?

2008-08-03T11:04:00.001-05:00

I was asked what are the greatest lessons that life has taught me. One group that floats to the top has to be...

: Attention is the currency of life.
: You become what you attend to.
: Usually, right here and now is marvelous and beautiful;
Pay attention to that.

Pending collapse?

2008-07-12T22:32:00.002-05:00

The soviet union collapsed 17 years ago. Here is an interesting presentation about comparisons between the US and them.

It is definitely food for thought and unfortunately I agree with most of his observations. The problem I have with it is some of his attitude. I believe that the coming economic problems can be a portal to a much healthier and rewarding life style, if we prepare well and build that life style now, while we can still afford to.

Chakra Insight

2008-07-05T10:29:00.006-05:00

This morning during a yoga class, we were focusing on the chakras and the colors associated with them.

(image from http://www.innercosmos.com/throat_chakra.htm)

The three lower chakras are all associated with basic drives and physical issues.
As we started with deep red in the root chakra, I was picturing the smoldering hot temperatures it takes to glow red, and associating that with the red hot issues of sex, money and power.

A little farther up the spiritual evolution scale, the next chakra is orange; a more refined, hotter temperature.

The yellow of the next higher chakra can be created with still hotter temperatures.

Sometimes the heart chakra is associated with pink. Pink is a mixture of white light (very hot) and a touch of red. It denotes that the heart is at the top of the lower chakras, with a nod to its roots. The heart is also associated with green, which is the bottom of the upper chakras.

The upper chakras are associated with senses and higher, more spiritual issues.
I realized that the colors associated with those can no longer be created from heat. You get them by differentiating white light (like with a prism).

The insight tells me that the lower chakras are built on fire and heat. When they are working well, we achieve a white enough light for the upper chakras to differentiate into spiritual energy.

A class you may have taken before existence

2008-06-18T20:32:00.008-05:00

No matter what kind of life you choose to become, the program can be summarized like this:

Any form of life is a set of capabilities.
You have no capabilities unless and until you have structure.
All structure is a set of limitations.

You choose a set of limitations.
You explore those limitations as you struggle within them.
This makes you an active part of the universal mind.
Cosmic endorphins will be doled out for your effort.

Shorter summary:
Struggle within your bounds.
Gain direct grace

May it continue

2008-06-16T21:34:00.003-05:00

Lately, I have been struck by beauty. The shapes of clouds, waves of wind in a field of rye, the subtle changing color of the sky, the way Lynn smiles during a romantic movie scene.

Last night I listened to a series of TED talks. When I was done, I sat there for a moment, stunned by the beauty of the lessons they gave me.

Seeing beauty in unexpected times and places is a good habit.
I think I'll keep it.

Nice life

2008-05-17T23:44:00.002-05:00

Ethan was curious how big the moon was compared to the earth, so we hopped on the web to find out. Naturally that led to him being curious about the size of the sun, then the other planets.

Soon we were watching videos that show the relative sizes of each planet with the sun, then other stars. Ethan would laugh out loud as each new heavenly body dwarfed the ones before it. That brought two bright faced happy and fascinated little sisters poking their heads in and laughing just to support him.

Amber said "That is my life." That is what home life is on a regular basis.

Nice life!

Education isn't something you "get"

2008-05-11T10:09:00.002-05:00

It is something you "do".

"Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune."
(Jim Rohn)

I have bought into these concepts for as long as as I have been old enough to criticize schools.

OM Mooo

2008-05-11T09:09:00.003-05:00

As I get older, there are more times when my voice resonates deeply in my chest. Now I better understand the ancient practice of chanting "OM" and why the practice seems to be dominated by males. It feels good when that deep voice vibrates every bone and nerve in the chest.

Cows may be on to something.
Many times lately, I just get the urge to belt out a long deep "MOOOOO". It feels even better than "OM". It resonates deeper. It is more expressive. It helps clear cloudy feelings. Maybe cows have it figured out and we are doing it backwards.

This morning I was soaking in the tub. The resonance was wonderful. I was OMing and MOOing to my heart's content. Then I noticed...
When MOOing, the flow of energy is outwards; like expressing emotions. When OMing, the flow is inwards; like learning.

That must be useful insight.

Wind

2008-05-08T08:58:00.002-05:00

=====

The pessimist complains about the wind.
The optimist expects it to change.
The leader adjusts the sails.
~John Maxwell~

The winds of change are blowing.
Let's adjust our sails.

The life stages of time flies

2008-05-06T22:09:00.004-05:00

I was just wondering...
If time flies are the adult stage...
Is there such a thing as time maggots?
and time pupae?

Time eggs:
Little bitty nuggets of time; rich with promise and hope for the future. It is a quiet stage where ideas stay confined and just incubate.

Time maggots:
Ideas hatch from their shell. Forever hungry, they consume enormous amounts of time, recycling it into new body of knowledge. Eventually they get satiated and form...

Time pupae:
Another quiet stage to develop and metamorphise. Eventually they emerge as adult...

Time flies:
This is the adult form, where ideas really take flight. Life gets buzzier as time scatters to the winds. Time flies spread germs of ideas, pollinate, annoy people, feast, travel, procreate. Along the way they find nourishing bodies of time in which they lay their fertile ideas;
More time eggs.

Infested with time flies

2008-05-05T21:40:00.003-05:00

Spring gets kinda busy

Inspiration to write ebbs and flows. So does available time.
Suddenly a whole month has gone by and inspiration never intersected with time.

Be that as it may, I do love to write ideas and feelings. Insights that I never expected tend to flow out of the pencil, or the keyboard.

I'm up for some good insight.

Memes Rule!

2008-04-06T12:59:00.005-05:00

Today I was struck with with a certain knowledge that memes have been a major evolutionary force, evolving our genes to better suit their purposes.

Why would our brains be designed so that they latch on to ideas so firmly that they will defend those ideas to the death? Especially when religion gets involved we will argue, and not listen, and even fight a war to defend our ideas, our faith, our way of life.

The main reason I can think of is that memes have been the ruling evolutionary force ever since we first developed the ability to socialize. People who had the ability to handle better memes were more likely to survive. As memes thrived, they shaped things like our big brain and our ability to speak. Now that we have big brains, we are excellent hosts to memes. We are their platform, an arena in which memes can compete.

A meme is just an idea. It can come and go easily. An existing meme could easily be flushed away as soon as another idea comes along. Being thrown out of your battle vehicle at the first bump just won't do, so a seat belt is needed.

It would make sense for memes to evolve us so that our brains hang on to them tenaciously. Then they have a fighting chance. It makes us a much more useful platform.

I am certain of it.

Real morality

2008-02-24T14:07:00.005-06:00

As I woke up this morning, I was wondering about morality.
It seems that morality is all about acting for the long term common good. A moral person cultivates the discipline to overcome short term destructive habits (even though they may be pleasurable) in favor of long term prosperity and deeper happiness.

Our concepts about morality change as we learn and mature. In the 1950s and 60s, driving and burning fuel and fertilizing monoculture crops were all good things. Now our culture is learning that those behaviors are causing huge problems for the future of ourselves individually and our entire civilization. Suddenly those behaviors are the ultimate immorality.

You and I have not substantially changed our fuel consumption patterns. We talk about it, and make gestures toward improving, but the bottom line is not really better. We are not going to allow our grandkids to label us as immoral, so we have to change.

Contemplate this...
Global warming and peak oil are bunk. We don't have to reduce our usage by 90% like experts say. We only have to share better at current levels of usage. Because we are Americans and deserve more than most people, we get to use 150% of the amount of fossil fuels per person compared to the rest of the world. That still means we have to cut down our fuel consumption by a factor of 3.6. That is a 63% reduction from our current levels.

Homework Exercise: Seriously practice using only 27% of the fuel you are used to.
How will you do it?

Later we can contemplate how even this level is not yet near moral.

Storm warnings

2008-02-24T13:51:00.005-06:00

Lately I have been making a career of learning about the convergence of peak oil, global warming, and economic depression.
Each is real.
Each is big.
Each is coming to a head very soon.

The convergence of the three is mind boggling.
That is exactly why most people and virtually all governments ignore it.

As people around me start to grasp how real it is, they ask what they can do personally to survive. After contemplating what an individual can do to help, I eventually realized that there is one philosophy that applies to individuals, families, communities, and to civilization as a whole...

The more we know about how to live well without large amounts of water, fuel and store bought food, the more resilient we will be.

Truffle power

2008-02-21T21:20:00.004-06:00

My goodness!!!!!!!!!

That was the best meal any of us have ever had.
Neil and Tori and Jeanne and Lynn and I were trying to figure out how to freeze the moment; how to savor the incredible experience for just a little while longer.

The back story...
Last week I was mindlessly wondering out loud what a truffle really tastes like. Before I knew it, Lynn had ordered a few truffles over the internet. Now we were faced with the imminent arrival of one of the most exotic and expensive foods in the world, and we had to figure out what to do with it.

They are a fungus, somewhat related to mushrooms, but they smell strongly, like a male pig in rut. With my level of experience, I might have put them in a pizza. Neil came up with the idea of challenging some of the finest chefs in the area to make a wonderful meal with our truffles. Chef Tim Anderson of Iven's on the Bay said yes.

Tonight the five of us showed up for a 5 course meal centered on truffles. The soup was served in a tiny but slightly tall shot glass. No spoon, you drink it. Upon tasting it, we were immediately and unanimously blown away; transported to new world by a subtle exotic and powerful taste experience.
Each of the five courses managed to bowl us over with dish licking, shell scraping tastes.

When the chef showed up, we gave him a standing ovation.
WOW!

Searching for how to give more deeply

2008-02-13T23:12:00.006-06:00

Flowers and candy and store bought cards are a nice way to open a relationship. They are pleasant and state clearly that you have romantic intents.
In terms of personal relationship, they are safe and cheap. They cost you little personal effort for the huge payback they create. What's not to like?

Showering your love with commercialized safe and cheap tokens is like putting candy sprinkles on an ice cream cone. It is fun for a snack, when your dish is sweet and fat.

The love of my life is more like truffles, fillet mignon, fresh salad, finely seasoned garden vegetables.
She is delicious. She is nourishing. She is good for me.

She deserves better than safe, cheap, commodity tokens.
She deserves my time, my attention, my deepest essence.

Dear Lynn,
I give to you a physical token,
a hand made embodiment of my time and attention.

I give to you my written words,
a deeply felt attempt to condense my love for you and make it more tangible.

I share with you my karma,
a lifetime of good luck by design and effort.

Please be my valentine.
Love, Paul

10 secrets

2008-02-09T13:24:00.000-06:00

I really liked these 10 secrets that I stumbled on at God's Thumb.

Secrets for Success and Inner Peace

The First Secret:
Have a mind that is open to everything and attached to nothing.

The Second Secret:
Don’t die with your music still in you.

The Third Secret:
You can’t give away what you don’t have.

The Forth Secret:
Embrace silence.

The Fifth Secret:
Give up your personal history.

The Six Secret:
You can’t solve a problem with the same mind that created it.

The Seventh Secret:
There are no justified resentments.

The Eighth Secret:
Treat yourself as if you already are what you’d like to be.

The Ninth Secret:
Treasure your Divinity.

The Tenth Secret:
Wisdom is avoiding all thoughts that weaken you.

Grading on a curve

2008-02-05T22:08:00.000-06:00

I am male.
I am hardwired to appreciate curves.
In addition, I specialize in seeing flow; seeing trends.
Even so, I am surprised at how much a curve on a graph can affect me.
A good scary curve in a graph can excite me, and haunt me.

Here is an example (from Wikipedia)

Notice the change in the slope in the last decade. That offends my sense of future.

Another set of curves that speaks volumes can be found here. (Please follow link. He won't let me copy it.)
Notice that the human population curve over 1 million years is absolutely square. Even when zoomed in to the last 1000 years, the curve is extremely close to square. Just follow that upslope and ask how long we can keep this up.
Nothing; no budget, no bacteria, no human population can continue to grow at these rates. Anything growing this fast and this continuously is likely to crash, like hitting a brick wall.

Some math to digest our record budget

2008-02-04T23:27:00.000-06:00

3.1 Trillion Dollars!
How do we make personal sense of such large numbers?

3.1 trillion / 301,139,947 = 10,294
The US budget divided by the US population = $10,294 per citizen

$58,480 / 3.14 = 18,624
The median family income divided by the average family size = $18,624 dollars income per family member.

10,294/18,624 = .55
The federal budget equals 55% of the median family income. This is on top of state and local taxes.

Of course, rather than pay that immediately we are charging it (along with interest) to our kids.

Our record budget is 63% larger than 2001, Bushes first year in office. It again includes more money for military while eliminating 151 domestic programs including some education, health and job-training.
Does anyone else see some alarming trends here?

Achieving Grateness

2008-02-02T22:39:00.000-06:00

Last night, I overheard Nathan mention that he was grateful for how his life is going. That got my mind wandering down paths about how important it is to be grateful. It sets you in a frame of mind to be accepting and happy. Karma opens opportunities you otherwise might have missed.

After writing the above, I looked up "grateful"...
The root word "grate" is an obsolete adjective that used to mean "agreeable, thankful, pleasing". It has the same Latin roots as "graceful and grace", which originally meant "God's favor or help".

People naturally want to help a grateful person.
A grateful person is naturally happier.
Life long accumulation of help and opportunities grows exponentially like compound interest.

To a student of life, it seems obvious that to achieve greatness, one must first achieve gratefulness.

You will do it WHEN?

2008-01-20T21:42:00.000-06:00

Every summer I talk about all the projects we are going to do next winter when things slow down.
Now that it is winter... Has anything slowed down yet?

Digital world

2008-01-01T01:23:00.000-06:00

Photons are digital
Atoms are digital
DNA is digital
Voting in a democracy is digital

In all these different scales, amorphous information is encoded into a digital form, making it easier to store, copy, and to act on.

It seems that when life on a given scale gets populous and complicated enough, it eventually finds ways to build a new, higher level structure. That structure often needs to make decisions so that it can act. It must be stable enough to be fair and trusted by its citizens. It formally encodes wishes of its citizens into law.

Analog world

2007-12-30T21:06:00.000-06:00

Just like theories;
All analogies are wrong.
Some are useful.

Analogies are wonderful things.
They are the way we learn and understand.

As analogies help us see similarities,
They help us connect many differing observations,
They weave loose phenomena into a more sturdy coherent world view;
A steadier platform from which we can operate.

Unlike theories;
Analogies don't attempt to present themselves as true.
They don't attempt to be perfect,
Just useful.

Good vibrations

2007-12-30T20:53:00.000-06:00

This week I received a new concrete vibrator. Immediately I started to experiment with vibrating mud. It does a marvelous job liquefying stiff mud and helping it flow. When the vibrations are removed, the mud gets stiff again.

Then I noticed that the mud flows counterclockwise around the vibrating wand. There was something oddly familiar about the picture of the mud circling the wand. Finally I remembered...
It looks a lot like pictures I have seen many times in basic electricity books; it looks like a magnetic field flowing around a current carrying wire.

This has to be an analogy telling me something about why a moving electric charge creates a magnetic field. Hopefully the lesson will make itself clear in due time.

Stable structures

2007-12-25T12:54:00.000-06:00

One of my lessons this week was about service, and how it relates to multi-level structures.

Members:
Everybody and everything is an organization made up of members. In the case of your body, the members are cells. They are all working hard to make your body systems healthy and viable. In return, the cells get services like food and oxygen and waste disposal and protection.

Hosts:
In turn, everybody and everything are members of larger host organizations. For people it includes governments, corporations, schools, clubs, etc.

Stability:
Any entity that wants to be survivable and stable in the long term needs to provide value to both its members and its hosts.

My take home lesson:
When I need to make a decision, it is usually best to choose a path that benefits both my body and my community.

The royal "We"

2007-12-19T08:42:00.000-06:00

I is We
We are Many
Many is one

As I woke this morning, I was still firmly in my dream character while another part of me noticed the state of my physical body and realized I was dreaming, while another part of me was planning my next project. Each was a different persona; a different consciousness.

For a moment I wondered...
Who is this "I" that is observing this?

A burst of parallel answer; too instant, too broad for words; referring to the recursive and fractal nature of community at many overlapping scales. Then the simple words...

I is We
We are Many
Many is one

One track mind, many track brain

2007-12-10T20:35:00.000-06:00

Artists, philosophers, physicists, mathematicians, theologians;
The lucky ones are among those who occasionally get such an insight that it leaves them with the thrilling feeling that they have just seen right into the mind of God.

Me?... I seem to keep bumping into God's brain.

Everywhere I look; every dimension, every scale, every interaction of anything, I eventually see how it functions like a brain.

If everything is one big brain, it couldn't help but be omnipotent and omnipresent.

Life in time-space

2007-12-06T22:41:00.000-06:00

At some point, your pan dimensional self decided to string together an interesting experience by trying out life in time-space. Time-space is a game, a set of rules you agree to follow; such as limiting yourself to only a four dimensional path (like when we play a board game). If you break the basic rules (actual rules of physics) you must exit the game. Within those rules, you find an infinite freedom of choices.

In this game, you and other players near you collectively blaze a narrow path through the jungle of the pan-dimensional all. We call this path "Time". While following the path, you also have other degrees of freedom. Some of those we collectively call "Space".

One popular strategy in this game is to make your path strong and resilient like a string. When individual fibers intertwine, they become string. The strongest strings have long fibers intertwined with many others. Those fibers are mostly aligned with the length of the string.

Our string is our path; time.

To create long fibers in time;
we pay attention to lessons of the past, learning from it and building on it.
we predict the future, then act to make it comfortable, safe, exciting, noble, etc.

We intertwine these fibers by interacting with each other.

Short fibers are created by;
Breaking basic rules (you die)
Ignoring the past
Don't care about future
Don't prepare for tomorrow

Short fibers don't add much strength to a string, but they do have other characteristics;
They add fluff, fuzziness, body, lubrication,
They dust off the main string, like spores in the wind leaving seeds in other places.
They aid digestion and help scour a path clean.

The difference between the two functions are remarkably like how a brain is structured;
Long fibers are the neurons;
Short fibers are the glial cells.

just a Fiber

2007-12-03T09:46:00.000-06:00

This morning I took a little extra meditation time while the teacher showed me a lesson.

I was graphically seeing how and why all of time-space is...
just a fiber,
in a thread,
in the cloth,
in the great tapestry of life.

As I leave the meditation, it is hard enough to even hang on to some of the pictures and logic and feelings; I am not even going to try to put it into words here.

As I write, I am eating lots of fiber for breakfast.

Celebrating deadly sins

2007-11-23T13:14:00.000-06:00

The seven deadly sins:
Lust, Pride, Gluttony, Greed, Envy, Sloth, Wrath.

Ryan pointed out to me that, on each of our major holidays, we tend to focus on a different deadly sin.
Valentine's day we focus on Lust (we usually use more romantic words).
Fourth of July is all about Pride.
Thanksgiving is definitely Gluttony
During the Christmas season, we focus on getting our kids to practice both Envy and Greed.

The above are strong connections. Sloth and Wrath have weaker connections.

We end the year with a wild party, the next day start the year Slothfully lazing in front of the TV, watching football.

Veteran's day we celebrate the people who bravely helped our country deliver its Wrath to other countries.

Anybody have better connections?
Or thoughts about why we tend to celebrate the deadly sins?

Why is attention the currency of life?

2007-11-18T19:23:00.000-06:00

Tonight, at a meeting I attended, I was told that many spirits were present. It soon became obvious that the "teacher" was there with me. It seemed like every little thought in my head had an immediate answer. At one point I happened to wonder why attention is the currency of life.
The answer was swift...

The reason that attention is the currency of life should be obvious.
It has been established earlier that pretty much everything is a neural network. Neural networks are like fractals. They are self similar at many scales. On any scale, individual neural networks each act as a single neuron in the next larger scale neural network.

The intelligence and power of any neural network is in the quantity and quality of the connections between neurons. At a social level, every person is seeking to create new or better connections. Every time you pay attention, whether it is to friends, business dealings, or bed time stories; the process fine tunes your connections, it is you doing your duty as a neuron in the bigger brain.

It is programmed into the very nature of nature itself, that living beings will trade mainly in attention, for that is how higher life is formed.

I ran the math, He is more than right.

2007-11-12T22:25:00.000-06:00

So Why Is Gas So Damn Expensive?

Written by Aaron Newton on his blog of

Tuesday, 22 May 2007

Well, actually its not. One gallon of gas does the work of one adult male working for six weeks (pretty cheap for the cost of $3)

Pretty sunset

2007-11-12T17:53:00.000-06:00

The evening star and crescent moon
hang low over the fading sunset.
A beautiful sight,
They will be gone soon.

We may want a charcoal making setup

2007-10-28T22:00:00.000-05:00

This weekend I have been focused on charcoal. I have always planned to use it for cleaning air and water. It adsorbs most organic molecules, removing most odor, taste and color. It is easy to make and when it is dirty, easy to recharge and re-use .

Lately I have been learning that charcoal is also an incredibly useful soil additive. It lasts many hundreds of years in the soil, hanging on to all kinds of organic molecules; so it captures and holds nutrients. Hairlike fungi in the soil tickle the nutrients out of the charcoal and feed them to the plants. In some tests it improves plant productivity by 880%.

Making charcoal creates additional heat and fuel while it uses up some of the mountains of sawmill waste we have around here. When it ends up in the soil, it acts as a carbon sink, taking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and reducing global warming.

For us, making charcoal beats the heck out of a win win situation. If I counted right, this is a win win win win win win win.

more information...
Link 1
Link 2
Link 3
Link 4

Simplicity isn't simple

2007-10-08T05:56:00.000-05:00

There is a basic truth that I must deal with whenever I try to design something;
Simple only works from a given point of view.

Make something simple for somebody and it almost certainly makes things more complex for someone else. Often that is the value proposition to your customer. Whether you are selling goods or a service, you are saying "I am offering to make it simpler for you to get X, because I will handle the complicated details."

Of course, we often make things unnecessarily complex. Taking unnecessary complications out of your design (or your life) is like editing a movie or a well written essay. It takes a lot of attention, reflection and work to hone it down to be simple and elegant.

Much of civilization is about simplifying. We pave our land, and make buildings with smooth walls and floors because flat is simple. We create uniform laws and currencies. Every time we simplify something, it becomes a platform upon which we can build a more complex structure.

As civilization gets complex, we all eventually want to simplify our lives. When people attempt to return to the simple life, they often find out that nature is enormously complex to deal with.

It boils down to aptitude.
Whatever you are good at seems simple to you.
So, Follow your heart and life gets simpler and better.

By the numbers

2007-09-18T22:09:00.000-05:00

Google constantly impresses me. It keeps getting easier to verify wild claims that someone throws at me. So tonight I looked a few things up and, by golly it is not hard to imagine man being capable of messing up the earth.

Let's take it up close and personal.

First we take all the land area in the world, then divide it by the human population; we each get about 6 acres.
Your personal 6 acres is about 1 and a half city blocks. Less than 1/4 of that is suitable for farming. The rest is largely mountain and dessert and frozen tundra.
It is real easy to see how I can affect that much land in my lifetime.

According to Winona Duke, each American's direct and indirect contribution to solid waste is one million pounds per year and 5 million pounds of contaminated water every year.
That sounds impressive, but I am not seeing support for her million pounds per year. The best number I can find is closer to 1500 pounds per year of landfill waste, plus about 40,000 more pounds of CO2, and about 3 million pounds of water.
Ahhh, but that is only on American soil. Add in the stuff we buy from other countries because we prefer that they do the dirty work and create pollution over there. Then add in transporting that stuff around the world. Winona's numbers are pretty close after all.

So...
Imagine if you dump all your 6 million pounds of waste on your own 6 acres.
Without careful management and reuse, you end up living in a smelly garbage infested pig sty.
As long as we buy into our consumer lifestyle, this is what we are doing, but it is mostly in someone else's back yard.

Wisdom of the language

2007-09-14T07:30:00.000-05:00

Hopefully this will become a series of entries because there are so many examples of where our language may be harboring a collective wisdom distilled through millions of people over thousands of years.

One example that struck me this morning is "Ignore".
In current usage; "ignore" means "disregard" or "pay no attention to", yet "ignorance" means "to not know".
So does "not knowing" mean that we are actually "not paying attention"?

The teacher was impressing on me this morning that all knowledge is available. We choose to pay no attention to most of it. Some level of ignorance is necessary to play the game we call life on earth.

The take home lesson is that we truly do have the awesome power of knowledge available to us, and it is ok to ignore most knowledge.

Our challenge and our position in the big picture is to make some of that knowledge practical in the here and now.

Thanks, Aina

2007-09-12T21:39:00.000-05:00

Truth lies at the point of paradox.

That little message was brought to me by a new friend last week. It elegantly expresses a truth I have been trying to express for years.

Tell me a story

2007-08-19T08:30:00.000-05:00

Throughout human history, story tellers have been among the most important and revered people in every culture.
Be good at telling stories.
It will serve you well.

Things people buy

2007-08-18T22:42:00.000-05:00

People don't buy things.
People buy stories.

That is a lesson from recent months. It holds true, and is powerful wisdom;
and it can stand to have additional light shine on it.

People also buy function; Such as a house cleaning service, or a tool to drive screws.

If you sell only the function, where the story is not important, you are selling in a commodity market where prices are low, competitive and out of your control.

People need to buy the function of transportation, but the car dealers know better than to sell function. They provide the function, but they sell the story; the sex appeal, the muscles, the fantasy.

Sometimes the only function is the story; such as an autographed baseball. Without the story, the ball is worth a few bucks. With the story it is worth maybe a million bucks. Value in antiques is more story than function. TV, movies, books and fame of all kinds are all about stories. Art and crafts usually have some aesthetic value, but they command big bucks if there is a good story about the artist.

The food pendulum has swung way to the commodity side; cheap with no story you would want to talk about. Now food is swinging toward the story side. You want to know the ingredients, know it is organic, even who grew it and where.

The ideal items to sell would...
a: provide superior functions
b: have a very interesting and compelling story that fits the times.

Informing the giant

2007-08-17T10:16:00.000-05:00

Lately I have been studying lessons about communications, perception of reality, and guidance. It has been occupying some of the best hours of the day.

Some of the lessons from this morning's bath, while staring into the water...

Whether they are objects, or ideas, or emotions, the only things we actually observe are the surfaces of neural network energy topologies.

Similar to seeing the world as it is reflected in a pool of water, everything we observe is reflected in the topology of our personal neural network. The dynamics that we observe around us are often ripples in our own surface. A tiny ripple can create enormous distortions.

We can calm our internal ripples and thus get more accurate observations.
We can set up our internal ripples to make us perceive more life, love and good intent than may actually be the case. We can set up our ripples to make us perceive more inertness, hate and mal intent. In either case, we react accordingly. Every other neural net observes us, making our attitude part of their reality. Thus, our attitude ripples through the larger neural landscape that we call reality.

We can apply this knowledge by minimizing emotions, pre-conceptions or body cycles that distort our perceptions when we are dealing with people.
Another way to apply it is to be generous when we think of people. Assume the best of them. They are human and will react accordingly. They will occasionally lash out in anger, or fail in other ways, but they will eventually rise to meet your expectations.

Moving my Giant

2007-08-16T23:06:00.000-05:00

I have been emotionally moved lately by watching well done works of animated art.

Last night we watched The Little Mermaid for the first time in many years. I was struck by how smoothly the story flowed and how well it was told. When we watched the "how it was made" feature, it brought tears to my eyes. I was left wondering what it was that affected me so. The best answer I could come up with... It was the story of teams of genius coming together to create something great.

Tonight we watched Spirited Away. There was no need to watch how it was made. The teams of genius showed through in almost every scene.

The emotion is still strong. I am inspired to believe that we must pull our team together and commit an act of genius.

Judging from the animated examples, an act of team genius includes...
Keenly observing mundane details of the world around us.
Inspiration on many fronts and from many talents.
Years of dedicated hard work.
Much practice and focus and editing.
Appropriate public relations.
Spirit guiding us to time things right.

Reduce cholesterol, good side effects

2007-08-14T13:09:00.000-05:00

If properly administrated, this way to reduce cholesterol can only have good side effects.

It is a small study that showed a reduction in cholesterol when people wrote affectionate notes about someone in their lives; An even bigger reduction if the note was to your loved one, rather than writing in third person.

Finding my giant

2007-08-08T21:36:00.000-05:00

Last weekend, at an impromptu time, Amber guided me on what became a spiritual vision trip.
It was powerful.
I am still absorbing the feelings and the ramifications.
I am changed.

In my paper journal, I wrote details of images I saw. I find myself periodically writing additional thoughts about it; like a list of ingredients that helped make the experience work so well.

In the experience...
Some early images included pagodas and many variations of eastern temples. Then I was traveling towards a radiant ball of energy, like a portal. The ball became a sun rising over a lake. Soon I was traveling on the lake, almost at a right angle to the sun.

The lake was getting narrower and I passed several iconic dead critters.
The lake got narrow like a canyon, then almost like a cave. As I entered, there were waves traveling vertically; up. I could sense that they were alive. Two different streams of undefined energy were also traveling up. I ascended with the energies.

The first thing I saw in this new space was shapes. Clear, simple geometric shapes that I could not define or name. After a few other images that I could not define, I saw simple happy creatures. Clearly these were not any life form known on earth. The feeling was that my guides were very happy to see my arrival. They were showing me that I was now experiencing additional dimensions and it is going to take a while to learn the territory.

Soon I was looking down on sand and pine trees (home). I was able to move around freely while viewing from above. The view was slightly curvy, a little like a fish eye lens except as I moved I could sense the macro view and interior micro details at the same time.

I viewed around me and everywhere I looked the landscape quickly turned lush green. I laughed. Soon I was traveling (like walking 100 feet high) fast enough that I could see the curve of the earth. I was looking everywhere and making much of the continent turn green and lush and productive. I liked the implied message.

Later I saw a storybook opened up to a picture printed across both pages. It was an ocean with a ship on it. The ship sailed out of the two dimensional pages into the three dimensional world. It sailed into a narrow area with land on both sides (similar to the lake in the earlier part of my trip). Crowds of people cheered jubilantly and confetti was in the air everywhere. A closer look revealed that the confetti was actually bees and butterflies.

At the start of the vision trip, I had traveled alone in a small canoe sized boat going North, past iconic dead critters. At the conclusion, I was traveling South through the same passage way; but now in a ship; and abundant, jubilant life was celebrating on all sides.

It took me hours to bring my mind back into this (normal?) world.
I feel larger,
and guided,
and supported,
and more confident that we are successful and doing the right thing.

And we have much to learn.

Another kind of sychronicity?

2007-07-28T20:05:00.000-05:00

Again, I need to rethink my theories about the cause of that inner drive that sometimes makes me feel a need to be tied up. That feeling has been extra strong the last few days.

Earliest theories had to do with socially inhibited sex drive. Last year came a realization that this drive doesn't necessarily have anything to do with sex. Recently I had been drifting back toward updates of the old theory.

Today I was surprised by 4 year old Ian when he brought me a piece of rope, put his hands behind his back and politely asked me to tie his hands. In light of the theories that had been on my mind lately, I was so surprised that I didn't really answer him. He asked me at least three times. Later I found that he asked his dad the same thing last night.

Obviously, Ian's wish to be tied up does not spring from socially imposed restrictions on his sex drive. It pokes a big hole in that line of theories. It leaves me really curious why sometimes, some of us want to be tied up. I will be looking for answers, data, research, and your input.

Separation synchronicity

2007-07-21T08:51:00.000-05:00

I'm not sure I have ever seen stronger synchronicity in a lesson of the week. Perhaps the teacher is working overtime to get us in alignment.
This week it seems like everyone in the family is dealing with separation issues that are coming to a head.
Lynn and I were dealing heavily with estate planning.
Amy's best friend died.
Ryan working his way out of Green Range Energy.
Raya working her way out of Round Belly Clothing.

Each one contemplates great change.
Each one requires learning to release; to let go.
Each one requires the student to examine who they are, who they might have been, and who they want to be.

In those around us we observe that great change brings great emotion. It tends to progress; Early stages often include anger, then greed. Those emotions need to be accepted as real, but if we act on them, they can trap us in a recursive whirlwind of misery.

If we learn to minimize those parts, we focus on asking "How can we make this the best possible outcome for everyone involved?"

What is your population?

2007-07-08T13:29:00.000-05:00

According to Discover magazine, your body is a planet; population 100 trillion cells. However, 90 trillion of them are not your cells. They are bacteria, viruses, yeast and other critters that keep you functioning. Most of them also help defend you from the occasional bad bugs that hurt your walking ecosystem.

Our modern society tends to think that the only good bacteria is a dead bacteria. We tend to focus so much on our fear of the bad bugs that we forget about the good ones. It is not good to eliminate bacteria. It is important to keep a high ratio of good to bad.

Bacteria are everywhere. One teaspoon of soil may contain up to 10,000 species of micro-organisms and billions of individuals. There are specialists for just about every situation that might come up. By changing the ecology, we can encourage certain specialists to flourish. For instance; after an oil spill, the oil eaters take over and help clean up.

When we try to kill bacteria without understanding the ecology, we are likely to set up a situation where the bad guys have no competition, with disastrous results.
The bottom line is two part action...
Clean up anywhere you expect bad bugs (around meat etc.)
Encourage good bugs (healthy soil, yogurt, kefir, etc)

Perfect

2007-07-04T09:05:00.000-05:00

I was listening to an interview of the author of The Square Foot Garden on TV last night. As part of his speech habit, he likes to use the word "perfect" a lot.
Later, Ryan and I were contemplating... That is a pretty good philosophy. When something is adequate, it is "perfect".

Eventually, that made us wonder...
What is the difference between mediocrity and moderation?
Mediocrity is moderation in an area in which you like to excel.

Powerful Friends

2007-06-29T09:17:00.000-05:00

Let your friends do your work for you.

Time is one of your friends.
No force on earth is more powerful than time. Get to be buddies with it and it will be happy to do you favors, both big and small.
One small example; I have learned to ask of time to help wash the dishes. I used to work hard, using lots of soap and elbow grease to try to scrub baked crusty stuff off of a dish, mostly because I didn't want to spend a lot of time at the task. Now I put the crusty dish under water and let time do most of the work. I come back and help once in a while. We make a good team.
There are many big examples too.

Bugs are friends.
What I loosely call "bugs" do most of the biological work in the world. Getting comfortable with them is important to being comfortable on earth. As we encourage the most helpful bugs, they will help clean and recycle and defend us from unhealthy bugs.

The Teacher is on duty

2007-06-24T23:01:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I was low on personal energy due to a 24 hour flu bug. I was tired of everything and wondering why the hell I'm working so hard and investing so much in our crazy venture. There must be better things to do with my time and money; certainly easier things.

Tonight I'm feeling better and started reading some blogs.
Whamo!!
A series of lessons lined up to beat me in the face and say
"THIS is why you are working!"

It started with "How to save the world " Saturday Links
And led to Earth in imminent peril
Then Birds vanishing
Then Climate change and battles for resources will set the world aflame
And Climate change blamed as Lake Superior Shrinks
and more stuff... but you get the idea