Ideas, ideas.. .. and solutions.

I occasion to sit around and think up ideas.

I mentally pan the issues of the day and try to discover interesting ways to contribute to the solutions to the problems that they represent. Wait, that means that there are no problems, only issues. Well, there are no issues, only solutions.


The subject of ecology has given way to environmental awareness, which in turn has introduced us to specific issues like ozone layer depletion, deforestation and desertification, global warming, waste, and a myriad of other not the lesser but just as important issues like unemployment, homelessness and poverty.

Lest I feel the burden that all of this world's imperfections begs to heap upon my shoulders if I let them, I tend to gravitate to more interesting and less affectatious notions dealing with matters personal and consumerist. Creations that might yet contribute to the betterment of our individual lives. I guess that's where the money is.

Say, for example, that your cell phone is handy but you're doing business online and even a quick search for where the ringing is coming from, when it finally reveals its whereabouts, just sends you up the wall. What if the caller is as impatient as you - and stops trying just as you grab the phone, or you make it almost in time but the phone is upside down in your hand and it stops ringing just after you have deftly turned it right side up? So.. what if the mouse you're using is really just an iPhone that serves double duty as a wireless mouse with the press of a key, but still takes calls? Just an idea.

Legitimate though these preoccupations of mine be, they never completely drag me away from the more important possibilities for the resolution of matters affecting us in annoying ways. Like the economy, for instance. I think that it might be possible to impact economic growth positively while bringing a large number of financially challenged people out of their frustrating existence.

I am thinking of the surprisingly many who answer the question, "Do you have a bank account?" with the negative. The reason is that one needs a picture identification card like a driver's license. In fact, I know of one who could not open a bank account because she had no driver's license. Obtaining one has become more difficult over the years. Driver education is one economic experiment that still profits from the inadequacy of economics.

But every bank should have a facility for providing a personal bank account picture ID card to anyone who needed to open a bank account but otherwise could not for reasons stated. The card would come with privileges and restrictions, such as the ability to save money, write cheques, make debit card purchases, and use the investing strategy services offered by the bank, and most importantly, to establish one's credibility as a sound and frugal money manager. There is no argument for denying this feasibility, since the same level of security exists with the common debit card.

Just an idea.

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Do lobsters feel pain?

There are conflicting reports from reputable institutions that have undertaken in-depth research projects which have studied the question of whether boiling a lobster alive causes them to feel any pain. Even the notorious Cecil Adams, of Straight Dope fame and who knows almost absolutely everything, appears to be fence-sitting on this one, passing on this particular assignment to one of his cohorts, GFactor, who reports, "As a recent article on the topic puts it: "It's debatable whether the debate will ever be resolved.""

As far as I am concerned, we only pretend that the lobster doesn't feel any pain and will promote any source which agrees with that viewpoint, because we would like to continue to eat lobster without feeling any guilt over the cruel act of having dropped them alive into a pot of boiling water. I would prefer to have them saturated in vodka or rum before doing the nasty deed, so as to at least numb them. I haven't actually tried that, but then I am no great fan of lobster or crab because they are simply too much work and too messy, and in the case of crab, hardly worth the effort to get at the meat. I prefer shaved roast beef au jus on a kaiser myself, jus on the side.

I sit with those who believe that lobsters do indeed feel pain and gross discomfort when dropped squirming into a pot of boiling water. I have reason to believe this. The Atlantic Veterinary College has an interesting link to its Frequently Asked Questions site, dealing with lobster anatomy. On this page can be found a compelling discussion of the lobster's uncanny sense of smell...

Lobsters "smell" their food by using four small antennae on the front of their heads and tiny sensing hairs that cover their bodies. Their sense of smell is so fine that they can sniff out a single amino acid that tags their favorite food.

Now, that's very, very sensitive. So, it turns out that the lobster is a very sensitive and perceptive creature. Naturally, because of their different anatomy, they will sense things differently. It stands to reason that this must include their sense of touch. They no doubt have tactile sense, are able to perceive, and yes, understand, the difference between sandy and rocky sea floor. I can't imagine any lobster trying to dig out a shelter in a rock.

The conclusion drawn by most researchers is that if a lobster feels any pain, they must feel it differently than we do. Well, of course. Insomuch that lobster "smell" their food by using four small antennae on the front of their heads and tiny sensing hairs that cover their body, you can be pretty sure that these antennae and sensing hairs will feel intense "pain" when they are in contact with boiling water. That would be the same sense that steers them clear of the ocean's thermal vents, to keep from being boiled alive at the bottom of the sea, which to many would be a total waste of a good lobster.

That's not to say that lobsters are not found around hydro-thermal vents. Thermal vents offer a favorable (I doubt the lobster knows any better) environment for the Kiwa hirsuta "yeti" lobster, a species of Squat lobster, which are only found in a region about a mile deep off the Easter Islands. They have evolved a tolerance for super-heated water, and as evidence that proximity to their food source is a valuable asset which contributes to their survival, have also evolved extraordinarily long, what appear to be insulated pincers. Obviously these creatures have a genetic predisposition to wariness and trepidation, acquired no doubt because their food can only be found in that zone around those hot thermal vents where it is most abundant, and where just a little too much heat would render the predator but a wasted delicacy. They are blind, a required sacrifice for the privilege of survival.


Some might argue that those feathery hairs on the pincers allow them to sense their food, but I am more inclined to think that they at least also serve the purpose of deflecting the waves of heat radiating from the thermal vents, to keep their heads cool.

Squat lobsters are among the most abundant decapods (which is what lobsters are). Among the largest of the Squat lobsters - only a few species are found around the hydro-thermal vents on the ocean floor - are the Chirostylids, with their extremely elongated pincers, which are thought to have evolved by way of competitive mating, but it seems to me that these creatures have descended from survivors of an era when the world was volcanically volatile, and the longer one's pincers were, the better one's chances for survival lest one be exhumed by one's proximity to a spume of fatally hot geyser waters.

The specimen in the image below is of the New Zealand shallow-water squat lobster. Actually, that is a misnomer, as these species of squat lobster, called the Galatheids, of which he is Munida gregaria, are found at abyssal depths. They are so abundant that their spawn produces a "red tide" at times. I can just picture this fellow reaching into a hot plume for some tasty morsel not quite out of its reach.


Their numbers, not just their adaptation, suggest that these particular creatures were around long before the Earth cooled enough for surface life to emerge.

Hydro-thermal vents offer a dynamic environment for the highly specialized life forms that are found around them. The actual temperatures around a hydro-thermal vent are subject to constant change. Tube worms are abundant in these environments, helping to serve as markers for the vent openings. A tube worm might experience a 20 to 30 degree temperature gradient over the length of its body. The actual temperatures where these tube worms live vary anywhere from about 2 degrees to 30 degrees Centigrade or more above ambient temperatures, while the plume of water rising from a vent opening is super-heated to much greater temperatures. Extreme temperature variations are a function for evolutionary environmental adaptations and appear very likely to have endowed the squat lobster with its unique ability to survive in close proximity to water temperatures that can easily kill it.

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Alzheimer’s disease is preventable

A great deal of knowledge about Alzheimer’s disease has come to light as a result of intensive research over the last few years. Some sources estimate that about 50% of people who live longer than 80 years of age will probably develop the symptoms of Alzheimer’s.

More than just cognizance and awareness are affected by this insidious disease. The brain monitors and manages heart rhythm, breathing reflex, the immune response, and so on – in short, all of the transparent physiological and metabolic functions that keep us alive and healthy while we go about our business. People don’t necessarily die from Alzheimer’s directly. The disease causes the brain to malfunction in those areas. The normal communication between neurons and neuron networks are disrupted to the extent that their normal functions cease and the body steadily degenerates as a result, leaving it prone to complications from other causes like cancer.

There is hope, in the form of a particular type of vaccine produced by the Merck Company called Zostavax. Zostavax is a vaccine provided only to people over the age of 60 to protect against the development of shingles in mature adults. Shingles is a painful condition caused by the infection and subsequent deterioration of the myelin insulation which protects healthy nerves. A very common virus lies at the root of this condition.

Chicken pox, and later shingles, are caused by the Varicella zoster virus, or cold sore virus. Herpes zoster remains dormant in the roots of certain nerves and can be reactivated during times of stress. Anyone who has had chicken pox as a child is at very high risk for developing shingles in their maturity.

There are at least 8 viruses associated with the herpes family which can infect humans, of which the most common is the cold sore herpes virus called HSV1. HSV1 is carried by anyone who has had the chicken pox and/or who develops cold sores. That very likely includes almost everyone alive.

Recent studies at the University of Manchester of the brains of deceased Alzheimer’s patients have revealed the presence of HSV1 DNA in 90% of the amyloid plaques found in the affected brain areas. This fact points to a direct correlation between HSV1 and Alzheimer’s.

It follows that a good first line of prevention of Alzheimer’s disease is to treat any HSV1 infection with acyclovir, the anti-viral agent commonly prescribed for herpes. In older people, the best possible deterrent against the development of Alzheimer’s associated with the re-activation of the dormant HSV1 virus leading to shingles is to ask the doctor for the Zostavax vaccine as soon as one is past 60 years of age.

It is becoming apparent that vigilance in the application of preventive measures can probably prevent the onset of Alzheimer’s in people who might otherwise die because of it. I saw my mother go that way recently, and it is not pretty.

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125th post on this blog

Gratifying what one can find on the web if one is half-way inquisitive. I found this great little collection of rock and roll videos on a blog called red food coloring.

The Rolling Stones 1968

Rock on!

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Kaballahrama

Basically, Kabbalah is the study of the inner secrets of the Torah, which comprise the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Hebrew bible, and which happen to comprise the Old Testament of the Bible. Devout Jews and Christians alike believe those five books to be the direct word of God. Adherents to Kabbalah subscribe to the belief that God revealed secrets, including all those about creation and the true nature of the Godhead, to Adam, who is construed to be the first of God's Earth's human expressions.

The bible is rife with mystical experience – the miracles leading to the exodus, for example; the burning bush and the encounter with God on Mount Sinai. Jewish orthodox belief holds that Moses also accepted the Torah on Mount Sinai by divine inspiration, in addition to the Ten Commandments. This places a great mystical importance on the Old Testament to the occasional class of believers so inclined.

Kabbalists seek to understand the hidden meaning of the words of the Torah in the attempt to gain a closer understanding of that which Jewish orthodoxy believes cannot ever truly be understood – the very nature of God, and to perhaps derive some knowledge of the secrets behind the working of miracles, which are perceived as magic.

The revelation of the Pentateuch and the witness of those miracles by the ancients have imbued an almost irreconcilable curiosity in those who yearn to know more about occult things. This thirst for knowledge has persisted, ever since those times when Egypt was under the rule of the pharaoh Ramesses II, and when he acknowledged the great power of the slaves’ God who worked those miracles through Moses. Ramesses released them from their bondage as a result. Since then Kabbalah, in its original intent, which is to find out if it is possible for one of God's creations to do that at will, has become a legitimate area of study by rabbinical scholars. Those of whom who are devoted to it study the Torah for up to three hours a day.

It is probable that the entire history of the evolution of sorcery and witchcraft to the levels where they exist today in all their various manifestations have their origins in the witness of, and wondering about, all divine miracles. And about the mystery of creation, which Kabbalists have attempted to rationalize, and about which they have come to develop theory and hypotheses.

Out of their study of Kabbalah has come their limited knowledge of God – limited because God cannot be understood by human beings because we are too deficient in our capacities compared to him; that he encompasses the universe but that the universe does not encompass him; that creation is a manifestation, extension if you will, of his divine presence and that all matter and spirit are one with him. Curiously enough for their being a part of the same religion, some believe that matter did not exist before God - and yet others believe that matter did exist before God.

Over the centuries, it seems that the study of Kabbalah has seen as many interpretations by scholarly rabbis as there have been scholarly rabbis.

The Jewish Diaspora tended toward a decentralization of the rabbinical college, and this precluded their ever developing an integrated school of thought. As a result, many rabbinical scholars developed original interpretations and ideas concerning the Torah’s hidden secrets. In fact, over 2,000 years ago the hermetical scholar Ben Sira even warned against delving into esotericism, saying, “You shall have no business with secret things”.

It is thought that Kabbalah, as a field unto itself, actually has its beginnings during the middle ages and the Rennaisance. Rabbi Isaac Luria (1534–1572) is considered to be the most influential of the Kabbalist teachers, founder of an important school of mysticism whose understanding of the way of things linked man’s deeds to the secret processes of creation. He taught that through deed, the original order of the cosmos might be restored and that then the way of reality would unfold into the climactic coming of the Messiah. He taught mostly through oratory but his philosophy was expounded in numerous works by his disciple Hayim Vital.

The death of Rabbi Isaac Luria and his disciples left a void which a charismatic and controversial Kabbalah scholar by the name of Sabbatai Zevi (1626-1676) filled - to satisfy the public need for greater spiritual insight, a need made all the more profound by the chaos left by the pogroms of the Ukrainian Cossacks who massacred Jews and Roman Catholics alike, during the years 1648 to 1654. The Jewish masses were convinced that their “Jewish Messiah” had come. Zevi's meditations included mystical chants and incantations.

To the disillusionment of most Jews, Zevi became an apostate to Judaism. He converted to Islam to avoid execution by the Ottoman Sultan for plotting to conquer the world and rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem. The Sabbatinian movement retained some followers in Turkey, who concluded that his conversion was but a clever ploy to inspire Islamic followers into the way of the Jewish faith. There are Sabbatinian sects today.

The “Frankists” were followers of the pseudo-mystic Jacob Frank (1726-1791), a Kabbalist who eventually became an apostate to Judaism when he converted to Catholicism.

There are sects of Judaic Orthodoxy which maintain that idolatry is sinful, and yet the red string bracelet of Tamar’s first born twin (Genesis 38:28), placed there innocently so that the first named could be re-identified, has become a talisman to dilettantes. The thought among the more occult Kabbalists is that the red string bracelet wards off the evil eye. Apparently, Rachel's tomb was encircled by her devotees with a red string, and bracelets subsequently cut from it. Therein lies the tradition. Talismans are really just small idols.

Between the extremes of divine dignification and its antithesis, however that may be described, lies the gamut of all things pertaining to the supernatural, including superstition. The study of the Torah will continue, because the messages that can be read into them are virtually infinite in number, and they must be realized.

Underlying the real purpose of scriptural study is the establishment of a specialized adaptation to inspired epiphenies so that they manifest into the deeds from which civilization is ultimately hewn, insomuch as curiosity gives rise to invention.

It is acknowledged amongst all religions that there is much more to reality than meet the senses, and that we exist in but a narrow sliver of the entire spectrum of it, insomuch as we can see but a narrow detectable sliver of the range of frequencies that comprise the entire optical spectrum. That is the lure to which real students of Kabbalah are drawn.

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What it is that drives this world

The "disgraced media baron" Conrad Black (as he is described in the Toronto Star today) has written a poignant critique of the state of America's prison system, which he addressed to the editors of the Sunday Times of London. He should know what he is talking about. He is serving a six-and-a-half year sentence - for being the Canadian owner of American newspapers who had used a portion of his company's income to pay for personal expenses. I personally have a problem wrapping my head around the idea that that is a wrong thing to do, considering that he essentially owns those companies, but who am I to judge. Greedy people who also owned interests in his companies complained. They weren't getting their kickbacks, probably.

Anyway, Conrad states...

"US justice has become a command economy based on the avarice of private prison companies, a gigantic prison service industry and politically influential correctional officers' unions..."

It truly is a prison "system", and a very lucrative one at that, to the point where America incarcerates up to 12 times as many people on a per capita basis than do most other first-world nations. Many people are getting rich from that. What does that say for the concept of freedom?

It should be no mystery to anyone as to what it is that drives this world - some might say that it is money. By the end of Ronald Reagan's presidency, he had expanded the U.S. military budget by almost 45% over the total amount of military expenditures during the height of the Vietnam war. In 2008 the entire world will have spent US$1.47 trillion on military expenditures. Of that amount, US$1.05 trillion will have been spent by NATO countries and US$711 billion of that by America. Don't ask what America is doing in Iraq and Afghanistan. You don't spend money without getting something back for it.

Haliburton Corporation got something back for its huge investment in the Bush-Cheney campaign for the presidency, one that it was so determined to win that many question the legitimacy of the results. That company is the prime contractor for the rebuilding of post-war Iraq, and also for the construction of the all-important largest oil pipeline construction project yet undertaken, the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, which delivers crude oil from the vast reservoirs under the Caspian Sea to the West via Turkey's Mediterranean sea port. It was constructed in record time. Many construe that logically as America's reason for being there in the first place.

Many put the onus for the resolution of the current economic crisis squarely on the shoulders of the consumer. Wait, aren't those the same people sending their kids to die overseas in some conflict where the business of oil is really its prime underlying cause? Do you really blame the natives there for being upset that their country is being overrun by foreign interests before they themselves have a chance to exploit their own region's resources to benefit the area where they live? The lessons of Russia's exploitation of Afghanistan's oil resources to the extent that those fields are now completely dried up have obviously not been learned. There are only a few reasons for the restlessness of the natives there.

It is clearly evident that America is taking timely advantage of its technological and military superiority to undertake measures to maintain its lead as the world's biggest consumer of petroleum products. The evidence is everywhere, including in those statistics which reflect the ongoing popularity of big pickup trucks, as they continue to be the biggest selling private vehicles in the nation. They are gas guzzlers.

To be fair, it would appear that Conrad Black is just as guilty as the country he is discrediting, because what drives the world is greed, and that is why he is in prison, after all.

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Thoughts on god and the economy

Here’s what I see happening in the world today, and how I might resolve things if I were boss.

The old system of an elite rulership overlording its minions is folding over onto itself and consuming it.

Unfortunately, that “elite rulership” is slow to catch up. Most are not – give them credit – but some are. The real problem is that the governments of this world have more or less configured themselves around an old system which pays lip service to the elite while it continues to exploit the working classes. That was a way that worked once for the sake of progress and economic growth, often unbeknownst to the elite, but not anymore. In one manifestation, this results in massive government employment which has been largely responsible for creating a definable middle class.

Wars have been fought for personal gain at the expense of others. Case in point - Russia has made war for no other reason than to acquire tasty produce which it did not have, resulting in a dearth of that produce wherever they campaigned for them - the Balkans, actually, and Afghanistan. The Russians are not to be blamed. They are just an example.

The current global economic situation can best be resolved by way of a paradigm shift of such proportions as cannot be readily appreciated.

By way of example, the common belief in a god who existed before anything else, and who created the Universe, is not just untenable, it is ludicrous. The point is, that so long as people have something to believe in which can never be verified or proved, then they continue to be happy to believe in it, and all is fine and dandy. When truth is realized, as a rule, people are happy to believe in it until they bore of it, and then move on to something else. My guess is that no-one who believes in this god will ever be unreconciled. Therein lies a great example of paradox theory.

That does not mean that god does not exist.

According to my education, humankind is made in the image of a god in which he or she is compelled to believe. But my range of perception is limited to a very narrow range of all the frequencies within the bandwidth of that spectrum which encompasses all. In fact, the perception of my visible optical range comprises just a small sliver of the entire optical spectrum. Even birds see more than I do. The same applies to my other four senses.

The concept of ‘other dimensions’ of reality must be appreciated within a rational context of limitations. There is no possibility of other dimensions existing with their own three dimensions of being, any more than there are any “other universes out there”. That makes no sense. The concept of other dimensions should be construed as the addition of parameters to the practical dimensional realm of this one three dimensional reality wherein creation has become manifest, because it is the only one in which it can manifest.

Therefore: the fact that a spiritual realm exists cannot be doubted by virtue of all the recorded experiences which provide the genuine proof of its existence, including my very own experiences. I must conclude that, within the entire spectrum of being, the spiritual realm co-exists with this physical realm wherein we find ourselves, which in totality constitutes reality.

As I see it, the lord of that higher spiritual realm - or god, as we have come to know him - is a very highly evolved and almost inconceivably complex being whose evolution predates ours by many millions, perhaps billions of years, and who has found a way to evict the physical limitations of his corporeal being, yet retain the identity of the self which is his spirit, and who has learned how to maintain it for perpetuity. That is a paramount technological achievement.

Not many can accept such an adjustment in the thinking of their beliefs. Such is the nature of a paradigm shift. It requires readjustment.

All of which brings me to the point of my discourse on the current global economic situation. As I see it, probably, phase two of the global economic future will see the large institutions that are bailing out the smaller ones over the current crisis fail, by over-extending themselves.

A drastic re-assessment of what we believe in the way that things have been done in the past is called for. It may very well be that a bizarre eclectic mix of all the tried politico-economic systems of the past must be implemented globally - a combination of socialism, capitalism, communism, democratic internationalism – what have you, so that we can guarantee economic security for everyone for perpetuity. All it takes is a bit of sacrifice. We, none of us, can continue to pursue the “American Dream” without a huge trade-off in material losses. Paradox, again.

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