Free Will

Free Will

I’ve been thinking about the idea of human feelings and emotions being ‘biochemical algorithms’ developed over millions of years on the East African savannahs as defined by Yuval Noah Harari in his book, Sapiens.

It certainly leads to the conclusion that there is no such thing as ‘free will’, just another human myth to try and explain the only two functions that scientists are beginning to acknowledge, deterministic evolution through natural selection and the apparent statistical randomness of the universe, which preclude any such concept as ‘free will’.

When I look back over my life, contemplating, meditating on its course and the decisions that have supposedly led me to my current position, I honestly can’t see that any other decisions than the ones I made were truthfully, factually open to me.

I know that there are those who will claim my complete agency and responsibility for those decisions. But, the longer I live, open myself to and see the reality around me, the more I doubt the idea of ‘free will’, that in truth, all our decisions could be mapped out by an AI agent, given enough data, biochemical, psychological, external, could predict every single decision I or anyone else would ever make.

Therefore, ‘free will’ is a myth (IMHO). You are certainly entitled to your own opinion on the matter…

–LE

Eternal Now

 

Eternal Now

To paraphrase Carlin

Now doesn't really exist

Merely the intersection 

Of future and past

Here it comes..

Wait, it's almost here

Not yet…

Now?

Nope, it's already gone

Here it comes again…

But 

It's the future that

Doesn't exit

Merely a hoped-for 

Potential, 

An assumption

Of continuation 

And the past is

Only a story of what has

Passed through

The eternal present 

Only a pattern of

Neurons strung together

Temporarily until

Those patterns dissolve

Into the Void as

The essence of our

Perceptions also

Dissolves into that same

Void from which our

Constituent essences 

Continually recycled in

The Eternal

Now

–LE

Temporarily Etched On The Ground

Identity

 Identity 

All human Identify is

Based on stories

Stories we tell ourselves

Based on the stories

Handed down to us

Since the beginning of

Human communication 

It's how we establish

Our reality

These stories are based

On the selective information

We call 'facts'

Our vested interests intact

Since there are no such things

As 'facts'

Just perspectives

Agreed to by

Humans in charge

The 'winners'

So to speak

But

In spite of the overall

General stories

We each have our own

Individual stories too

Just as 'fact-free' as

The general ones

Merely perspectives

Guiding the rendering of

Our masks

What we want or

Expect others to see

Protects our vulnerabilities 

Our true realities 

We are human

After all

-LE 

The Primordial Ooze

The Primordial Ooze

the darkness is
growing and I'm old
so what to do
one thing only
fight the growing
dark strike a spark
a match a candle
light a bonfire

spark it
wherever opportunity
presents tinder
make daily choices
that brighten not
darken our
collective
futures

don't be deceived
all actions have
costs impact
ever brighter
futures or breed
dark superstitions
reverse evolution
sliding back into the

primordial ooze

--LE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Early Onset Dementia --LE - Ink (Micron Pens)
on Multimedia Paper 8x8"

SS & Medi-dare

 SS & Medi-dare

SS retired - required - inspired
just plain tired - almost expired
expiration date all up to fate
emancipated  and medicated
perhaps need bruja-ha
or shaman help truer

SS short-shrift - left adrift
SS sucking sound as
austerity abounds - moving
wealth by fiat to leach-class
warehouses for the greed
brokers and their want-a-bees

medicare not really there
less money for private
providers pirate connivers
no vision nor dental -
no meds less parts
C thru Z - extra fees

Where's my bruja?

--LE

 

            VA Parking Lot

Last-minute Message for a Time Capsule...

To continue with yesterday's ending theme...

Last-Minute Message for a Time Capsule

By Philip Appleman

I have to tell you this, whoever you are:
that on one summer morning here, the ocean
pounded in on tumbledown breakers,
a south wind, bustling along the shore,
whipped the froth into little rainbows,
and a reckless gull swept down the beach
as if to fly were everything it needed.
I thought of your hovering saucers,
looking for clues, and I wanted to write this down,
so it wouldn't be lost forever --
that once upon a time we had
meadows here, and astonishing things,
swans and frogs and luna moths
and blue skies that could stagger your heart.
We could have had them still,
and welcomed you to earth, but
we also had the righteous ones
who worshipped the True Faith, and Holy War.
When you go home to your shining galaxy,
say that what you learned
from this dead and barren place is
to beware the righteous ones.

from New and Selected Poems,1956-1996
University of Arkansas Press, 1996

Philip Appleman, a Foundation member, is also the author of six earlier books of poetry, three novels, and several nonfiction books. His third edition of the Norton Critical Edition of Darwin was published this year and he is editing a new edition on Malthus. He is married to playwright and poet Marjorie Appleman and is distinguished Professor Emeritus of English at Indiana University.

With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.--Steven Weinberg

Time for a new Paradigm

What are the main problems in the world? Could they be the poverty of vast portions of the planet? Or perhaps you think it's disease, or the scarcity of food for all but the richest nation-states of the planet, or even a lack of jobs? Why does such a small portion (1%) own or control the vast majority of the worlds resources, energy, and production? Is this “meant” to be? Is there some divine law that mandates it? Or is this the “Social Conditioning” that we've all had to suffer with, kowtow to, since the feudal doctrine of the “Divine Right of Kings” that was foisted upon us, along with all it's variation over the millennia, like Capitalism, Socialism, Communism, Fascism, Marxism, and etc. They are all of the same ilk, just shuffling the basic components of the systems: money, property, government. Why should the resources and arable land of our planet, which is in reality the birthright of all of us be subject to the will of only a few individuals or governments?

The truth is that we are socially conditioned to accept it as “natural,” the way it has always been and will always be, because it is in the vested interest of those in power to keep us all accepting their power, as if it's their “divine right.” They are trying to hang on to a paradigm that has favored them since it's inception. And that's no accident. The problem is that their paradigm has also led us to economic collapse, and even to possible collapse of the planets ability to sustain human life, except for a very (privileged) few... the same ones who own or control most of the resources of our planet.

Social and financial stratification is not inevitable, but an intentional strategy for keeping the vast majority under control, and scrambling to barely feed and clothe themselves while those in the upper strata claim ever more and more for themselves.

Time for a new paradigm. Not sure what that is yet, but am currently looking and interested in the Zeitgeist and Venus projects. I'm not totally convinced yet, but am very interested in the concepts. They are certainly better than anything we've tried up to now. It's a new paradigm, and nothing is perfect, and since it hasn't been tried, some questions can't be answered until it is tried. For now I'm keeping my mind open. Certainly, the old paradigm hasn't worked for the vast majority of humanity!

http://www.thezeitgeistmovement.com/
http://www.thevenusproject.com/

A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything. --Friedrich Nietzsche

All things are subject to interpretation; whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth. --Friedrich Nietzsche