Month: August 2019

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One Statement and Two Questions

August 31, 2019

From 1960 through 1985, the Soviet Union had the second largest economy in the world. Russia’s economy in 2019 ranks 12th, sandwiched between Spain and South Korea. Even adding back the other former Soviet states wouldn’t cause it to break the top 10. The past thirty years in the former Soviet Union have seen the greatest transfer, or disappearance, of wealth in human history.

Question 1: Where did the money go?

Question 2: Why are so many leaders in the West behaving like puppets with a hand up their back when asked simply to do what’s best for their countries and the planet?

MOE

Mi.I.C.H – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Tory Negotiating Strategy

August 31, 2019

Having sold Brexit to the public on the basis that the slimy continentals have been eating the British lunch for decades, the best thing to do now is nothing. Simply wait until they come crawling back to the table with exactly the deal 10 Downing Street wants: all the benefits of membership with none of the costs or obligations.

After all, the EU wouldn’t let their chief benefactor, prime mark and choicest victim slip away. Would they?

Clock is ticking down, Tusk. Better hurry. Say Uncle!

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Dissolve the Senate!

August 31, 2019

BoJo = Genius. We don’t need no stinking Parliaments.

Minor miscalculation. The UK, it turns out, is not entirely an island. This complicates casting off lines and steaming away from the continent as planned. There is a land border with another EU member country. Who knew?

The solution is simple. Dig a moat between Northern Ireland and Ireland to make the geography more the way its was imagined by Nigel, Boris and company. Deep thinkers all.

MOE

M.I.C.H – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Radioactive Rain

August 31, 2019

Dementia? Perish the thought.

We could buy all of Greenland for the rare earth minerals. This would save us having to buy just the rare earth minerals themselves, which would be embarrassing because the owners have been our friends and allies for centuries.

We could nuke Hurricane Dorian. A radioactive storm surge is just what Mar-A-Lago needs.

Suggestion: We could also nuke Greenland to speed up melting and thereby accelerate access to the rare earth minerals.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Rosalind Franklin Mars Rover

August 27, 2019

As press releases for the new Euro Mars rover come out, we see the question “Who was Rosalind Franklin?”

The answer is short and easy:

She was the woman who took pictures of the structure of DNA so that Watson and Crick could discover it.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Step 3 – Never Presume To Know The Mind Of God

Sunday August 25, 2019

You would think that this one simple act of humility would be the thing all religions could agree on. But the opposite is true. Each creed stakes itself out as the one which knows the mind of God.

May we point out that if a God exists – and that is a big if – it is clearly not trying to communicate with us. Therefore, we would not expect to know its mind. In an earlier post we gave a reason why that might be.

Since Chipotle or Burger King can easily reach us anytime and anywhere they please about a new menu offering, we must assume that an all powerful creator is not trying to reach us. If it were, we would expect to see and hear the message, outside, in the street, through our eyes and ears – since by all-powerful we do not mean stronger than dirt, we mean able to blow out all the stars in all the galaxies in the universe like so many candles on a cake. This presumes such an entity could at least engage Ogilvy, Google, WPP or Omnicom to get us a message.

And no, Dora, God is not talking to you. That little voice in your head is just the way it sounds when you are thinking, but not out loud. We all carry on an internal conversation.

And no, Rodney, such an entity is not communicating with us via ancient texts. That would be beyond pathetic and way not all-powerful. See last Sunday’s post.

So the silence is filled by sacerdotal arrogance and manipulation:

Parishioner: What does God want me to do?

Priest: I’ll go in the back room and ask. Wait here.

Parishioner: What did he say? (always a he)

Priest: He said you should do exactly as I say.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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On The Passing Of An Oligarch

August 23, 2019

It would be good if people stopped referring to people as having “a net worth of $….”

A person’s maximum net worth is 1.0 – one human soul. As wealth increases, it becomes harder and harder to exceed 0.5.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Step 2 – Beware of Those Bearing Ancient Texts

Sunday August 18, 2019

Step 2 in our quest for a religion which doesn’t require us to pretend anything has to do with jettisoning ancient texts. What follows goes for any of them but focuses on the central text of Christianity, because that is the writer’s religious tradition.

If ever confronted with the common evangelical question Do you accept the Wholly Buy-Bull as the Authoritative and Inerrant Word of Gawd?, it is very important to answer No, of course not. Why would I?

Here’s why you wouldn’t.

First. Jesus didn’t have a Bible and Christianity got along just fine without one. Take those paintings of Jesus holding the Holy Bible in the crook of his arm and file them along with other anachronisms, such as presidential statements about founding fathers securing airports during the American Revolution. Centuries separated the life of Jesus of Nazareth and anything bound on the left remotely like a Holy Bible.

The things generally required for a member of the Christian faith to believe are listed in two similar and compact creeds, known as the Apostles’ and Nicene. Neither contains anything like “I believe in the Holy Bible, the authoritative and inerrant word of God.”

Second. The Bible doesn’t ask us to accept it as Authoritative, Inerrant, or the Word of God. Those claims are made for it, not by it. Although he’s the most often quoted source for the holiness of the Bible (having written as a sideline that all scripture is inspired by God), what would Paul say at a modern church service upon hearing the Reading of the Epistle? He’d probably jump up and shout “Hey, that’s not the Word of God, that’s just taken from one of my letters!” One man’s correspondence is another man’s scripture.

Bible is a word meaning book. The Bible is a type of book called an anthology, or collection of books. There are two versions in common circulation and they don’t contain the same number of books. So much for authoritative. Authorship of the individual books is not generally a mystery. The names of the authors are on many. None claims to be the Book of God. Some of the more important books, the Gospels, differ on central issues – such as what day Jesus was crucified. There goes inerrant.

Belief in the holiness of ancient texts is simply idolatry in literary garb and needs to be called out as such. Invisible gods are a hard sell, ask any missionary, so tangible talismans come in handy. The Bible and the Cross are the two most powerful talismans in Christianity. If you find yourself falling off a cliff and can only grab one, grab the Cross. In it may be your salvation (more on this in a future post). The other is just a book.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Step 1.1 Thy will be done on Earth…by chance

August 17, 2019

From the scientists:

It is clear that chance is operative in the World as an ordinary state of affairs.

For the religionists:

Even the Lord’s Prayer directly implies that God’s Will is not operative in the World as an ordinary state of affairs.

Otherwise, why would anyone have to pray for that to be the case?

So Science and Religion, at least Christianity, should agree about the centrality of chance. They should also agree about the absence of God’s Will as a natural force in the Universe.

Nothing happens for a reason – unless we make it happen for a reason. Therefore, never justify personal action as being what God “wants”. Nobody knows what that might be, if anything.

Haiku to the New Haiku

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Of Briefcases and Walls

August 16, 2019

How is it that a briefcase can be heavier on both sides at the same time?

We place the briefcase against the wall. It falls away.

We turn it around. It falls away.

How can a briefcase be heavier on both sides at once? Is there a repelling force? Science gives no clear explanation for this common phenomenon.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity