Research into A.I. has to some degree surpassed human calculating capacity. Problem solving with speed and accuracy has enabled computing power sufficient for computers to beat world champions at Chess and Go, and can even compete with professionals at games like Poker. However clever and able robots with state of the art artificial intelligence may get, their human creator’s are going to struggle to move them into areas which make humans humane. They may in the future begin to perceive the world around them as we do, even though this is a vast problem to solve. And solving it could create a nightmare scenario.
Another great problem is human motility. Compare a ballet dancer or a gymnast to a robot and they are seemingly far apart in ability. However much greater are those areas of human behaviour which are most important to us: love, consciousness, self awareness, empathy, value and belief systems, the aesthetic appreciation of beauty and so on. About some of these science is still in the dark ages of understanding.
Just take one of the above: holding a value or belief. These can be so strong that a person may be prepared to sacrifice their life. A human being is designed to look after itself, and yet it is capable of self sacrifice, giving up its own self interest entirely. Humans will voluntarily get together to risk their lives for others, doctors, police, mountain rescue teams, firefighters, RNLI, the list could go on and on. An A.I. could be programmed to do such things, but placing a value system in a robot could lead to a million pound artificial human committing suicide because it had failed to do some small task properly; like pouring a teaspoonful of sugar into a cup and stirring an invalid patient’s tea. This is its reason to exist, to keep the patient happy, and it has failed. Given a simple conscience this machine could breakdown. If it could feel any depth of shame it might seek to end its existence. A value system is extremely difficult to moderate. How much value do we place on a thing or an objective or an idea. A.I. is admittedly a marvel of invention. A project which has consumed vast amounts of finance, ingenuity and computing power to make them operate as they do; but they are still nothing close to even mimicking humanity. I am not suggesting this is a primary aim, but it gets close to it. Its imaginary fulfilment is conjured up in the film industry in multiple forms, some good, some bad, so positively evil. Who knows what may happen. A competition is certainly on to beat humans in areas where A.I. has the potential to do so.
The complexity involved in creating an artificial human is immense. And yet what about considering the model upon which AI is being developed? My point is this, if the most intelligent of the most intelligent species on earth has over the last seventy years got this far, and is still on the lower slopes of Everest in replicating something even remotely close to fully human, then what kind of intelligence produced ordinary examples of this phenomena like you and I?
Much of this website is concerned with questions: Logical or Illogical, God or no God, Creator or no Creator, Design or no Design. Normal or Abnormal, Natural or Unnatural, Good or Bad, Wise or Unwise, Progressive or Regressive, True or False, Possible or Impossible and so on, and on…
Logical thinking is to think on the basis of knowledge, what we know, and certainties, what we can prove. A Lego brick is a designed object and as soon as you look at it you realise by its structure that it is intended to be linked to other pieces similarly designed. If it is bought new from a toy shop you will get it in a box, and inside a selection of Lego parts wrapped in a clear plastic packet. On opening this you discover an instruction leaflet telling you how to put the pieces together, to make the object illustrated on the box: the truck and trailer. The instructions are the key to building the object accurately, leaving no spare pieces over.
From all that information you deduce not only that every part has been designed, but designed for a purpose. It is on display to entice a prospective customer, provide an income for the Lego corporation and pleasure to the child who receives it. We all understand these principles very well; most of us have at some time in our lives been involved at every level of this process. We apply parts of this logic in one way or another most days of our lives, even if it is as mundane as going to Costa or Starbucks to have a sit down and a cup of coffee. You can take any point in this process and work logically to prove that thought and design and purpose are always apparent. Even the young child is aware that the truck was intended to be played with. He or she might get this wrong and think a power drill was made for the same purpose, but would be correct in thinking it exists to fulfil a purpose. This intuition is increased when the instruction leaflet which makes sense of the many apparently random pieces is opened. We now know for sure that these will combine to make a three dimensional truck and trailer identical to the illustration on the box. All of that should convince even the greatest of sceptics that it was designed. Obvious? In the case of the Lego yes, but not necessarily so in all cases. Most people in the Western World have been taught to make an illogical exception to this universal rule. To think that you and I, who also came with a specified instruction code called DNA, somehow arose from a process of purposeless chance, guided by nothing more that a hit or miss process called natural selection. For all these reasons to argue that design was not a vital component of everything that exists is counter intuitive. It is difficult in nature to find a single thing which is pointless or without function.
Below is a brilliantly conceived counter argument to designed by God or gods, from Carl Sagan. It is so well done that I can both applaud it and reject it with complete peace of mind. Nonsense in the face of evidence does not become sense just because it is well wrapped, clever and beautifully delivered by an expert. It sounds good while it skims over the surface of what is known about God, science, design, morality, consciousness and nature.
There is one comment of Sagan which I totally agree with: “We have a talent for deceiving ourselves.”
There is a truth that even Sagan might have admitted. Not one of us has a greater need to deceive ourself than an atheist who has taken an intellectual punt on their being no Designer or Creator of the Universe, the Earth and You and I.
I looked up internet lists of the Most Influential Scientists, Past and Present. Johannes Kepler was 9th on one of the lists. A German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer; a key figure in the 17th-century scientific revolution, best known for his laws of planetary motion. His writings provided one of the foundations for Newton’s theory of universal gravitation. As I read through quotes attributed to him I thought that this man was more than a scientist, he seemed to have the instincts of a poet and philosopher as well. In modern terms he could be thought an eccentric genius, since he interested himself in astrology, believing the motions of the planets had their effects on earth. At times it seemed as if he were a prophet, speaking into our age, seen it in his mind’s eye and comprehended its character. As if he knew where we were headed. He more than believed in God he was devoted to God. All the following quotes of his are in italics.
The chief aim of all investigations of the external world should be to discover the rational order and harmony which has been imposed on it by God and which He revealed to us in the language of mathematics.
The laws of physics. Where do they come from, and why do they have the form that they do? The answer to those questions are we do not know and have no means to find out. They are simply beyond us, a solution so remote it must feel like a centuries long silent scream of frustration. Traditionally, scientists have just accepted that the laws of physics were elegant mathematical equations originally imprinted on the universe at its birth, and fixed thereafter.
Nature uses as little as possible of anything.
Unlike man, nature uses clean energy to power all its systems. Adenosine triphosphate (ATP) is considered by biologists to be the energy currency of life. It is the high-energy molecule that stores the energy we need to do just about everything we do.
When ships to sail the void between the stars have been built, there will step forth men to sail these ships.
Kepler had the foresight to anticipate space travel and space ships.
If God himself has waited six thousand years for someone to contemplate his works, my book can wait for a hundred.
He believed the Earth was young, thousands rather than billions of years. Evolutionary theory requires millions and billions of years before the theory can even hypothetically work. Long before radiometric dating was invented, scientists believed in long ages. It was an article of Faith and had nothing to do with science and everything to do with necessity.
Without proper experiments I conclude nothing.
Richard Feynman, one of the great scientists of the 20th century gives a talk on this subject which is humorous, to the point and true. Don’t make your conclusions before you have solid evidence. Because if you do this you are locked in to your publicly stated position and therefore liable to defend both it and your reputation at almost any cost. Human nature is not overridden by the call of truth. Pontius Pilate washed his hands of a man he knew to be innocent, and Jesus was taken from his presence to be crucified.
…for a long time I wanted to become a theologian… now, however, behold how through my efforts God is being debated in astronomy.
It has taken the modern age to throw out the only rational solution to the design apparent throughout nature and the cosmos. God was not apparent to Kepler just because he was a bible believing Christian, but because what he saw and what he knew spoke most eloquently of a Creator. One of a beauty and an intelligence of which we can just about faintly comprehend. And that only because we are made in his image and likeness.
Why waste words? Geometry existed before the Creation, is co-eternal with the mind of God, is God himself (what exists in God that is not God himself?): geometry provided God with a model for the Creation and was implanted into man, together with God’s own likeness – and not merely conveyed to his mind through the eyes.
Freeman Dyson FRS (born 15 December 1923) a British-American theoretical physicist and mathematician speaks on this matter of invented mathematical equations being found to exist in the cosmos.
He who will please the crowd and for the sake of the most ephemeral renown will either proclaim those things which nature does not display or even will publish genuine miracles of nature without regard to deeper causes is a spiritually corrupt person…
There are plenty of celebrity scientists, some like Richard Dawkins who appear never to have done an experiment or engineered anything, but who nevertheless speaks as if he knows everything. He represents the truth of above quote to the letter. He has proclaimed those things which nature does not display, such as scientific proof of evolution, and will speak and publish about genuine miracles of nature without regard to any deeper cause than that proposed by Darwin and its later incarnation Neo-Darwinism.
Great is God our Lord, great is His power and there is no end to His wisdom. Praise Him you heavens, glorify Him, sun and moon and you planets. For out of Him and through Him, and in Him are all things….. We know, oh, so little. To Him be the praise, the honour and the glory from eternity to eternity.
A hymn of praise which would be replicated by large numbers of PhD scientists working and publishing today, who believe exactly as Kepler did. An example being James Tour.
As soon as somebody demonstrates the art of flying, settlers from our species of man will not be lacking on the moon and Jupiter… Given ships or sails adapted to the breezes of heaven, there will be those who will not shrink from even that vast expanse.
There is about 350 years separating Kepler’s prediction and the 1969 landing on the Moon and a spacecraft to Jupiter in 2003.
The diversity of the phenomena of nature is so great, and the treasures hidden in the heavens so rich, precisely in order that the human mind shall never be lacking in fresh nourishment.
I believe that concluding comment is true. Creation exists for two primary reasons: to show the reach and creative power of God and to demonstrate how much he loves the only beings on earth gifted with consciousness and the inclination to praise and worship.
Could Earth be not only the unique and privileged planet that gave birth and protection to life but one that occupies a significant place in the universe. A place denied by one of the most revered principles in science: the Copernican Principle.
Nicholas Copernicus was a great scientist who is credited with destroying the once assumed position of the earth at the centre of everything. He proposed the sun as being the axis around which everything revolved. One of the greatest principles of science is the Copernican Principle. It stands as a major pillar of modern science. A view of the cosmos once based on biblical principles has long since rid itself of the thought that God had made everything and placed the earth at its centre. Modern cosmology assumes the Copernican principle, which observes that the universe appears the same in all directions from the vantage point of Earth. Once this is accepted then we can also infer that the universe, seen on the large scale, is much the same everywhere. In other words a centrally placed object becomes meaningless, since there is no centre. The Earth and its Sun and its galaxy are no more significant than any of the other countless billions of galaxies stars and planets. In the overall scheme of things we are just as Carl Sagan famously described us: “a pale blue dot” in a vast arena. His comment was made on the basis of a photo taken from Voyager 1 on February 14th 1990. His speech is worth hearing.
If you found this video online you would see the following hand written comment just beneath the picture of Sagan. It reads: “In order to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe.” That is a very profound and pin point accurate remark. To explain the apple pie we must first explain the universe which allows the ingredients to exist, be selected and gathered, the pie to be put together and then baked for the requisite time. None of this is simple or easy to explain. The reason being that the pie requires a human to do all the actions necessary. And a human, like the universe is believed to have evolved by chance. Design and purpose are naturally ruled out in the case of the apple pie’s maker, but naturally ruled in for the apple pie. How so and why? Good questions!
Between them, Copernicus, Sagan, and the many others during the interim reduced the earth to just a microdot on a stage so vast that no-one can accurately calculate it. In summary the Copernican Principle states that humans are not privileged observers of the universe. In other words the principle has been used to put the earth in its very modest place. And alongside this assumption there was another; God as Creator of the universe was deposed leaving a great void soon filled firstly by scepticism regarding first causes and secondly the rise of atheism in all scientific disciplines. It may come as a surprise that atheism is a belief system, no different to any other. That it holds its place as being above criticism and having ended superstition is a script written essentially in the same language as religious texts by secular priests and scribes like Dawkins, Dennett and Nye. In my view Copernicus has been cheated, a great man used as an instrument to advance an atheistic, godless view of science. Why? so we can be told that we are nothing much, neither favoured nor blessed; we just got lucky in a celestial sweepstake. There are however problems, the first being Copernicus himself. Here are a few quotes which suggest he was a devout believer in God, and he had a virtue rarely seen and heard nowadays: humility.
“For I am not so enamoured of my own opinions that I disregard what others may think of them.
“To know the mighty works of God, to comprehend His wisdom and majesty and power; to appreciate, in degree, the wonderful workings of His laws, surely all this must be a pleasing and acceptable mode of worship to the Most High…”
“The universe was built for us by the best and most orderly workman of all.”
“How exceedingly fine is the godlike work of the best and greatest artist.”
A workman has practical knowledge of building and creating and an artist has an appreciation of beauty and the capacity to create it in a vast array of mediums. Copernicus uses the words workman and artist with reference to God. At the conclusion of God’s creative acts it is said He rested from his work: looked at it and declared it as very good. It has taken modern evolutionary science and atheist philosophers to study all of creation and attribute it to blind, random, purposeless, directionless chance. While biologists, zoologists, anthropologists, geologists endorse this view, many mathematicians and physicists look at the evidence in the heavens and its governing laws and call it bewilderingly fine tuned; almost as if we humans were the recipients of a Goldilocks experience. Gifted a habitable planet like earth so that life in all its abundance and variety could live upon it in a fully functioning, mutually beneficial Eco system. One only made possible by a seemingly unique wrap around atmosphere. If Copernicus had been left alone to formulate the principle which bears his name it may have read very differently.
Big news that hit the headlines a couple of years ago and which for a while rocked the scientific world has become far less public of late. Its initial reverberations tossed the cosmological principle around causing consternation among cosmologists and even theoreticians like Lawrence Krauss. This unorthodox threat was dramatically described as the Axis of Evil. It involved space probe data readings for what is called the Cosmic Microwave Background. What is believed to be the residual afterglow from the initial Big Bang. This vast explosion of something out of nothing is supposed to have kicked the entire universe into being. This theory came to prominence in the late 1920’s. Then came the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) a NASA Explorer mission that launched in June 2001. Other probes followed around the same time, including the Sloan Digital Sky Survey which mapped the visible stars seen from the Earth and revealed that we seemed to be at, or near the axis or centre of the known universe. This extremely unwelcome discovery, the affirmation of galaxy mapping over two decades seemed to revise modern science’s view that the Earth is nothing special regarding its location.
NASA’s Planck probe which began in 2009 was able to fully map an image of the known universe. One NASA picture showed an arrow at the bottom left of a digitally enhanced galaxy map pointing out that the Earth is at the centre of everything, which harmonised with the Sloan Survey which showed galaxies seemed to be a meticulously aligned, in a loose form of geometric web around Earth. The Sloan Digital Sky Survey image was published on the cover of the New Scientist magazine a few years ago. I cannot show the image for copyright reasons. The photo showed a huge array of galaxy clusters arranged in a clear pattern of concentric rings around a centre, at which point was said to be the earth. The following is from Wikipedia.
“The “Axis of Evil” is a name given to an anomaly in astronomical observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). The anomaly appears to give the plane of the Solar System and hence the location of Earth a greater significance than might be expected by chance, a result which appears to run counter to expectations from the Copernican Principle.
This is all much too complex for me to describe, so I will introduce the response of Lawrence Krauss to explain it all in measured scientific language devoid of emotion and hype. Or to be honest, loaded with emotion and hype.
He is quoted as follows in a 2006 Edge.org article:
“But when you look at CMB map, you also see that the structure that is observed, is in fact, in a weird way, correlated with the plane of the earth around the sun. Is this Copernicus coming back to haunt us? That’s crazy. We’re looking out at the whole universe. There’s no way there should be a correlation of structure with our motion of the earth around the sun – the plane of the earth around the sun – the ecliptic. That would say we are truly the centre of the universe.”
The Axis of Evil demonstrated many strange and unaccountable alignments relating to the ecliptic, the Earth along its equator and on its axis which would put the Earth near the centre of the known universe. All of this seems to indicate that there is a level of design involved which goes beyond what can easily be explained, other than by God of course. All these problems were dealt with in the classic manner. Close down the debate, never mention it again and hide the entire matter under more pressing and fresh news. This procedure is well known in politics, bury a contentious issue by releasing it on a news day when something dramatic is happening elsewhere. I doubt if Krauss even thinks about the Axis of Evil anymore, let alone has nightmares about it.
If you want more information about the annoyance caused by the centrality of the earth controversy then look up Edwin Hubble, Red Shifts and his reaction to the fact that everything he observed through his telescope seemed to be moving away from the Earth at great speed. He described this as “intolerable” and a “horror”. A very strange reaction to your own data. Please check it out on the Internet. But in brief, Hubble found evidence that all galaxies were moving away from us and that the universe was expanding. This was observed as a red shift in a galaxy’s or in a quasars spectrum. The further away the galaxy the greater the wavelength red-shift. This led to the doctrine that these red-shifted galaxies were speeding away from us faster than those located closer to us. The greater the red shift the greater the velocity and distance. However, the fact that everything seemed to going away from our earth-bound viewpoint, from any direction you pointed your telescope was disconcerting. To a simple person it looked like evidence for us being in a central location.
This article highlights two areas of confusion and both are problematic.
The LGBTQ issue is a problem. People of my generation find it difficult to adapt because it transgresses every concept of normality we were taught both at home and at school. Primarily by people we trusted: those in authority, parents and teachers. To many of us this confusion over sexual identity is madness in the truest sense of the word. A partly contrived problem, concerning a tiny minority of the population who have gathered a prominence and momentum, hyped up and out of all proportion to its real significance. In saying that I am not attempting to minimise the impact this has on individuals. I think that should be taken seriously. Those enduring gender confusion must be treated with the same respect and kindness and skill as any other person finding life difficult. But if a largely psychological problem, gender confusion was designated a medical disorder before changed by political pressure to the less loaded term: dysphoria. When I see it driven to near the top of our political and social concerns by ideologues who distort reality, I along with many others get concerned. I will not go on about it as other articles deal with the matter in more detail. This is just a curtain raiser and an introduction. The issue I believe is one of identification, and not so much of gender. We have a problem that ought to be faced head on, but we cannot do that for reasons which are close to applying gagging orders against those of us who would say stop. Look at the whole thing again from the beginning. Examine its roots and its history and ask real questions about whether or not gender reassignment therapy, puberty blocking chemicals for adolescents, and surgery when requested are appropriate responses to what may well be, as suggested above,caused by other factors which may even be as shallow as peer pressure or the latest celebrity endorsed fashion. It is now known that all sorts of pressures are being applied, pushing troubled young people, some autistic, into taking life changing decisions.
Hate crimes have been introduced to the political and social arena, and they pose a threat to anyone brave or stupid enough to express concern, criticism or just plain old fashioned opinions. Two thousand years ago these new laws would have had a different appearance. Like a pride of hungry lions circling a huddled group of persecuted dissidents. Those who would not fall to their knees and bow to the craziness and corruption of imperial rule. Today those who want to protest against so called progressive trends feel afraid. And that is not an exaggerated fear and nor is it unwarranted.
Below is a talk given to a gathering of the concerned in Canada. The speaker lays out the issue clearly, calmly and with authority.
The second issue, also elaborated on in other articles is that of Islam. A religion which has supporters far removed from the fanatics, and this makes confronting the matter all the more difficult. These advocates are intelligent, in positions of power and influence and argue their case cogently. Their objective is to put a positive impression on Islam along with invoking a sense that it needs legal protections and oppressed victim status. Those who see Islam as a problem are quickly stigmatised as Islamophobes. In 2015 a conservative councillor tweeted the following.
“Islam is like alcoholism. The first step to recovery is admit you have a problem.”
That surprisingly incendiary remark caused the perpetrator, Mr Lamb, first to apologise for his misdemeanour and later resign as a member of the Conservative Party. There is according to Baroness Warsi growing signs of Islamophobia in her party. She was the first Muslim woman to have a seat at the Cabinet table, and claimed there was a “deep-rooted problem” in the party. Well if the above remark is a sign of Islamophobia, then how would any kind of remark expressing negative concern about the Muslim community avoid being called Islamophobic? Mr Lamb’s comment was essentially mild in tone, saying nothing more than there is a problem which needs addressing. An observation which is obviously true. Opinion Polls confirm this fact.
One of the reasons is that the Quran preaches jihad against the kafir: the infidel. That is anyone who is not a Muslim: an unbeliever, a pagan, a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Christian or a Jew. And Europe knows from experience it is a target of Jihad. Why is the preaching of that creed, which is based in Islam’s holy book, not hate speech? The Bible has been similarly accused, but is much the more likely candidate under current political opinion to be formally classified as hate literature. Jihad of whatever sort, peaceful or violent, covert or open, is according to the Quran an essential part of Islamic teaching. If that is accepted as a fact then there is a problem. Ignoring it will only serve as a short term solution. The sensible option is to face the issue. Face Muslim leaders with the issues and try to negotiate a solution. Expressing this concern as Mr Lamb did, in terms of alcoholism may not have been the most diplomatic way of opening a debate; but it at least opens it up for discussion. And it needs opening up because a large proportion of the British public are concerned. According to a recent report in the Guardian newspaper, polling of more than 10,000 people in July 2018, found 32% of people believed there were Muslim “no-go areas” in Britain governed by Sharia law. That supposed reality is officially denied, but the view from people living in deprived areas of the UK should be listened to, primarily because they probably know better than any official what is actually going on in these communities. They may know a good deal more than official authorities who tend to tow the politically correct line. Officials who could well represent the same councils, police and social workers who denied the scale and religious background of the sex grooming gangs. A scandal which became such a big issue it hit the media and front pages of every national newspaper. Another Guardian report of a recent poll indicated a shocking figure. That three-quarters of non-Muslims believe Islam has provided a negative contribution to British society. In the face of that information surely some initiative must be taken. Perhaps the government should take this vast number of self confessed Islamophobes, the majority of the general public, into a prolonged training scheme. Its the kind of re-education project that appealed to Marxist dictatorships. And that is what should scare us the most. That if a decision must be taken, in whose favour would that decision be made?
I will conclude by returning to Mr Lamb and his reference to an alcoholic who has a problem which has to be faced. If it is not, how will he or she be enabled to function well in society? There are remedies, of course, and the first is to recognise that there is a problem. If you cannot even say that there is a problem without being accused of hate thoughts or speech, then the only option is to kick the problem down the road. And there it sits in the long grass and festers, becoming increasingly unstable; a potential grenade placed into the hands of the people you least want to deal with it: the far right. No-one in their right mind wants that to happen, but failure to face what most people in this country know to be a growing problem seems to be the favoured answer. Wait, hope and make concessions, appears to be the only solution on offer. It is the hopeless, clueless response of the coward. The video below is a conversation on the issue. Its title is alarming to anyone who cares about the future of our country. And that will include large numbers of moderate, mostly I imagine less religiously inclined Muslims or apostates; those who are happy to live in the West alongside all the other minorities. even with small c conservative white indigenous citizens like myself. Most people want to live in peace with one another, and I share that feeling. I also fear that as Douglas Murray says in the video below, there may not be a soft landing on Islam. It is not always the moderate majorities who hold the power when things begin to go wrong.
This was written before the terrible mass killing of 49 innocent Muslims in and around two mosques in Christchurch New Zealand. This tragedy was reported today: the 16th of March 2019. On this website I have written a lot about the dangers of the extreme left, but this appalling act demonstrates that the far right is equally repugnant. An insane hatred driven by fanatics incapable of drawing the distinction between good and evil and what can be done and what cannot be done under any circumstances.
Left and right-wing extremism have both been horribly demonstrated over recent decades, every month brings a new selection, the recent mosque attacks in New Zealand being the latest full scale atrocity up to this point. I am on the conservative right of the debate, but that does not mean that I hold to, or in any way approve of Neo-Nazi white supremacist fascist movements. Nor to the blind reactive hatred that underpins the vile ideology of the extreme right, or their cold merciless indifference to the lives or views of others. To disagree with or disapprove of a thing or person does not alter anything when it comes down to the foundational respect due to each individual person, regardless of their colour, creed, ethnicity or view on life. That respect only disappears when a person acts or speaks in a way that breaks the barrier most of us understand. The one that exists between what we call civilised and uncivilised. At the level of malignant savagery, blind hatreds and insane zealotry this fragile balance falls apart and chaos reigns.
I am a Christian who holds right-wing, conservative views. That viewpoint has at first base this primary and unalterable directive: I am to love my neighbour as myself. And my neighbour must include those who oppose everything I believe in and value: even my enemy. An ISIS zealot, holding a sword above me with the intention of removing my head from my shoulders is included in this God given commandment. I have no mandate to hate anyone. However the command to love does not mean I cannot hate ideologies that oppose everything I understand to be good and holy. The consequence is that I will and do criticise state institutions, religions and popular movements promoting ideas I dislike or loathe. This could mean hating movements and ideas that claim a Christian motive and pose as acting in the name of Christ. The inquisitions of the medieval age would qualify. In my view they are impossible to defend. God’s kingdom is not formed by force of arms or coercion. And Christianity was free of these faults for a few centuries, until it became subsumed into the political realm and the Roman Empire. With the trappings of power came corruption and worldliness.
From ancient history we must turn to the present day and examine our preoccupation with conspiracy theories. It is I believe normative for right-wingers to believe conspiracy stories have validity. To deny the existence of conspiracies is to assume a protest group has no agenda beyond what is written in their prospectus. I think that to accept a political or social prospectus at face value is naive, especially if it has ambitions to convert you to its cause. The Bible could be accused of holding and promoting a conspiracy theory. It accepts there is a ceaseless battle going on between the kingdoms of heaven and hell, light and darkness, good and evil, truth and lies, and that much of this drama is played out upon the earth. So for the sake of argument let’s accept that conspiracies are real and pose a constant threat.
Jesus had this to say.
“When it is evening you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red’; and in the morning, ‘It will be foul weather today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Hypocrites! You know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times” (Matthew 16:2-3).
The signs of the times are scarcely hidden, one of the most obvious is that if you hold right wing, conservative or traditional views on society and morality then you are almost by definition falling into the hate crime categories under our newly enlightened state laws. Accused and condemned in one breath; your reputation plastered all over with the ready made stigma of phobic infestation. Open your mouth and prepare to be attacked for attitudes which are assumed in advance by groups putting aside much of our ancient faith and culture. The question is, does it matter? To most probably not; if life is as trivial as a game of cards, then so long as we have not invested too much in the result, winning or losing is not going to be life changing. Jesus however indicates that how we live our life does matter and that the rule of cause and effects kicks in with very painful and life changing results. We reap what we sow!
An example from Deuteronomy. “If you diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God, to observe carefully all His commandments, … all these blessings shall come upon you” …. “But it shall come to pass, if you do not obey the voice of the Lord your God, to observe carefully all His commandments and His statutes which I command you today, that all these curses will come upon you and overtake you.”
Reading through the list of curses is an eye opening, heart stopping crash course on reasons why it is important to understand the signs of the times. Does the bible give us a clue? The answer is yes, Jesus said the end will follow a time when humanity was acting as they had in the days of Noah. What was life like then? It is described in the following terms.
“The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.”
It would be untrue to say that is where we are now, but we are I believe heading fast in that direction. Modern life is taking on the appearance of a game, one in which we can self identify as whatever we think we are. It is becoming a hedonistic, violent, dark and self absorbed existence in which we partake either as active competitors or onlookers. A kind of osmosis, soaking it into the core of our being, thinking perhaps this drift towards nihilism absolves us of responsibility and leaves us untouched by its grubbiness. Here is a definition of nihilistic philosophy. It represents a total rejection of moral values and religious beliefs and denies any meaning or purpose in life. In political theory nihilism is carried to an even greater extreme, it argues in favour of the destruction of all existing political and social institutions. And here we are, busily deconstructing society in ways that have never been seen before. We have become like the proverbial frog in the pot that didn’t notice the increasing temperature until it was too late, the madness and corruption begins to boil and overflow all around us.
Jesus tells us to “take heed to yourselves in case your hearts become weighed down with partying, drunkenness, and cares of this life…” He says: “Watch and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass….”
So we are to watch not only the signs of the times in world events, but the signs of our own spiritual state. We must not be blinded by our daily cares. We need the vision to see ourselves as God sees us, to see the urgent need to repent, change and prepare. Paul when writing to Timothy gives an idea of what to expect.
That is a downward trajectory, a falling away from something better. The following is worth watching because we are travelling and gaining momentum on a road we have never before travelled. If you begin by using hate laws to moderate speech to the extent where we cannot speak freely without fear, then we may be moving towards totalitarianism, and that has never worked out well, not when done by the Church or the State. Hate laws could at a push be likened to the tanks that moved into Tiananmen Square in Beijing. When a regime like this is faced by up to a million protesters it will take action. The lone figure represents a person who will not be persuaded that the state has the right to remove his freedom to have an opinion contrary to that of the prevailing power structure. This standoff between power and individual freedom concluded with the suppression of freedom of thought and conduct. I do not think we can have any assurance that in our time, through the use of very different methods of control, we are not watching, like dumb beasts staring over a barbed wire fence at the last rites of any true freedom of expression.
Here is a quietly spoken reasoned defence of free speech from the ADF International. This is a faith-based legal advocacy organisation that protects fundamental freedoms and promotes the inherent dignity of all people. On its website it describes itself as having a full-time presence at all the institutions of strategic international importance. Accredited by the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), the European Parliament and Commission, and the Organisation of American States (OAS). Additionally, we enjoy participatory status with the EU’s Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) and engage regularly with the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).
Who am I is becoming a confusing issue filled with uncertainties. He and she are pronouns that once had the field to themselves, but no longer. To make a mistake in identification may have serious consequences, maybe leading to a prosecutable hate crime. We are in the process of creating a society which is upending long established social guidelines: these relate to morality, ethics and what was once understood to be natural. Changing from a people who knew who and what we were to one that creates whatever we want be. The LGBT issue is a crucial part of that deconstruction and its influence on political policy is far reaching.
The following saying is attributed to the Christian Saint Anthony the Great. He died in 356 AD and could be speaking to our generation.
“A time is coming when men will go mad, and when they see someone who is not mad, they will attack him, saying, “You are mad; you are not like us.”
The force of that statement can hardly be over emphasised in the current social and political environment. In a mad world the sane will be committed to an asylum for corrective treatment. This has happened under communist totalitarian regimes. You may be interested to know that political correctness, the enforcer of current social thinking has been described as Cultural Marxism. Marx was one of the founders of Communism which has proved itself to be a brutal dictatorial system of government. In Mao’s China the communist re-education programme was conducted in concentration camps under the harshest conditions.
In Western society we are far from this, as yet, but things are changing and the direction is obvious, as are the consequences. We are confused because confusion is being sown like wheat in China. The result is a contagion of mixed messages, false facts, and indoctrination. I am not unsympathetic to what is going on, people are suffering and unsure and anxious, with suicide among the young on the increase. I do not doubt I would be equally confused growing up as a young person in a society which has deliberately thrown over almost every structure which once held it together. One of these being the nuclear family: father, mother and children born of the union made between their biological parents. That model has been overthrown and the results are all around us; tragic stories mapping the breakdown and dispersion of the family unit. The cause is I believe one of the results of Post Modernism, or perhaps Post, Post Modernism. Things have moved on since adding Post Truth to its arsenal. These revolutionary ideas have had the effect of removing ourselves as far as possible from the old certainties that were once our overseers and guardians. We have adopted a new kind of faith which welcomes diversity in all its forms. As individuals we decide what is true when it comes to essentially private issues like gender and sexuality and how cohabiting adults interact with one another. These may be personal issues but they have wide social consequences. But we are no longer to be ruled by outdated norms which dictated how nature was to be understood and acted out. There are well documented disastrous statistics documenting this ongoing process. One for which no state department or pressure group is prepared to take the blame. An example: data released by the Office for National Statistics shows that 13.3 per cent of deaths of females aged between five and 19 are now due to suicide, The number of teenage suicides in England and Wales increased by 67 per cent between 2010 and 2017. Mental health and anxiety among young people cannot be unexpected in the current social environment.
By focusing on LGBT I am not ignoring a reservoir of other reasons; from high, usually unattainable expectations, to a facile lifestyle largely focused upon ourselves. I believe it is a symptom rather than a cause of confusion. We have chosen to refuse a truth which changes every expectation; which is that there is a calling on our life to something higher than making the most of ourselves or an image of ourselves. That however is a subject of other articles.
This LGBT issue is therefore just one of many which are focal with regard to the changes taking place in society. This is dangerous to confront, and giving offence is unavoidable. Difficult for someone like myself to say what I feel without causing hurt and anger, reactions which unfortunately close down a lot of reasonable questions being asked. One of LGBT’s immediate effects has been to blur the contrast that once existed between what was considered normal and abnormal, natural and unnatural.
There are many factors involved, this article concerns LGBT culture which has put into question whether gender was fixed or fluid. These new ideas and ideologies ran counter to the views of the main religions; that was until major sections of Christianity began moderating their views in order to accommodate the new reality. This new reality rapidly gathered support from all parts of society. To be anti-Gay to any degree or for any reason became a hazardous occupation. Which is why today the subject has to handled very cautiously, the Twitter mobs enjoy indulging their fondness for virtual lynching’s via social media. I fear and suspect I have not handled the matter with sufficient caution.
One of the strangest results of this interference in what was once a natural acceptance of norms in society, such as definitions of gender, is that it has set feminists at odds with the transgender lobby. The reason? A male transgendering to female has at least in theory, lawful rights to enter formerly gender specific areas: women’s toilets, changing rooms, refuges and prisons. Each one of these are supposedly devoted to the protection of women from the unwanted attention of voyeurs and predatory males. Looking at all this from what could be described as a traditional point of view, it is difficult to acclimatise to the demonstrable lack of care and foresight. These problems were not difficult to anticipate; problems which all originate from the raft of equality, diversity and hate legislation which have changed our once stable nation out of all recognition. The old saying that the Law is an ass has been underlined in recent times. The truth is it cannot adapt fast enough to the changes. Trying to square multiple circles has tipped the law into confusion and contradictions. It is difficult to anticipate where the madness will eventually terminate. No doubt a Royal Commission will one day be demanded, and such are the complexities it could remain in session for as long as the famous Dickensian court case Jarndyce and Jarndyce. Dickens used it to attack the court system as being near totally worthless, as any “honourable” man among its legal practitioners remarked: “Suffer any wrong that can be done you rather than come here!”
Nowadays this caution about embarking on legal action has a different consequence to the one identified by Dickens. It is not the interminable length of a court case that is to be feared, it is the almost inevitable result. Anyone who offends against the new prospectus is guilty. The reason? You have no defence that can stand unless your are prepared to go to the Supreme Court, as two Irish Christians discovered. They were taken to court by a homosexual who wanted a pro Gay message to decorate his cake. He was politely refused; declined on the grounds of Christian conscience. You see it is hazardous for Christians to take offence however carefully and respectfully it is done.
In the case of LGBT the law will never get it right. Why? Because the law is not equipped to deal with such a problem. It is like multiple interest groups trying to make claims on items broken beyond repair by a bomb blast. The Law is out of its depth, the damage is scattered all over in the hearts, minds, spirits and emotions of recent generations, which in my view have lost touch with its roots and foundations and refuse to return to better ways once well understood and accepted. And government is no better. Ofsted is a government organisation set upon ensuring that our children are detached from the old certainties. They preach to the schools, they enforce their agenda in ways the worst kind of conservative Christians are often accused of doing. In that kind of case the word indoctrination would be used. Isn’t that charge equally applicable to Ofsted inspectors? It has been recorded that they are empowered to interview a child; one to one privately in a schoolroom without parental consent. Asking intimate questions of a type that would not have entered the mind of an average teenager, even in the early 1960’s. Dutifully promoting lifestyle choices opposed to the very things some traditional schools are trying to protect children from: such as indoctrinating the open minds of children into the very diverse world of the LGBT culture. Questions like: Do you know what a lesbian is? Are you happy in your gender? These kinds of questions are being asked by government officials to children. That is their mission, and they are permitted to do it without hindrance. Ofsted are authorised to teach the permitted doctrine of the State and no one has the authority to prevent them. Here is a quote from a Christian Institute article.
‘At Grindon Hall Christian School in Sunderland, primary school children said they were asked if they knew of any boys or girls who thought they were in the wrong body, and if they knew what gays and lesbians did… The mother of one pupil stated: “The questioning was completely inappropriate, they asked her what lesbians were, and whether she felt trapped in someone else’s body.” The head teacher said: “Pupils were embarrassed and surprised to be asked questions about sexuality. The offer of a one-to-one meeting with an inspector, who was a complete stranger to them, in order to discuss personal matters of sexuality was also viewed with alarm by some parents.” Following the inspection in November 2014, the school was rated ‘Inadequate’, with the draft Ofsted report stating that: “The Christian ethos of the school permeates much of the school’s provision. This has restricted the development of a broad and balanced approach to the curriculum.” Ofsted failed to investigate the conduct of its inspectors, and the Department for Education has now forced the school to be transferred to a secular trust.’
In its ‘Integrated Household Survey’, the Office for National Statistics asks 178,197 people about their sexual identity. Most chose to answer. These are the figures. 93.5% of people said they were ‘heterosexual’ or ‘straight’. 1.1% said they were ‘gay’ or ‘lesbian’. 0.4% admitted to being bisexual. That’s a lot of people, but its still a tiny minority. Do they deserve to be heard? Yes of course. Is their influence massively disproportionate? Absolutely! And it is currently being enforced as a vital component part of educational standards in the UK. That is indoctrination sponsored by the State.
I hope you will appreciate the disconnect in terms of justice. Since it is a fact that those who stand opposed to this mission by government agencies, and are willing to protest, may be liable to the threat of censure of the same kind being applied to individuals and schools. You see it is OK for a person like myself to be hated for expressing views on actions I believe to be dangerous and wrong. Hate crime is a perverse and very nasty weapon when put into the hands of ideologues like the politically correct. If this continues then I think that for free speech, rights to protest against the liberal left and preach the full gospel of Jesus, including the writings of Paul, will soon be over.
Below is a video presentation by a doctor deeply concerned about where the LGBT issue is leading us, one of the few of a rapidly diminishing group of experts prepared to challenge its core beliefs. The reason being the threat of losing their jobs in a profession they have dedication their lives. None of the LGBT beliefs stand before the medical facts, as Dr Saunders demonstrates. We are being led by the nose into a world of medical experimentation; with people and organisations dedicated to health care coerced into using their patients as unwitting guinea pigs. I hesitate to use the use word Frankenstein, but it does seem to apply. No one knows the long term effects of drug therapy and surgery on those undergoing the processes involved. Many of the individuals under treatment are known to be vulnerable, sometimes autistic. This entire lifestyle is known to lead to increases in almost every type of negative data regarding health issues, both physical and mental, including psychological issues, unhappiness, depression, anxiety and suicide. At least one study into whether or not decisions made to accept drug therapy and surgery are later regretted was closed down. If the LGBT issue was not an ideology it would by now have been shut down with immediate effect, reconsidered and critically assessed. The chances of that? Nil!
Islamic terrorism began with Al Qaeda’s attack on the twin towers of New York. Since then other associated groups have added to the threat. The video clip below was recorded before the military intervention against Islam State: known as ISIS. The dangers being discussed on the political programme This Week were in the context of remarks made by the then Prime Minister David Cameron. He had complained about the use of the expression Islamic State by the BBC in its news broadcasts.
Cameron had said:
“It is a perversion of the religion of Islam and many Muslims listening to this programme will recoil every time they hear the words Islamic State.” “I wish the BBC would stop calling it Islamic State because it’s not an Islamic State; what it is is an appalling, barbarous regime.”
The historian Tom Holland had been invited to make his views known. They were and still are very interesting, especially since the end of ISIS as a military threat has been accomplished. All the more so when you consider Holland’s concluding remarks.
Where are we headed? During the last century two very famous dystopian books were published: A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley published in 1931, and 1984 by George Orwell published in 1949. Very recently, because I had written on the subject, the idea of buying both books came into my mind. The impulse was strong and I bought them both the same day. At the present time neither have been read, although I checked out the very different but weirdly aligned visions of the future in online reviews. Orwell’s story is a grim version of totalitarian life whereas Huxley’s is more of absolute control fostered by a society engineered as a pleasure dome. The following thoughts of mine were written a year or more before I had any knowledge of these two great books, apart from their titles and general subject matter.
Gradually it dawned on me, a long life gives you perspective. I formed the impression that we were being subtly coerced to conform and give way obediently to the demands of officials in whatever guise they presented themselves. If you want to create a society that is run by the state at every level of existence then you must gain a degree of instinctive compliance, conditioned responses: yes sir, no sir. How to do that without raising the hackles of the masses? Train them, but do not let them know what you are doing. Make it sound and feel as if it is for the greater good, set ideals before them, make them feel we are making a real change to the way we interact with the world and those around us. We can do better if we make the effort, humankind can evolve a way of life that will benefit the whole rather than the few. Forget that religious mumbo-jumbo which taught us that there is an inherent evil of original sin dragging us down. Persuading us that we need the sacrifice of a Christ figure to make us fit for purpose. It was a myth and we can rise above it, we can move forward without the negativity of religion dogging our footsteps. We can then develop new commandments which will constrain the bad and release the good. In other words, we know better than the one who supposedly created us. In fact, do not concern yourself with this creator because he, she or it does not really exist, and we only permit religion because for the moment it is too embedded in our culture to safely remove without chaos arising.
But a start has been made, the softest target Christianity is feeling the squeeze. It is slowly being throttled by low level persecutions, weak leadership and natural wastage. People are enjoying the lives they have, what need therefore of a future afterlife that is probably just a myth devised by priests to entrap us all. The new order will provide, giving us other things to focus on, such as entertainment on tap twenty-four hours a day. Sunday becomes just another day. Why believe a Creator God who made everything in six days when Darwinism and evolutionary theory has killed off the myth and replaced it with pure science and cold, hard facts?
Time to think about beginning again. If the old has lost its appeal why not knock it down and rebuild from scratch. If you have a building site with plans for its renewal, but its old buildings are still standing then the first job is obvious: bulldoze the old and lay out the ground plan for whatever its replacement may be. If the area is of sufficient size then both operations can run concurrently. That is I believe what’s happening in our country, in our continent and to some extent globally: a transformation, a new world order. To accomplish this entire populations need converting. The first lesson army instructors teach new recruits is to conform to a very different life. The old life as a civilian has gone, the new has come. Many of your old rights are voluntarily laid down for the sake of the new reality. Every scrap of self will with regard to what you will do and when is systematically knocked out of you. It is a process designed to make every single person move or stop on a shouted order.
To melt something as hard as iron and shape it into something new takes extremes of heat. If your objective is to remake society then something similar is required. Many things must change, be twisted out of shape and reformed before the new creation is fit for purpose: an example of this process are language conventions; these can change and have changed radically. Compare the English of Chaucer or Shakespeare to that used in messaging via iPhone, emojis etc. and try to unravel the multiple differences in the use of these conventions, especially when trying to convey meaning. You may categorise modern novelties as improvements, simplifying the language for ease of communication. Or you could call it vandalism: a race to the bottom of the sink. And as if kept in waiting for this moment in time, there has arrived a generation prepared for the unveiling of a new reality, one capable of overwriting the once stable, normal, and oh so boring old reality. Did we really live for centuries thinking that binary was a word descriptive of sex and gender? Change it, change it all without thought of the consequences. Let’s follow the Gadarene swine and head for the cliff edge. You might recall that in this gospel account the pigs had become infested with the evil spirits cast out of a madman by Jesus.
Jesus made reference to a wide and easy road that led to destruction and added that many people were choosing it in preference to a much tougher route that led to salvation. We are I believe set fixedly on this wide road and are thoroughly enjoying the experience. At the time of the early church Rome was a code name for Babylon, the seat of power and evil representing everything opposed to God. To the early church Rome and all its attractions and vices was the epitome of the wide road leading to damnation. In our society this highway has manifested itself in many ways, some of which have been referred to already. There is more to come, but as to specific causes, they are not so easy to identify. However, I do believe there is one particular aspect of our current society which may have initiated the drift away from our historic foundations. A strange culprit, seemingly innocuous and harmless: I believe it to be the entertainment industry! A phenomenon well known to the peoples of Ancient Rome. In our times it slowly developed following the traumas of the Second World War. The nineteen fifties saw the growing influence of American culture and materialism. The nineteen sixties saw the full flowering and the Great Escape from the harsh structures and conformity to rules and ways of conduct that held us fast for so long. The changes were meteoric, dismantling the old order and supplanting it with the new. Seemingly in a moment we moved from a grey world to one filled with colour: the buzz word at the time, fuelled by purple heart drugs and hippie culture was psychedelic. The sixties was birthed, and with it change became a way of life.
Access was gained to a world of previously unimagined freedom: drugs, sex and rock and roll. The entertainment industry, which has never stopped growing and now includes among its many delights, the Internet. Access at any hour of day and night to anything you wanted, including every imaginable vice: all available instantly, anywhere and anytime in any form, real or virtual. The one thing a provision of twenty-four hour a day access to information, entertainment, gambling, sex, shopping, the lives of others, etc., etc. gives, is to trivialise everything, including relationships. I can imagine a day when sex dolls will be much more attractive than the real thing. They will provide the thrills without the need to do anything about pleasing that which has pleased you. Human relationships may well be thought as a demanding, expensive and unnecessary chore. Virtual reality through AI may be preferred by many for all the above reasons. If you were more intellectually attracted, robots could be made able to converse while tapping into all the areas of knowledge that most fascinated you. A made to measure cyborg: always attentive, interested and switched on or off according to your mood. Sounds attractive, and that is exactly why it is so dangerous. Every drug gives a high, and this entire scenario is a drug with one purpose in mind, to distract us from everything that matters.
Today’s toddlers are using mobile phones, creating a world that will to some significant degree become a living experiential virtual reality. One which they may well choose to bed down with and make their inner home. The day may come when they prefer it to real life. This is no longer science fiction, some of it is here already. Teenagers disappear to their bedrooms and most parents know little or nothing about what they are doing on their iPhone’s or with whom they are communicating. We have yet to see what this future generation will do, but another quantum leap cannot be far distant. Even today sexual identity has become such an issue that it acts like a hub around which near everything revolves. As a subject it has become controlling, with your attitude to it a test and moral guide as to your fitness for modern life. Disapproval is not really an option if you want to advance your status in this transformed society.
The effect of this change in culture is that objective facts become far less influential. These are being replaced by appeals to emotion and personal beliefs which can only lead towards instability. The demands for ever increasing levels of choice are an inevitable result. Equality legislation has created the appearance of doing away with any hierarchy of beliefs and convictions. The best example of this is the sudden demise of Christianity as the faith of the UK. In a society such as ours one religion cannot be allowed to occupy a dominant position. The reason being it denies equality of religions. It does not stop there, since definitions of what is natural and normal have also been forced to adapt to the new reality. We can no longer say that is just the way things are. Long standing institutions have had to give ground in order to accommodate this brave new world where anything goes providing it meets standards imposed by the State. And this is the strange part, British Values have become a set of Commandments, in essence just a rigid as the ten God gave to Moses. And these new commandments, scarcely ten years old have been meekly accepted.
It is nearly as dangerous for you or me to challenge modern commandments, (British Values), as it was for those who rebelled against the ten given by God. The old certainties have passed away and the new have been imposed. One burdensome yoke cast off and another less burdensome to most placed on our shoulders instead. The advantage for those forming whatever is coming is that objective facts are somewhere between sidelined and departed. Any concept of religious truth is close to gone now that the Christian God has authorised competitors. Meta narratives are gone; enter the bright new dawn of emotive convictions popping up like crowd-funding events, repetitive mantras and a refusal to face fact-based points of view. Post truth, an expression tailor made for an age governed by a new prospectus. This post truth world is generated by the appearance of things, the look and feel is everything; the truth and facts are secondary. A gender is felt rather than known through genetics or biology. To achieve such an outlook on life facts of nature have to be sidelined. This takes some doing, social engineering is required. A new language must be created in order to avoid the obvious, which is that every human naturally born is the result of sexual union between a male and a female. To avoid this fact it is necessary to build a society which is willing to deny nature. To use abnormalities to sponsor your argument and propaganda to square the circle. This reminds me of an astute comment by Joseph Goebbels. One which can be paraphrased as follows: the best propaganda works invisibly, penetrating all of public life without that public being aware that it is thinly disguised propaganda.
All societies impose rules and we accept them as a necessary fact of life. The problem is that PC rules do not make any allowance for criticism or the non-conforming, nor do they see any humour in a perceived offence. Which makes it perfect for children at a strict school but hopeless for adults in an adult environment. And as far as Britain is concerned, non-conformity is precisely what made it so successful and inventive and enjoyable to live in. Even in the military non-conformity works. Drake with the invasion by the Spanish Armada and Nelson at Trafalgar broke the usual rules of naval combat. The SAS was formed by a non-conformist. Dunkirk was a crazy idea, with civilians getting involved in a military operation. Lawrence of Arabia was another maverick. Churchill used to search out off the wall ideas and encouraged many of them. Almost every heroic act has involved breaking or stretching guidelines and rules. Encouraging the self-confidence to question legislators should be the first rule of a free society. As much as we loved good order and conformity we also used to love and cherish eccentricity. None of the above actions would have survived the tick box mentality of modern officialdom. We are trading these former freedoms and a rather beautiful eccentric past for a society with the potential to spawn a monster, not just petty minded and brittle but also vicious and unjust. It is cowering people, making us frightened to speak out, even joke, and that is I believe exactly what is intended. Shut down any form of dissent. There is a famous quote from the philosopher / statesman Edmund Burke.
“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
The above refers to people who do know what is going on, see the threat but refuse to speak or act against it out of fear. I am thinking of those in high positions of influence. Below is a less well-known quote by Burke and is one I do apply to myself.
“Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.”
This article has only appeared because I came across the following video. It kind of wrapped the unfolding ideas into a satisfyingly complete story. It could be titled The Endgame.
Hearing anything at all is the sound of a miracle.
If you think the image above of an ape smoking a cigarette while playing a guitar on stage is unlikely, then think again; because in comparison to sound waves giving rise to music and conversation, an ape strumming Fantasia No. 10 by Alphonso Mudarra is a near certainty. Why? Because sound is an extreme rarity, possibly a one in countless trillions of chances against even the possibility. In our solar system we have just one star, the Sun. In our Milky Way galaxy there are about a billion stars and thirty billion planets. And that is just in our celestial backyard. Sound as we experience it probably only occurs in one place in the entire universe: and that would be on planet earth.
How can that be? Because we need three things. The first is to provide the medium through which sound waves can be carried, and that is air. Next an organ sensitive to sound, and finally a processing structure capable of interpreting the incoming sound waves. In summary we need the atmosphere of planet Earth, an ear and a brain.
Nothing can be heard in Space. In space, there are no molecules in the large empty areas between stars and planets. With no molecules in the vacuum of space there is no medium for sound waves to travel through. And that is the reason nobody can hear you shout in space. Sound cannot travel in the vacuum of space. Space isn’t a complete and empty void, interstellar gas and dust does have the potential to carry sound waves. The problem is we cannot hear them. The particles are so spread out, and the resulting sound waves are of such a low frequency, that they’re beyond our capacity to hear them. In other words there is, as far as science can know, nowhere else in the universe other than on earth where sound can be heard. That fact is just the beginning of the ongoing and ever more sophisticated miracle of sound as we humans experience it. From our breathing, to a scream in the dark, and onto the fine tuned beauty of an orchestra playing one of the great musical compositions. Sound is not just a thud of a rock falling to the ground, it is a work of genius, a miracle that could not happen if the subject of the next article: the Atmosphere, did not exist to provide the air without which sound could not be transmitted.
Sound can both scare us and make us deliriously happy: the sounds of a violent threat or the first time a baby tries to say the word “Mummy”. In either case, the air we breathe which is probably unique to our planet, must be a miracle. Since nothing could register in our brains without a hearing system of incredible complexity. One linked to a brain that can interpret sound and trigger a response in seconds. Imagine a time delay of even five minutes between hearing and comprehending a verbal message. Dinner party conversations would become a nightmare.
That sound, in all its fathomless diversity evolved is so far beyond the realm of commonsense and experience that I wonder how a sane person could ever accept that it happened in any of the ways we are taught. We have been fed a lie and it takes a brave scientist to confess the truth. Here is one: the famous scientist Fred Hoyle is quoted as saying the following.
“Once we see, however, that the probability of life originating at random is so utterly minuscule as to make it absurd, it becomes sensible to think that the favourable properties of physics on which life depends are in every respect deliberate … It is therefore almost inevitable that our own measure of intelligence must reflect … higher intelligence’s…even to the limit of God…such a theory is so obvious that one wonders why it is not widely accepted as being self-evident. The reasons are psychological rather than scientific.”
Below is an even more famous quote.
“The chance that higher life forms might have emerged in this way is comparable with the chance that a tornado sweeping through a junk-yard might assemble a Boeing 747 from the materials therein.”
Can you imagine something like this orchestra playing The Planets by Holst happening anywhere else in the universe, given all the information listed above? On the basis of the total lack of any supporting evidence for sound anywhere in the universe, then if you were to calculate the chances you are I believe circling somewhere in the hazy region of the incalculable and absurd.
We are designed to hear. The technical problems involved and the engineering solutions put into place to enable us to hear are incredible. If you interested, you can see and hear an explanation in the video below.
