Liminal Worlds
Whatever is liminal, or emerging –arts, culture, society, spirituality
Is HAARP the Cause of Mass Bird and Fish Deaths?
Jan 18th
Is HAARP to blame for the recent fish and bird deaths around the world? There have been many conspiracy theories related to HAARP over the years, but lately they don’t seem all that farfetched, especially when you have mysterious phenomenon like these recent animal deaths, with no plausible official explanation available.
Officially, HAARP is simply a research project based in Alaska, This is from the official HAARP website:
HAARP stands for The High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program. The goal of this program is to further advance our knowledge of the physical and electrical properties of the Earth’s ionosphere which can affect our military and civilian communication and navigation systems. The HAARP program operates a world-class ionospheric research facility located in Gakona, Alaska.
If you want to know what the hardcore “conspiracy theorists” are saying about Haarp, a good resource is Michael Ruppert’s site, From the Wilderness.
The following video points out that there is a notable connection between the bird and fish deaths and the location of HAARP facilities around the world:
Finally, for a broader perspective, check out what visionary thinker and researcher David Wilcock has to say about the animal deaths. He also blames HAARP, but he places it within a much more complicated narrative involving extraterrestrials. No, he’s not saying the ET’s are killing the birds, but that the controlling forces of the U.S. and other governments are using HAARP as a way to shield the planet from the benevolent intervention of the ET’s.
The Crystal Path
Jan 15th
THE CRYSTAL PATH
I walked out laughing into the night,
And felt the frigid snow beneath my boots,
The snow flakes sparkled in the Christmas lights,
Stillness all about I took an unmarked path,
Along a frozen stream with gurgling spectacles of ice,
So quiet almost deafening the silence of it all,
I turned to see my footprints disappear,
And heard the breath of Winter’s white
Drown out the sounds of Summer’s flight,
Down the pristine crystal way
My soul was forging heat inside my chest,
The steam from out my lips
Kissing and softly hissing
As the cold dissolved its mist,
I stopped and stood amazed
Feeling the ivory and pellucid aire
Envelop me into its breast,
As if I was a god inside his lair,
Who made this world of white
And ice and snow,
Twas then I saw the eyes of grey,
The wolven ears and fur and tail,
Who watched me from the rock
Beside the stream,
And pierced my vision
In its smirking smile,
As if to say:
“Now you understand
A little of the way.
Welcome to my dream,
I offer it a gift,
For I have summoned you,
To go back to your den,
And put your gifts to pen
For all the world to see.”
We stared awhile and breathed
The chilly snow that whirled about.
Then fast he turned and disappeared
As if he was not there.
And so did I
Back to my cave
Of precious warmth
To write these very words.
james patrick casey 1/11/11 stone ridge ny
Law & Order -Entertaining Mind Control
Jan 10th
Law & Order has come to define the modern TV crime drama. It’s been a fixture of American television for 20 years now, having premiered in 1990. I’m a relatively light TV watcher and never saw a single episode until sometime in the early 2000s, but I quickly became hooked. I recall coming home after working late and mindlessly (is there any other way to watch TV?) watching reruns until I was fairly well caught up.
More recently, I’ve given some thought to what effect this show has on me, and probably many other viewers as well. My conclusion is that, on many different levels, it epitomizes what might be called the old paradigm, or dualistic way of looking at life. This may seem obvious when it comes to a crime drama, which is, after all, by definition based on the good guys vs. bad guys archetype, but I believe Law & Order actually personifies this more than any other show in history.
Let’s start with the title itself. Law & Order -two words that immediately get us into the binary mode. Then there’s the distinctive and somewhat jarring, “da dum” beat that introduces every scene. This is quite obviously a form of conditioning the audience to the rhythm of the show, and this two-note sound continues the binary theme, which was created by Mike Post, who has named this sound “The Clang.”
If you listen to the introductory narration for Law & Order, you might notice, aside from the grim, slightly anachronistic tone of the announcer, that it reinforces the dualistic mindset by pointing out that,
“In the criminal justice system, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups: the police who investigate crime and the district attorneys who prosecute the offenders. These are their stories.”
Now, there’s a subtle but important bit of propaganda in the above paragraph. It doesn’t say that “suspects” are prosecuted, but “offenders.” This sounds like we already know the person is guilty of the crime. I checked out what the word “offender” means legally, and according to the Duhaime.org legal dictionary it means: “A convicted person for whom there is a substantial risk of re-offending.” In other words, we are being told to assume that the defendants who are being prosecuted are guilty! Otherwise, it would say, “the district attorneys who prosecute the suspects,” or at least, “the alleged offenders.” Somewhere along the line, the basic principle of “innocent until proven guilty” was dispensed with.
All that, and we haven’t even gotten past the introduction of the program! Most of what can be said about the plots of Law & Order could be said about any police drama, though this show has somehow taken it all to a new extreme. It’s hard to generalize too much about a program that has spawned a large number of spin-offs, each with a different cast and focusing on a different aspect of crime. Some of the shows, obviously, are better than others, but overall the fast pace and mostly good acting makes for a compelling and very watchable 60 minutes.
Yet, what state of mind does it put viewers in to watch a show like Law & Order week after week, year after year? For one thing, it tends to provoke a feeling of anxiety about crime and violence. Many of the shows also succeed at creating villains who are so despicable that, not only are we glad to see them put behind bars, but we’re actually ready to cheer if they don’t live till the end of the episode. I’m not sure if this is a new development, but I’ve noticed quite a few episodes where a victim ends up killing his or her tormentor vigilante style and is often not prosecuted for this action. To root for this type of behavior does not prove that we’re violent or uncivilized, only human. A good scriptwriter or novelist knows how to create evil characters who are beyond redemption and whose brains we want to see splattered on the sidewalk (with the possible exception of the more saintly among us).
A pertinent question, however, might be, how many such evil predators are really out there? In the U.S., violent crime has decreased quite a bit over the last few decades. Even more tellingly, statistics also show that in the majority of cases the assailant of a violent crime is someone known to the victim. This is also true when it comes to cases of sexual abuse, something Law & Order focuses on quite a bit, and has entire show, Special Victims Unit dedicated to this topic. According to Childhelp, 90% of children who are sexually abused know the perpetrator. Yet, the typical picture we get in the media, crime novels, and of course Law & Order is that of the sinister predator who is stalking the streets, or the internet looking for victims. It’s not that such despicable characters don’t exist, it’s just that their numbers are far smaller than you’d conclude if you constantly absorb shows of this type.
If a TV show or film that uses the good guys vs. bad guys format is done right, most people will obviously naturally be rooting for the good guys to kick ass. In police shows, that means that we learn to adopt the mindset of cops and prosecutors, becoming impatient with laws protecting suspects, devious defense attorneys and even district attorneys who don’t give the cops on the street free reign to do their jobs properly. For example, if we’re watching SVU and see Detective Eliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni) slam a suspect against the wall and maybe even deliver a punch or two, we not only sympathize, but feel a sense of vicarious elation at the forces of justice dishing out well deserved blows to scumbags.
Perhaps the most insidious aspect of a show like Law & Order is the overall feeling it gives us about other people and the world around us. Even if violent crime has little impact on our everyday lives, by bringing it into our living rooms it becomes a dominant force. The dim view it gives us about human nature and our society is one that ultimately justifies the status quo. Without well armed police, prisons and the criminal justice system, no matter how imperfect, we’d all be devoured by thugs, sociopaths and other predators, the message seems to be. Is this assumption false? Not entirely. If everything else remained the same and the criminal justice system was dismantled, the results would probably be quite chaotic. That doesn’t mean, however, that very different ways of doing things aren’t possible. If we’re in a state of fear, however, we’re not likely to search for such alternatives.
This is not limited to Law & Order, of course. If you’re a fan of modern crime fiction, especially masters of this genre such as John Sanford, James Lee Burke or Michael Connelly, you are also confronted with evildoers who are not only sadistic and sociopathic, but brilliant and devious as well. Yet a well written novel, with its character development and slower pace, even if it follows a familiar good vs. evil formula to some extent, always creates a more complex and nuanced view of life than a sixty minute TV show.
Law & Order is an entertaining and effective piece of modern brainwashing. Of course, all television contains elements of mind control, and all dualistic stories tend to oversimplify life, but Law & Order combines these two elements with unusual efficiency.
The Shallows by Nicholas Carr
Jan 8th
The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains
by Nicholas Carr
What led me to pick this book up was one of the blurbs on the back saying that this was “Neither a tub-thumpingly alarmist jeremiad nor a breathlessly Panglossian ode to the digital self…” (Tom Vanderbilt). Since the internet is pretty much a fait accompli, I don’t see much point in the anti-technology argument today, but it’s also a good idea to be objective about what all these devices are doing to us. Carr’s book does give a mostly balanced view of the subject, as he traces the history of books and reading as well as technology and points out how developments such as the clock and the map radically altered, not only our perspectives but the actual wiring of our brains.
The idea that the internet makes us more ADD is hardly original, and pretty much a truism. However, it’s just becoming known that the tasks that we spend lots of time attending to actually change the chemistry of our brains. One of Carr’s major problems with the information age is that it’s made it difficult for many people, even highly educated people (such as Carr himself) to sit down and read a book the old fashioned way.
Carr admits that there are advantages that come with these “new brains” of ours, such as an increased capacity to process certain types of information and visual images. His main criticism, however, which is contained in the book’s title, is that while our knowledge is becoming much broader, as well as instantly accessible, it’s also getting shallower. In other words, we don’t have the time or patience to stick with any one idea long enough to think deeply about it -we’re too anxious to move on to the next website, tweet, Facebook post, etc.
It’s hard to argue with Carr’s arguments, but in the end he doesn’t really suggest any solution. This isn’t really a criticism of him, as what solution could there be?
We can’t dis-invent the internet, and not many people would be willing to do this even if it were possible. For people who really despise it, the best hope is a complete collapse of civilization and a reverting back to earlier times -not a possibility that many people would consider inconceivable right now.
I think, however, that Carr, like many people, might overrate the real value of “traditional” intellectual book learning. From one point of view, reading itself is a highly artificial activity, one that promotes an extremely left-brained, Aristotelian view of the world. We could just as well see (as some do in fact) the internet being part of a kind of cyber-shamanism that’s an electronic version of a more tribal and spontaneous way of life. Of course, this is probably romanticizing the internet a bit, as the way it’s commonly used is hardly conducive to the type of spiritual renaissance some are hoping for. Yet the possibility is still there, and in some places we see signs that it might be gathering momentum.
The Shallows makes some good points about the internet. If you’re an avid reader, the best antidote to what Carr cautions about is to keep a balance between reading and net surfing. You may also want to listen to more books on tape, which I suspect are a more whole-brained way to take in either information or stories (something Carr never addresses).
One thing seems clear -the internet has the potential to distract us and waste many of our hours if we don’t take conscious control over how we use it. This, naturally, has to be kept in perspective with its many benefits. The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains at least helps make us aware of what we may be losing when we’re online.
EFT -Tapping For Healing and Achieving Your Goals
Jan 5th
EFT or Emotional Freedom Technique is a newly popular healing system based on the same principles as acupuncture. It is, however, much simpler, as rather than applying needles to the various energy centers of the body, you simply tap with your fingers. Another advantage is that EFT can be done on oneself easily.
There are now quite a few books on EFT, such as The EFT Manual (Everyday Eft: Emotional Freedom Techniques), as well as courses and videos. Some teachers combine it with other modalities, such EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), another simple technique where you move your eyes back and forth to stimulate changes in brain chemistry. EMDR has been proven especially effective for post traumatic stress disorder. So in some EFT books, you’ll do some eye movement prior to, and at the same time as the tapping.
EFT is used for a variety of purposes, from healing emotional wounds to helping you reprogram yourself for purposes such as attracting prosperity or losing weight.
One of the best ways to gain an introduction to this, or to practice it even if you’re already familiar with it, is to follow along with videos.
The following is a New Year’s EFT “tap along” created by David Childerley, who actually has a large number of such videos on YouTube. He combines affirmations with a basic EFT sequence. As he explains, there are many other, more complicated taps you can do, but for the purposes of making a brief video he simplifies it a bit. It’s still a great way to practice easily and get some positive reinforcement for your goals.
Binaural Beats -the New Way to Meditate
Jan 4th
Binaural beats are a technology used to produce relaxation, a meditative state and sometimes for self-hypnosis (e.g. along with subliminal messages to help you stop smoking, lose weight, etc.). The basic idea is that each of your ears is exposed to sounds of a slightly different frequency, and the brain synchronizes these two frequencies into a single sound. That’s why, when you listen to binaural beats, you’re not consciously aware of two separate sounds.
You can find lots of audio programs, some of them quite expensive for sale nowadays that use binaural beats, usually with ambient music and sometimes with subliminal messages. However, if you want to experiment with this, you can find lots of free videos on YouTube as well. The advantage of this is that these videos often add some great visuals, such as mandalas and fractal images that go with the sounds. The only caveat is that you should plug stereo headphones into your computer to get the binaural beat effect.
Below is one such video. The creator’s channel is called JezebelDecibel, and she has a large selection of videos you can watch, as well as complete MP3 recordings for sale. For many people, this is an easier way to meditate.
Dan Gilbert -What Makes Us Happy?
Jan 2nd
Dan Gilbert, author of books such as Stumbling on Happiness, gives a TED talk about how people exaggerate the effect different outcomes will have on their happiness. He begins with the startling fact that people who have won the lottery and who become paraplegics are, on average, equally happy six months after the event. The main lesson from this talk would seem to validate the often repeated idea that happiness comes from within more than external circumstances.
TED Talks are often interesting, so if you’re not familiar with them you may want to check out their website. Sometimes they can be a little too “left-brained” and materialistic for my tastes (see earlier posts on this topic) , but they’re still worth checking out.
The Hipster Subculture Is Totally Evil
Dec 19th
The goofy , mendacious, trendy, hipster subculture ought to be denounced and belittled with the utmost vehemence .
The hipster movement ought to be bashed, *regardless* of whether or not they stop bashing everyone else .
Let there be none of that relativist sellout tallk which oinks out MTV- era stuff like, “well I respect their point of view , but I don’t agree with them”, nor any similar namby pamby, duplicious, sell out prattle !
Such a postmodernist/ relativist “conflicted” ambivalent/ambiguous approach is, itself, characteristic of the hipsters .
It does not matter how hard they purportedly work to keep New York City running. The ironical postmodernist trendiness they promote is pernicious …they are the decadent, *spoiled brat* bourgeois …the evil, yet still uglier outgrowth of the yuppie predecessors . Hipsters are spoiled brats lost in the ugly ‘careless flower of youth’ , and the hip irony the promote is soulless , being the poisoned fruit of those who prefer the mushy middle of balance: of what H.L. Mencken once called ‘respectable mediocrity’ . Irony is quite overrated. Hip irony be dammed, and dammed some more ! Let there be NO mellowness , but, instead, unabashedly vehement and one -sided vitriol which calls hipster thinking totally wrong , not “wrong to us” , but, instead , totally wrong, period .
Next time I am looking for something to wrap rotten refuse in the garbage with, I think that the text of the book ‘Fight Club’ or Pitchfork Magazine ought to be used for such purposes ! Of course I don’t have any copies , but if someone mails them to me with the note emblazoned on it ‘For Wrapping Garbage’ , it will be appreciated !
-Tree (Guest Blogger)
Questioning Orthodoxy on Evolution & Climate Change
May 14th
The following is Part 3 of a four part new video series by David Wilcock. All are worth watching, but I’m highlighting this one right now because of some fascinating evidence that is unearthed in regard to two modern sacred cows: global warming and evolution.
David Wilcock first points out that climate change is occuring on many planets, not only earth, which suggests that it’s far more complicated an issue than is usually supposed.
Even more startling is the evidence he brings up that completely overturns many assumptions about evolution and Darwinism. For example, there are links to studies that show that life can spontaneously evolve within a single generation -or even within the lifetime of one organism- in response to environmental pressures.
There is even evidence to suggest that life can be generated from nonliving matter!
To be open to such ideas, you have to first remove them from any entrenched political or ideological frameworks. For example, people will tend to label you a reactionary or conservative if you question the orthodox view of climate change. Similarly, you are immediately labeled (by some) a religious fundamentalist if you question evolution.
The truth is really more complex, and not tied to any particular dogma. It does not follow, for example, that if climate change is interplanetary and not (mostly) caused by humans, that all environmental concerns are irrelevant. In other words, you don’t have to be an “anti-environmentalist” to question the orthodox view of global warming.
And you certainly don’t have to be a fundamentist, or even a monotheist to question the current orthodoxy on evolution. These are only the simplistic positions that the polorarized media push people into.
Sarah Silverman vs. TED
May 13th
When I first discovered the TED talks, I thought I’d found a great source of cutting edge, innovative intellectual stimulation. But the more of them I watch, the more I’m starting to think that it tends to represent a rather narrow and conventional view. I really started to wonder where they are coming from when they showed a rather trivial presentation by professional debunker Amazing Randi.
This video shows what happened when TED invited controversial comic Sarah Silverman to speak. Predictably enough, she offended many people, including the organizer of the conference. How smart can these people really be if they were surprised when Sarah Silverman said something politically incorrect?
What’s especially annoying is that I could not even find the original talk given by Sarah, while TED routinely posts all of their talks on their website. The video below is an interview by Bill Maher about the TED incident.
While I’m sure there are still some positive things about TED –with all of the hundreds of talks they organize every year some of it has to be good!– my overall estimation of them is steadily declining.
