Philosophy and Psychology for the 21st Century

Governments and Disappointment

2011-11-26T15:25:00.000-08:00

An African chief stated that there are only two problems inAfrica – rats and governments. The chief’s obvious disappointment withgovernments is shared by people all over the world. There are different kindsof governments based on different assumptions.

A reasonable argument is thathumans prefer autocratic leadership in the form of kings and queens orcharismatic leaders with a military background. Humans have an impressivetendency to form hierarchies with groups, large and small. This is a tendencyderived from an instinctual social order that relies on groups organizingaround leaders, alpha animals, who by ability or inherited status can controlothers. In small groups, leaders are more visible and more accountable to othermembers of the group. Small group leaders must court favor on a daily basis orrely on intimidation of critics and competitors. As groups enlarge, leaders areless visible and less accountable and hierarchies become better defined andmore fiercely defended. Dictatorship is the oldest and most prevalent form ofgovernment. The Economist Intelligence Unit's Democracy index 2010 reported on55 authoritarian regimes in the world. They suggested that democracies were indecline.

The hope, of course, is that the autocratic leader isbenevolent and shares the wealth with his or her devoted subjects. Hopeful citizensare usually disappointed. History tells us that wealthy aristocrats who fail toshare the wealth can be deposed and killed by rivals or revolutionaries. Governmentsin Africa are often corrupt and belligerent. They sometimes organize masskillings to remove groups that are no longer wanted or needed. Any oppositionis rewarded by imprisonment or death. The aberrations of African countries areconsistent with human history and mirror the worst conduct prevalent in Europe overmany centuries. Recent events in Arab countries are further repetitions of age-oldstruggles with ruthless elites using force to suppress dissent.

The invention of more or less stable civil serviceorganizations is the real basis of government and the key to social stability. Indemocracies, politicians are elected to pass laws and may act as temporaryexecutive officers of government institutions. They are seldom qualified forthe responsibilities they assume. In the best case, government institutions arestaffed by well-educated, well-informed experts who advise and guide electedadministrators, accept some of their ideological biases without compromisingthe conduct of the institution's business. Seldom is the best case achieved and instead, in many countries,citizens discover that they are victims of the worst case mismanagement of institutions– often a product of political meddling and nepotism. You could argue that thereal result of elections is guaranteed incompetence of elected lawmakers.

Democracy Flaws

Democracy and freedom are not necessarily linked. An alert,well-informed citizenry and a politically independent judiciary are essentialto the preservation of some personal freedom. A civil society develops multipleoverlapping levels of dispute resolution with the right to appeal bad decisionsthat are common and inevitable when local tribunals decide who is privilegedand who is not. A champion of civil rights is often in the uncomfortablepredicament of defending the rights of humans he or she disagrees with,dislikes and even fears.

All governments are inefficient and are prone to corruption.In every large institution, there is a tendency to fascism, the dictatorialrule of an elite group who believe only they know what is right and true. Afascist displays innate tendencies, modified by learning, but devoid ofcompassion. A fascist promotes arguments and dissension, developing the ideathat only some citizens have rights and privileges and others become outsiderswho must be constrained, imprisoned, deported or eliminated. A fascist leader is a dictator. Theidealistic notion that governments only exist to serve the needs of the peopleturns out to be a denial of human nature. Attempts within governments toregulate themselves appear in the most affluent nations where the people arewell educated and well informed. Well qualified citizens often demand betterperformance from their elected officials and their media often broadcast newsof wrong-doing. An elected official representing well qualified citizens has avested interest in protecting his or her reputation by behaving correctly andfollowing ethical rules. This peerpressure dynamic is essential for small group regulation and may work to some degreein larger groups because of the increased ability of private citizens to broadcastdisapproval.

Elections are often thought to be the essence of democracy,but as human groups grow larger and social organization more complex, the idealof citizen controlled government becomes impossible. The Economist Intelligence Unit assessed thekind and quality of governments in 167 countries during 2008. Only 30 countrieshad full democracies, representing 14.4% of the world population.

Type	Countries	% countries	% population
Full democracies	30	18.0	14.4
Flawed democracies	50	29.9	35.5
Hybrid regimes	36	21.6	15.2
Authoritarian	51	30.5	34.9

Five European countries Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Netherlandsand Denmark had the highest ratings for fully functional democracies. Canadawas eleventh and the US 18th on the list. North Korea had the lowest ratings asa dysfunctional authoritarian regime.[i]

By the end of 2010, full democracies decreased to 26 (12.3%of world population) and flawed democracies increased to 53 (37.2%). Thedemocracy score was lower in 2010 than in 2008 in 91 countries out of the 167they surveyed. They attribute the decline to economic distress in the afflictedcountries. [ii]

The Economist democracy report of 2008 stated: “Flaweddemocracies are concentrated in Latin America and Eastern Europe, and to alesser extent in Asia. Despite progress in Latin American democratization inrecent decades, many countries in the region remain fragile democracies. Levelsof political participation are generally very low and democratic cultures areweak. There has also been significant backsliding in recent years in some areassuch as media freedoms. Much of Eastern Europe illustrates the differencebetween formal and substantive democracy. The new EU members from the regionhave pretty much equal levels of political freedoms and civil liberties as theold developed EU, but lag significantly in political participation andpolitical culture—a reflection of widespread anomie and weaknesses ofdemocratic development. Only two countries from the region—the Czech Republicand Slovenia (just)—are in the full democracy category. Hybrid andauthoritarian regimes dominate heavily in the countries of the former SovietUnion, as the momentum towards "color revolutions" has petered out.”

The Economist's 2010 report stated that:" The dominantpattern in all regions over the past two years has been backsliding onpreviously attained progress in democratization. The global financial crisisthat started in 2008 accentuated existing negative trends in politicaldevelopment."

Kershaw recalled Hitler’s rise to power, exploitingdemocracy to create a demonic dictatorship. Other countries continue on afascist course in the 21st century. Kershaw asked: “Could something like ithappen again? That is the first question that comes to mind when recalling thatHitler was given power in democratic Germany 75 years ago. With the world nowfacing such great tensions and instability, the question seems more obviousthan ever. Hitler came to power in a democracy with a liberal Constitution, andused democratic freedoms to undermine and then destroy democracy itself. Thatdemocracy, established in 1919, was a product of defeat in a world war andrevolution and was never accepted by most of the German elites, notably themilitary, large landholders and big industry. The Nazis’ spectacular surge in popular support reflected anger,frustration and resentment that Hitler was able to exploit among millions ofGermans. Democracy had failed them, they felt. Their country was divided,impoverished and humiliated. Scapegoats were needed. It was easy to turn hatredagainst Jews, who could be made to represent the imagined external threat to Germanyby both international capitalism and Bolshevism. Internally, Jews wereassociated with the political left which was held responsible by Hitler and hisfollowers for Germany’s plight. These distant events still have echoes today.In Europe, in the wake of increased immigration, most countries haveexperienced some revival of neo-fascist, racist movements. Skillful politiciansaround the globe have proved adept at manipulating populist sentiment and usingdemocratic structures to erect forms of personalized, authoritarian rule.” [iii]

From Human Nature and Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason 2012 Edition.

[i]Democracy report 2008 Economist Intelligence Unit http://www.eiu.com/index.asp

[ii]Economist Intelligence Unit’s Webinar. Democracy In Retreat:The EIU's Democracy Index 2010 . December 15, 2010 Online.

[iii] Ian Kershaw. How Democracy Produced a Monster. NYT February3, 2008

Happiness

2011-11-24T15:31:00.000-08:00

When all the arguments about human needs and tendencies subside, one simple idea always works. Humans want to be well fed and safe. Happiness begins with shelter, healthy air, adequate food, and clean water available in a secure environment. To remain happy, each person must be accepted by a social group that provides access to resources, employment and human rights. Do humans understand how to become happy? Yes and no. Humans have restless minds and generate dissatisfactions at a greater rate than they generate contentment. The restless, nomadic human is driven every day to emerge even from a stable, comfortable home to satisfy these relentless urges and drives.

Happiness may be equated with affluence but there are problems with affluence. I occasionally visit people who are rich and live in big houses. You can tour someone's elegant mansion and admire his or her couches, paintings, lavish bathrooms, wardrobes and swimming pool. While I live simply, I do have an appreciation for domestic comforts, interior décor, art and finely crafted art and artifacts, I know that being rich does not increase mind space nor does it decrease the constantly regenerating drives that sustain a state of dissatisfaction in all humans. A rich man with a big house may find that he is most comfortable sitting in his smallish study, in an old leather chair that is a little beaten up but fits his body after many years of daily contact. He might spend his leisure time watching videos, especially old movies that he has collected. The other 10,000 square feet of his mansion sits idle, except when he has parties but he does not enjoy those much anymore; he is tired of the ingratiating behavior of relative strangers, their idle chatter and malicious gossip. This is not to argue that having money and property will always make you miserable, as some poor people like to think.

One problem of affluence is that humans repeat behaviors that were once gratifying and successful. It makes sense to repeat drinking a glass of water when thirst recurs, since water flows through us and must be replaced continuously. If you add alcohol to the water, having the second and third drink turns a pleasurable experience into to pathological experience: a nice person may become a monster; a healthy person becomes mentally and physically ill. The absurd consequences of typical human behavior have been broadcast by centuries of literature and self-help advice.

As soon as an object becomes “mine”, its value increases. An object possessed becomes an object that possesses the owner. If you enjoy buying objects and taking them home, the numbers of objects increase over time and you have to buy a bigger home. If buying one pair of shoes made you happy, you go back for a second and a third pair. If one car makes you feel good, buy two or three. This tendency to repeat acquisitive behaviors is built into marketing strategy- merchants offer "two for the price of one" or "buy one at the regular price and get one free."

Some individuals rationalize their compulsive acquisitive behaviors and refer to themselves as collectors. They promote interest in their collections and inflate the value of their objects. Others simply fill the space available to them with inexpensive junk and then rent storage to handle the overflow. Others fill small living spaces with newspapers and magazines until their dwellings resemble the underground burrows of acquisitive rodents. We know from common observation and formal study that acquisitive behavior is an old animal pattern that is built into our innate tendencies and is not going away. Some individuals thoughtfully regulate their consuming habits, having understood and learned to control their innate tendencies to hoard and consume more. The best advice for humans is "do more with less."

Philosophers have noticed the human tendency to desire anything and everything. As soon as you have satisfied one need, another arises. They have recommended less material preoccupations and a more contemplative life. In contrast to constant preoccupation with devouring the world out there, a contemplative human needs spaciousness and contentment rather than consumption. You need a few hours to relax at home and say (with a sigh of relief) I have, at least briefly, everything I need.

One of the Buddha's insights is stated simply: "The cause of all suffering is desire." He would suggest that the route to happiness is to decrease expectations and needs and not to consume more of everything. Appreciating one flower, one friend, or one precious artifact is more gratifying than trying to have a hundred of each. Money does not buy happiness, but, if spent wisely; more money can achieve comfort, and relative security in healthier more pleasant environments. In the best case, more money gives you more options and more freedom denied to less privileged people, including the philanthropic option, helping others by donating money to worthy causes.

From Human Nature & Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason. The book a 21st century description of anthropology, sociology, psychology and neuroscience - disciplines that need to be integrated as they are in this book. The topics are essential to understanding human nature, its origins and its problems. Download the eBook version from Persona Digital Online

Error and Limitations

2011-11-21T14:54:00.000-08:00

Human cognition is inherently fuzzy. Human performance is also fuzzy and mistakes are common if not inevitable, even with advanced skills and years of experience. It makes sense that there should be some slack in the evaluation of human performance and conduct. One of the common themes of storytelling is the incompetence of others and humans take pleasure in recounting the errors that others make.

An industry of litigation has emerged around human error and the pretense is that there are perfect humans who make no serious errors. The legal case for damages is built on the assumption of a standard of care and due diligence that exceeds the standards achieved in actual performance. If a surgeon amputates the wrong leg, a lawsuit against him is likely to succeed.

But surgeons, like all other humans, make mistakes everyday – they forget to do things; they jump to conclusions when there is too little evidence and fail to make decisions when there is enough evidence; they misinform patients; they write undecipherable notes; they get tired, irritable and impatient. The problems that physicians and surgeons face are universal human problems. They face a constant barrage of events that are complex and uncertain. Their tools and understanding are limited and their own needs are often neglected so that their performance is compromised. On the plus side, you can argue that, given their limitations, medical doctors do well most of the time, creating some order out of random and chaotic events. However, not all doctors do well all the time.

When humans make mistakes, they often claim: “I am only human.” Of course, that is a redundant statement since we already know that they are human, but the statement does suggest that someone, somehow expected them to perform at a superhuman level. The protest “I am only human” refers us to the principle that all humans have imperfect performance but judge others more harshly than they judge themselves. The indignant storyteller assumes the disguise of the perfect one who knows no error or sin.

A complex fantasy of superhuman performance emerges in every culture that supports the delusion that humans do better than they actually do. This is a collective self-deception on a grand scale. Leaders and aristocrats with various pedigrees are often given unearned prestige and superhuman abilities may be attributed to them. All humans, regardless of status, share basic tendencies and limitations. Inflated attribution will lead to disappointment sooner or later.

Self-deceiving and unrealistically high standards for others have a social value and appear in every human group. Claiming a high standard makes it easy to shame, blame and discredit others who make mistakes. High standards are used to motivate group members to work harder, compete and achieve more. In the best case, high standards operate as attractors that align individuals with learning experiences that can improve performance.

Another function of high standards is to support claims of elite groups that they possess special qualities that others cannot attain or can only attain by seeking membership in the elite group. Humans can be described as animals with material ambitions and moral aspirations whose performance inevitably fails to meet their own expectations, but they ignore their own limitations and deny their own errors. A more realistic view is that even the smartest, nicest humans have distinct limitations, will routinely make mistakes, and occasionally, one of their mistakes will have major and tragic consequences.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in the US is a prototype of interacting groups of smart people who sometimes cannot get it right. In NASA, the smartest scientists and engineers collaborate on making space flights and other projects. NASA is also a showcase for US technology and has a major public relations responsibility. NASA failures are highly visible tragedies that are well-studied. When the regular orbital flights of NASA’s shuttle began, managers estimated the risk of failure to be 1 flight in 100,000. After the explosion of the shuttle, Challenger, in January 1986, Feynman declared that NASA exaggerated the reliability of its product to the point of fantasy. In 1988 when flights resumed, the revised estimated risk of catastrophic failure at 1 flight in 50.

After a decade of successful flights the estimate of risk was improved to 1 in 254 flights. The shuttle, Columbia, disintegrated on re-entry in 2003, and the risk estimate became 1 in 100. A piece of insulating foam fell off the fuel tank 82 seconds after liftoff and struck one wing edge with sufficient force to punch a hole in the wing. On re-entry, hot gases entered the wing causing progressive damage and the eventual disintegration of the shuttle. All astronauts perished. NASA teams worked for two years and spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to fix the foam problem. When the next shuttle took off in July 2005, again pieces of insulating foam broke off the fuel tank two minutes after launch but drifted away in the thin atmosphere. The shuttle completed its mission, but NASA, displaying appropriate caution and concern, announced that further flights would be suspended until the problem had really been fixed.

The actual risk of catastrophic failure of the shuttle as of 2005 was 2 flights in 113 or 1 in 56.5 flights. In his report on cognitive problems at NASA after the Challenger disaster, Feynman stated:” It appears that there are enormous differences of opinion as to the probability of a failure with loss of vehicle and of human life. The estimates range from roughly 1 in 100 to 1 in 100,000. The higher figures come from the working engineers, and the very low figures from management. What are the causes and consequences of this lack of agreement? Since 1 part in 100,000 would imply that one could put a Shuttle up each day for 300 years expecting to lose only one, we could properly ask: “What is the cause of management's fantastic faith in the machinery?” We have also found that certification criteria used in Flight Readiness Reviews often develop a gradually decreasing strictness. The argument that the same risk was flown before without failure is often accepted as an argument for the safety of accepting it again. Because of this, obvious weaknesses are accepted again and again, sometimes without a sufficiently serious attempt to remedy them, or to delay a flight because of their continued presence. “ Feynman concluded that a successful technology requires that reality takes precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

From Group Dynamics and Human Nature by Stephen Gislason. Available in print edition and as a download from Persona Digital Online.

Protests and Mobs

2011-10-23T12:38:00.000-07:00

We have recognized that humans are social animals who interact continuously. There is a constant tension between self-identity and group membership; between self-interest and group interest; between bonding, belonging and being a free independent person. There are important differences between acting alone and acting within a group. Group size also influences behavior. We have also recognized that humans do best living in working in small groups and become dysfunctional when they join larger groups. Social grooming is one of the most common everyday social interactions among chimpanzees and other primates. Chimpanzees allocate a large portion of their daytime hours grooming each other.

Humans often form social gatherings and interact with multiple partners at the same time in everyday interactions, such as conversation. Adult male chimpanzees compete for higher status by forming coalitions. Males have to renew or confirm their relationships with each other by frequent grooming sessions in relatively small clusters. Adult females do not compete for higher status by forming intimate allies and do better by having wider interactions with many individuals and tend to groom in larger groups.
Some primate species, including humans, come together in groups of several hundred individuals for conventions. These are temporary congregations that may have enduring benefits or adverse consequences for the participants. Humans also assemble in-groups to protest, to seek revenge and to attack real or imaginary enemies. Well-focused mobs with effective leaders can be agents of change. Authoritarian rulers are sometimes disposed when large numbers of people protest injustices on the street, risking their lives to demand rights, freedoms and justice. Democracies need activism and public displays of disapproval to survive corrupt and incompetent politicians who tend to disregard human rights.

Even in polite societies, mobs may become disorganized and destructive, transforming more or less well-behaved humans into combatants, who push, shove, raise their arms in the air, show fist gestures and shout meaningless slogans. Soccer fans, for example, will gather in large stadium to enjoy the game and then riot as they exit, crushing each other and destroying property down the street. Mass movements of humans occur regularly and often operate at the lowest level of intelligence with none of the moral restraints that are available when individuals act alone according to the rules and peer pressure of the local community.

Street Mobs with Opposing Views

Mobs of people have assaulted each in passionate encounters that lead to mass deaths. Kakar describes an ethnic riot as-the intense, sudden physical assault by civilians of one group on civilians of another group. He stated that: “In the 20th century, the number of dead claimed by the primitive weaponry used in ethnic riots was second only to the number killed by sophisticated armaments. Ethnic riots can be followed by secessionist warfare, terrorist violence, and a general undermining of democratic institutions.” Dictators often use protests as an opportunity to kill large numbers of disobedient citizens either by uniformed police shooting at the crowd or by more surreptitious attacks by mercenaries who form counter protest mobs.

Horowitz studied 150 ethnic riots in 50 countries and concluded that lethal riots combine passion and calculation. He identified four factors that lead to killing: a hostile relationship between two groups; a response to events that engages the anger of one group, a response dominated by outrage or wrath; a sense of justification for violence, such as viewing it as self-defense, part of a long drawn-out war, or punishment of the other group for wrongdoing. The participants in lethal riots believe that that their aggression will not be punished.

Societal assets that reduce outbreaks of violence include more liberal, humanitarian attitudes that negate ethnic animosity and increase the aversion to violence of all kinds. Increased personal risk assumed by would-be rioters is an important deterrent. Even in polite societies such as Canada, the deployment of riot police has become routine for crowd control. The politicians and police will argue that dangerous riots often escalate over days and even weeks so that early intervention and detention of aggressive rioters will prevent escalation toward property damage and of loss of life. Crowd control is not an easy task.

Suppression of Dissent

Despite token support of human rights, the right of free speech and the right to assemble and protest peacefully, governments everywhere prepare to suppress dissent by using force, arrest and detention. You could invent a scale to rate governments according to their tolerance for public protest and their willingness to abrogate human rights to stay in power. One of the problems with mob control by riot police is that legitimate and peaceful protest may be suppressed with the same vigor as potentially dangerous riots. Public protest is a citizen’s right in a free society and a necessary option when governments become corrupt and autocratic. A citizen concerned with civil rights will insist on strong civil control of police actions. Otherwise, corrupt governments will use police and military power to further their fascist goals.

Autocratic governments stay in power by limiting or banning public protest, suppressing free speech and using lethal force to punish individuals and groups for challenging their authority.

From Human Nature and Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason.
Available as a printed book or as a PDF download from Persona Digital Online.

Failing Economies

2011-10-05T18:58:00.001-07:00

There has been a remarkable proliferation of euphemistic, metaphoric and deceptive descriptions of economic events in the 21st century , peaking in 2011 as global economic crises proliferated. Even the Economist Intelligence Unit, usually a reliable source of data and analysis, used euphemisms such a "soft patch" in economic recovery to describe an impending global disaster.

In the US, when Ben Bernanke sat at his computer and typed 800 billion US dollars into current government accounts, his action was described as "Quantitative Easing." In this century of economies as numbers in computer databases, printing money is old fashion. With the proper endorsements from high-ranking government officials, you just type in numbers and all is well. Not that quantitative easing is such a bad idea -- should be available to all hard-working citizens with increasing debt burdens.

Not to be outdone by US extravaganzas, the countries of the European Union began to fail as individual countries such as Ireland, England, Italy and Greece accumulated increased debt burdens with threatened defaults on paying both the interest and principal owed. By mid 2011, global economic recovery appeared to be a wish, a fantasy, a delusion more that a realizable goal. Krugman wrote: "These are interesting times — and I mean that in the worst way. Right now we’re looking at not one but two looming crises, either of which could produce a global disaster. We can only hope that the politicians huddled in Washington and Brussels succeed in averting these threats. Even if we manage to avoid immediate catastrophe, the deals being struck on both sides of the Atlantic are almost guaranteed to make the broader economic slump worse. In fact, policy makers seem determined to perpetuate what I’ve taken to calling the Lesser Depression, the prolonged era of high unemployment that began with the Great Recession of 2007-2009 and continues to this day, more than two years after the recession supposedly ended. "

I admit that I admire Krugman's social and political analysis more than his economic theory. He favors governments spending their way out of recession to avoid stagnation or worse, depression. He confronts opposing economic strategies that demand fiscal restraint, debt reduction, increased taxation, and reduction in the size of government. To some extend my simplistic understanding of human nature restores reality but not optimism about the prospects for economic recovery.

Just to review the main dynamics at work:

Humans do best living and working in small groups. Their cognitive limitations become obvious when they attempt to manage large groups, corporations and countries.

Large systems will reliably reach an avalanche state and tend to fail suddenly and dramatically.

Economies are complex, somewhat chaotic systems that no-one understands well enough to manage from the top down.

No-one can know what will happen next.

Burning cheap fossils fuels was essential to wealth generation and environmental destruction in the 20th century. Cheap fossil fuels are becoming scarce. The environmental degradation they helped cause will become more threatening and more expensive.

Environmental degradation with extreme weather events, declining resources and increasing populations will not allow a return to the easy affluence enjoyed by a few in the 20th century. Reduced growth, reduced consumption, reduced expectations will be good for everyone.

Government leaders do not have the knowledge, skills, power or political will to rescue us from the impending crises they help to create.

The 2011 civilian revolts in Northern African and the Middle East are not signs of progress towards civil societies, new affluence and justice for all. They are recurrences of inevitable social chaos that arise from increasing populations and decreasing resources to sustain those populations.

There are many mechanisms that cause inequitable distribution of resources. Large numbers of educated, unemployed, frustrated young men in many countries are protesters, rioters, potential revolutionaries waiting to be inspired to take action against oppression. The combination of wealthy, armed dictators, expanding numbers of poor and defenseless citizens, with the overwhelming adverse forces of nature creates death and destruction that has no obvious solution. The role of climate change as an overwhelming force that threatens the survival of entire countries is generally ignored by economic theories. Events so far in the 21st century point away from all idealist visions toward the harsh realities of human conflicts and suffering that have prevailed as long as humans have walked the earth.

From Human Nature and Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason
Availble as Printed Book or PDF download from Persona Digital Online.

The Common Good -- No Consensus

2011-08-31T11:03:00.000-07:00

One ethical argument is that group interests should have priority over selfish interests. An investigation of ethics must consider this argument and develop metrics for the common good. No-one should assume that it is easy to define the common good. In political battles, clearly divergent, if not contradictory ideas of the common good prevail and efforts to achieve consensus are difficult to impossible. The ethical implications are profound.

Michael Sandel asks What’s the Right Thing to Do? He teaches political philosophy at Harvard and offers a popular course -- Justice. One of his intellectual anchors is Jeremy Bentham who wrote Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation in 1780. Bentham proposed a utilitarian test to evaluate the morality of any action: ask the question will my action produce the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people? John Stuart Mill later argued that respect for individuals rights as "the most sacred and binding part of morality" is compatible with the idea that justice rests ultimately on utilitarian considerations. In simple terms, the two arguments compare individual interests with group interests.

Sandel also reviewed the philosophy of Immanuel Kant who argued that reason tells us what we ought to do, and when we obey our own reason, only then are we truly free. Kant’s ideas seem oddly unrealistic in the 21st century. Reason is in short supply. Every person assumes that he or she is more reasonable than others who disagree. There is no consensus about the “common good.” We know that some humans are bad and will harm others as a matter of course; their behavior will not be altered by rational argument or laws and must be constrained by force. Some of these bad people arrive in positions of authority and power. Some bad people are elected, even to the highest positions in government where they can do much harm without insight or remorse.

We know that the audience, the "public", is made up of different groups with vested interests that conflict. We know that everyone invents stories that support their own point of view. Everyone deceives others and there is no absolute truth. We know that the voting public contains individuals with different mental abilities and that most humans have distinct limitations on what they can and will understand.

Human destiny as a species still lies with the programs in the old brain that offer only limited empathy and understanding and insist on the priority of local group survival at any cost. Individuals can transcend the old programs by diligent learning and practice but individual effort and learning does not change the genome, so that there can be no enduring civility without the persistent and relentless initiation of new humans into a rational and compassionate world order. Whatever we value about civilized human existence - culture, knowledge, social justice, respect for human rights and dignity must be practiced anew and stored as modifications of each person's neocortex.

From the Good Person - Ethics and Morality by Stephen Gislason. Avilable as a print edition or as a download from Persona Digital Online.

Does Capitalism Really Work ?

2011-08-23T12:11:00.000-07:00

The term capital means money. In a root sense, money is an analogue of work and goods. In the best case, monetary policy develops a value-based connection between work, industrial productivity and monetary rewards; between industry and goods for sale. However, money is weak analogue of value and monetary policy has become increasingly abstract as countries grow larger and richer. Now, you would be challenged to demonstrate a valid connection between money and real value.

Money has become numbers stored in computer databases. The numbers are not connected to real things in the real world. If everyone with numbers demanded real goods for their numbers, the cost of real goods would skyrocket and the stores would be empty. The "economy" is an abstract number machine with inputs and outputs and prolific, complicated transactions that require fast, global computational networks to proceed at a frantic pace that defies understanding.

Idealist versions of capitalism still persist among people who are both wealthy and content and among people who have aspirations but little understanding of the realities of capitalist economies. A capitalist might argue that every newborn has the opportunity to become rich, even if his or her parents are poor. The trick is to master the techniques of using money to make money, leaving behind any quaint notions of trading time, effort and skill for money. One basic strategy is to buy for less and sell for more. Another is to purchase property and services that others will rent or consume on a continuing basis, so that you make money while you sleep. Another strategy is to use some money or capital assets as leverage to borrow and invest more money, increasing your net worth.

Borrowing money or credit is perhaps the greatest strength and the greatness weakness of capitalism. Credit promotes spending, construction and expansion. Individuals enjoy assets such as a cars and homes that they do not own. Corporations buy supplies and build new factories on credit. The credit aspect of capitalism only works if the borrower can earn money and payback the lender.

In the US, Adam Smith declared the virtues of capitalism in the “The Wealth of Nations,” which established a new economic theory in 1776. Sloan suggested: “Smith’s treatise was as transformational as the American Revolution and established the intellectual foundation of capitalism, free markets and individual choice. Smith’s thesis is that setting people free to pursue their own self-interest produces a collective result far superior to what you get if you try to impose political or religious dictates: “Free people allowed to make free choices in free markets will satisfy their needs (and society’s) far better than any government can. Smith believed passionately in free trade, both within countries and between them. He felt that allowing people and countries to specialize and to trade freely would produce enormous wealth, because freeing people and nations to do what they do best will produce vastly more wealth than if everyone strives for self-sufficiency.”

Smith’s vision is idealistic and, if you consider the US as an experiment in his theory of free markets, then you have all a lot of data to disprove his thesis. To advocate capitalism, you have to believe in the regulatory magic of a “free market.” Supply and demand determine the price of goods and services. Consumers become the regulators of corporate behavior by rewarding companies that provide good service and good products at a reasonable price. It does sound reasonable, but in practice there are complications.

You could argue that capitalism is a good system if you are rich and a bad system if you are poor. Capitalism is really about, making and hoarding money. It is about investing money to make more money without working. Capitalism is about controlling resources including the human resources needed to make and sell goods so that capitalists have more money to make more money and grow wealthy. Problems in a “free market” economy include risky credit, gambling, reckless pollution of the environment, exploitation of natural resources and exploitation of workers. Regulation by government is necessary to constrain reckless and sometime criminal behavior of individuals, corporations and government agencies.

In capitalist countries, free markets hardly exist. If there is an ongoing argument, it is not about what kind of economy you favor, but how much government regulation you support. Economy Watch stated: “The US government makes full use of economic tools such as money supply, tax rates, and credit control, among other things, to adjust the rate of economic growth. The US Federal Government also regulates the operations of private business to prevent monopolies. The government renders a number of direct services in the form of providing support for national defense, monetary aid for research and development programs, and funds for highway construction, and infrastructure in general. In 2008, the US federal debt stood at $9.2 trillion, 67% of GDP. Each taxpayer owed $79,000 of government debt that must be added to personal debt to get a reasonable idea of the problem. American consumers typically also have a crushing burden of personal debt.”

The US government debt continues to grow and will likely increase for many years, even with disciplined fiscal restraint. If you are an optimist, you will argue that with low interest rates the burden of debt is manageable; with economic recovery and growth in GDP, government incomes will rise and deficits will eventually be eliminated.

The economics of capitalism became ideologically attached to democracy, although the connection is neither inevitable, nor even workable. I write from a perspective of a comfortable, safe citizen of a country (Canada) that combines capitalism and socialism with relatively good results. While Canada is not perfect, it is a country that looks viable in the long term, given stability of its neighbor, the USA. The US, in contrast, fell into deep recession in 2008 with a failing infrastructure and out of control government spending on futile wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - all based on paranoia, lies and promises that could not be realized.

The benefits and vices of a “capitalist” economy are most clearly manifest in the USA. Prior to the great collapse, the Economist reported that eight out of ten Americans thought their country was heading in the wrong direction (they were right): “The hapless George Bush is partly to blame for this, but many are concerned not so much about a failed president as about a flailing nation. One source of angst is the sorry state of American capitalism. American house prices are falling faster than during the Depression, petrol is more expensive than in the 1970s, banks are collapsing, credit is scarce, recession and inflation both threaten the economy and consumer confidence is an oxymoron. Many Americans feel as if they missed the boom. Between 2002 and 2006 the incomes of 99% rose by an average of 1% a year in real terms, while those of the top 1% rose by 11% a year; three-quarters of the economic gains during Bush’s presidency went to that top 1%. The rich appear in Barack Obama’s speeches not as entrepreneurial role models but as modern versions of the “malefactors of great wealth” denounced by Teddy Roosevelt a century ago: this lot, rather than building trusts, avoid taxes and ship jobs to Mexico. Free trade is less popular in the United States than in any other developed country, and a nation built by immigrants is building a fence to keep them out. “

By the end of 2010, economic recovery appeared to be a wish, a fantasy, a delusion more that a realizable goal. Economist Krugman summarized the plight of the US: "We are no longer the nation that used to amaze the world with its visionary projects. We have become, instead, a nation whose politicians seem to compete over who can show the least vision, the least concern about the future and the greatest willingness to pander to short-term, narrow-minded selfishness."

From Human Nature and Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason 2011 Edition, available as a printed book from Alpha Online or as a PDF download from Persona Digital Online.

The Real Meaning of the Arab Revolts

2011-08-04T14:05:00.001-07:00

A responsibility to protect resolution was passed by the Security Council in 2011, authorizing military intervention to protect civilians in Libya. This resolution led to NATO nations joining together to bomb Libya over many weeks, shifting their resolve from protecting peaceful demonstrators (who became armed rebels) to removing the dictator and his supporters from power. Even when a final outcome is uncertain, it is obvious that responsibility to protect is an idealist's notion with no possibility of practical application

Libya was just one Arab country among many to erupt in civilian protests with peaceful demonstrations leading to property destruction and wanton killing. Beginning in Tunisia, citizens' street protests became a revolutionary passion that spread to adjacent Arab countries. The Arab uprisings had implications for the rest of the world.

Idealists who promoted democracy and freedom were quick to support popular uprisings that demanded reforms or removal of dictators. This distant idealism paints a pretty picture of the benefits of democracy and recommends elections as the ultimate goal of reform. The reality, of course, is very different.

Democratic states are in decline everywhere and their citizens, protesting in the streets, are subject to paramilitary police suppression. The transition from autocratic states with corrupt institutions to fully functional states whose institutions serve the best interests of the people would take, even the best case, centuries to achieve. The basic dynamic of street protest is that citizens with diverse needs and interests will unite in opposition to a common enemy. While the brief interlude of apparent consensus is impressive, cohesion vanishes as soon as the common enemy is defeated.

The Economist Intelligence Unit report in February summarized the emerging revolutions in Arab states: 'The recent momentous events have been extraordinary in several respects. The popular uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt were sudden and unexpected, occurring in seemingly infertile territory. The revolts were home-grown affairs led by secular forces. They have overturned a host of stereotypes about the Middle East and North Africa region and have caught the outside world unawares. In Egypt, the head of a regime with one of the biggest repressive apparatuses in the world was toppled within a few weeks. Authoritarian regimes elsewhere share similar characteristics: human rights abuses and absence of basic freedoms; rampant corruption and nepotism; the presence of small elites that control the bulk of a nation's assets; and poor governance and social provision. Economic hardships in the form of stagnant or falling incomes, high unemployment and rising inflation have affected many countries. Some authoritarian regimes have young and restless populations. Long-serving geriatric leaders are another common feature. In Egypt Hosni Mubarak had been in office for 29 years; the former Tunisian president, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, was in power for 23 years. Ali Abdullah Saleh has ruled Yemen since 1978 while Libya's Muammar Qadhafi has been in power for more than four decades. The longer ageing autocrats hang on to power, the more out-of-touch and corrupt their regimes tend to become, and the more of an anachronism and an affront they become to their peoples."

In his description of protests turned armed rebellion in Libya, Solomon Stated: "A post-Qaddafi Libya could easily be roiled in internal battles, ultimately dividing into several smaller countries, each dominated by local tribes. That could make life better for some Libyans, and it could make life worse for others; it would almost surely be problematic for Western companies with oil interests in the country. Modern Libya is an artificial construct, a remnant of colonialism. The glue holding it together is failing, and the warnings of chaos are real. The choice between chaos and oppression is always a tricky one, but this population is tired of oppression and corruption, and chaos may look more attractive to them."

In Egypt, Mubarack was deposed, but street protests continued, hoping to persuade military leaders to proceed with democratic reforms. The apparent cohesion of the crowds lasted only a few weeks and then violent clashes resumed between Christians and Muslims.

Shadid and Kirkpatrick wrote:"But in the past weeks, the specter of divisions — religion in Egypt, fundamentalism in Tunisia, sect in Syria and Bahrain, clan in Libya — has threatened uprisings that once seemed to promise to resolve questions that have vexed the Arab world since the colonialism era. In an arc of revolts and revolution, that idea of a broader citizenship is being tested as the enforced silence of repression gives way to the cacophony of diversity. Security and stability were the justification that strongmen in the Arab world offered for repression, often with the sanction of the United States. But even activists admit that the region so far has no model that enshrines diversity and tolerance without breaking down along more divisive identities. In Tunisia, a relatively homogenous country with a well-educated population, fault lines have emerged between the secular-minded coasts and the more religious and traditional inland."

If civilians in any country needed protection, it was in Syria, but no help was forthcoming. A New York Times editorial summarized the deplorable conduct of a failing dictatorial government: "As many as 1,600 courageous Syrians have been slaughtered since pro-democracy demonstrations began in March (2011). On Wednesday, after three days of shelling, President Bashar al-Assad ordered his military to storm Hama, the city where his father killed up to 20,000 people three decades ago. Where has the international community been? Shamefully paralyzed. The United Nations Security Council finally issued a statement condemning “widespread violations of human rights and the use of force against civilians by the Syrian authorities” — but with no threat of sanctions. For two months, Russia, China, India, Brazil and South Africa had blocked any action at all. It is going to take a lot more pressure to persuade Mr. Assad that his time is up — or to persuade those enabling him to switch sides."

Early in this chapter (On Law), I discussed the irregular if not random distribution of ethical conduct. If ideal justice involves the fair and impartial measurement of human behavior and more or less equal treatment for all citizens, then ideal justice is impossible. The eruptions in Northern African and the Middle East are not signs of progress towards civil societies and justice for all. They are recurrences of inevitable social chaos that arises from increasing populations and decreasing resources to sustain those populations.

There are many mechanisms that cause inequitable distribution of resources. The combination of wealthy, armed dictators, expanding numbers of poor and defenseless citizens, with the overwhelming adverse forces of nature creates death and destruction on a grand scale that has no obvious solution. With diminishing resources worldwide, the prospect of wealthier countries, rescuing failed states seems less and less likely. In Somalia, Ethopia, and Kenya today a prolonged drought is producing a famine crisis with 11 million humans at risk. Somalia has been a failed state for decades. No input of emergency food aid will solve such a profoundly systemic crisis.

Events so far in the 21st century point away from all idealist visions toward the harsh realities of human conflicts and suffering that have prevailed as long as humans have walked the earth.

From Human Nature and Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason. Available in a Print Eidtion and as a PDF file download from Persona Digital Online.

Group Size and Cognitive Limits

2011-07-14T12:11:00.000-07:00

Humans are primates. Primates tend to live in complex, multi-tiered social systems in which different layers are functional responses to different environmental opportunities and problems. Chimpanzees, like humans, have a fission/fusion form of social system. The community is divided into a number of temporary foraging parties whose composition changes with changes in the environment. A larger group may divide into smaller foraging groups when food is scarce. Smaller groups may fuse when food is abundant or when an external threat makes alliances more attractive.

Dunbar and others established an important relationship between intelligence and cohesive group size. The basic idea is that the cohesion of primate groups is limited by the information-processing capacity of the neocortex. One human can only maintain social and working relationships a limited number of individuals by meaningful personal contact. In simple terms, you can only know a small number of people well enough to understand their individual characteristics, to evaluate what they are likely to do and to develop cooperative work habits. You can only form intimate contacts with a few select individuals.

Each human has a people sphere around them with a central region of intimates and a peripheral region of acquaintances. Just as there is a range of human cognitive ability, there is a range of human social ability. The most gifted humans have larger people spheres that might include up to 150 people. Beyond the boundaries of the known-people sphere, other humans blur into an undifferentiated “public.”

Humans can recognize more than 150 faces, but the faces are often nameless and meaningful associations are minimal, obscure or absent. Less socially gifted humans have difficulty maintaining connections with a smaller number of people and may not be able to sustain even one intimate relationship. Dunbar points to several examples in aboriginal groups, university facilities and military organizations that limit group size. The Hutterites limit their communities to 150 people and explain that if the number of individuals is larger, it becomes difficult to control their behavior by means of peer pressure. They prefer to split the community rather than create a police force.

The cohesion of primate groups is maintained by grooming each other. Body contact and grooming establishes and services friendships and coalitions. Coalitions protect their members against harassment by the other members of the group. The more harassment an individual faces, the more important coalitions are. A coalition’s effectiveness is measured by its members' willingness to come to each other's aid and is directly related to the amount of time its members spend grooming each other.

Dunbar stated: ”Group size is a function of relative neocortical volume in nonhuman primates... Among primates, the cohesion of groups is maintained by social grooming; the time devoted to social grooming is linearly related to group size among the Old World monkeys and apes. To maintain the stability of large groups, characteristic of humans, by grooming alone would place intolerable demands on time budgets. It is suggested that (1) the evolution of large groups in the human lineage depended on the development of a more efficient method for time-sharing the processes of social bonding and that (2) language uniquely fulfills this requirement... Analysis of a sample of human conversations shows that about 60% of talking time is spent gossiping about relationships and personal experiences.”

The emergent idea is that smaller groups based on kinship and affinity work better and larger groups require formal external structures that define and enforce specific roles and behavior. In modern businesses, smaller work groups increase job satisfaction and allow the coordination of tasks and information-flow through person-to-person links. In some high tech software companies, smart and nice employees are happiest working in a village atmosphere that includes children, pets and combines work with play.

In contrast, highly regimented and anonymous work environments disconnect employees from every other expression of their lives and produce “alienation” a common feature of urban life. Large companies do better by re-organizing around small and cohesive work groups that resemble bands of less than 20 people. A family-like unit of 3 to 10 people is often the first size of group to achieve effective collaboration and cooperation. While conflict is inevitable in human groups of any size, natural conflict resolution only works in small groups.

From Intelligence and Learning by Stephen Gislason. Available as a printed edition or an eBook for download from Persona Digital Online.

Frames and Propaganda

2011-07-11T18:45:00.000-07:00

The human world is a big place, populated by more than 7 billion humans, busy everday doing good things and bad things. News media attempt to report on events often with boastful slogans such as "keeping you informed as it happens" or "the first and best with breaking news..." Of course, no-one and no news agency can keep up with all world events. Everyone can only sample a few events everyday, with limited understanding of what is really going on out there.

Frames can be appreciated as devices that help us sample and present aspects of bigger pictures. A frame is real device that encloses a picture or selects a part of a larger picture. The view finder of a camera frames a photo to be taken. A good photographer frames a photograph with a sense of composition. The photo will be cropped and sized according to its final use. Paintings are placed on the wall and their display is considered to be an expression of taste and wealth.

Framed samples are appealing to humans and represent a fundamental strategy of coping with the profusion of events that occur in the real world. A photograph in a magazine or on a gallery wall is one selection from hundreds or thousands of images. Movie directors understand how to use successions of frames to present a story. Cameras are mounted on moveable platforms that allow shots from below, above, moving toward, moving away. The audience is guided by the director’s point of view to consider only some possibilities among many.

Language is also framed for presentation. Indeed, all media rely on framing devices to present selected samples of what is going on out there. A proud newspaper such as the New York Times has a tradition of responsible journalism and its writers attempt to report factual events truthfully. The front page of the Times is an important frame that is viewed internationally. Readers trust that the writers and editors have worked hard to use that frame responsibly. In contrast, the front page of a tabloid paper may reach a large audience, but readers need to know that the contents of that frame are fictional and cannot be trusted.

The advantage of understanding the frame metaphor is that it awakens interest in the semantic and pragmatic analysis of language. It is important to understand that all words and phrases are limited samples. Humans are story tellers. Thinking is speaking. The main purpose of story telling is to persuade others that you are a good person who knows what is true and that everyone should agree with you. All speakers and writers present a limited sample of all possible descriptions. Names artificially abstract objects and events from the contexts that give them meaning. Clever speakers and writers chose words and phrases to direct attention to their point of view and to advance their vested interests.

Professional propagandists have detailed understanding of the techniques of persuasion and control using language tools. They know how to direct and limit discourse and can imbed commands in polite language that influence the behavior of their audience. The goal of a propagandist is to develop a slogan that is propagated as a meme, infecting millions of minds. In each mind, an associative network of meaning is activated whenever the slogan is heard or seen.

For example, political strategists for the Republican party got George Bush elected by concentrating on slogans propagated through radio, television and printed media. Republican candidates would not engage in meaningful discourse. An observer could not decide if they were actually dumb, or just acting dumb on the advice of strategists. The Bush group was prolific in the production of slogans and succeeded in propagating a series of memes. For example, Bush cut taxes for the wealthy and claimed "tax relief" for all citizens. All citizens want relief from some burden or other and taxes are high on the list. But the Bush Boys were also big spenders and borrowed extravagant sums of money to finance their misadventures. The real world consequence of “tax relief” was that the US government borrowed increasing amounts of money so that as of 2007 every man woman and child in the country owed at least $30,000, almost half to foreign investors. Also, large sums were borrowed from the pension savings of citizens that should have been invested and protected from political squandering. As of 2007 at least 600 million US dollars was spend destroying buildings and killing people in Iraq. This cost was cleansed of all moral wrongdoing by calling the misadventure a "war to defend freedom." The war was against "terrorists" but waged in Iraq that had not contributed to the terrorist attack on the World Trade center in 2001. Fifteen of the 19 attackers came from Saudi Arabia. The economic disaster of 2008 followed and may not resolve for many years.

Many years ago, Chomsky described the merging of commercial interest with political agendas that conspired to control the public mind in the US and most other affluent countries. The media in the US achieves a biased mass consensus, despite a declared intention to present just the facts and to fairly represent all points of view. Chomsky wrote: "The guardians of history in every society are acutely sensitive to the faults of officially-designated enemies. The crude way to murder history is to lie. A more effective device is to set the bounds of permissible discourse. In coverage of contemporary affairs, the practice is a virtual reflex, as has been extensively documented. It is also standard in media critique, ensuring that unacceptable truths are banished from the mind. Thus, it is child's play to demonstrate the docility of the media with regard to US depredations (in other countries)… One factor is the power of business propaganda in the U.S. This is the country where the public relations industry was developed, where it is most sophisticated. It’s the home of the international entertainment industry, which is mainly propaganda. Huge funds are put into controlling the "public mind," …this is toward the capitalist end … there’s a huge expenditure on marketing, which is a form of manipulation and deceit... something like one-sixth of the gross domestic product goes to marketing. A large part of that is advertising. Advertising is tax-deductible, so you pay for the privilege of being manipulated and controlled."

From Language and Thinking by Stephen Gislason. Available in a printed edition or as a PDF download form Persona Digital Online.

Artificial Intelligence = False Claims

2011-07-01T12:44:00.001-07:00

When you do not know exactly how digital computers work and how programmers utilize the hardware, it is easy to be fooled into believing that computers are intelligent or will be soon. When you know exactly how digital computing works, you are less likely to believe in computers that will develop their own intelligence. In fact, a programmer knows that he or she has to tell the computer exactly what to do in precise and annoying detail. Without expert programming, digital computers are dumb machines.

The ability of a digital computer to calculate quickly exceeds human ability. A common impression is that a calculating computer is smart. Humans have difficulty doing calculations and only a small percentage of any student population will excel in mathematical ability. The ability to calculate quickly and accurately is overly impressive.

The abstract reasoning that underlies advanced mathematics is more interesting and is independent of the ability to calculate. Most mathematicians are happy to do calculations on a digital machine and do not feel the least bit threatened that some computer will take over their job of abstract reasoning. Digital computers have no sense of meaning, cannot perceive and are only able to make simple robotic decisions about the data they receive. They can store images accurately and will faithfully recall stored data unless a malfunction intervenes. Output procedures are echoes of input procedures. The biggest advance in programming involves searching thru large databases to find the right answers to specific questions. Goggle`s search engines represent state of the art algorithms, designed to deliver relevant results to search inquiries. Failure to achieve relevance remains a persistent search problem. Google requires teams of programmers working everyday to monitor and refine their software.

Popular science fiction postulates that digital computers will become intelligent sentient beings and take over the world. Arthur Clark’s Science fiction novel and Stanley Kubrick’s movie version of 2001 were thrilling in 1968. I was thrilled the sense of motion during the docking of shuttle with the space station, transformed by Strauss’ Blue Danube Waltz. The spacecraft in the movie was operated by HAL, the computer. HAL represented the possibility of computers developing human-like artificial intelligence.

In 1968, anything was possible, but with subsequent developments in brain and computer science, we now know that living intelligence is so developed, complex and profound that any success with machine programming is disappointing and rudimentary. We now know that real intelligence lies well beyond the ability of present and future digital machines. In AI there is more artificial and less intelligence.

David Stork,a machine intelligence researcher wrote: “Perhaps a dark side of HAL’s legacy is to have fixed an anthropomorphic view of artificial intelligence so firmly in the minds of a generation of researchers… But those idiot savants (AI programs) did not show even the slightest signs of achieving general competence. In the subsequent AI winter -- brought on by the end of a military research spree as well as the inevitable collision between venture capitalists and reality – only the mechanical cockroaches survived.“

I do not believe that digital computers even of great speed and complexity will attain consciousness, nor do I believe that robots controlled by digital computers will ever come close to achieving the self-organizing, free-living intelligence of a human.

Mark Tildon of Los Almos Laboratories makes small robots from spare parts derived from discarded portable cassette players. A few transistors in his robots handle the task of moving limbs and solving problems such as getting past obstacles or dealing with broken parts. His robots resemble insects and move like insects. Tildon observes that living brains solve the complex tasks of surviving as free beings in an ever-changing world by using simple and compact circuits. He observes that efforts to make free-living robots using digital computing fail because even simple tasks quickly grow in complexity and require state of the art computing power.

Digital robot abilities are in a much simpler domain than living creatures and may never compete well, even at a rudimentary level. While the work done on robotics and artificial intelligence is interesting and useful, progress to date informs us that it will be exceeding difficult to achieve the digital equivalent of the free-living intelligence of an ant. AI and robotics helps us to appreciate that the ant brain is a marvel of computation and miniaturization. We may eventually progress to computational devices based on different materials and strategies that are more brain-like and achieve better and unexpected results. At this writing, no one knows how to do this. The search continues with the study of animal brains.

Despite the science fiction roots and unrealistic arguments (often delusional), machine intelligence enthusiasts are more visible and vocal than ever before. Their meetings have the giddy feel of a born-again religious revival. One god-substitute is singularity:” Techno-Rapture. A black hole in the Extropian worldview whose gravity is so intense that no light can be shed on what lies beyond it. … the human mind is not the final word. Someday, human technology will advance to the point of being able to improve on the underlying hardware (the brain) - an event known as the Singularity. Depending on how much futurism people have been exposed to, they tend to imagine different candidate technologies, “different timescales, and different outcomes for humanity. The Singularity Institute's favored technology is computer-based synthetic minds - "Artificial Intelligence" or "AI" - which we think can be developed quickly and with an outcome favorable to humanity … The Singularity Institute seriously intends to build a true general intelligence, possessed of all the key subsystems of human intelligence, plus design features unique to AI. We do not hold that all the complex features of the human mind are "emergent", or that intelligence is the result of some simple architectural principle, or that general intelligence will appear if we simply add enough data or computing power. “

There is room for fantasy and speculative thinking; however, no-one needs to take the Singularity view or timetable seriously. Some of the worst future predictions claim that digital circuitry is becoming faster, denser and less expensive and therefore “supercomputers’ will soon emerge that have greater processing power than the human brain. Some even suggest that massive parallel processing is superior to brain computational abilities.

There is no knowledge that allows anyone to assess brain processing ability and no basis to compare brains with digital computers. One of the aspects of “futuristic speculations” that amazes me is the lack of knowledge about the present. Another aspect that concerns me the most is the ignorance of life processes. I doubt that any machine will soon display free-living competence. Ant brains are amazing but digital robots are disappointing. The challenge for future computer designers is to make robots that do as well as an insect in a free-living competition. This task will require a new computing technology, lots of money and the rest of this century to achieve. Unless, of course, some genius discovers and copies brain circuitry that underlies insect competence.

I am concerned about human treachery, but have no concern about machines independently developing destructive intentions that could rival or match their human makers. Evil is a human invention. Humans already make world-destroying machines. This is not a future scenario. Once launched, a world-destroying machine such as an intercontinental ballistic missile carrying hydrogen bombs is self-sufficient. The ICBM is a dumb robot that after launch can find its way to its target without further assistance from human programmers. A bevy of dumb ICBM robots with hydrogen bomb warheads can destroy human civilization. The combination of bad and dumb humans and dumb robots is to be feared. This is history and no one has to wait for future malevolent robots to be constructed.

From Intelligence and Learning by Stephen Gislason. Available as a PDF download from Persona Digital Online

Can Corporations be Good Citizens?

2011-06-20T12:46:00.000-07:00

One way to epitomize the 20th century is to describe the emergence of corporations as a dominant form of social organization. The corporation turned out to be an efficient way to organize, administer and build industrial capability. As corporations enlarged and became wealthy, countries became wealthy and were transformed. The emergent legal definitions of incorporation submerged the rights and duties of individuals and advanced the protection and privileges of small groups who were legally incorporated.

In the best case, a corporation values its workers and its customers and develops win-win strategies so that everyone benefits – the corporation posts profits, the workers enjoy stable employment and the customers are satisfied with the goods and services they receive. If best cases exist, they tend to be temporary.

Corporations depend on rules to regulate their employees and more rules to govern their interaction with customers. While there is an ethos of customer service in retail organizations, enlarging corporations become less friendly, less personal and less civil, leaving customers with problems they cannot solve, complaints that will not be addressed, and helpful suggestions that will not be heard.

The internal dynamics of corporations reveal all the tendencies of human nature, somewhat tamed by the discipline required to remain more or less efficient and legal. The alpha members of corporate society would tend to be ruthless dictators if they were not constrained from many directions. The growth of rules and regulations has paralleled corporate growth. You could argue that some balance had been achieved but events at the beginning of the 21st century are relentlessly adverse and quite different from the conditions in the 20th century when corporations grew larger and wealthier as a matter of course.

You could also argue that governments are not always competent nor constructively motivated. Civil service organizations grow to resemble corporations. You cannot rely on morality or government regulation alone to achieve benevolent corporations. Changes in legislation that make corporate executives more accountable are desirable along with more honest and competent internal self-regulation. An ideal solution is to transform people who manage and work for corporations into good citizens who have a strong sense of fair play and will do no harm to others.

Knowing that humans routinely lose their sense of responsibility and morality when they sign up as members of a large group, you are not surprised when you learn of the depredations of corporations. The current question is can large corporations evolve into more responsible and ethically motivated organizations?

Balkan and others have argued that corporations are sociopathic since their prime interest is making money and the end justifies the means: “A corporation is inherently amoral, callous and deceitful; it breaches social and legal standards to get its way; it does not suffer from guilt, yet it can mimic the human qualities of empathy, caring and altruism.”

A new legal definition of corporations would seek to balance the profit motive with social responsibility. Corporate executives need to be accountable to their shareholders, customers, workers and neighbors and less preoccupied with their own greed. Government and corporations provide similar opportunities for executives to divert wealth into their own bank accounts and to favor family, friends and allies with monetary and other rewards.

Competition is the force of natural selection. Many have argued that competition in the market place keeps bad corporations from surviving. Competition has been a driving force for technological innovation and corporate efficiency. In the best case, bad products tend to disappear since consumers search for better and cheaper products. Confusion arises when cheaper is not better. The drive to win over competitors by marketing cheaper products has produced profound dislocations of people, money and corporate activities.

Corporations do not remain loyal to their workers or the communities that supported them. They move manufacturing to developing countries. Corporations use every means to keep labor costs low. They exploit poor and uneducated workers in countries that do not protect their workers.

Mass migrations of unskilled workers are another feature of the 21st century that will grow beyond any definition of national boundaries. Some of the poor worker migration is legally organized. Most the migration is illegal, spontaneous and disorganized. Humans have always migrated. They deplete the resources in one area and then move to the next.

From Human Nature and Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason. Available as a Printed Book From Alpha Online or as an eBook (PDF) From Persona Digital Online.

The Problem with Self Evaluation

2011-06-13T15:15:00.000-07:00

One of the key issues of human existence is the discrepancy between evaluating others and evaluating oneself. Humans evaluate and compete with each other in a continuous negotiation that involves strategy, criticism, conflict, and overt battles. The brain systems that evaluate others are not used in self-evaluation.

Humans tune into other humans and copy desirable statements and behaviors. The term “appropriate” suggests that language and behavior can be matched to suit the needs and standards of a specific group. Skilful humans learn to be appropriate in different social settings. Humans self regulate in social settings by observing others and adjusting their own behavior to be more congruent with the behavior of others.

A constructive response to rejection is to change appearance with more care in grooming and costume selection; to learn behaviors and stories that are more acceptable to the group.

Since most humans cannot observe themselves in action, they cannot evaluate their own appearance, facial expression and behavior. It is easy to argue that humans, like other primates, are mostly interactive creatures, pre-occupied with what others are doing. Humans have little or no native cognitive ability for self-evaluation and limited ability for self-regulation.

The result is constant negation and conflict among humans who judge the others harshly and have little or no insight into the effect of their own behavior on others. In the simplest analysis, humans tend to judge others with more skill, more detail and more critically than they judge themselves.

Each human peers out from a central illusion of a perfect self that must survive at all costs. This feature of the human mind is “innate narcissism” and is neither optional nor negotiable. The admission of error is difficult for most humans. The basis of this reluctance is practical; humans who make errors are criticized aggressively and may be demoted or dismissed from the group. The denial of errors is an innate defensive reflex. Denial of errors also manifests a real and important inability to accurately evaluate oneself.

A social group provides external regulation in the form of values, beliefs, approval, disapproval, criticism, and by insisting on standards of conduct. Self-evaluation largely consists of monitoring the effects of your own actions on others. Some humans are socially gifted and spontaneously adjust their behavior to receive desirable responses from others. Females tend to be more socially aware and skillful than males. Some humans are socially disabled and do not adjust their behavior even when they are repeatedly censured and punished.

The potential ability to self-evaluate with any accuracy and skill must be learned and practiced in a sustained and intelligent manner. There are terms that refer to narcissism such as “self esteem” or “self-image.”

The proud person manifests narcissism in a more or less acceptable manner. The arrogant person is aggressively narcissistic. The empathic person recognizes the narcissism in others. The selfish person fails to recognize the narcissism in others. The shy person hides his or her narcissism.

The idea of “low self-esteem” is flawed since it assumes that narcissism is optional and some people lack this feature, but this is rare.
Humans who fail to achieve the approval of the local group feel sad or angry, often both. Their narcissism is intact and their distress arises from the inability or reluctance of the local group to acknowledge their wonderful characteristics.

The rejected ones will complain and may appear to value themselves less, but their distress emerges from a deep and narcissistic conviction that they should receive better treatment from the group. Humans who are rejected repeatedly develop aversions to hostile individuals or groups and places where rejection occurs. Their withdrawal and aversive behavior is often described as “low self-esteem.”

There are many strategies available to achieve more approval, ranging from supplication, to self-improvement, to destructive aggression. If the group rejection is sustained, the oppressed member becomes “depressed” and expresses self-doubt; his or her withdrawal maintains the social peace. If, on the other hand, the oppressed member becomes angry, he or she will leave the group, seek allies and may return, seeking revenge, sometimes after many years.

From the book The Good Person, Ethics and Morality by Stephen Gislason. Available as an eBook for download at Persona Digital Online.

Wired, Wireless and Alienated?

2011-06-07T13:16:00.000-07:00

All human affairs proceed in a dialectical fashion with progression and regression in constant play. Good and bad results emerge from every innovation. As the media world becomes more complex and more demanding, a high tech citizen runs the risk of becoming unhappy and confused. We know that better access to procedures and information is a decisive advantage for people who can use the information. In the early days of the www, there was discussion of the "emergence of a global brain paradigm for modeling the world."

However, humans have a limited ability to embrace other humans and are quickly over-loaded by information that is not immediately relevant. Some smart people are happy to leave the cell phones in a drawer and leave the hectic lives for a nature retreat. They value the natural world and celebrate opportunities to reconnect with their “inner self” and nature. Carl Jung suggested: “Too much man makes a sick animal. Too much animal makes a sick man.”

Humans have long lived in small groups and travelled to join assemblies of other groups. These gatherings have become highly organized affairs with formal presentations and social interactions. Real meetings have important features that virtual interactions such as email, text messages, chat rooms and social networks lack. Humans rely on seeing facial expressions, body language and observing the coordination of speech with gestures. Without access to a real person, the information is always incomplete.

The frequency of rude and angry emails and comments posted are problems with virtual communications. Internet etiquette has emerged to reduce angry responses. A smart communicator will delay a response to an irritating message and will consider how to reply in a diplomatic manner. Internet users worry about loss of privacy, but the real danger is that a sicker animal may emerge who is comfortable in virtual reality but disoriented and destructive in the real world.

The business leaders of the information age are highly competitive and believe that they are in a race. The race has only to do with business competition and profits. The world would be a better place if everyone slowed down and made more gradual transitions from one state to another. There is no race. There is nowhere to go. We are already here.

Who is fooling whom?

There are potential benefits. There are some hazards. Most internet users will have limited ability to understand how to find the best information and will default to slogans and seek free entertainment. Social networking sites are popular because they are free and entertaining. The FaceBook idea is that you can advertise yourself, acquire friends and become a friend of many others. The real effect is that the meaning of friend is deflated.

Real friends are rare and need to be cherished. Virtual friend are not friends at all. There is a possibility that meaningful relationships can develop after online contact, but this is not probable. There is a risk that your personal information may be used against you.

People worry about loss of privacy but another danger is that a sicker human animal may emerge who is comfortable in virtual reality but disoriented and destructive in the real world. Nice people watching TV in their living room are already more comfortable in the virtual world of television programming and are often confused about what is really going on.

Dependence on Machines

In the unrealistic fantasies about computers becoming intelligent, willful and taking over the world, there is an imbedded and legitimate concern about human dependence on machines. There is an associated concern about human limitations. As computer networks expand, humans become dependent on them and have more difficulty understanding how the whole system works. Another concern is that humans are selfish and chaotic in their pursuit of wealth.

The proliferation of perverse machines makes some people wealthy but with little benefit to the individual user and to society a whole. You could argue that cars and airplanes are perverse machines because they encourage humans to be restless wanders in pursuit of ephemeral pleasures.

Electronic games are perverse machines since they occupy time and attention in a virtual reality that might be better spent enjoying and cultivating the real world.

Television has been declared a perverse machine for the same reason – a virtual reality replaces the real world and sedentary viewers become fat, sick and confused.

The real question is what humans really want? A better real world is a good answer. A better real world would be more natural, cleaner, safer, and more stable. A better world might be achieved, but not by the people watching TV text messaging and playing videogames.

The realworld infrastructure that depends on computer networks to operate is based on human intelligence and demands the dedicated work of people who are tuned into the real world. The maintenance of enlarging complex systems is difficult and requires advanced education attached to dedication and constant learning. An enlarging population now depends on a small elite group to maintain banking, communication, energy, transportation, government and military networks. An increasing dependence on expanding, whole-planet electronic systems is a new development and the possibility(aka probability) of catastrophic failure concerns many observers.

Human experience is typically paradoxical. Human information and intelligence is being distributed more widely than ever before and this distribution depends on a technologically elite group. If you tend to be paranoid, you are afraid of the technology and fear that a sinister elite group will take over and control the world. Science fiction paranoia tends to emphasis machine autonomy and fears machine dominance. If you are paranoid, all sinister plots are plausible and you cannot differentiate a realistic fear from an imaginary and unrealistic fear.

If you are pronoid, you are grateful for the benefits of the technological society and even if you are not part of the technology elite, you assume (quite correctly) that the scientific and technical elites consist mostly of reasonable and nice people who have interests and goals similar to your own. If you are realistic and pronoid, you know that computers are dumb and that robots are machines that weld and paint cars.

You are mostly interested in training enough smart people to keep our complex infrastructures operating. The need is for better solutions to basic problems such distributing medical information, controlling traffic in cities, distributing food and other goods and protecting airplanes from crashing.

The curious aspect of future technology fears and fantasies is that all the problems in the real world are discussed and then ignored. Even the most advanced countries have aging infrastructures, ready to collapse at any moment. Electricity, telephone, cable communications and the internet are carried by wires on poles that fall down easily, pushed by a little wind or shaken by earth tremors. Even if TV networks keep broadcasting, viewers may not have clean water to drink or food to eat. We can hope that communication of good ideas might reduce the extravagant devastation that humans inflict on their planet. What do humans really want? Do they want more distraction and entertainment in virtual reality or do they want a real life in a real, healthy world?

From Intelligence and Learning by Stephen Gislason. Download at Persona Digital Online.

Philosophy of Liberation

2011-06-01T13:16:00.000-07:00

All idealists with a commitment to realize universal civil and free societies will need to pause and consider that progress in this direction is not possible without dramatic change in the way humans think and behave. If there is progress toward a sustainable and agreeable life for expanding populations of humans, then religions have to become what they are not -- expressions of unity and cooperation.

Real progress in human affairs requires a new approach to education that is universal, persuasive and complete. How can this be achieved? Not by philosophers employed by universities or even book writers that gain an audience. What is required the sustained investment of wealth in new education in the sprit of cooperation and sustainable technologies. The wealth to support a new approach will come from enlightened individuals, corporations, governments and philanthropic organizations.

I want to make a clear distinction between religion and philosophy. Walter Kaufman described liberation philosophy that serves as a description of the best from the past efforts of philosophers and a prescription for 21st century advances in liberating thought:

“Philosophy, like poetry, deals with ancient themes: poetry with experiences, philosophy with problems known for centuries. Both must add a new precision born of passion. The intensity of great philosophy and poetry is abnormal and subversive: it is the enemy of habit, custom, and all stereotypes. The motto is always that what is well known is not known at all well… The poet's passion cracks convention: the chains of custom drop; the world of our everyday experience is exposed as superficial appearance; the person we had seemed to be and our daily contacts and routines appear as shadows on a screen, without depth; while the poet's myth reveals reality...

"News reports, and even scenes we have seen with our own eyes, are distorted images in muddy waters of reality. We live upon the surface; we are like ants engaged in frantic aimlessness pursuits until the artist comes, restoring vision, freeing us from living death. Philosophy, as Plato and Aristotle said, begins in wonder. This wonder means a dim awareness of the useless talent, some sense that ant-likeness is a betrayal. But what are the alternatives? Vary the metaphor.

"Men are so many larvae, crawling, wriggling, eating - living in two dimensions. Many die while in this state. Some are transformed and take flight before they settle down to live as ants. Few become butterflies and revel in their new-found talent, a delight to all. Philosophy means liberation from the two dimensions of routine, soaring above the well known, seeing it in new perspectives, arousing wonder and the wish to fly. Philosophy subverts man's satisfaction with himself, exposes custom as a questionable dream, and offers not so much solutions as a different life. A great deal of philosophy, including truly subtle and ingenious works, was not intended as an edifice for men to live in, safe from sun and wind, but as a challenge: don't sleep on! there are so many vantage points; they change in flight: what matters is to leave off crawling in the dust.”

Religion for the 21st Century is available in print or download formats. The book is intended for a well-educated, smart reader who is interested in a world view of political and religious expressions past, present, and future. The main theme is that each group has its own claims and stories and will tend to reject others. A reader committed to one point of view may not accept the egalitarian review presented here. Stephen Gislason

Paranoia, The Favorite US Cognitive Box

2011-04-27T14:45:00.000-07:00

Paranoia an innate cognitive bias, a tendency to suspect others of conspiring against you and wanting to hurt you. You could argue that there is healthy kind of paranoia, useful whenever people are really out to get you. A sick version of paranoia exaggerates this possibility. The sick paranoid suspects and blames others too often, too intensely and may attack innocent others who are seen as hostile.

Where does suspicion fit in? We are all obligated to scan our environment in search of signs of danger. Often, we detect subtle clues that there may be danger lurking but we are not sure. Suspicion is the tendency to treat uncertainty as threatening. Suspicion triggers anxiety and fuels gossip and self-talk. Underlying suspicion are continuous, subconscious evaluation of the danger potential of your environment.

You could argue the healthy aspect of aspect of paranoia is that by being wary and looking for clues of danger, you are protecting yourself from harm that might lurk behind every tree, in every alley, in every park, and on every busy street. For as long as life has existed on earth, more vigilant animals have survived longer than less vigilant animals.However, vigilance need not turn into paranoia.

Although many humans now enjoy relative safe environments, information about crime, corruption, accidents and natural disasters raises the level of suspicion and fear. Some humans adapt better to safer environments and become less vigilant and more trusting. This is a “taming” process. Others remain wary and some are possessed by excessive suspicion.

Wild animals can be tamed. The essence of taming a wild animal or human is to replace wariness and suspicion with relaxation and trust. The result is that in safer environments, tamed humans are less likely to anticipate danger and perceive most events most days as impersonal, routine and safe.

One of the technical challenges in evaluating the meaning of events is to connect events that are likely related to one’s own activities and interests and to treat other events as more or less spontaneous and unrelated to oneself. Normal vigilance and appropriate suspicion are successful in sorting events into the relevant and non-relevant categories. Sick paranoia involves an exaggeration of event relevance and poor judgment in assessing the meaningful connections among events that are essentially unrelated. The human tendency is to invent relationships that are non-existent, to be superstitions and to believe in magical connections that relate unrelated events.

What if you become overly sensitive to mild or even innocuous signals that you should ignore? You pass a nice man on your walk and he smiles. You could think:”… that’s nice; he’s a friendly guy who probably likes the way I look.” Or you could think: ”..that smile is suspicious – he must know something about me; he must be part of the conspiracy that is tracking my movement; he was probably reading my mind.” The latter style of thought is paranoid.

The paranoid person exaggerates his or her importance and exaggerates the ability of others to sustain secret, well-focused conspiracies. We invent stories and talk with others to probe the meaning of clues about danger that may be lurking in the shadows. These stories blame others for any distress and misfortune.

Paranoid stories that focus on conspiracies and imminent danger might be true; however, they are usually improbable. When paranoid thinking takes over a person’s cognitive processes, even remote possibilities turn into probabilities. The self-centered nature of the human mind tends to go this way and can move into an absurd form of narcissism. You become so important that it is entirely plausible that the CIA, FBI, your co-workers, your family, even creatures from outer space have nothing better to do but to watch you and conspire against you.

Psychiatrists tend to think of paranoia as personal – one isolated person with false beliefs, but paranoid thinking is characteristic of group activity. If you tell a friend: “I think they are out to get me.” Your friend agrees and says: “Yes, they are out to get me too.” You have moved from paranoia to consensus. With three people agreeing, you have a local reality system.

Conspiracy theories are common and almost everyone in conversation with friends will join in a conspiracy talk. This is distance paranoia. The mildest form is to refer to an anonymous but powerful group called “They,” They are distant or concealed and you know very little about them except they are up to no good. A common subject for gossip is to speak about what “They” are doing. They are spying on us. They are incompetent. They are to blame.

If you look closely at any human group, large or small, you find constant disagreement and a tendency for all affiliations to fall apart. Agreements within and among groups are notoriously difficult to achieve and hard to maintain. Real conspiracies do exist, of course, and most human groups are busy creating and attacking enemies, but there is a reassuring, irregular and inconsistent incompetence in all this activity even among professional conspirators. Coherent conspiracies are not long-lived and a single dominant conspiracy is not usually part of the enduring fabric of any society.

In the good old days of science fiction, the plots were placed in a fictional spacetime zone – there was no confusion about fact or fiction. The paranoid drama of the 1990s and beyond was sicker, occurred in the suburbs and presented itself as almost true if not truly true. I am concerned that too many members of the audience were encouraged to develop their paranoid tendencies.

If you practice paranoid thinking, you can get good at it. Television programming and movie scripts thrive in paranoid territory. Increasingly, scriptwriters hold large audiences with conspiracy plots, aliens, and all the weird stuff that plagues paranoid schizophrenics. The series, the X-files, was good example of psychotic material on TV.lWhile I liked the look and calm demeanor of the actors that play FBI Agents, Mulder and Scully, the plots were demented and the success of the series spoke to a troubling receptivity to paranoid ideation. The actors put a more or less reasonable face on script content that was fundamentally insane.

Paranoia flourishes in organizations where people compete for power, money and prestige. Larger organizations generate more paranoia because each human can only know and understand a small number of co-workers and all the people who are out of close-range tend to blur into one large “conspiracy.” Organizations do best when they inspire company loyalty and provide an abundance of common signals that reassure participants that they are safe and part of a cooperative family.

In complex societies such as the USA with enclaves of political and economic power and organizations that employ secrecy and engage in covert actions, a high level of suspicion is common. Suspicion is appropriate if you are involved in competitive and covert transactions. The history of covert CIA operations, for example, is not reassuring that things are as they seem. Professional conspirators, working in their “nation’s best interest” have a tendency to get it wrong and often to do more harm than good.

One version of USA paranoia is the belief that the federal government and its military are conspiring to end the rights and freedoms of average Americans and must be opposed by internal revolution. There have been many versions of anti-government groups; some are militant and others form legitimate lobbies The White House administration of Bush and Cheney appeared to be successful in confirming the worst fears of the most extreme paranoiacs as well as confirming the fears of better informed, more rational critics of the government.

Although American law forbids government agencies from engaging in illegal activity close to home, the evidence that leaks out or is declared by whistle-blowers reveals that the CIA and other secret organizations, including paramilitary groups sponsored by the CIA, routinely engaged in illegal and immoral activities at home and abroad. These revelations support paranoia in a regrettable way.

The idealist hopes that a free democratic society can achieve 100% honest and lawful activities even among agencies that specialize in secrecy and deception. The idealist assumption is that an honest, right-thinking citizen should have confidence that his or her government is trustworthy and obeys its own laws. A desirable assumption? Yes. Realistic? No.

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason. Available as a download from Persona Digital Online.

Introduction to Religion for 21st Century

2011-04-25T18:15:00.000-07:00

In this book I attempt to provide a fresh perspective on world religions. I describe some of the more obvious religious traditions on the planet and notes similarities and differences, as if I were a tour guide introducing a stranger to the history, real and imagined, of five of the more obvious religions. My wish is that even people who live in the cognitive box created by one group will take a vacation, fly outside of your container and enjoy an overview of humans – past, present, and future. If you can go beyond beliefs, claims, arguments and the narcissism that afflicts all of us, then you can ask: does membership in any religious group bring us closer to living in a peaceful, constructive, sustainable society?

From the Preface

Any discussion of religion invites misunderstanding and conflict. Humans have convened in small groups for thousands of years to celebrate, to appease evil spirits and to encourage good spirits to offer more privileges and benefits. Humans continue to dress up in costumes, beat drums, chant, sing, and dance and make offerings to innumerable gods. These celebrations help to maintain group unity and often induce euphoric feelings in the participants. While there has always been an archetypal form to these group activities, each local group develops its own version of myths, rituals and celebrations.

The belief in spirits is the universal form. The names, number and idiosyncratic expressions of the spirits is the local content. If you consider “religious” expressions around the world and throughout, history, you would notice that there a number of basic themes with thousands of imaginative variations. You also notice that in every tribe, village or city, people believe they have special relationships with gods and spirits not enjoyed elsewhere.

No discussion of religion will make sense until the importance of group identity is understood. Humans may sometimes look like individuals, but the truth is that all humans are members of local groups that determine what they know, how they communicate and how they treat other humans. Each local group develops stories, beliefs and rules. Collections of local groups with special beliefs into larger organizations are often described as a “religion.” Members of local groups are described as “religious” if they recite group slogans, attend meetings and celebrations. Religions often claim special privileges for their members so that the term “religious” is also used to claim advantages and superior moral authority where none actually exists.

The tendency for selective, even exclusive, group membership is deeply embedded in the human mind and shows up everywhere and at all times. The key elements of group identity are recognizable appearance enhanced by costumes, common language, common beliefs and common behaviors, especially ritualistic behaviors.

Religious beliefs are collected in a cognitive container that resists change. Inside a religious container, you are consumed by the specific language and beliefs of the religion, its symbols, assumptions and claims. Inside, you have costumes, rituals and celebrations that can be enjoyable and reassuring; however, fixed beliefs and beliefs systems are cognitive cocoons.

The concept of a large cognitive container such as “Christianity” is not realistic; Christianity has a thousand sub containers and each of these has a thousand more. The final sub containers are individual minds, each with its own cognitive box. If you examine the subdivisions of a ‘world religion” with a zoom lens, as you zoom into local areas, you see more and more differences, arguments, and disputes. You never find consensus.

If you zoom down to individuals who belong to local groups you see them competing with each other, arguing, and failing to reach agreements on important issues. The big divisions are well known and big disagreements are stable over centuries. The smaller disagreements are in flux; some subside others proliferate. There are infinite possibilities for arguments and finite possibilities for consensus.

Sometimes the larva trapped inside a religious cocoon enjoys a metamorphosis and emerges as a butterfly that can fly far away and enjoy a new life with new friends, and new freedom. True freedom is to live without beliefs and to invent your own community. In the ecstatic religions, the whole point of spiritual exercise is to fly away.

The 21st century philosopher's task is to update our descriptions of ourselves to accommodate burgeoning scientific knowledge and an increasingly sophisticated understanding of human behavior, the brain and complex systems in general. We have new and revolutionary knowledge about human beings, their languages, arts and culture; about information gathering, storage and retrieval; about computation, communication; about the transformation of energy and materials; about molecular biology, genetics and the evolution of life on earth.

We have to re-examine what we care about and advance new vocabularies that allow us to proceed into new domains of thought and understanding. There seems a critical lag in the assimilation of new knowledge into the culture and a rapidly widening schism separates the few who know how things work and the majority who do not.

Available for Download from Persona Digital Online:
Introduction to Religion for 21st Century
by Stephen Gislason

Conflict, The Main Human Activity

2011-04-16T16:03:00.000-07:00

History records the tedious and repetitious details of human competition, conflict, destruction and killing. Students of world affairs will have little difficulty identifying recurrent disputes and conflicts as inevitable features of business and governments and the interaction of countries.

You could argue that human history is the history of war with brief interludes of peace. Wars have a few instigators and many victims. If you combine hierarchy, territorial competition with weapon manufacture, you create war. The human fascination with weapons and the strategies of fighting have created a complex of militaristic activities and preparations for fighting that are incentives to fight and have provided reasons to fight. The challenge for 21st century idealists is to find new, more effective ways to neutralize human belligerence.

Humans are critically disputatious, opportunistic and aggressively territorial. Human groups fight at regular intervals, often because of planned and strategic attacks on neighboring groups. The tendency and the skills required for fighting are innate. Fighting is one of the four prime movers of human behavior, sometimes referred to as the “four F’s.” In the primordial animal world, you have four options when you met another animal. You could feed by eating the stranger; you could fight with the stranger or you could flee. If certain prerequisites were met, you could have sex with the stranger. The four F’s interact in interesting ways.

The motives and movements involved in fighting emerge in children’s play and continue in speech gestures even among the most pacific people. Fighting often begins with vocalizations, and continues with gestures, shouts and threats. The idea of the fight display is to avoid physical injury by reaching a settlement or by fleeing.

Nice people who live relatively peaceful lives will avoid fighting but retain the tendency. Fights among family members are inevitable and, in the best case, are limited to shouting, grabbing, pushing, shaking, punching and kicking. It is natural for humans to pick up objects and use them to hit at close range or to throw them to injure at a distance.

The tendency to fight merges with tool making. Human ancestors become more formidable fighters when they deliberately selected objects such as sticks and stones to fight with. Fighting on an interpersonal or tribal scale involved deliberately fashioning and carrying tools that were used primarily as weapons. Early weapons combined sharpened stones, attached to wood handles and shafts with leather thongs.

Warriors are humans who have well developed fighting skills. Their goal is to kill other humans. Good hunters tend to make good warriors, but not always. Both hunting and fighting were required for the success of human groups and warriors have always been regarded with fear and high esteem. A natural warrior had to be brave and strong, cunning, determined and tolerant of deprivation and adversity. Warriors fought each other, face to face, with hand-held weapons, strategy and skill. To specialize in fighting, warriors have to be physically fit and trained daily in the skills of combat. Without advanced training, even an unusually large and fierce warrior could be defeated by a smaller, weaker foe with well-practiced skills and superior weapons.

As local groups grew, nation states emerged and warriors were replaced by large groups of anonymous soldiers who participated in combat with hand held weapons and machines designed to destroy property and kill other humans.

The Second World War was a festival of atrocities, murder and mayhem, dominated by increasing horrors inflicted by large numbers of more elaborate machines designed and deployed to kill humans on an enlarging scale. The distinction between civilians and soldiers diminished and often disappeared. The industrial basis for war continued to develop in many countries after the Second World War. The 21st century began with local wars erupting in many parts of the globe. The United States dominated the world by having well-funded industries dedicated to making weapon-machines. The US and Russia competed to build the most formidable stockpiles of nuclear weapons and delivery systems on alert, ready to destroy any and all nations on the planet.

In addition to good guys and bad guys, some humans are hawks who advocate and enjoy the idea of war and others are doves who abhor war and make conspicuous efforts to promote peaceful solutions for disagreements. Some readers might link the hawks with the bad guys. Without a doubt, doves are challenged by belligerent neighbors and friends and need to arrive at more effective ways of expressing their point of view, not as pacifists but as activists who seek to restrain their belligerent neighbors with tools such as persuasion, vaccination, social policy, and the pragmatic enforcement of laws.

Perhaps the planet could be divided into two halves with the doves enjoying a peaceful existence on their half and the hawks enjoying battle on their side. The trick would be to invent an impermeable membrane that could keep the groups separate.

Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason is available as a PDF download from Persona Digital Online.

The Responsibility to Protect

2011-03-08T12:27:00.000-08:00

My hope is that in this 21st century, a more realistic philosophy of human life will emerge as we recognize that it is impossible to permanently change human nature by social and political means - by education, persuasion, coercion and law. Humans can no longer rely on instincts and let nature take its course. Nor can progressive humans carry on with outdated social, religious and economic ideologies based on misunderstandings of human nature, human history and planet ecology. Life is a project with a one billion year history. Obviously, life systems can endure. The sad realization is that some humans destroy other life everywhere they go. The solutions to the problem can be summarized by asking how can humans be persuaded, educated and motivated to create sustainable systems without harming each other and the environments that sustain them?

Canada has tradition of peace-seeking and peacekeeping. Canadian military forces have specialized in peace keeping as part of the UN effort to restrain conflict in other countries. Canadian Foreign Minister, Lloyd Axworthy, worked to establish International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS) with the help of U.S. foundations and the assistance of the British and Swiss Governments. The commission published a report in December 2001 that advocated the right to intervene and the responsibility to protect victims of conflict.

The challenge: “If we believe that all human beings are equally entitled to be protected from acts that shock the conscience of us all, then we must match rhetoric with reality, principle with practice. We cannot be content with reports and declarations. We must, as an international community, be prepared to act. We won't be able to live with ourselves if we do not.”

Axworthy's idealism should appeal to everyone who enjoys a relatively peaceful life in a civil country.

The problem is that genocides occur within countries who have not achieved a stable infrastructure that supports civility and whose governments permit, plan, and promote killing of selected populations within the country. Rebel forces emerge in these countries to overthrow despotic military regimes. Fighting between rebels and military forces leads to social chaos which invites a third group of criminals with no political agenda to rob, rape and murder without fear of punishment.

Tribal groups in these countries who have been fighting for thousands of years will refresh their group identities, recall past grievances and renew their timeless battles with enthusiasm.

The right to intervene is a contentious idea, since an overwhelming military force is usually required to constrain state-sponsored killing, rebel militias and sociopathic criminals. Experiences in Africa, Iraq, and Afghanistan do not suggest that military occupation is successful in restoring civil order, but instead, adds an extra dimension of death and destruction. A military force is trained to blow up buildings and kill people. In the best case, a specially trained military force can act as a temporary police force and guard civil populations at risk.

There are enduring obstacles to constructive action in international affairs. The U.N. Security Council, for example, has the power to authorize military interventions, but the council has a history of inaction because its members cannot agree. Powerful nations such as the US, China and Russia are selling arms to governments that kill their own citizens. Every nation remains enthralled by military force, despite overwhelming evidence that soldiers and weapons do not bring peace,happiness and prosperity.

Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, suggested helping decent states protect their people; or by having an effective early-warning system, triggering “constructive action” when states start to collapse. He minimized the idea of using military force by external powers as a last resort. Ban Ki-moon is an idealist.

A report in the Economist described growing resistance in 2009 to the Responsibility to Protect UN resolution (R2P): “Assurances have failed to convince critics of R2P, who are adamant that the whole idea is just a cover to legitimize armed interference by rich Western powers in the affairs of poor countries. One person who takes that view is Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann, a Nicaraguan diplomat who is now president of the General Assembly. .. he says a more accurate name for the concept would be the “right to intervene” or R2I. Quite a number of countries might be persuaded to support a resolution diluting the commitment to R2P that was made by over 150 states at the UN summit in 2005.”

The use of military force has seldom been successful in restoring lasting peace in any country. Canada’s role as a peacekeeper shifted to combat in Afghanistan in 2001. Canadian combat troops increased in 2006, expanding to 2,500 personnel deployed as part of International Security Assistance Force. The effort to tame belligerent tribes in Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan is doomed to fail, but good men will die trying to kill the bad guys. A pragmatic and American acquaintance with military experience told me you cannot have a really effective military force unless the guys get out there and do real combat. “Peacekeeping is for cowards. If you don’t want to die, don’t sign up.”

Opposition to the Afghanistan “war” (a new description of international peace-keeping efforts) continues to be very active in Canada. In August 2006, New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton called for the withdrawal of Canadian troops from the south of Afghanistan, to begin immediately and soon afterwards pursue peace negotiations with the Taliban insurgents. In October 2006, protesters opposed to Canada's participation in the war in Afghanistan rallied in 40 cities and towns. The demonstrators demanded that the troops come home and affirmed that Canadian Forces should not accept combat roles but should remain a peace keeping and humanitarian influence in foreign countries. Another contingent of Canadians at home bought yellow ribbons and stickers for their cars to show their "support for the troops."

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason. Available for download at Persona Digital Online.

Jargon and Clouds

2011-02-15T16:34:00.000-08:00

The latest metaphor for internet communications is the "cloud." I am not a fan of the cloud concept and have practical concerns about placing all data records and computing resources in public networks. Doubts, notwithstanding, the fuzziness of the cloud does describe the disappearance of boundaries and coherence in the great and prolific noise of the internet.

Book critic, Sam Anderson, reflected on the state of language and books at the end of 2010. Electronic communication has changed human communication and changed the way people use language. The tendency is to condense, compress and fragment communications, so that sustained attention to meaningful conversations is less likely and books that require hours to days of concentration are becoming obsolete. Anderson stated: I tend to shy away from big, sweeping, era-defining statements. It’s the fastest possible way to be wrong about the world, and usually just an excuse for various forms of sloppy thinking: cherry-picking, scapegoating, doomsaying, fear-mongering, sandbagging, arm-twisting, wool-gathering, leg-pulling. And yet it would be hard to dispute that over the last 5 or 10 years, the culture has changed drastically. The shift is so obvious that it’s boring, by now, even to name the culprits: Google, blogs, texting, tweets, iPhones, Facebook — a little army of tools that have given rise to (and grown out of) radically new habits of attention. Many of us are now addicted, on the dopamine-receptor level, to a moment-by-moment experience of life that’s defined by a behavior sometimes referred to as “time slicing”: jumping every few seconds between devices or windows or tabs, constantly swiveling the periscope of our attention around and around the horizon to see where the latest relevant data-burst might come from. "

Ramchandani recalled Orwell's remarks that, since political language is usually the defense of the indefensible, it has to consist "largely of euphemism, and cloudy vagueness". She stated:" Anyone trying to impress, to sell or to obfuscate is likely to brutalise the language. Prominent offenders are businessmen, with their onboard customer service representatives, collision damage waivers, nonincremental growth opportunities and enhanced information management activities, providing innovative solutions and significant leverage in the use of resources, and thus permitting an increasing percentage of senior professional time to be expended on value-added solutions. Politicians can effortlessly match this. Their stock-in-trade is sustainable development, key performance indicators, the knowledge-based economy, inclusiveness and empowered communities, all offered up with mandatory passion, vision and excitement. Put politicians together with soldiers and you get Islamofascism, extraordinary rendition, selfinjurious behaviour incidents and the war on terror. "

I have mentioned nonsense as a popular result of humans communicating among themselves. The nonsense generated by business and politics has functionality and goals. Other nonsense is adventitious, sometimes amusing, mostly confusing. The misuse of general categories is one my ongoing concerns. Of the 2011 category names, slogans and memes, I would select as the most misused: Health Care, Economy, National Security, Terrorism, Global, and most recently, Pandemic. Health should have remained one the basic English words, protected by a supreme language authority. Instead, health has been lost to the politicians and businessmen. In Canada health was used as the name for a new medical and hospital insurance act in 1967. Canada Health Insurance led to Ministries of Health and a commerce in health services and products.

The problem, of course, is that health once referred to healthy people who were free of disease, physically fit, productive and happy. Healthy people did not need to spend money on doctor visits, drugs and surgery. Now health care points to injured and sick people who need doctors and hospitals. Either healthy people vanished or they can be ignored. New terms such as "wellness" appeared, but no category word could replace the proper label "health." Instead of health care, the correct term is medical care, a heterogeneous collection of products and services provided by MDs, drug suppliers and hospitals that deal with people who are not healthy. Medical care is required by people who move from health to illness, often slowly over many years, Life is a one way street and disease progression will remove opportunities for prevention or early intervention. Hospitals collect people who have serious injuries or advanced disease and require the most expensive medical care.

From Language and Thinking by Stephen Gislason. Available as an eBook from Persona Digital Online

The Sexual Kaleidoscope

2011-01-29T20:31:00.000-08:00

Any discussion of human sexual behavior and mating must begin with two clarifying statements; one about the extraordinary variability of the human sexual response and the second about the strong effects of biological determinants on individual sexual behavior, effects that cannot be modified by nurturing techniques.

By in large, humans do not invent their sexual interests and behaviors. They manifest their sexual interests and behaviors. If you examine the range of sexual behaviors and aberrations in any society, you are looking through layers of evolutionary development and observing behaviors that originate in different times and places, in different animals, for different reasons.

The human mind appears to be a repository of preferences and behaviors that date back to reptilian hissing, biting and scratching. The most sublime maternal affection and devotion appears in warm-blooded, milk-feeding mammals. Modern career women will talk about the “dinosaurs” or “cave men” when describing suitors who are less than considerate and kind. They refer to old layers of the male mind that offend them. At the same time, women will be aroused by other primitive male qualities and seek sexual liaisons with exciting and “dangerous men”. Their love-making may include hissing, purring, growling, biting and scratching. DNA lays down general rules for body sex and mind sex, but leaves it up to the environment to select from a range of possible combinations. Innate preferences change over time.

The environmental determinants begin with effects directed toward sperm and eggs and continue in the maternal womb. When a baby is born, the external environment influences that disposition of neurons in the brain that direct sexual behavior and maturation. The net result of all the variables is not fully revealed until several years after puberty begins. At puberty three regions of the brain are reorganized to assume gender-specific reproductive behaviors: the prefrontal cortex and nucleus acumens (motivation); the hippocampus-amygdala complex (salience); hypothalamus, midbrain and spinal cord (performance).

Sisk and Foster suggested that: “…attainment of adult reproductive status involves both gonadal and behavioral maturation through a series of brain-driven, developmentally timed events, modulated by internal and external sensory cues… The brain initiates gonadal steroid hormone production at puberty; hormones activate neural circuits mediating reproductive behavior during adolescence.”

The best way to understand sexual preferences and behavior is assume that each person is adaptable but has a set of innate preferences that both guide and limit the choice of a long-term sexual partner. Preferences are built on a foundation that is enduring but not fixed and learning experiences can redirect these innate tendencies to some degree. These innate preferences begin with the bodybrainmind blueprint laid down in DNA, but it is wrong to say that innate sexual preferences are genetic.

A more correct description is to say that innate preferences are biologically determined by the interaction of DNA/RNA programming with the physical and social environment. Sexual development and expressions involve a predictable program sequence that takes an individual through childhood; transforms him or her during adolescence for reproduction; sustains reproductive interest for three decades and then retires each individual from reproductive duties. While aging humans may continue to have sex, their interest and ability usually declines and the frequency of sexual encounters decreases.

Fich and Dannenberg suggested that animal research revealed the basic patterns of hormone influence on the development of male and female behaviors. For example, they stated: "The manipulations of neonatal androgens affected adult sexual behavior. Female guinea pigs exposed to testosterone by various regimes during the prenatal period increased male-typical sexual behavior (mounting). These subjects also decreased female-typical behavior (lordosis) when, as adults, they were gonadectomized, primed with estrogen and progesterone, and tested for sexual receptivity. Similarly, male rats castrated at birth reduced male-typical sexual behaviors and increased feminine behaviors in adulthood. These same behavioral patterns were seen in adult male rodents exposed prenatally to stress or alcohol, which disrupts the prenatal testosterone surge in male fetuses. These effects are mediated by aromatization of testosterone to estrogen, since sexual behavior can be masculinized in females and reinstated in neonatally castrated males with early administration of a synthetic estrogen or high doses of estradiol. Estrogen has also been shown to act asymmetrically in the hypothalamus to modify reproductive behavior of the female rat.

The development of psychic gender identity is not an on and off affair but involves a mix of semi-independent variables with many possible combinations. Gay and lesbian hangouts tend to gather diverse individuals with many body-psyche gender variations. While each individual may feel that he or she or she-he is choosing a lover or mate, his or her choices, like all human choices, are directed and constrained by programs built into the brain and modified by hormones and environmental determinants. An increase in man-made estrogens in the environment, for example, interferes with male embryo development and promotes female behaviors in males. Females with more male hormone act like males. Males with more female hormone develop breasts and act more like females.

Gender subtypescan be understood by allowing different mixes of six sexual identity and preference programs in the brain:

1 An inner sense of sexual identity - male or female or both

2. Sex-specific behavioral characteristics

3.Polarized sexual attraction

4.Falling-in-love - spontaneous preference for one sex

5. Sexual appetite preference for one sex

6. Aversion to intimacy with one sex

Preferences are built on a foundation that is enduring but not fixed. Learning experiences redirect these innate tendencies. Given the opportunity, most humans will experiment with a range of intimate contacts and will satisfy their sexual urges in a variety of ways. Some humans are more open and experimental than others. Some humans have more opportunity to have varied relationships and some are strictly limited by local rules to just one kind of relationship.

A straight heterosexual individual answers the ideal description of male gender: a person who has a male body, feels like a man, is attracted only to women and only has sex with women. He falls in love and marries a woman and has an aversion to the idea of having sex with a man. A true heterosexual woman has a reciprocal set of congruent characteristics.

A homosexual male has a man’s body, feels more or less like a man but displays a mix of male and female behavior and is attracted only to men. He falls in love with men, has sex with men and has an aversion to sex with women, although he enjoys female friends. Male homosexuality sometimes runs in families. Identical twins share more of their genes than regular siblings and one twin is more likely to be gay if his twin is. Homosexual men are more likely to have homosexual brothers even if they were not twins. There is a tendency for homosexuality to run in the female line — men whose mothers had gay brothers tended to be homosexual and studies have investigated the possibility that a gene in the X chromosome might be involved. Homosexual adolescents have paid a high price for their same-sex preference and if they were free to choose a lover or mate that was congruent with the wishes of their family and community they would not pursue the homosexual path. These adolescents simply discover what their preference is and can do nothing to change it.

Passion varies from human to human. Some humans are affectionate, erotic, fall in love easily and often. Some humans are easily aroused and love sex. Others are cold, aloof and have difficulty forming intimate ties with other humans. Some tend to be irritable and angry and are not affectionate; they tend to remain alone or become unhappily married prudes who criticize and often seek to punish more affectionate and erotic humans. Some require unusual or bizarre sexual stimulation. “Kinky sex” was invented, in part, for hard-to arouse individuals. Sexual arousal is sometimes linked to aggression and cruelty. Fortunately, most people who enjoy bondage and torture just play at sadomasochism and no-one is injured or killed as in real expressions of sexual cruelty. The formalized and ritualistic aspects of sadomasochistic sexuality appear in religious ceremonies world-wide and suggest that this is an innate tendency that is expressed in a variety of ways. Even the nicest humans are fascinated by sadomasochistic stories and will enjoy horrifying terror movies and news reports of unsavory sexual crimes. Some humans are missing the programs that create affection, love, intimacy and empathy. They remain cruel, dishonest and some are dangerous sexual predators.

From I and Thou, a book about close relationships by Stephen Gislason.

Download from Persona Digital Online.

Religion, Politics and Control

2011-01-26T13:24:00.000-08:00

Human societies began with small groups that were more or less self-regulating entities. Group myths and rules provided common ground for group members. Families lived in local clusters, forming clans which joined together to form bands. Tribes were larger organizations based on looser affiliations of bands that defined and defended larger geographic areas. As tribal groups enlarged and became more powerful, local group myths grew into larger group myths complete with symbols and rituals that played a vital role in tribal cohesion. In the cohesion stories, tribal leaders grew larger than life often with supernatural powers. This irregular and uncertain progression from small to large groups continues in human societies today.

Civilizations in every region for as long a history has been recorded, featured Kings, Queens, and Emperors who were supported by aristocratic classes of priests. These divine leaders promoted Gods and rituals that supported their claims. Their priests acted as custodians of royal privilege. In turn, royalty provided wealth and prestige, often building temples and comfortable accommodations for the priests. Artists and architects became key allies of the priestly classes, building the largest structures in town with art and sculptures depicting gods and rulers.

The wealth in every society has been controlled by rulers and priests. A typical society is ruled by a small elite group that controls a large peasant group. Poor people have always been uneducated, obedient and available to work for or fight for the elite classes. The arrangement was altered recently as more affluent democratic countries emerged with educated middle classes who demanded a bigger share of the nation’s wealth and working classes who formed unions to negotiate higher wages and more benefits for their workers. Even in the most enlightened societies, however, large numbers of followers continue to follow leaders in self-destructive, even suicidal adventures. The tendency for most humans to submit to authority appears to be a fixed feature of human nature.

In many countries, the authority of religious organizations declined as the education and wealth of more “middle class” citizens increased. A relatively new idea is to separate the state from religious institutions. The shift from aristocratic control to democratic control requires new freedoms for citizens to become self-determining individuals who cannot be coerced by autocratic authority.

The US serves as an experiment in group dynamics. The US constitution formally declares the separation of state and religion. The US in the 20th century made slow but sure progress in achieving human rights for its citizens. Paradoxically, as other countries progress towards more individual freedoms and less religion, in the 21st century, the US appears to be regressing with increasing influence of fundamentalist Christian groups on politics. At the same time, scholarly investigation of the religion-political interface is alive and well. The American Political Science Association, for example, has a section devoted to the study of religion and politics. Topics of study include issues of church and state, law, morality, political behavior and social justice. The tendency for university educated people to study social and political movements and write books can, in the best case, lead politics in the direction of more civility rather than less.

The Scandinavian countries are among the most liberal and progressive despite the fact that Norway, Iceland, Finland and Denmark have constitutional links between church and state. In these countries, polls report the lowest levels of church attendance. Sweden disconnected Church and state as late as the year 2000. In my case, my Icelandic grandmother was a devout Lutheran. She told stories of her life in Iceland, taught me Icelandic songs and history, but little else about her Lutheran religion. I did recite the bedtime prayer she taught me: Now I lay me down to sleep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.” My grandmother gave me the legacy of the good person. She was gentle, kind, and affectionate. She was a practical woman who raised nine children, worked hard all her life and knew suffering. As a result of all her life experiences, she was a good person.

Thanks to grandmother, I have no difficulty recognizing good people. I have no difficulty recognizing bad people, regardless of what they say, their social status, beliefs, or religious affiliation.

What continues to surprise me is how many bad people can hide in the disguise of a religious person.

From Religion for 21st Century by Stephen Gislason. Available as an eBook download form Persona Digital Online.

Aggression 2011

2011-01-16T12:16:00.000-08:00

Aggression is best described as threatening or attacking another. The smallest aggressions occur with rude, insulting behaviors that may escalate into an attack.

While individuals clearly are aggressive, the most alarming and destructive aggressions are group activities. Groups define boundaries in spatial terms and also in ideological terms. I often read discussions of aggression that quickly focus on violence. Attacks are often violent, but aggression is a series of behaviors, most of which occur in daily social interactions without violence. The notion of aggression as an antisocial instinct has been replaced by the notion that aggression is a tool of competition and negotiation. Survival often depends on mutual assistance and aggression is constrained by the need to maintain beneficial relationships.

In families and schools, aggressive conflict is similarly constrained. It is only when social relationships are valued that one can expect a full complement of natural checks and balances. According to de Waal: “With the early provocative description of Australopithecus as a lustful killer and the appearance of Konrad Lorenz's On Aggression in 1967, the origins of violence became a central theme in debates about human social evolution . Popular authors explained inborn aggressiveness, as man the "killer ape." The horrors of World War II left everyone with little confidence in human nature.”

Investigation of aggression first focused on individual behavior rather than social phenomena. Primatologists came to study relationships as determinants of human behavior. De Waal described an incident that should be familiar to most humans. “In the chimpanzee colony at the Arnhem Zoo, in the Netherlands when an alpha male fiercely attacked a female, other apes came to her defense, causing prolonged screaming and chasing in the group. After the chimpanzees had calmed down, a tense silence followed, broken when the entire colony burst out hooting. In the midst of this pandemonium, two chimpanzees kissed with their arms wrapped around each other. These two turned out to be the same male and female in the fight.“

Observations of other primates often fit the human experience. De Wall suggested that conflict resolution had at least three elements: (1) indications of a calming function of grooming and other body contacts, (2) recognition of long-term social relationships and their survival value, and (3) demonstration of a connection between aggressive conflict and subsequent inter-opponent reunions, called "reconciliations."
In all primates, humans included, aggression is an aspect of social life that occurs in the best relationships. You could argue that understanding aggression important but understanding conflict resolution by reconciliation is more important.

Ethologists linked aggression to territory. Every animal stakes out some space to call its own. The space has boundaries that are defined by the aggressive behavior of the animal. Many animals have elaborate systems of spacing themselves so that territorial claims are seldom disputed with violent attacks. Birds have the most creative system – they sing to each other. This is my territory chirp, chirp; please stay away from my space, chirp” Chemical secretions are good territory markers and are widely used in the animal kingdom. You can mark the boundaries of your territory with urine as cats, wolves and dogs do. You can secret chemical messengers from special glands and rub it on trees and rocks to let others know “this is my place.”

Territorial aggression has both a defensive and an offensive mode and sometimes they are the same behaviors. Every so often, an animal decides to challenge the territory of another – he wants to relocate, expend his space, or perhaps he does not have a space to call his own and wants some. You can capture another’s territory by frightening him away with warning calls and a fierce display. You might win by causing him to flee or you might kill him. He might win by getting angry and charging you with teeth and claws displayed convincingly. You lose your confidence, turn and run and he chases you, not just to his boundary but way down the street, just to let you know that his power extends beyond his domain. It may take months or years before you have the temerity to try another raid or you may go hunting for another animal who is more easily intimidated. If you do not flee from a more aggressive, stronger adversary, you will be injured or killed.

Humans have evolved elaborate territorial strategies and have replaced urine and odor markers with visual markers, constructions, rituals and rules. The function of well-defined boundaries is to minimize conflict. The regulation of territorial rights is a government task. Land registries and fences make good neighbors. High rock walls and moats patrolled by crocodiles make safer cities.

Property law reduces the frequency of dispute and courts replace violent aggression with negotiation and settlement. Nations confront each other with a variety of negotiating tools, but no nation relies on international law to secure its territories. Every nation relies on military force.
Since the end of the Second World War, the Soviet Union and the United States of America combined ideological differences, technological ingenuity with a reptilian version of territorial defense that involved massive deployment of nuclear weapons, missile robots ready to launch at all times and satellite surveillance of the planet. The nicest way to summarize the human predicament is that territorial defense remains a dominant concern in the 21st century.

A more realistic statement would warn that a suicidal insanity threatens the survival of all humans in the 21st century. Russia and the USA are the two countries with insane stockpiles of nuclear weapons, aka weapons of mass destruction. Both countries are achieving modest aggreements to dismantle their weapons and adopt more reasonable and benevolent methods of resolving differences.

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason. Available for download from Persona Digital Online.

Decisions & Discrimination

2011-01-03T15:13:00.000-08:00

Discrimination refers to noticing differences and making choices based on evaluating differences. One of the trends in neuroscience involves understanding of how decisions are made. You could argue that detecting and responding to differences is the most universal strategy in animal brains.

Humans are good at detecting differences and make millisecond decisions that have a lasting influence on their subsequent decision making procedures. The kind and degree of difference is always in flux and depends on prior learning, context and social status. Discrimination is a deeply imbedded property of the human mind that is expressed in almost every human behavior we might consider. However, discrimination as a popular topic is often a misinterpretation of the normal activity of noticing and acting on differences.

In popular debates, discrimination is treated as an aberration. Terms that end in “ism” and “ist” are often used to describe discriminating people in a derogatory manner. Thus anyone with a different ancestry who disagrees with you becomes a racist.

This is not to argue that noticing differences is always positive. It is to argue that humans base a lot of their decisions on noticing differences. In a positive mode, the description “a discriminating shopper” identifies human who notices differences in design and quality of manufacture, choosing high quality products rather than cheap ones.

We have recognized that group membership is all important to humans. You recognize familiar humans who speak and act like yourself as members of your group. In a crowd you notice humans who display small differences in speech, costume and behavior. Most often these small differences are the basis for shunning or ignoring the “strange” humans. In the most rigid groups, everyone wears the same costume, repeats the same polite language, with the same intonation and behaves in a predicable, ritualistic manner.

We have recognized that racial and ethnic boundaries exist but obvious boundaries are not required for discrimination.

The ideal of an egalitarian society is to recognize the merit of individuals; to allow social mobility based on learning and achievement; and to protect individual expressions by social policy and law, but human nature does not change. Group preferences and boundaries that separate groups can always be identified.

This discussion is from Neuroscience Notes. The book places the human brain at the center of the universe. Since the brain is the organ of the mind, consciousness and all knowledge is contained within the brain. Neuroscience Notes is part of the Persona Digital Psychology and Philosophy Series of related books. The most closely related volumes are the Human Brain and Intelligence and Learning.

Persona Digital Online offers downloads of eBooks, music and other digital documents.

The Common Good

2010-12-09T12:50:00.000-08:00

One ethical argument is that group interests should have priority over selfish interests. An investigation of ethics must consider this argument and develop metrics for the common good. No-one should assume that it is easy to define the common good. In political battles, clearly divergent if not contradictory ideas of the common good prevail and efforts to achieve consensus are difficult to impossible. The ethical implications are profound.

Michael Sandel asks What’s the Right Thing to Do? He teaches political philosophy at Harvard and offers the most popular course on campus -- Justice. One of his intellectual anchors is Jeremy Bentham who wrote Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation in 1780. Bentham proposed a utilitarian test to evaluate the morality of any action: ask the question will my action produce the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people? John Stuart Mill later argued that respect for individuals rights as "the most sacred and binding part of morality" is compatible with the idea that justice rests ultimately on utilitarian considerations. In simple terms, the two arguments compare individual interests with group interests.

Sandel also reviewed the philosophy of Immanuel Kant who argued that reason tells us what we ought to do, and when we obey our own reason, only then are we truly free. Kant’s ideas seem oddly unrealistic in the 21st century. Reason is in short supply. Every person assumes that he or she is more reasonable than others who disagree. There is no consensus about the “common good.” We know that some humans are bad and will harm others as a matter of course; their behavior will not be altered by rational argument or laws and must be constrained by force. Some of these bad people arrive in positions of authority and power. Some bad people are elected, even to the highest positions in government where they can do much harm without insight or remorse.

We know that the audience, the "public", is made up of different groups with vested interests that conflict. We know that everyone invents stories that support their own point of view. Everyone deceives others and there is no absolute truth. We know that the voting public contains individuals with different mental abilities and that most humans have distinct limitations on what they can and will understand.

Human destiny as a species still lies with the programs in the old brain that offer only limited empathy and understanding and insist on the priority of local group survival at any cost. Individuals can transcend the old programs by diligent learning and practice but individual effort and learning does not change the genome, so that there can be no enduring civility without the persistent and relentless initiation of new humans into a rational and compassionate world order. Whatever we value about civilized human existence - culture, knowledge, social justice, respect for human rights and dignity must be practiced anew and stored as modifications of each person's neocortex.

From The Good Person, Ethics and Morality by Stephen Gislason

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Brain Circuits and Computer Metaphors

2010-12-01T16:06:00.000-08:00

Wild Speculation

I have been reading and hearing too much wild speculation about smart computers and computer chips implanted in humans to replace damaged brain parts or to make people smarter. 99% of this speculation is not smart. I want to provide a basic understanding of brain "ciruits" and put computer metaphors in perspective. Here is an introduction from my Neuroscience Notes.

What About Circuits?

The word circuit is often used in neuroscience. Early metaphors compared brain connectivity with electrical wiring that appeared on streets and in buildings. Simple electrical devices such as switches, relays and telephone switch boards were often used as models of neuronal network components. An early description of an action potential travelling along an axon became "firing" and this inappropriate comparison is still with us. Later, electronic circuits became better models of how neurons may be connected together and neural networks were built with transistors and circuit boards. Any comparison of brain activity with electricity can be misleading, since the voltage fluctuations detected by electronic instruments are produced chemically in the brain and are transmitted by ion fluxes across cell membranes, quite different from electrons flowing in wires and transistors.

An important sub-discipline, electrophysiology, explored the wave activity of the brain using the equipment and techniques developed to monitor electronic circuits. A fundamental concept of brain activity was the dynamic balance between excitation and inhibition. Arousal, action and reaction were properties of excitation. Rest, recuperation and inactivity were properties of inhibitory systems. Loss of inhibition in the brain has serious consequences, from hyperactivity to seizures.

Electronic circuits evolved dramatically in the last half of the 20th century and became essential for much human productivity, communications and information storage. Two domains of circuitry developed – analogue and digital. The differences are important to understand.

Analogue Not Digital

In electronic terms, the brain is more like an analog system than a digital device. The difference is obvious to theorists and electronic engineers but may not mean much to other people. A tape recording is an analog record that stores a waveform analogous to sound waves or electronic waves generated by sound interacting with a microphone. A digital recording stores samples of the waveform as a series of bits. To play back a digital recording you have to convert the samples back to an analogue waveform that plays through sound-producing speakers.

Analog devices are more closely related to the phenomena they represent. Analog computers use circuits that compute in real time. You can arrange transistors to add or subtract two incoming signals - this can be done with a few transistors and the circuit can operate in real time 24 hours a day with instantaneous results.

You could add other simple circuits to notice and make decisions about the similarity or difference between the two signals. This is an efficient approach to real-time computing. You would construct an analog computer if you wanted a simple, efficient and reliable system that sensed, decided and acted in real time continuously over many years. This is the essence of living brains.

You can identify several functional circuits in the brain that can be represented by analogue electronics: oscillators, tuners, feature detectors, mixers, differentiators, integrators, amplifiers, filters, relays, compressors, exciters and feedback controls.

In contrast, a digital computer requires a more elaborate structure - the input signals have to be encoded into a binary stream and stored in memory along with program instructions. The data can later be directed to a CPU that combines the incoming data with a program using logic, arithmetic instruction and memory addresses to arrive at the result. Results of CPU manipulations are then stored in memory, decoded and displayed. The digital machine is more complex than an analogue computer, less reliable and consumes more space and energy than the analogue computer to accomplish the same task.

A brain takes the analog approach and accomplishes sophisticated computations in real time, efficiently, usually without storing any data. Early studies of neurons focused on the on-off characteristic of action potentials and a misleading comparison has been made with the transistor switch in digital circuits. An action potential does not have the meaning of a 0 or 1 digital switch since there is no evidence of binary coding in the brain. The most important distinction between digital computing device and the brain is that the digital device separates data and the procedures that operate on the data. A brain integrates data and procedures so that you can never separate data, programs, and hardware. There are no brain programs that resemble computer programs stored in a coded format since all the programming and all the data is built into neuronal networks. To change a brain program you have to grown and/or prune the connections among neurons. There are several properties of living systems that set them apart from non-living systems. The most fundamental properties of a living system are not possessed by any non-living system are a preprogrammed but adaptable metabolism, self-replication, self-reference, self-modification, spontaneous activity, growth and repair. Information processing in the brain is electro-chemical and involves a neuronal version of quantum mechanics. The quanta are packets of chemicals, neurotransmitters.

Koch suggested many years ago that the brain should be viewed as a hybrid computer, one that employs both digital pulses (between neurons) and analog computations (within them). I do not share Koch’s notion that there is any digital processing going on in the brain. A neuron’s action potential or “spike“ is an analog signal,; a series of action potentials can be compared to pulses in frequency modulated radio transmission. The prerequisite of digital computing is not the wave form but the binary nodes that decide the meaning of inputs. You would have to find neurons wired like switching transistors to make the logical decisions: and, or, not-or, not-and. You would also have to find memory storage in binary code, large arrays of two-state switches with a reader that can tell if each switch is on or off. I will be surprised if a single instance of digital computation is discovered in animal brains.

I will argue that animal brains interface analogue-like input and output circuits with processors that are unlike any electronic circuits we have invented and we do not understand the basic principles. We know that memories are not true analogues of experiences, but rather are compressed recordings of features extracted from the incoming data stream. The recordings are not discrete entities; they are distributed, overlapping and interactive.

While you can create a science fiction story of self-modifying computers, the engineering challenges are formidable. The first step in a practical system would be to develop self-modifying software that does not frustrate users with inappropriate decisions and does not self-destruct. The sense, decide, act and remember capabilities of insect brains are remarkable, but no man-made system can come close to realizing the genius of insects. You could argue that human intelligence is just an elaboration of ant intelligence, complete with dependence on group interactions. Or you could argue that humans and other animals are special creatures with unprecedented abilities.

The intelligence in digital machines is not native to the machines and was put there by humans. The advantage of investing your knowledge and skills in a computer program is that your hard-earned procedural skills are retained and can be used by hundreds of millions of other humans for years to come. Groups of smart, dedicated people can perfect programs over time so that users have all the advantages of accumulated human experience.

You can download a PDF copy of Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason at Persona Digital Online.

Anthropology from Neuroscience Notes

2010-11-23T13:31:00.000-08:00

Anthropology means the study of man, anthropos. Man means in this context humans, male and female, young and old. I first encountered anthropology in two forms, the study of human origins and the study of other societies, especially distant ones who had not acquired all the complications and vices of urban industrial society. Stones and bones are the evidence used by paleoanthropologists to study early humans going back millions of years. Archaeologists study the stones, bones and artefacts left by humans in the past 10 thousand years. You might consider sociology to be a division of anthropology that studies contemporary societies at close range.

One of the tools of anthropology is ethnography, descriptions of kinship, language, organization and dynamics of local groups. You could argue that all human studies are studies of human nature and that anthropology should grow to embrace all other disciplines or all disciplines should incorporate anthropology. Since anthropology existed as a department within universities, competing for funds, students and recognition, the discipline has remained a specialty, more or less confined to a limited set of tools and assumptions. European colonization of distant countries led to studies of the local flora and fauna, using descriptive taxonomies, drawings and hand written notes. A similar approach was taken by early anthropologists in their studies of human groups.

Harris reviewed the history of anthropology in his book, The Rise of Anthropological Theory'. Harris considered ecology and demographic dynamics as determinant factors in sociocultural evolution. In his later works, he and others considered the importance of food as a social determinant. In his book, Cannibals and Kings he considered the vices of centralized control of essential natural resources that lead to institutionalized oppression, an inevitable characteristic of imperial states throughout history. His ”cultural materialism” focused on the practical concerns that support survival, on the infrastructures of food production, reproduction, and local group cohesion.

The desire to discover truly innate features of human nature has been a main feature of anthropology and the arguments that prevailed in the 20th century. While ethnographies reveal a remarkably diversity of human expressions, underlying themes emerge that are common to all. My strategy is to use Anthropology resources, selecting the best ideas that are most compatible with 21st century understanding, avoiding polemics and historical debates.

Anthropology involved critically disputatious humans who invested much of their time and energy arguing with each other. Ideas useful in the 21st century idea developed with increasing, multidisciplinary sophistication. You could divide essential ideas into two groups. The first group involves general principles that can be applied in every situation. The second and largest group involves science and technology complete with a growing repertoire of concepts and techniques that promise to make older approaches to understanding human conduct obsolete. One essential idea is that human nature is animal nature, somewhat modified in the past million years.

Another idea implicit in all viable explanations is that the details of human systems change continuously and technologies evolve. The critical disputatious nature of humans does not change. The basic dynamics of competition, copying and conflict do not change. We can now state with confidence that every group organizes around kinship and ad hoc affiliations.

Every group has technologies of tool making, food production and distribution. Every group has hierarchies and rules. Every group has internal conflicts and conflicts with neighboring groups. Every group has methods of resolving conflicts without killing.

When conflict resolution fails, humans kill each other. Killings tend to multiply since humans seek revenge for harm done to members of their local group. We must also recognize that humans are best suited for living in small groups and become dysfunctional in predictable ways when groups get bigger.

Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason Available as a PDF download from Persona Digital Books

Modern Humans, Ancient Creatures

2010-11-12T13:06:00.001-08:00

Both the good and the bad tendencies of mindbodybrain are innate properties that have useful functions, were not invented by modern society and are not going to change until the construction of brain changes. The dialogue between good and bad in human affairs is constant, predictable and universal.

When a baby is born, the family and local community begin to teach the emerging being what is going on here and now. They provide the local language, costumes, customs beliefs and the local science and technology. All adult humans have a technology to teach. While the local culture has an obvious impact on the appearance and behavior of emerging adults, the constant features of the human mind are pervasive and persistent. The variance in mental abilities within a local group will often be greater than inter-group variance.

The first principle of bodybrainmind is that each person has a repertoire of innate programs and some choice how the programs are going to be expressed. Innate programs have been called "instincts." The old definition of "instincts" refers to behaviors that arise spontaneously and are not learned – needs modification since evidence suggests that some innate programming has to be practiced and is molded by learning. The distinction between strictly innate and strictly learned behavior is artificial. Some innate programming is relatively fixed and cannot be changed by learning.

The distinction between constant features of the human mind and variable features is useful. Constant features are manifestations of innate brain structure and function. Variable features manifest the range of tendencies and abilities within a human group, the variations introduced by physical environments and the variations introduced by learning. Speech, for example, is a constant feature of the human mind; a variable feature of speech is the language(s) learned. A range of linguistic competence is determined by aptitude, learning and the physical environment.

All brains are equipped to learn. We can use computational metaphors to sketch in the territory of mind study, using concepts that are becoming generally known. The metaphors are not actual or real descriptions of how the brain works. When you are using a computer, you do not invent the programs themselves but you do learn how to use them. You do not have program a word processor, but you do have to learn how to use it. The more you learn about and use your word processor the better you get at using it

If you buy a computer with software installed, the operating system and the word processor seem innate to the system. This is roughly analogous to the human brain that comes with a word processor installed or, more precisely, it comes with installation routines that activate sequentially over several years, progressive “software” installation that is modified by practice. If a baby does not practice using the installed word processor, however, the progressive program installation will be abbreviated or aborted.

In the brain, hardware and software are properties of the same physical entities. The distinction is helpful to recognize that the inborn properties of mind are modified by learning and learning is, in part, similar to software. Many of the programs built into our brain have a special feature. They can be modified and elaborated by the experience of the individual. Brainbodymind is, therefore, an open-ended system that will evolve a unique identity in the lifetime of each individual. Humans live in a tense matrix of innate tendencies and experiential forces that modify or elaborate these tendencies.

Individuation occurs as experience modifies some brain structures and coexists with old programs that persist regardless of the individual experience, because the older brain structures resist modification. We talk in terms of freedom, free will, and self-determination. These are all attributes of the open-ended possibilities of bodybrainmind.

As much as we might try, we are not going to able to show a distinction between sound and the experience of sound or light and the experience of light. As much as we might try to elevate objective evidence as existing separately out-there, we will never be able to go beyond the for-me-ness of human experience. The distinction between subjective and objective is relatively useful as long as you do not examine the distinction too closely. With close scrutiny, subjective and objective are similar and the only issue is how many humans agree on what it was that they experienced.

The modification of brain structure and function is "learning". Learning involves all experience and not just time spent in school. In fact, the learning achieved in school classrooms is relatively unimportant. Learning is dependent on the availability of the innate program that organizes and supports the acquisition of skills and knowledge. There is no chance of a newborn baby talking in coherent sentences even if both parents prompt him 24 hours a day. The baby and the parents have to wait until the brain has developed the language circuits; they emerge in a predictable sequence. Every normal baby first blows bubbles, coos and babbles, practicing language modules as they come online until the whole system is fully functional.

To modify innate mind programs:

1. Everyone has to practice using his or her innate abilities to become good at anything. If you want to become a good killer, buy a gun and practice killing – an electronic simulator will do.

2.If you want to win the Nobel Peace Prize, practice communication skills, appeasement, and reasonable negotiation and learn to be compassionate.

3. Everyone has to learn tolerance and must practice controlling anger and aggression. If you want to become good at hate, practice telling inflammatory stories about other humans.

4. If you want to love and be loved, practice acceptance, appreciation and gratitude; stop developing malicious stories and blaming others.

5. Understanding how people and the natural world really work does not come easily.

6. If you want to understand, you observe, explore, study and protect the natural environment. You form and sustain alliances with other intelligent people.

7.Dedication to learning is required - sustained study, self-scrutiny and continuous practice of tolerance and understandings are the prerequisites to develop an insightful, compassionate, modern person. Learning is a life-long process.

From Neuroscience Notes and The Good Person - Ethics and Morality, two books by Stephen Gislason.

The Military Mind - Can It be Fixed?

2010-11-09T15:12:00.000-08:00

Governments tend to include military organizations which have grown large and complex with an abundance of machines and electronic communications. A sober realist who studies weapons technology and the mind set of the creators will have serious doubts about the prospects for peace in decades to come. For the foreseeable future, competition to establish military dominance would seem inevitable.

It is easy to argue that most humans seek dominance, are ready to fight, and support governments with advanced weapons. When US President Eisenhower retired in 1961, he warned US citizens of the military industrial complex. He stated prophetically: “The conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”

When all is said and done, the military has two functions:

1. Destroy property
2. Kill other humans

Soldiers are rewarded for destroying property and killing other humans; they cannot make independent evaluations based on deeply felt, personal expressions of caring, concern, justice and freedom. Military personnel have ethics or rules of conduct that control their behavior within military organizations.

There are also “rules of war” that are often ignored in combat situations. An ethical soldier may do great harm to others as long as he protects his comrades and follows orders. Some soldiers are sociopathic criminals who take advantage of war to commit atrocities against civilians.

While you could argue that many soldiers are basically good people who commit socially sanctioned crimes, there is an equal argument that soldiers are the agents of evil and cannot be excused. There is another argument that soldiers are also victims. They are killed by the people they are supposed to kill, but more, they are agents of a political elite who chose war over negotiation and compromise. The politicians do not go to war, nor do their family members. High ranking officers stay at a safe distance from the battles and order others to kill and be killed.

In Canada on November 11 every year, people gather to remember soldiers who died in past wars. There is a collection of veterans, current military personnel, politicians, media people and ordinary citizens. An assumption is made that remembering the victims of the war serves the interests of living Canadians. The same misleading platitudes are repeated every year. There are references to honor, courage, valor, freedom, even references to fighting that will end all wars.

One of the clashes in every society occurs between hawks and doves. While one group is directly or indirectly approving of solders killing others in defense of “freedom” another group is opposing combat roles. Weapon lovers talk about the enemy with great enthusiasm. They want to use freedom destroying weapons to defend freedom. Without an enemy, expensive weapons look ridiculous. Hopeful idealists imagine a different nonviolent world with an external nervous system that links minds in grooming and altruistic information sharing that will render the two military activities (killing and property destruction) obsolete.

Every country that can afford high tech weapons makes a substantial investment in armaments. As new weapons are manufactured in more affluent countries, older weapons are sold to poorer countries so that the ability to destroy property and kill humans is well distributed over the planet.

The Kalashnikov AK-47 is a hand-held automatic rifle; an agent of death that sprays bullets in the direction it is pointed. Little or no training is required to kill other humans. Several countries manufacture and export them. They are sold to governments, criminals, civilians, terrorist and are used by child soldiers. Hodges described Kalashnikov societies where the proliferation of the weapon “makes it impossible for civil society to assert itself and halt the killing.”

A report compiled by the US Congressional Research Service stated: "We are at a point in history where many of these sales are not essential for the self-defense of these countries and the arms being sold continue to fuel conflicts and tensions in unstable areas...Where before the principal motivation for arms sales by foreign suppliers might have been to support a foreign policy objective, today that motivation may be based on economic motives."

In 2008, the United States was responsible for two-thirds of all armaments sales to other countries, valued at $37.8 billion, increased from $25.4 billion sales in 2007. Italy was second, with $3.7 billion in weapons sales in 2008. Russian sales were down from the $10.8 billion in 2007 to 3.5 billion in 2008. Sales from the US to developing nations included a $6.5 billion air defense system for the United Arab Emirates, a $2.1 billion jet fighter deal with Morocco and a $2 billion attack helicopter agreement with Taiwan. Other large weapons agreements were reached with India, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, South Korea and Brazil.

India and China, the two most populous nations on the planet are creating large, powerful military organizations with nuclear weapons. China has advanced missile and submarine technology that gives them the offensive capacities that rival the worst that the US and Russia have to offer. The balance of power is shifting to Asia. The idea is not avoid war, but to avoid losing a war. Eisenhower was right. The military industrial complex is a powerful and atavistic force that absorbs inordinate wealth, dedicated to destruction and death. The cover of national security and military honor keeps most citizens confused and docile. At home, military personnel wear attractive uniforms adorned with badges, and medals. They have bands, marches, and perform impressive funerals. Their cemeteries and national monuments to honor dead soldiers are often visited by patriotic citizens.

Anyone who really wants peace will have to confront and constrain governments that spend their money on weapons. They will have to reduce and redefine the nature and conduct of military organizations. The power of the military industrial complex must be reduced. The international sale of surplus armaments must eventually cease. Guns at home must be banned. The problem, of course, is that no country will disarm unilaterally. In the USA, few citizens will give up their own guns. They are ready to fight. Everyone has to disarm at the same time to the same degree and so far, this is impossible.

Transforming the Military Mind

Canadian military organizations have undertaken peace-keeping roles in several countries and have contributed to disaster relief at home and abroad. If you change the enemy from people you do not like or fear, to human vulnerability with a growing list of natural threats, then military organizations become valuable assets to countries that have them. Although the military mind has developed from innate tendencies that are not going to disappear, a shift in focus and priorities is already underway in the 21st century. This shift requires better education of participants, more cooperation among agencies within countries, more international cooperation, less secrecy and a big dose of compassion.

Since I am convinced that human nature includes competition, conflict and killing, I do not expect as miraculous cessation of hostilities. I cannot expect that a minority of well-informed, well-intentioned peace keepers can restrain their more belligerent and less informed neighbors. If there is hope, it lies in the impracticality of war and the pacifying effect of sustainable affluence.

The notion of national security as a discrete, definable goal is already obsolete, but lingering devotion to this archaic concept is an important obstacle to transforming the military mind. The smart people within the military realize that the world is changing; interdependencies are growing, vulnerabilities are increasing and threats are well distributed. Nations are porous with little or no hope of defending even well-defined boundaries.

Resources are limited and the cost of paranoid defense preparations is becoming an luxury even for affluent countries that are running deficits just to keep going. Many countries are living on loans that they will either have to pay back in the coming decades or join a growing list of failed states who defaulted on loan repayment.

It is cheaper to abandon enemy- based thinking and to cooperate with other nation states to cope with catastrophes to come. While there many humans that blow up assets and kill others, the belief that terrorists as a special and most important threat is an expensive, paranoid delusion.

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason Download eBook Online.

Insults, the Opposite of Polite Talk

2010-11-01T15:34:00.000-07:00

The opposite of polite talk is insulting talk. Insults are names and attributions designed to hurt others, to arouse anger and ultimately to start fights. Children are often taught:” Sticks and stones will break my bones, but names will never hurt me.” While the intention is to alleviate some of the suffering a child feels when others hurl insults, the statement is not true. “Names” can be harmful and are often remembered for years; whereas pleasant experiences are forgotten.

You could ask why insults are potent as expressions of aggression and as triggers for fights. Proud males, for example, so reject insults that a scrappy fight, a formal duel, or a declaration of war follows insult. If you are a skilled peace maker, you learned to deflect insults and inhibit anger. But even the most skilled pacifist will still be hurt by insults and will require strategies of self-defense that do not depend on anger or revenge.

An important meaning of an insult is: ”I don’t like you and intend to do you harm.”

The term “profanity” originated with religious authorities to describe words and expressions not approved by the church. Blasphemous language opposes the authority of the church. Insults are often expressed with profanity, using words and gesture that are rude and disrespectful. Synonyms for profane speech are cussing cursing, swearing, obscenity, dirty words. Words that refer to the anus, feces and sexual organs are often used as insults. Disrespectful words that refer to ethnic origins, religion, and occupation are also used as insults. Referring to people as animals with low status is insulting.

Offensive and Taboo Words

The meaning of every word is context dependent and every local group has rules about good words and bad words. Social status determines the tolerance for offensive words. High status usually requires strict language discipline; any deviation from polite speech will lead to rejection. If you are a stranger entering a new group, it is a good idea to learn and use polite speech, avoiding words that would offend.

Fuck is the most used and most versatile English swear word, used as a noun, verb, adjective and adverb. The verb, fuck, refers to sexual intercourse. Even polite girls in the heat of passion will say “fuck me” to their lover, but in other contexts may never use the word. I have occasionally kept the company of working men who often say fuck; the frequency of fuck in their conversations can be as high as every third word. Most of the fuck words are simply part of the prosody of their languages, but there is an underlying hostility to the whole approach to communication. One man who becomes annoyed with another will shout “fuck you” with his index finger raised, an obvious insult. He may walk away with a disgusted look, repeating fuck many times as he disappears into the distance. Fuck is not acceptable in polite conversation and is taboo in respectable newspapers and on television.

Some taboo words describe objects of disgust that are not mentioned in polite talk: feces, urine, vomit, menstrual blood, pus are high on the list of disgusting things. Street words for sexual parts and acts are usually taboo, even when proper terms are seldom used and casual terms are common and numerous. Ethnic slurs express the human tendency to discriminate against others that are different.

Discrimination is multifaceted, begins with insults and extends into fights which are sometimes lethal.

One reason to reject vulgar words in civil society is to suppress the tendency to fight and kill.

You could argue that trading insults is a substitute for actual fighting and may be permissible, but the tendency for verbal battles to escalate is real and dangerous.

From Language and Thinking by Stephen Gislason

The Musical Brain

2010-10-25T18:29:00.000-07:00

Music is found everywhere in humans groups. Musical information consists of pitch, loudness, timbre, location, and movement of the sound source. A combination of sounds of different pitches produces harmony and a sequence of pitches becomes melody. Timbre describes the harmonics in a sound that give it recognizable qualities. A range of timbres in human voices provides for the sound identification of individuals. You can identify who is talking from voice timbre and intonation, just as you can identify a trumpet, an oboe or a violin.

Formal music is assembled into language-equivalent structures, suggesting phonemes, syntax and semantics. The elements of music began millions of years ago with other animals. We humans are just recent practitioners of the art of sound communication.

The general plan of communication using sounds and written symbols involves a supramodal, movement-modeling capacity that can create and retain schemas of action in the world and that some of these schemas are expressions that we refer to as emotions, some as language and some as music. It is not surprising that these three modes often merge as the most dramatic and moving form of human communication.

The central feature of intelligence is the ability to understand what is really going on out there and to respond to events with successful and adaptive behavior. Praxis is skillful movement and is central to intelligent behavior. If you add mimesis to praxis, you can start building a meaningful model of intelligence.

Music in the original sense is communication, part of group assemblies that featured drumming, vocalization and dance. In an evolved sense, music became attached to rituals, celebrations, theatre and entertainment. Active group participation in creating music and dance has often become passive as audiences collect to sit and listen to professional musicians perform.

Our brains have evolved to detect and evaluate discrete low volume sounds. Everyone who has spent time in natural environments will know that little sounds are ubiquitous in nature. Loud sounds are unusual and signal danger. A nature person will be able identify birds, insects, and other animals by their characteristic sounds. Wind sounds inform about weather changes. Some trees can be identified by the sounds of their leaves vibrating in the wind. A sailor can determine wind direction and velocity by moving his head slightly to hear changes in pitch and timbre as the wind blows around his head.

The human brain extracts several kinds of information from the components of sounds: pitch, loudness, timbre, location and direction of movement. Animal communication begins with sounds that declare specific meanings such as the alarm cries of squirrels and monkeys, bird songs that regulate mating and social activity and human grunts, shouts and cries that attract attention, signal danger and express emotion.

The auditory system is organized into spatial and nonspatial, processing streams. In the monkey, the posterolateral auditory cortex is more responsive to spatial features stimuli than the anterolateral region that is more selective for vocalization. Single neurons in these cortical areas respond differentially to features of the auditory input.

Neurons selectively responsive to vocalizations were found in the ventral prefrontal cortex. Neurons responsive to spatial features were found in the dorsal prefrontal cortex. The responsiveness of auditory neurons in both the prefrontal and parietal cortices is dependent on the significance of the stimulus. The superior temporal sulcus in humans exhibits selective activation for voices.

Neurons detect the start and end of sounds through separate channels; onset is detected by neurons close to the sensory receptors. On and off decision are made in cortical areas responsible for language processing. Leek explained that the distinction between 'chop' and 'shop,' or between 'stay' and 'say" are based on short, transient differences at the beginning of the words: "One of the major challenges is to note precise timing information in speech that permits localization of sound in space, separation of sound sources that are occurring simultaneously, and the suppression of redundancy such as echoes in a highly-reverberant space." People have sound recognition problems when the auditory cortex fails to encode the audio frequencies and timing cues.

Parietal Lobes

Learned skills that require constant monitoring and adjustment are the basis of musical performances. The parietal lobes have been described as memory and multimodal skill processors. Each parietal lobe sits between the visual brain (occipital lobe) behind, and the frontal lobes in front and the temporal lobe below. In the simplest terms, there are two functional regions; 1. the postcentral gyrus is the sensor cortex that receives data from the body and face via the thalamus; 2. the remainder of the parietal lobe is an associative memory device that integrates body sensory input with visual information to create awareness of a body moving in space.

Damage to the parietal lobes can often be recognized as loss of motor skills and abnormalities in body image and spatial relations. Damage on the left side may cause right-left confusion, verbal memory deficits, difficulty with writing (agraphia), difficulty with mathematics (acalculia), other disorders of language (aphasia) and the inability to identify and use objects (agnosia). Right parietal lobe damage causes neglect of part of the body, difficulty making things (constructional apraxia), and denial of deficits anosagnosia). Bilateral parietal lobe disease may be recognized by the inability to control eye movements (ocular apraxia), inability to resolve visual information into recognizable objects (simultanagnosia),and the inability to reach for an object with visual guidance (optic ataxia).

The inferior parietal lobe creates a multi-modal map of auditory experiences processed initially in the right temporal lobe, which is dominant in the perception of timbre, chords, tone, pitch, loudness, and melody. When the right temporal lobe is damaged deficits appear in the ability to sing, melody recognition, and impaired evaluation of loudness, and timbre. The capacity to enjoy music may be lost (amusia.) Right temporal-parietal area damage also impairs comprehension of verbal prosody and emotional speech. Itoh et al demonstrated that the left parietal lobe plays a significant role in piano performance.

From the Sound of Music by Stephen Gislason

Download a free draft copy until Nov 15 2010

The Dream of Democracy

2010-10-23T13:43:00.000-07:00

The term democracy refers to governments formed by the people who, in the best case, act in the interests of the people. The term is widely used, often without understanding of what it means.

According to Posner, in the US, the founding fathers did not want to set up a democracy but a mixed government. The presidency is the monarchical element, the Senate and Supreme Court are aristocratic elements and only the democratic element is the House of Representatives. This design had worked to balance competing interests but with increasing size and complexity of government, the design has become obsolete. Government becomes a circus of competing interests, displaying their wares in a variety of private venues.

Canada copied the British Parliamentary system with a three layered, mixed government. Britain has a Queen who remains the nominal head of government, an aristocratic assembly, the House of Lords and an elected parliament where the majority party forms the government. In a display of absurd anachronism, the British Queen continues to own all of Canada not in private hands, and appears on all official documents issued by the government.

Athens, Greece is often given credit for inventing democracy. But in Athens only one in 10 residents could vote. Women could not participate and slaves had no rights. Those who did vote were often tempted to vote in favor of war. Athens flourished for a few years, but the Greek empire and democracy was over within 150 years. While the Greek legacy was carried on more or less by the Romans and spread through Europe, the real story of ancient Greece is tragic.

Elections are the showcase of democracy but may not achieve desirable results. Elected leaders often find subsequent elections to be inconvenient and assume dictatorial powers instead.
The real process of government is an endless series of negotiations and private deals. Negotiated deals tend to benefit the more aggressive, influential and wealthy participants.

Government as a circus is perhaps better than government as a dictator’s court but in most democratic countries, few citizens are happy with the way governments work.

Democracy and freedom are not necessarily linked. An alert, well-informed citizenry and a politically independent judiciary are essential to the preservation of personal freedoms. A civil society develops multiple overlapping levels of dispute resolution with the right to appeal bad decisions that are common and inevitable when local tribunals decide who is privileged and who is not. A champion of civil rights is often in the uncomfortable predicament of defending the rights of humans he or she disagrees with, dislikes and even fears.

All governments are inefficient and are prone to corruption. In every large institution, there is a tendency to fascism, the dictatorial rule of an elite group who believe only they know what is right and true. A fascist displays innate tendencies, modified by learning, but devoid of compassion. A fascist promotes arguments and dissension, developing the idea that only some citizens have rights and privileges and others become outsiders who must be constrained, imprisoned, deported or eliminated.

Elections are often thought to be the essence of democracy, but as human groups grow larger and social organization more complex, the ideal of citizen controlled government becomes impossible. Eventually, democratic rights might be restored by internet technologies that provide valid information and permit citizens to vote directly on policy issues and legislation.

The value of elections is not so much the selection of the right people to run governments since this result is seldom achieved, but the opportunity to disrupt political oligarchies in the early stages of their development. You could argue that candidate selection for elections is so inappropriate to the task facing the elected politicians that an election lottery choosing from thoughtfully selected, highly qualified citizens would do a better job of forming governments.

In a civil society there must be a wealth re-distribution plan so that money and power is not concentrated in a small elite class but, at the same time, does not discourage or penalize smart people who make the extra effort to innovate and contribute to the general good.

Affluent populations need to protect themselves from attacks that originate from inside and outside the group. The need for protection appears to be persistent and relentless with no prospect in the future of any reprieve. Fascist groups within elected governments typically advance the need for national security to consolidate their power, to threaten political opposition and to suspend citizens’ right and freedoms, replacing external threats with internal repression.

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason

Cities - Problems and Solutions

2010-10-20T12:37:00.001-07:00

The 21st century began with 50% of humans living in cities. If you are wealthy, cities collect interesting people, expensive goods, and diverse erotic pleasures. If you are poor, cities are concentrations of displaced humans who lack food, shelter, sanitation and medical care.

Cities concentrate the most negative expressions of humans: gambling, prostitution, crime, and drug use. Poor people from rural areas tend to migrate to cities, hoping to make money and improve their circumstances; they seldom succeed. Even in the most affluent countries displaced and poor people crowd into cities. Some are exploited by rich people as cheap labor. Others are ignored. Some turn to crime, others depend on charity or government welfare.

In the best case, the trend established in the first half of 20th century was to increases employment opportunities and increase general wealth. Canada was one of the nations developing a social contract that guaranteed essential benefits for all citizens including new immigrants and refugees. The benefits included free public schooling, free medical and hospital care and guarantees of minimal access to food, shelter and public health services. These benefits are expensive, so that reductions in the budgets for social services began in the late 20th century and will decrease further as budgetary deficits grow.

At the same time, income and personal wealth disparities grew larger. The net effect was the fewer humans had more and more humans had less. Cities change as the population demographics change within them. Cities states, in the historical record, were ephemeral. Most were built to withstand attack from invaders and most disappeared after decades to centuries of growth and affluence. Modern cities, like cancers, grow unchecked, metastasize and destroy their own support system.

William Rees, an economist at the University of British Columbia took an ecological approach to economics. He is concerned that cities are growing too large to be sustainable. Cities are centers of consumption and depend on the surrounding environment to supply energy, food and to accept and disperse waste. Rees measured the ecological footprint of cities and his results are not encouraging.

At the end of the 20th century, 1.1 billion people live in the largest cities with populations in the millions; their carbon dioxide emissions were greater than the capacity of all the world’s forests to process the gas. One city person requires at least five square hectares of resource rich land to support him or her. The 472,000 people living in the city of Vancouver in 1999 on 11,400 hectares of land actually required the output of 2.3 million hectares of land.

The real capital is not money but air, water, food and other resources. City states deplete these resources at an alarming rate – fish stocks are depleted; soils are depleted, washed or blown away; fresh water supplies are marginal, depleted or contaminated; the air is polluted and ozone depletion combined with global warming from increased greenhouse gases threatens progressive and erratic climate changes. Extreme weather becomes more destructive with the cost of repair and replacement escalating every year. Climate changes threaten agriculture, as we know it.

Patel and Burke expressed concern about poverty and disease in growing urban populations. They wrote: "Although natural disasters and armed conflicts cause migration into urban centers, most people relocate to cities in search of employment. When they arrive, many find only one affordable housing option: illegal and unplanned dense settlements lacking basic public infrastructure, where they must live in lodgings made from tenuous materials, such as used plastic sheets, discarded scrap metal, and mud. The United Nations Human Settlements Program (UN-Habitat) reports that 43% of urban residents in developing countries such as Kenya, Brazil, and India and 78% of those in the least-developed countries such as Bangladesh, Haiti, and Ethiopia live in such slums… residents are usually tolerated and their presence tacitly accepted, but the local government generally ignores them, accepting no responsibility for accounting for them in planning or the provision of services.

Urban hazards include infections, injuries, air and water pollution, diabetes and hypertension.Increasing the population density in cities without proper water supplies and sanitation increases the risk of transmission of communicable diseases. Mortality among children under 5 years of age and among infants is higher in urban slums than in rural settings."

Scientists, anticipating the effects of climate change, have imagined major disruptions of city-states with civil disobedience and armed conflicts arising from the competition for scarce resources. Solutions are available but are improbable, given human tendencies.

A sane, rational city-state would limit its growth; limit its pollution and progress toward food, water and clean air sustainability. You must ask the key question: If all long-distance supplies were blocked could the citizens of a city continue to live comfortable, healthy lives?

One prerequisite of a sane city is self-sufficiency. Global Trade has always been the enemy of self-sufficiency and the ally of vulnerability. The need to transport food and goods long distances would be reduced by increased local production. The local transportation of goods could be streamlined into centrally controlled supply lines that achieve maximal efficiency. We could advance toward intelligent distribution systems such as large pneumatic or electromagnetic tubes that send containers between city centers at high speed with minimal pollution. It is absurd to have goods distributed by trucks, in traffic, chaotically, with no cost effective distribution plan. Food can be grown and processed within a city by returning some of the land area to market gardens and intensive greenhouse technology. Each city would have to renew and support a surrounding agricultural zone.

Cities would essentially backtrack about 100 years when food supply lines were shorter and farmers living adjacent to the cities could supply most if not all of the food.

The humanity of a city can be restored by living arrangements that promote a sense of community. Good architecture and city planning support groups of individuals that know each other and can relate to each other – small interactive communities. Local groups can relate to their natural environment and can restore an understanding of how to supply their own needs. If a local group does not have a natural environment, then the group will be dysfunctional and members of the group will become sick animals. If a group grows too large for individuals to know and relate to each, then the group will be dysfunctional – sick humans.

From Group Dynamics (2010) by Stephen Gislason

Learning & Intelligence

2010-10-19T14:48:00.000-07:00

Intelligence is expressed in the ability to learn. Smart people learn faster and learn more than not so smart people. Intelligence is manifest in the ability to acquire complicated skills and excel in performance by practice and progressive improvement. Competent people are smart people who have the discipline to practice and improve their performance. In demanding, professional environments the nicest people tend to be the smartest and most competent. There are exceptions.

Bodybrainmind is an open-ended system that will evolve a unique identity in the lifetime of each individual. Individuation occurs as experience modifies some brain structures and coexists with old programs that persist regardless of the individual experience, because the older brain structures resist modification.

Here are simple insights into the learning process:
Learning is the process of modifying brain structure and function.
Learning is dependent on the availability of innate programs that organize and support the acquisition of skills and knowledge.
Learning is mimetic and spontaneous. Infants and children copy the sounds and behaviors they see and hear.

The ability to learn can be equated to the construction of the brain and to the ongoing chemistry of life. I always instructed my young patients with above average IQs who were not learning well in school that they were somewhat like a shiny new car with a turbo-charged engine, but someone put the wrong gas in their tank and now we are disappointed with their performance. You could get a badly constructed car and be disappointed or you could be dealing with the wrong gas; the food supply and the physical environment determine how well the child's brain is going to work.
A biological view regards mental states and behavior as products of brain function. Teaching is an intentional effort to constructively alter the brain function of students in a lasting fashion. While information is the pedagogical input to the student's brain, food, water and air may be regarded as the main input of chemical information into the student's body-brain system. If the food supply is biologically inappropriate or a child is hypersensitive and reacts inappropriately to food, dysfunction and disease are the result.

The increased presence of non-nutrient molecules in the blood stream in the form of additives, contaminants, toxins, drugs and intoxicants makes brain dysfunction more likely and more difficult to interpret. Whenever humans are sick or influenced by food and/or airborne chemicals, their brain function is compromised and symptoms include disturbances of sensing, feeling, remembering and acting. Their learning is impaired and their behavior may be disturbed.

Different Paths?

The answer to the question should students follow different educational paths? is simple – yes they should. Should teachers and school administrators reply on IQ test to assign students to different paths? The answer is no, they should not rely on IQ tests alone. You can argue that children with high scores on tests of intelligence tend to learn more of what is taught in school than their lower-scoring peers but there are limitations to what can be predicted about individual students.

IQ scores sort a student population in a standard bell curve distribution and after years of use and have known correlations with scholastic accomplishment and employability. Intelligence tests predict school performance about half the time. The correlation between IQ test scores and school grades is about 0.5. Correlations between IQ scores and total years of education are about 0.55. Better, more comprehensive intelligence and aptitude tests are highly desirable. Intelligence goes beyond reading, writing and math. I am not a fan of general education, conformity or standard algorithms for education. Some of our most gifted children are oppressed, they face unnecessary obstacles and discrimination in schools that fail to appreciate and develop their special abilities. The task for better education is to appreciate a range of abilities that are valued, admired, and rewarded in adult society.

Children with special aptitudes for athletics, music, art, drama, design should be identified early and sent to schools that support and encourage development in these specialized areas. Rare children have special abilities in mathematics, physics, design and creative ideas. These children will thrive if they are introduced to brilliant adults who can act as mentors. In an ideal school, gifted, well informed teachers would have a close and personal relationship with each student and would evaluate their interest and abilities individually.

According to the Task Force of the American Psychological Association: "What children learn in school depends not only on their individual abilities but also on teaching practices and on what is actually taught. Recent comparisons among pupils attending school in different countries have made this especially obvious. Children in Japan and China, for example, know a great deal more math than American children even though their intelligence test scores are quite similar. This difference may result from many factors, including cultural attitudes toward schooling as well as the amount of time devoted to the study of mathematics and how that study is organized…

"There are a number of reasons why children with higher test scores tend to get more education. They are likely to get good grades, and to be encouraged by teachers and counsellors; often they are placed in "college preparatory" classes, where they make friends who may also encourage them. In general, they are likely to find the process of education rewarding in a way that many low-scoring children do not."

From Intelligence and Learning by Stephen Gislason
Also read Neuroscience Notes.

Go to Persona Digital Online to download eBooks.

Spontaneity, Intentions, Free Will

2010-10-18T10:57:00.000-07:00

Simplicity without a name is free from all external aim. With no desire, at rest and still, all things go right as of their will. Lao Tze

All human behavior arises spontaneously from procedures in the brain that are not rendered consciously before the event. The speaker and the audience are aware at the same time of what is spoken. The term "intention" derives meaning when it refers to the human ability to simulate behaviors, plan and self-regulate. Intentions are not properties of consciousness but are complexes of spontaneous drives, learned and previously rehearsed behaviors.

Intention is poorly understood, partly because humans claim complete control over their goals and behaviors when the outcome is good and deny all control when the outcome is not so good. The understanding of "conscious control, self control, intentions and will" goes something like this:

Human action is mostly spontaneous, not planned or known in advance.
You can learn to override some spontaneously arising drives and behaviors that are undesirable; override skills require daily practice in social circumstances.

You may be able to control some emotional expressions, but usually, emotion will take control with no option of intervention.

You may be able to direct some of your energy into adaptive plans that have been designed and practiced in advance.

Learned skills, continuing practice and diligence are required.
You can study your own behavior, learn and practice new routines when old ones are harmful or ineffective.

You can meditate and learn more about the spontaneous activity of your own mind.

An emotion is inherently spontaneous and challenges override skills. You can get angry and say hurtful things, apologize with the excuse "I was upset and didn't mean what I said" and expect to be forgiven. The more often you get angry, say hurtful things and apologize, the less plausible is the excuse and the more harmful the behavior. A mother demands (angrily) "Why did you do that?" when her four year old child spills a jug of lemonade and the distraught little girl does not know why she did that - she bursts into tears and runs to her room.

There is often no "why" to actions. Actions are spontaneous. Mistakes are common and sometimes are dangerous. Good performance of critical tasks is achieved by rigorous practice, followed by ongoing checking and monitoring routines to reduce error. Even the most rigorous error-checking schemes will not be perfect.

A young man accused of committing crimes is asked: "Why did you do what you did?" His honest and best answer is: "I don't know." We discover who we are as we go along. No one really knows why he or she did anything, although everyone makes up stories that suggest unusual ability to plan and predict. Every human who considers carefully will realize that retrospective analysis of human behavior will reveal both individual and universal patterns of behavior that emerge spontaneously.

Even when you recognize patterns of behavior and associate behaviors with antecedent conditions, you still do not know exactly why the behavior occurred. You will not be able to predict accurately future occurrences of any behavior except to say that humans tend to repeat what they have said and done before. You can offer a psychodynamic explanation based on your pet assumptions about how the mind works. Most psychodynamics are ad hoc explanations with doubtful validity. You can shrug your shoulders and say "karma". Karma refers to a complex of causes that stretch back to the beginning of the universe. The important determinants of human behavior may have little to do with biographical details and recent events. The essence of brain function is spontaneous activity.

All living creatures are intentional in the sense that they all project themselves into the world every day to get what they need. All living creatures have needs, goals, drives and strategies. Intention does not usually include a well-developed conscious plan, except in unusual circumstances.

Life generates activity. Activities have goals. Drives are programs in the brain that organize and energize activities. The primary goals are food and water. The drives are hunger and thirst. Drives are states of disequilibrium that originate with body needs and are stabilized by satisfying the need, finding, for example, food and water. Secondary goals are more numerous and include shelter, safety and sex, often in that order. The grand scheme for human existence is - air, food, water, shelter, safety and sex. If a man feels threatened, he has difficulty eating, cannot achieve an erection and cannot have sex.

Spontaneous drives are powerful. The human tendency is to keep busy devouring the world. Humans are predators, consumers, world-eaters with a large appetite. Human intelligence is directed to obtaining desirable things by skill, cunning, deception or force.

Most human problems can be solved by not wanting things, consuming more selectively and consuming less. Children are random little creatures. They do all sorts of things that they should not do, make many mistakes and hurt themselves often. The randomness is useful to tune into features of the local environment that are new. Children learn by exploring, copying and by making mistakes. Sometimes children are injured and sometimes they die by making a mistake. Every parent dreads the fatal mistake and good parents are constantly vigilant, using warnings, instruction and constraints to minimize the danger facing the inexperienced child. A one-year-old will crawl and then stagger around the house pulling and pushing on every object and will put everything that fits into his or her mouth. There is no way for a parent to sit down and have a nice chat with the infant about what is permissible activity and what is not.

A responsible parent will use the words "no" and don't" more often than any other words as they interact with their children. Humans lose some of their early randomness and tune into their environment more selectively as they get older. The no's and the don'ts become incorporated into a strategy of not doing things that are risky and harmful. A mature human, however, will continue to do all sorts of thing that they should not do. Not doing things is often the key to success. Adults often behave like a one-year-old infant exploring the kitchen cupboards. A small group of smart and nice humans act like parents and try to regulate the reckless behavior of others. Elaborate regulations are required to achieve a tolerable level of destructive behavior, but are generally unsuccessful at sustaining a high level of constructive behavior.

The philosophical and legal question is: "what differentiates our intended actions, for which we are responsible, from other actions?" The raw legal definition is; do you know right from wrong? A more subtle version is:" Do you understand why you did that in terms of your desires, goals, beliefs and consequences? Another issue is control. Could you control and direct your actions or were you directed by irrational forces such as emotions or false beliefs? The concept of control becomes complicated when you consider the organization of the brain and the many variables in brain function.

A normal, sane person loses control if he drinks too much beer at a football party. A patient with frontal lobe brain damage after a car accident loses control because he or she lost circuits that regulate action in terms of appropriate and goal-directed behavior. A patient with Alzheimer's disease loses control because she or she cannot remember what just happened and cannot plan what will happen next. The true test of freedom is making the choice not to do things that your world-eating appetites insist that you do. Every "free society" has elaborate arrangements in place to continue the constant repetition of no's and don'ts. Some tendencies that need modification are:
Humans are social animals and are not good at self-regulation.
Humans routinely do all sorts of harmful things to themselves, including harming themselves with bad food, cigarettes, alcohol, fast cars, cocaine, other drugs, legal and illegal.

Humans conspire together to do all sorts of things they should not do such as consuming all the non-renewable resources that are in reach, making toxic chemicals and spreading them on the land, in the air, the water and on their food. Humans conspire, plan and cooperate in complex enterprises with the sole intention of killing other humans.

An ancient human tendency is to exploit an environment, deplete all its resources and move on to the next environment.

Spontaneity, Intentions, Free Will is from Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason, available as a printed book or PDF download.

Sentences & Reasoning

2010-10-17T21:40:00.000-07:00

Every statement is a form of reasoning. Whether any sentence succeeds at being reasonable is another matter and not always easy to determine. Syntax involves creating word sequences based on underlying rules. Decoding of sound sequences must identify individual words and must take the whole sequence into account to derive syntactical meaning. The transition from word identification to sentence deciphering is a new brain capacity that permits the complex language development we are now considering.

Our brain stores nouns and verbs separately and has many surprising habits of separating words and syntactical rules in subcompartments. You get something of this effect with computer programs that store data and program segments in scattered blocks of memory and then keep a map of where all the pieces are. In addition to a map, the brain seems to evolve a series of controllers that remember strategies for putting all these pieces together. A number of different languages can coexist in one brain and speakers with different linguistic styles can co-exist in one brain. The underlying strategy seems to be based on grouping objects and actions into meta categories with meta rules that form the syntax or grammar of the language.

A sentence has a logical form. Subject, verb and modifiers fit together to form a reality simulation. Declarative statements with a subject, verb and object are the most reliable of statements. If I tell you that Jack ran up the hill and Jill followed, you are likely to form a mental image similar to mine. You could also quiz me in a direct way to get more information by using the “w” words; who, what, when, which, where, why? Jack who? Jack Smith. What hill? Sentinel hill. When? 11 AM Friday Sept 1, 2000. Why? To fetch a pale of water. It all makes sense. When a story is familiar, the meaning can be invoked with an abbreviated version: Jack Jill Hill might suffice.

The distinction between form and content is useful in the analysis of language. Everyone encounters writing that appears to consist of coherent statements, but on closer reading makes no sense at all. Nonsense is often in the content and not in the form or grammar of the writing. Sentences may be well constructed and the inherent reasoning may be more or less acceptable, but the content is gibberish. You could argue that nonsense is the natural content of language since it is easy to invent false statements and difficult to determine what is really going on out there. You can make any outrageous statement you want and become convinced that it is true if one other person agrees with you. The improvisations of gossip are more prevalent that the reasoning embodied in responsible philosophical and scientific discourse.

Formal logic is based on rules that link premises to conclusions. The problem with premises is that meaningful and true content needs to come from outside language. Humans regularly use good logic to move from wrong premises to wrong conclusions and then use wrong conclusions as derivative premises. In computing, this problem is expressed as “garbage in, garbage out.”

Science is an enterprise that encourages humans to make a bigger effort to find out what is really going on out there. Statements made by scientists are manifestations of a more disciplined effort to get reliable content into sentence form. The human culture world as of the new millennium had two kinds of people; scientists who make a bigger effort to get reliable content into their sentences and non-scientists who say or write whatever they want. Responsible journalism is somewhere in middle. Even when language is used skillfully, with good content, there are limitations and interesting problems.

Douglas Hosftaeder was fond of self-referential sentences that are both entertaining and unnerving. Some examples:

This sentence no verb.
This statement is false.
I am a liar.
This sentence has five words.
This sentence is longer than five words.
The end is at the beginning of this sentence.

The statement I am a liar is particularly challenging because it turns logic inside out. If the sentence is true, it is false. If the sentence is false, it is true. This sentence reveals a fundamental problem of language that becomes increasingly self-referential as it becomes more abstract and disconnected from events that are really happening out there. Thus, a culture world, created out of books, plays, movies, magazines and statements broadcast on television, or cell phones and the internet all become a virtual reality, mostly fictional, that is disconnected from and incongruent with the real world.

From Language and Thinking and Neuroscience Notes, both books by Stephen Gislason; available as ebooks for download

Intelligence - in short supply?

2010-10-14T15:10:00.000-07:00

The challenge is to become intelligent about intelligence. Humans have a great interest and ability to create nonsense. You could argue that many of the features of intelligence are deployed in the cause of nonsense but nonsense is not intelligent.

Intelligence is really about survival in a threatening world. Humans survive because of the genius abilities such as vision, hearing, skilled movement and speech; abilities that are built into their brain, innate gifts from nature. Humans do not have learn how to see or how to hear what is going on out there, but they do have to learn what it means to them today. This is an interactive process.

Although modern humans tend to emphasize individual thought and expression, most thinking is talking in groups. Talking has become wireless media, social networks online and video sharing. The clammer of gossip and marketing is deafening.

The newest human abilities are more dependent on learning and are the least reliable. Reasoning, planning and learning to tolerate other humans in a friendly constructive manner require the most sustained practice. The term, nice, refers to these characteristics and therefore nice people require sustained learning to remain reasonable, to tolerate others and to behave in a friendly, constructive manner.

To become nice and to remain rational and skilled, a human must belong to and work within a supportive group that shares these characteristics. Human groups often have the opposite effect, supporting intolerant and irrational thinking and belligerant behavior.

In the recent past, new knowledge proliferated in every human population with only a few humans doing well at cultivating the new abilities. In higher education and other life contests, general ability has been traditionally desirable. The "well-rounded" individual was a generalist, good at everything but perhaps not outstanding in one skill.
The key to human survival is group cooperation and individual specialization. The group tends to smooth out the negative effects of individual limitations and irrationality.

In every affluent urban society, a small subpopulation cause most of the trouble and consume most of the social and medical resources available. Often the understanding and solution of social problems involves the interaction of elite and educated group with a sick, aberrant, dysfunctional group. Their interaction involves a persistent, inevitable misunderstanding arising from incongruent needs, values, information and capabilities.

Human societies involve increasing specialization of individuals who are skillful at performing single tasks. The income of an individual often depends on this specialization and does not depend on a general or comprehensive understanding of how their society works and his or her place in it.

A similar description applies to individuals in many animal groups, beginning with the social insects. Humans and ants have much in common; the most compelling similarity is that individuals achieve viability on the planet, not by solitary activities, but by participating in a meta order that involves the entire group.

This is not to argue that humans fail to live acceptable lives in modern societies. It is to argue that most humans live at a minimum level of overall comprehension and, even if they become more or less civilized, they will tend to regress to old and innate patterns of intolerance, hostility, aggression and conflict without an infrastructure of external controls that limit hostile behaviors. It is to argue that many to most humans can remain misinformed and unreasonable as long a small number of more intelligent and skillful humans build and maintain infrastructures that support the others.

From Intelligence and Learning by Stephen Gislason MD
Persona Digital Books

Morality and Neuroscience

2010-10-11T10:32:00.000-07:00

The idea that moral cognition as a collection of specialized brain functions is developed by neuroscientists. Morality is not viewed as a new, abstract entity, but as a collection of animal attributes that have evolved over hundreds of millions of years. Human morality is an expression of old social cognitions and motivations that have emerged as a less than perfect human version of primate tendencies such as caring for others while seeking dominance. In primates there is an innate sense of justice that forms the deep foundation of morality. Moral emotions are described: compassion, embarrassment, indignation, guilt, shame, pride, contempt, disgust, anger and gratitude. If you had to chose the most reasonable and pacific members of the primate family, it would be Orangutans or Bonobos, not humans.

Moll suggested that: “moral emotions” result from interactions among values, norms and contextual elements of social situations and are elicited in response to violations or enforcement of social preferences and expectations. Although the contextual cues that link moral emotions to social norms are variable and shaped by culture, these emotions evolved from prototypes found in other primates and can be characterized across cultures. The challenge for moral cognitive neuroscience is that it requires extensive cross-field integration of neuroscience, psychology, evolutionary biology and anthropology, among other areas. In setting the goals of scientific exploration in this field, some central issues should be considered. How does the human moral mind emerge from the interaction of biological and cultural factors? How can the context-dependent nature of moral cognition be explained by neuroscience? How does moral cognition relate to emotion and motivation, and what are their neural substrates?”

Moral cognition involves several cortical regions: the prefrontal cortex (PFC), the medial and lateral orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), the anterior temporal lobes (aTL) and the superior temporal sulcus (STS) region that is involved in social perception. STS damage disrupts the ability to recognize socially relevant perceptual features of faces, body postures and movements. Patients with frontal lobe damage display a range of social disabilities and antisocial behaviors. A lesion of the anterior PFC, for example, impairs moral evaluations that rely on predicting the long-term consequences of actions. Patients with OFC damage display socially inappropriate behaviors; they fail to modify behaviors that produce negative outcomes. One patient, for example, became aggressive and callous towards other people after OFC damage; he failed to recognize facial expressions of anger and disgust. Anterior temporal lobe damage disrupts awareness of more abstract social values that are learned and practiced. Subcortical structures involved in moral cognition are the amygdala, ventromedial hypothalamus, septal area, basal forebrain, and the walls of the third ventricle, rostral brainstem and tegmentum.

The limbic system generates behaviors out of body needs and tends to override other regulators of behavior. If you are starving, you may steal or kill to obtain food. But if you are well-fed, you will obey the rules of supermarkets and pay to obtain food. Dysfunction in the limbic system is expressed as motivational disturbances with disorders of appetite, thirst, sexual drives, social attachment and aggressiveness. Studies of sociopaths reveal abnormalities in all these regions.

From Ethics and Morality by Stephen Gislason

Consciousness and the Really Real; From Neuroscience Notes

2010-10-10T10:14:00.000-07:00

You can start by saying that if it has not been conscious to someone at some time it does not exist. However, you cannot say that if it has been conscious at some time to someone, it does exist, it is real. If you want to pursue old philosophical arguments, you might claim that the most fundamental stuff in the universe is photons or quarks or neutrinos, or cosmic energy or something like that. If you are diligent in pursuing inclusion-exclusion boundaries, you will always arrive at the simple fact that whatever the stuff of the really real is, without consciousness no one knows that it exists; ergo, consciousness is the most basic stuff of universe.

The distinction between inside and outside origins is irresistible. But, not all contents of consciousness are phenomena. To use Kant’s definition of terms, phenomena are events out there in the world and noumena are conscious experiences that originate from within. The brain places samples of its inner workings into consciousness; ghost images, selftalk, dreams are normal noumena. Delusions and hallucinations are abnormal noumena.
Consciousness is associated with awareness and vigilance. The unconscious animal will not hear or see the predator approaching. The conscious and vigilant animal maintains a global awareness of the local environment.

Sensory receptors are tuned to features of the environment that may satisfy drives or signal danger. Projects are generated by brain programs that often provide little or no information to consciousness except – “do it”.

Consciousness has a self-reflective option. You can stop, find a quiet place and ask “why am I doing that?” You may not get an answer or the answer you get by talking to yourself may not be true. Humans routinely fabricate nonsense stories about why they do things. If you insist on stopping and asking “why am I doing that?” repeatedly, but not compulsively, you become a poet, philosopher or monk.

You can play with the idea that you are an independent consciousness who got attached to a body for a ride on planet earth. This is something like taking a ride in Disneyland. You buy your ticket; get in and away you go. Maybe they give you a phony steering wheel so that you think you are driving, but actually, you are just along for the ride. You discover what is on the path, one experience at a time. You find out how you respond during the experience, not before.

Consciousness as a Container

As a monitor image of brain activity, consciousness will support different content. The contents of consciousness vary continuously and mostly involuntarily. We can refer to the contents of consciousness as "awareness" and you are more aware when the contents of consciousness are rich and varied. The underlying process of consciousness involves bringing monitor images of the outside world together with monitor images of inside the body. Images of the outside tend to be detailed and explicit in consciousness.

If consciousness is portrayed as a container for all experiences, you can begin to subdivide consciousness into regions depending on where the contents originated. There have been a variety of methodical constructions that divide the mind into compartments such as the consciousness and subconscious that interact in funny ways. An advance in understanding recognizes that most brain processing is done without representation in consciousness.

The contents that appear in consciousness are samples of brain activity. Vision dominates consciousness in a normal brain and is closely linked to the perception of location and sounds. When you can see, a marvelously detailed and interesting moving picture of what is out there dominates consciousness. The information content of the picture is enormous. If you try to record all the visual information in a few seconds of visual scanning your environment, you would consume gigabytes of computer memory. Thus consciousness consists of realtime monitor images that are not recorded in memory.

In contrast, monitor images of inside the body are vague and variable. Feelings and body sensation bubble up as if from below consciousness and disappear. If everything is going well, there may be little no feeling, just a pleasant neutral state. The idea is that a monitor image arising from the body tunes you into the world outside to locate something desired. When you are hungry, you feel vague sensations and scan your visual environment for signs of food. When you are thirsty, you look for signals that suggest water or water-containing beverages. Vague sensations from the inside are connected with detailed, explicit information from the outside.

Humans have difficulty describing the daily changes in the clarity of their consciousness. We do not have good words for all the possible changes in clarity of consciousness and descriptions such as "blurred, foggy, spacey, dizzy, dopey, intoxicated, drunk and stoned" indicate distortion or loss of monitor images in consciousness.

From Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason MD

Consciousness from Neuroscience Notes

2010-10-05T12:54:00.000-07:00

Consciousness is the experience of monitor images in the mind. At any moment, you and the world are revealed in your own separate consciousness. Everything that exists is manifest in consciousness. Paradoxically, we also know that much, if not most, brain activity occurs without the benefit of consciousness. The notion that consciousness is required to assimilate information and make decisions is as popular as it is wrong. The correct assumption is that an unconscious person can receive and process at least some information without awareness of what is going on out there.

Psychoanalytic and other metaphysical descriptions of the mind invented the “unconscious” or the “subconscious” to try to explain some of the more peculiar aspects of human behavior. Often consciousness and the subconscious were set apart as adversaries in a subterranean battle of mind. The findings of neuroscience suggest that all brain activity carries on below the surface and only a glimmer of this continuous brain processing is projected into consciousness as monitor images.
Much of the discussion about consciousness is polemics fueled by confusions that begin with inconsistent descriptions that continue into confusions that arise from that failure to clearly differentiate points of view.

The pathologist slicing a human brain in a clinicopathological conference will have a different understanding of bodybrainmind than a Buddhist monk in meditation. Humans often want to define consciousness using synonyms such as ‘awareness’ or by proposing properties of consciousness” such as "will" or "intentions”. No definition of consciousness will be completely satisfactory since mind and consciousness are inclusive. The problem, of course, is that we exist in consciousness and cannot get outside to begin an objective study.

Consider the Zen Buddhist koan: What is the sound of one hand clapping? Is this a good introduction to the seemingly impossible task of consciousness apprehending itself? The literal-minded person can dismiss the koan quickly by stating that clapping, by definition, is two hands coming together; therefore, one hand cannot clap and there is no sound. This pragmatic, rational approach fails to appreciate the uncertainties and ambiguities involved in language. A curious and open mind is attracted to the idea of one hand clapping and may enjoy contemplating the peculiarities of languages, images of hands in motion and sounds in nature.

Consciousness cannot be constrained by definition, cannot be captured by description, and cannot be limited by measurement. The essence of Zen insight is that conclusions are often limiting and unfriendly. Human names and categories are artificial and distort the understanding of and the appreciation of what is really going on out there. The creative mind stays, open and interested.

The study of the brain has not revealed exactly how consciousness works, but we know practical things about consciousness. Consciousness depends on spontaneously emitted pulses from brain stem neurons that ascend in a complex mesh of activating circuits to awaken neurons in the limbic system, thalamus, and cerebral cortex. Without this ascending activation, humans lapse into a coma. Four neurotransmitters are important in creating consciousness – norepinephrine, serotonin, dopamine and acetylcholine. Drugs such as anesthetics that interrupt consciousness interfere with cerebral cortical activation.

Pacemaking neurons in the brainstem pulse rhythmically, sending activating signals into the thalamus. Pulses of electrical activation are accompanied by pulses of chemicals released to sustain activation. The thalamus, in turn, activates the cerebral cortex and links all subsystems in meaningful packages of activity that deliver monitor images of their activity to consciousness. Cortical neurons return signals to the thalamus so that cortical activation can be regarded as a looping system that recurs and resonates. We can speculate that several brain modules acting together have high-level executive functions and at the same time contribute to a continuous, composite monitor image.

The deep question is that if I am that consciousness that is the monitor image of my brain activity, where exactly do I exist?

No one will ever know if the conscious experiences of other creatures are similar to our own, but it is reasonable to suggest that there is a range of consciousness that begins as monitor images in animals with little and simpler brains and expands to more diverse and detailed monitor images in animals with bigger more complicated brains.

There is little doubt that birds are conscious, dogs and cats are conscious. You can assume that consciousness is more developed in primates and is associated with increasingly intelligent adaptation to changing environments and increasing complexity of social interactions. You can argue that not only do humans have the chimpanzee experience built into their minds, but humans probably feel most connected, most spiritual, most attuned to the world when they are enjoying chimpanzee-like experiences.

From the book, Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason

Fear, the Survival Emotion

2010-08-25T18:58:00.000-07:00

Fear is a pure and fundamental emotion and is preprogrammed in the amygdala. No one has to learn to be afraid but everyone has to update his or her database and learn what new things are frightening. There is an archetypal list of feared objects: snakes, insects, heights, night, and small, dark, damp spaces that may hide creepy, crawly and slimy things. Humans are afraid of capture and imprisonment and fear small, closed spaces that may lack oxygen.

All animals are in danger everyday and yet must carry on with their lives and careers as if they are going to survive. Animals need calm, functional states and emergency programs that focus their attention and mobilize their resources to deal with danger.

Fear and anger are emergency programs. The basic idea is that as soon as a danger signal is detected, all attention is focused on the signal source and consciousness floods with an unpleasant feeling. The feeling is there to make sure you do not try to override the emergency program. The fear program is broadcast into the body via the sympathetic nervous system and the hormone adrenalin, secreted by the adrenal gland. Energy is mobilized through the release of glucose. The heart races and pumps more blood. Respiration accelerates to increase the oxygen content of the blood and all muscle tissue is put on alert.

Fear is preparation for fight or flight. The term “panic” describes fear that is associated with confused or vacillating behavior. Panic is a confused mixture of flight and flight. A movie audience panics when the theatre catches fire. They push and shove, punch and kick as they attempt to flee the building. When crowds panic, people die of suffocation and those who fall down, are trampled under foot.

Misslin describes the neural mechanisms of fear as a hierarchical network with the amygdala as the point of convergence of threatening stimuli. The central nucleus of the amygdala projects to the midbrain periaqueductal gray (PAG), the hypothalamus and the brainstem that coordinate flight, freezing, avoidance reactions, submissive postures, reduced pain sensitivity and autonomic arousal.

Fear is a strong aversive emotion and animals and humans quickly learn to avoid situations that made them afraid. One of the goals of an affluent society is to reduce danger so that average citizen can feel confident that they are going to survive the day. Fear is the opposite of security and a fearful person does not feel confident that he or she is going to be safe. Fear, as a conditioning state, is also generalized to associated signals.

Humans are conditioned to associate fear with a wide range of stimuli that by themselves do not suggest danger. Conditioned fear may last a lifetime if the fear-triggering event was intense or repeated. Phobias are recurrent fears linked to avoidance behaviors that may result from conditioning or arise spontaneously because the fear program is overly active.

Anxiety is a common but fuzzy term that should refer to low intensity fear and to conditioned fear that tends to be recurrent, context dependent and not linked to an obvious threat such as a hungry lion confronting you on the sidewalk. Anxiety also refers vaguely to many kinds of discomforts and dysphoria that all humans experience. An elaborate ethos of urban anxiety has developed in literature and in the curious and sometimes bizarre world of medical-psychiatric descriptions of the human experience. Physicians diagnose anxiety after brief conversations with patients and drug companies promote chemicals for the treatment of “anxiety disorders” as if experiencing life’s discomforts is a medical problem with a medical solution -- eating pills obtained from the pharmacy.

Terror
Terror is big fear just as rage is big anger. Terror is the emotion of impending injury or death. Beyond fear and anger terror seizes us as real danger impacts on our body. Terror may expressed by loud noises and wild gesticulating, but we also recognize the possibility of being immobilized - "frozen in terror" when the danger is imminent. Young animals in danger cry out to gain the protection of parents and all animals cry out as they are attacked to warn others.

A 10-yar old girl walking though the bushes in her swimsuit as she left the beach was attacked by wasps and shrieked as she ran wildly on the spot waving her arms in the air and all around her body. Her screams, shrieks and wild gestures brought her mother and other adults quickly to her rescue, but even as they surrounded her, she shrieked all the more loudly. A dog who has been injured will run away in a crouched posture, also shrieking with high-pitched barking and crying – unmistakably terrified.

From Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason available for download from Persona Digital Online

Cognition New Definition

2010-08-18T17:30:00.000-07:00

There are a large number of problems in human cognition that limit our ability individually and in groups to evaluate information and make the right decisions. Some of the problems begin with the careless use of language; examples are wrong names for things and events, lack of precise definitions, use of inappropriate metaphors, self-aggrandizing claims, illogical arguments, and deliberate lying. In Neuroscience Notes I have attempted to create a descriptive language that really works. Here is how a description of cognition begins:

Cognition

“Here is Edward Bear coming downstairs now, bump, bump on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs, but sometimes he feels there really is another way, if he only could stop and think of it.” A.A. Milne, Christopher Robin

The term cognition is a general category, not well understood. Cognition refers to processes that allow humans to know what is going on out there and how to respond. You can begin to understand cognition by examining how humans find food, eat and move in a coherent spacetime frame. The brain contains feature matrices that create meaningful connections between the body inside and the environment outside.

Humans have an innate sense of spacetime. Maps of spacetime can be found in the cerebral cortex. Sensory information flows into these spacetime maps and motor output flows out. Our speech grows from movements in spacetime and communications with sounds. We often use metaphors of movement in descriptions of everything that happens. Humans act on the world through praxis or skilled movements.

The term, thought, is often used as a synonym for cognition but this is incorrect. A giant leap in understanding cognition is realizing that talking is thinking. We talk to each other and talk to ourselves. Thinking is selftalk, listening to others, speaking with others, reading and writing. Speakers and listeners form thinking groups and in the best case arrive at a common understanding of what is going on out there.

Selftalk is the only conscious mode of thinking and is so implicit in consciousness that “thinkers” fail to identify selftalk as their primary mode of thinking. Thinking is, therefore, storytelling, a form of argument. If you want thinking to mean something else such as processing information, solving problems, making decisions or creating new ideas, then “thinking” is not a voluntary process that occurs in consciousness. Cognition involves many abilities that existed before language developed.

Cognition is rooted in a deep and innate understanding of how the world works. Cognitive structures in the brain are built from raw materials such as sensation, movement and emotion. Deep cognitive processes are about recognizing the relationships among events, making decisions, sequencing in spacetime, and problem solving. Nonverbal “thinking” is revealed in tool making, tool use, mimetic behavior, actions and simulations. Gestures, drawings, models and constructions are independent of language and proceed spontaneously in the brain.

The best way to problem solve is to examine the problem closely, talk about, write about it, draw pictures and diagrams, make models and then wait. Each human has a built in query system and a problem-solver that operates in its own way, on its own schedule and delivers solutions to consciousness when it is ready. Sometimes selftalk is part of the problem-solving process but often talking is not required. The solution to a problem or a creative new idea arises from an unknowable process, as a gift. I wait hours before I understand new information or can solve a problem. Big problems may take weeks or months to solve. New insights and paradigm shifts may occur after many years of struggling with wrong notions. This book consists of a long series of spontaneously arising ideas that I record. Sometimes, a new idea makes old ideas obsolete and I have to change an entire text to accommodate the new understanding. The process of writing requires selftalk rehearsal and constant revision that is more or less spontaneous and evolutionary.

Meaningful conversation is a common method of “thinking”, but repeating clichés, repetitive stories and case-making conversations are not recommended. I heard Marvin Minsky, then the guru of artificial intelligence at MIT, claim at a digital arts conference many years ago, that he hated to repeat himself. Subsequently, I heard him repeat this idea at least twice. My guess is that Minsky made this claim numerous times over several decades. Life is a repetitive affair and most humans copy and repeat what they and others say and do with little or no modification over a lifetime. Minsky’s aversion was to humans who repeat themselves mindlessly and tediously, people who annoy and obstruct smarter, more progressive humans who are interested in continuous learning and evolving understanding.

From Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason. Download eBook from Persona Digital Online.

Anger, the Dominant Emotion

2010-08-15T13:48:00.000-07:00

Emotions are Social Behaviors

Emotions are visible and obvious behaviors that communicate states of arousal and activation. Emotions are body language and can be read with little or no learning and from a distance. Humans can read emotional body language across cultures and can read animal emotions with little difficulty. Feelings are subjective, inner bodymind state that may not be apparent to an outside observer.

Feelings are the inner states that are produced along with emotions but may be separate from emotions. A feeling is the for-me-ness of an experience. Feelings are often not distinct and are difficult to describe. Emotions sometimes express, or are associated with feelings but feelings have a life of their own and may be independent of or incongruent with emotions.

Behavior in human groups is regulated by displays of status, intentions, body states, needs and distress. Emotions are obvious displays that add dynamics to human interactions. The face is the bulletin board of emotions, complemented by sounds, head movements, arm and hand gestures. The goal of polite society is to maintain a neutral state with little or no display of emotions.

Anger

Anger is the dominant emotion and displays of anger disrupt social gatherings. Polite humans learn proper conduct that minimizes conflict. Elaborate polite greeting and parting behaviors are required. The interaction of humans in public spaces is controlled by a variety of rules, devices and enforcement that minimize the opportunity for anger to emerge. When one person becomes angry in gatherings, others act to minimize the tendency for anger to lead to fighting. The primary dynamic of dominance and submission is always at work when humans interact. Emotions are the outer language of dominance and submission. Feelings represent the evaluation of dominant and submissive behaviors as monitor images in consciousness.

Anger is expressed by noisy displays and attacks. All human interactions are influenced by the threat of anger and much brain power is devoted to anger management. Anger is an old animal program that emerges from the reptilian brain - the lizard rises up hisses and attacks. The human rises, threatens with gestures and then, optionally, attacks. Anger energizes aggressive behavior and is both protective and destructive at the same time.

Anger, viewed as a program, has several stages expressed at different levels of intensity. Often anger intensity escalates from threatening behavior to all-out attack. The victor in a dispute intimidates his opponent who either submits with conspicuous supplication behavior or is attacked. Anger progresses to fighting. Combatants are injured or killed in a fight. Fights leave body scars, accounts to be settled and long-lasting memories that facilitate future fighting. Anger is a pure and fundamental emotion that is preprogrammed in the amygdala.

Human children get angry as infants when they are hungry or uncomfortable and do not achieve immediate satisfaction. The term “frustration” refers to an angry outburst that arises when seeking behaviors are blocked short of achieving the desired goal. Infants and young children demand instant gratification of their needs and are easily frustrated. An essential part of social maturation is learning to tolerate delays in gratification of basic drives. Children get angry often during the day and sometimes display alarmingly violent thoughts and behaviors. Anger is a daily feature of sibling interaction and is common in unsupervised children's play.

Anger is a daily experience in the lives of most adult humans. In the USA, psychologists report that the average person gets angry 10-14 times a day. Anger is endemic both at home and at work. At work, common anger triggers are unfair performance appraisals, favoritism, and sexual harassment. One anger management advisor teaches that “No one has a right to get angry; it is delusional to think that anger can be effective.” Cornell et al found that anger is a predictor of aggression among incarcerated adolescents. Self-reported anger scales were administered to 65 incarcerated male adolescents and higher scores were predictive of subsequent physical and verbal aggression.

To become a useful and acceptable member of society each person must learn to avoid making others angry and must lean to inhibit their own anger. The term “violence’ is often used to describe displays of anger. Other terms are invented to describe angry displays in specific places and circumstances such as “road rage” or “airplane rage”.

I was standing in a post office line when a three-year-old boy, nicely dressed in a suit, lifted a shinny silver foil package from a shelf at his eye level. His mother took the package from him and replaced it. In seconds, he was transformed into an angry demon. The whole anger program emerged almost instantly with screaming, running on the spot, shaking his head and torso. His mother looked embarrassed and confused but had the presence of mind to give back the package. The boy became calm immediately and within two minutes, replaced the package himself with obvious satisfaction.

The three-year-old boy exemplified one of the most troubling aspects of human behavior. Anger turns on and off quickly. The triggers for anger are many and, often, the emotion is disproportionate to the triggering event. The angry little boy could be described as displaying “post-office rage.” The post office syndrome is amplified in stories that appear on the news every day. An angry human can become quickly and inappropriately destructive and injures or kills other humans.

We often call children’s anger a “temper tantrum” and experienced parents learn to tolerate tantrums as a common response when the child is frustrated and tired. The three-year-old boy in the Post Office cannot say to his mother: ‘Please mother, let me examine the foil package because that is what three-year-old children are supposed to do. I have to complete this transaction with the world in order to feel that I am doing a good job and have the right of self-determination. When you take the package from me, my whole being is threatened and I have to oppose you with all the might I can muster. “

Anger is not derived from any other emotion as too many psychologists have claimed. Anger is not a fluid that is stored in the brain as Freudian psychodynamics suggests. Freud’s idea has become one of the most popular and persuasive wrong views of anger, that anger is an energy that accumulates, stored somewhere in the brain and has to be released from time to time. Some imaginative folks even believe that disease is caused by stored anger. However, there is no evidence of any kind that anger accumulates anywhere in the body or brain. Anger is a program in the amygdala and when it is turned on, it is really on; when it is turned off, it is really off.

Busman et al at Iowa State University concluded that expressing anger “to release your anger” increases rather than decreases aggressive behavior. Self-help books, support groups and self-styled therapists have promoted punching pillows and other forms of anger expression with the promise that this practice will reduce conflict. Angry therapists have sometimes justified challenging and abusing their clients, claiming that releasing anger was therapeutic. They are wrong. Anger researchers found that articles and books that recommended anger catharsis did persuade their student subjects to favor punching pillows and punching bags as a form of catharsis, but actually produced angrier students. Expressing anger is not cathartic, does not relieve “psychic pressure” and does not make you a better person. Expressing anger repeatedly facilitates anger. The more you practice being angry the better you become at being angry. If you want to become an antisocial, angry person, practice being angry.

Social mammals have developed anger protocols that permit angry outbursts but limit the damage done. Predators, sharing a kill, will growl, snap and jostle each other for a bigger share of the catch, but a pre-established pecking order will usually prevail and minimize the harmful consequences of the competition for food. If every competition led to a serious fight, there would be few survivors. Some members of a group must submit to minimize conflict; anger-submission is a behavioral dyad with survival value. Without submission, anger escalates into aggressive conflict leading to injury or death.

Modern diplomacy is an alternative to armed conflict and continues to use the anger-submission dyad. The art of diplomacy is to speak softly and carry a big stick. The stick is often an implicit threat that motivates a reluctant negotiator to compromise. Diplomacy fails when anger escalates and submission fails. When diplomacy fails, humans fight. Fights tend to have their own rules and suspend rules that tend to promote rational and humane behavior. If diplomacy fails at the level of competitive and hostile nations, fighting is transformed into war by the application of rational and sustained, but not humane group activity.

Rage is the tornado of emotions, a full-volume, high energy anger that overrides all constraint and control. Rage is physical, brief, violent and destructive. Raging humans destroy property, injure and kill others. Rage is produced by maximal activation of flight and fight systems, rapid heart rate, rapid breathing, high blood pressure, flushing and hypertonicity of all skeletal muscles. Maximal muscle strength is achieved in rage and amazing displays of destructive energy are characteristic of rage attacks.

From Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason MD. You can download an eBook from Persona Digital Online.

Introducing the Brain: from Neuroscience Notes

2010-08-13T10:48:00.000-07:00

Sense, decide, act and remember

The right way to proceed with the description of science is to begin with a foundation of true statements that are supported by evidence. The challenges are many. In Neuroscience Notes, I begin with statements that have general validity and introduce terms and concepts from neuroscience that every reader must learn. The statement "Nervous systems allow organisms to sense, decide, act and remember" is undeniably true. If you begin to understand these four domains of brain function, sense, decide, act and remember, then you accelerate beyond common language where confusion prevails.

Brains

Neuroscience is the broad inquiry into the structure and function of animal nervous systems. Neuroscience begins with the consideration of how the simplest animals on the planet interact with their environments. A deep sense that develops in humans who study and understand life is that every creature that lives on planet earth shares common properties. Nervous systems allow organisms to sense, decide, act and remember. These properties begin as simple devices and evolve into sensing strategies that are increasingly complicated, more accurate and more effective. A complex device such as the human eye is easier to understand if you already understand a simple device such as light detecting pigment spot in a snail. Thus, it makes sense for a neuroscientist to study all animals and to assume that principles learned about older, simpler animals can be applied to newer, more complex animals such as humans.

The brain is the organ of the mind. Anatomists have described the brain in terms of our evolutionary path. We have old-age, middle-age and new-age parts, each with different properties. A neuroscientist, Paul McLean, suggested that the human brain could be viewed as three systems of different ages - an old reptilian brain, a middle (early mammalian) brain, topped off with a new, advanced brain, the neocortex. The neocortex allows us to learn, adapt and create new modes of behavior.

New babies are not born with the new brain programs. Old programs are built into us and need not be learned. Old programs include some of the most negative qualities – predatory and territorial aggression, anger and fighting, for example. Some of our most positive qualities are also innate such as the tendencies to mate, bond and form social units with altruistic features. The old brain remains in control of our bodies and our minds.

The infant cerebral cortex is folded in an adult pattern but has one third the total surface area. Hiila et al compared cerebral cortices of 12 healthy infants born at term with 12 healthy young adults and demonstrated regions of lateral temporal, parietal, and frontal cortex expand nearly twice as much from infancy as other regions in the insular and medial occipital cortex. They suggested:" This differential postnatal expansion may reflect regional differences in the maturity of dendritic and synaptic architecture at birth and/or in the complexity of dendritic and synaptic architecture in adults. This expression may also be associated with differential sensitivity of cortical circuits to childhood experience and insults. By comparing human and macaque monkey cerebral cortex, we infer that the pattern of human evolutionary expansion is remarkably similar to the pattern of human postnatal expansion. We hypothesize that it is beneficial for regions of recent evolutionary expansion to remain less mature at birth, perhaps to increase the influence of postnatal experience on the development of these regions or to focus prenatal resources on regions most important for early survival. "

Whatever we value about civilized human existence - culture, knowledge, social justice, respect for human rights, and dignity must be learned anew and stored in each person's neocortex. Information always comes with noise, that extra, confusing, unnecessary stuff which burdens our brain not with the task of remembering but of forgetting. There is so much we do not want to remember that it is a wonder that a modern citizen manages to cope with information overload. Information noise interacts with molecular noise, useless or bad chemicals that flow through the brain from food, water and air.

Neuroscience views minds as manifestations of the living processes found in brains. Brain science does not "explain" mind, or consciousness, but does give us strategies for understanding the properties of mind. Neuroscientists have made rapid progress in the past few decades and some of them are asking the same sorts of questions that only philosophers used to ask. The difference is that neuroscientists are sometimes able to ask more specific questions that may lead to more insight into the basic principles of the human experience. Neuroscientists are motivated and equipped to find real and practical answers to philosophical questions, leaving philosophers behind in an anachronistic philological niche, repeating discussions of what philosophers said hundreds to thousands of years ago. This is not to argue that all neuroscientists are philosophers or that all neuroscientists understand the human mind, since many are focused on highly specialized tasks that reveal little or nothing about how the whole system works.

In the year 2000, the Nobel committee awarded the Prize for Physiology or Medicine to three neuroscientists, Arvid Carlsson, Paul Greengard, and Eric R. Kandel. Their research revealed basic processes at work in animal brains. Carlsson identified dopamine as at brain neurotransmitter. Greengard revealed the molecular cascade triggered inside neurons by the dopamine signal. Kandel realized that the molecular basis of learning should be studied in simple animal systems as the basis for understanding learning in human brains. He spent many years studying the nervous system of Aplaysia, the Moon Snail. His 1976 text “The Cellular Basis of Behavior” can be considered a classic in the study of nervous systems.

Kandel stated: “All animals are faced with the universal problems of reproduction, adaptation and survival. An important assumption of biology is that phylogenetically diverse organisms share similar sets of solutions to these problems. Since in the end we are concerned with identifying biological principles applicable to human behavior, the invertebrate is a convenient but necessary substitute for people. Although a solution found in invertebrates may not be the only mechanisms for a given problem, the solution is likely to be a common mechanism that might be found as well in vertebrates, including man.”

Neuroscience would say that consciousness is produced by brains and can be destroyed by brain lesions and brain death. Consciousness is a property of the old, middle, and new brains working together, but if old brain structures are damaged, consciousness is obliterated. If the neocortex is damaged, consciousness remains, but specific memory content, sensations, and skills may drop-out.

Cognitive philosophers increasingly provide commentary on what neuroscientists are doing and saying. Tim Smith stated that:” A large number of articles and books have monitored the growth of Cognitive Neuroscience… motivated by a feeling that "things are about to be understood." As advances in imaging has added new potential to the neurosciences, so too neural networks and computational models have added new power to the cognitive approaches. Neural networks are tools that enable researchers to "probe how high-level functions such as perceiving, attending, learning, planning, and remembering emerge from the massively parallel neural architecture of the brain."

Michael Gazzaniga stated that "Psychology departments across the country have realized that they've got to get into brain science- in humans and not just rats…. universities should be looking for people who can liaison with clinicians working with brain-damaged patients, with people doing brain imaging, with the computer jocks". Cohen remarked that research efforts have not been integrated. Integration requires uniquely trained individuals, people who can understand a number of disciplines. Since smart, humans with diverse knowledge and skills are not produced by university education, Schneider observed that finding staff with the right blend of cognitive psychology, neurophysiology, computational modeling, and brain imaging.... is a tall order. Gazzaniga suggested that the work of figuring out the brain will take another 200 years and I believe he is underestimating the task. If you want to know exactly how the brain works, the investigation is likely to go on for thousands of years. Humans tend to be impatient. They overestimate their accomplishments and underestimate the extreme complexity of natural phenomena.

In their introduction to advances in neurotechniques. Gray and Chouard stated:" It is an exciting time to be a neuroscientist. The experimental landscape has changed markedly over the past few years with advances in molecular genetics, optogenetics and functional imaging. Neuroscience research was once dominated by anatomical techniques. But, with the advent of electrophysiology, and subsequently molecular biology, anatomical labelling techniques were eclipsed. Now, improved anatomical methods are experiencing a renaissance, thanks to the ability to deliver molecules in a cell-type-specific manner, with advances in imaging methods, together with electrophysiological technique, makes it feasible to study the relationships between specific neural circuits and particular behaviours in rodents. Neuroscientists are also poised to benefit from systems-based approaches to data collection and analysis but lag behind other researchers, such as tumour biologists, in implementing these strategies. Using the results from such approaches to direct hypothesis-driven work and improve the design of these experiments could focus efforts on candidate genes in the genetic network associated with disease. "

From Neuroscience Notes by Stephen Gislason MD. Available for download at Persona Digital Online.

For Me Ness from Neuroscience Notes

2010-08-12T10:39:00.000-07:00

I believe that every educated person should understand something about neuroscience. The problem is that articles and books about the brain have become as popular as they are misinformed. Each writer appears to attach to one or two ideas out of context and then improvises on their own pet theories and speculations. For many years, my goal has been to develop a coherent story of animal and human brain function that is accessible to intelligent readers. For any science to make sense, you have to build on a solid foundation of basic principles and well established facts. Since the brain is the organ of the mind, the study of neuroscience is really a study of everything; everything we experience and know is in the mind.

I will dedicate this blog for the next several weeks to topics taken from my book Neuroscience Notes. I would, of course, prefer that everyone would read, study and discuss the entire book.

For-Me-Ness

There is a tension in us that will never completely go away. Feelings are polarized from negative (dysphoria) to positive (euphoria). Feelings are mixed with cognitions to arrive at the formeness or the salience of experiences. Negative feelings are associated with aversive behaviors that encourage us to avoid illness, injury and death. Positive feelings are associated with seeking behaviors that encourage us to find good food, clean water, safe places to rest and nice to people to share all of the above.

Composite feelings such as tenderness and concern lead us to consider the feelings of others and encourage us to share advantages that bring happiness. Feelings are conscious experiences that are real and important but have the elusive quality of all inside experiences – only I experience my feelings. You can guess my feelings by watching my behavior or hearing my description of what it feels like inside. Feelings vary from a low rumble in the mix to the turbulent inner state associated with all-consuming emotions such as rage.

Feelings tend to be short-lived; minutes rather than hours or days. Humans often cannot localize the source or the effects of their feelings and tend to blame others whenever they are not feeling well. Humans tend to become emotional when they are not doing well. Feelings are evanescent and can change abruptly. Criticism, an angry remark or an insult can switch a happy person to an angry person in seconds. An overly sensitive person may walk away from an argument in deep despair and may want to die. Drastic “thinking” is common. Pessimistic, sometimes nihilistic, thoughts are attached to the ancient feeling of dread; the occasion is usually some threat to your status in a social group.

Humans are usually tuned into behaviors that suggest other people have feelings. The sense of other people’s feelings is described as “empathy” A sensitive person will often pick up subtle signals that that are not conscious or explicit.

Some people talk about “vibes” psychics see “auras” and ordinary folk have “hunches and intuition” or just have feeling responses to others. You might meet a new person and walk away saying “I don’t know what it was… but I didn’t feel comfortable talking to that man.”

Insensitive people are not aware of others people’s feelings, are socially inappropriate and can be dangerous. Humans who routinely hurt others tend to have little or no empathy and injure or kill others with no hesitation or remorse. Even sensitive people who are capable of empathy have a range of sensitivity and can be remarkably kind and responsive to some and insensitive to others.

You can download the eBook version of Neuroscience Notes from Persona Digital Online. The author is Stephen Gislason MD. Published 2010.

Perseveration: Clinging to the Past

2010-07-19T13:10:00.000-07:00

“For what I am seems so fleeting and intangible but what I was is fixed and final. It is the firm basis of what I will be in the future and so it comes about that I am more closely identified with what no longer exists that with what actually is.” Alan Watts, The Way of Zen.

Despite the advantages of letting go of memories and artifacts of the past and being fully present, humans cling to the past. Humans find it difficult to change old routines even when circumstances change and the old routines are no longer effective; this is perseveration, a reptilian tendency. Clinging also involves myths and histories and the repetition of stories and collections of artifacts, used in ritualistic behaviors. The endurance of groups often depends on re-telling stories and repeating stylized behaviors.

The persistence of the past is not a feature of time or the really real out there in the universe, but a feature of the brain. All learning involves changes to the structure of the brain that tend to persist. Once learned, a behavioral routine is part of brain structure. New routines can override old routines, but older patterns persist and often prevail.

Children are more adaptable than adults because they are learning new things every day and their brains are more likely to change through experience and formal learning. Adults tend to be more fixed in their learned routines and fundamental changes require major reconstruction of their brain structure that occurs slowly over months to years.

Perseveration is maladaptive in proportion to the rate and degree of change in the environment. Adaptation requires behavior changes when big events alter the environment or new information requires behavior change. Humans who cannot learn new strategies and do not update their information tend to perish when circumstances change.

The lethal effects of preservation are apparent when you consider the adverse health effects of smoking, overeating, alcohol and drug use. At least half all diseases prevalent in affluent countries can be avoided by changing behavior, but the majority of humans will not or cannot change deeply imbedded habits.

You could argue that if conditions are stable, perseveration is allowed and there are some advantages. The first benefit is that established routines that have worked in the past are reassuring and if circumstances stay the same, the same routines continue to work. The second benefit is that familiar people, landscapes, sounds, smells and tastes are understood and trusted; whereas new and unfamiliar experiences require a major effort to learn, adapt and overcome the uncertainty inherent in change.

As humans age and lose much of the randomness, curiosity and adventure of youth, old familiar, experiences become increasingly attractive. The family album is brought out, old songs are played, and stories of events long ago are repeated endlessly. As dementia progresses new events are confusing or immediately forgotten, old stories are recalled and recited repetitiously with evidence of pleasure. There are stories of the “good old days” but painful past events tend to be recalled more often and are repeated and embellished as casemaking. The case argues that someone or some group has wronged you in the past; the wrongs are detailed; revenge and retribution are sought. Revenge and retribution become cultural activities. Much human drama depends on case-making stories with revenge as the goal. Hatred is the most entrenched version of casemaking that focuses story-telling skills on diminishing an enemy and promoting the right to revenge.

Education tends to perseveration. Children are required to learn facts about the past and are rewarded for reading old books, learning obsolete ideas and methods. Most discussion of educational reform focuses on achieving literacy and better math-science scores rather than producing happier, more cooperative more creative, more compassionate humans.

From Surviving the 21st Century by Stephen Gislason.

Religion and Wars Past and Present

2010-07-16T14:29:00.000-07:00

There is no place and time in human history that was free of wars. Human males enjoy fighting and when they do, they destroy property and kill other humans, often in a cruel, extravagant manner. Large fights with much property destruction and deaths of large numbers of combatants and civilians are described as wars. As populations increased, the magnitude of wars increased.

Somehow, even in relatively civilized countries, war is viewed as a normal expression of nations and war-making governments as valid expressions of the people. In an ideal future, war would not be considered a legitimate expression of governments. Instead humans who proposed war would be recognized as mentally ill and would be confined to special institutions for the politically insane.

History records wars that appeared to have a religious purpose or justification, although many group dynamics are usually at work, including the sheer delight one group enjoys when waging war against other groups. The delight is enhanced by winning a war and growing richer. The delight is diminished by losing a war and growing poorer.

The convergence of three conflicting religions at the Sinai Peninsula, a tiny piece of land, continues to this day. This modern version of an ancient conflict promises to generate increasing human paranoia and militarism that will obstruct efforts to replace war with negotiation and compromise.

The Christian Crusades were a series of military campaigns the occurred in the 11th through 13th centuries. The goal was to send warriors from European countries to take Jerusalem, the Holy Land from the Muslims. Noble knights leaving England might have shouted pro-Christian, anti-Muslim slogans, but, once on the road, they were easily distracted by other opportunities to pillage, plunder and rape. A 1250 French Bible illustration depicts Jews being massacred by Christian Crusaders. The Crusaders' atrocities against Jews in German and Hungarian towns, later in France, England left enduring hostility on both sides. The security of the Jews in Western Europe was threatened; legal restrictions on Jews increased following the Crusades.

Jews fought as allies of Muslim soldiers to defend Jerusalem against the Christians. Once allies against Christians, Jews and Muslims are now enemies and some Christians, especially in the US, support the Jewish settlement of Israel with money, weapons and belligerent slogans directed against Islamic states. The Crusades also involved battles among Christian groups in different countries.

In 16th century France, wars between Roman Catholics and Protestants were popular. In the 17th century, German states, Scandinavia, and Poland hosted battles between Roman Catholicism and Calvinism. In Northern Ireland, bloody battles between Roman Catholic and Protestant groups continued through the 20th century.

Puritan families left England in opposition to some of the expressions of the Anglican Church. They established New England on the Atlantic coast of what would become the USA. The first great migration to the new world occurred between 1630 and 1640. The influence of protestant groups in Canada and the US continues to this day, although intergroup wars have been replaced by political battles and litigation. In Canada, a French-speaking, Roman Catholic province, Quebec, continues to assert its cultural independence from the rest of Canada which is secular, multicultural and polylingual.

I have mentioned the rise of the Muslim empires, first by the Arabs and later by the Turks. While the battles that continued for centuries can be viewed as Muslims against Christians, the quest for territorial domination and wealth superseded other motivations. In the early 20th century, the Turks brutally suppressed political opposition in Armenia in what is now known as the “Armenian genocide.” Talat Pasha, the Turkish interior minister at that time ordered the arrest of Armenian leaders in 1915 and initiated large scale deportations and massacres of the Armenians. The stated reasoning was political, although Armenians were Christians and Turks were Muslims. The Armenians were accused of collaborating with invading Russian forces. You could argue that, all political excuses aside, the policies of the Ottomans were Islamic and that the first priority of an Islamic state was to defend Muslim territory. The second priority was to extend Muslim territory. The laws of the state were Islamic laws. Islamic states often tolerated members of other religious groups who paid taxes and enjoyed inferior status; however opposition to the Islamic state was not tolerated.

If you advance to 21st century USA, you find growing numbers of militant Christian fundamentalists ready to fight with Islamic fundamentalists. You time travel back to the 7th century. The documentary film, Obsession, was a brief course on radical Islam that increased concern among US viewers in 2007. The film featured clips from Arabic TV, interviews with former terrorists, videos of suicide bomber initiations, secret jihad meetings, indoctrination of young children, and private celebrations of 9/11. To US viewers, the most shocking revelations were the hatred of the US taught to children and the support for a global jihad (battle of God) with the goal of Islamic world domination.

On the other side, both radical and reasonable Muslims view footage from US television, news and movies. They see US extremists and their expressions of belligerence toward Islam. They recognize the belligerence of a US federal government with a policy of attacking any country that poses a threat to the US. The Muslims consider the US to be a country of greed, corruption and duplicity. The political equation is balanced with hatred growing on both sides.

From Religion for the 21st Century by Stephen Gislason.

Ants Working Together. A Model for Humans?

2010-06-15T14:07:00.000-07:00

Insect societies are remarkably coherent and suggest the best features of human social organization. Ants, termites and bees, like us, differentiate into castes with specialized roles, construct cities, organize food production and maintain military organizations. Ants, termites and humans are farmers. Cutter ant colonies harvest leaves to feed their fungal partners.

Mueller andRabeling described the remarkable features of cutter ant colonies: “The original fungus-growing ants were not leaf cutters, but debris collectors, using withered plant bits for cultivation of a relatively unspecialized mycelial fungus that retained close population-genetic ties to free-living fungal populations. Nest sizes were small, involving probably only dozens to hundreds of workers. The later evolutionary transition from debris collector to leaf cutter was accompanied by novel allocation of leaf-processing tasks to size-variable worker castes and a dramatic increase in worker number produced by long-lived queens. Some extant leaf-cutter nests are estimated to live for 10–20 years, have 5–10 million workers, and maintain 500–1,000 football-sized fungus gardens in an underground metropolis occupying the volume of a bus.”

Ant farmers have to deal with parasites and have their own version of the pest control using techniques similar to human biotechnology such as the use of bacteria to kill insect predators. For example, Panamanian leaf-cutting ants cultivate fungus gardens as a food source. A complex symbiosis has become apparent to researchers. Currie, for example, discovered that leaf-cutting ants carry colonies of actinomycete bacteria on their bodies. The bacteria assist the farming of beneficial fungi by producing an antibiotic that inhibits the growth of undesirable fungi. Currie and Clardy later isolated identified antifungal chemical, dentigerumycin. Currie revealed a complex interaction of bacteria and fungi required to digest the cellulose in the leaves.

Jones stated:” On a survey of one piece of Amazonian rain forest, social insects accounted for 80 percent of the total biomass, with ants alone weighing four times as much as all its mammals, birds, lizards, snakes and frogs put together. The world holds as much ant flesh as it does that of humans.” He reviewed Hölldobler and Wilson’s concept of an insect colony as a superorganism, single animals raised to a higher level of organization and intelligence. ” The world of superorganisms varies from dawn ants in Australia, which live in groups of a hundred or so separated only into sexual and asexual kinds, to the leaf-cutters, who cultivate fungal gardens and have millions of workers, divided into a diversity of castes, in a single colony. The whole place buzzes with information, passed on with chemical cues, taps and strokes, dances and displays.”

The ant brain is a tiny device, and yet, the will and ability to create and maintain complex social organization is stored in this highly efficient, micro-miniaturized living circuitry. Social organization is achieved by creating a metabrain from thousands of individual brains coordinated in a network using chemical signals. Investigation of the ant brain leads us to ask if the basis for human social organization is stored in an ant-brain sized nucleus in our own brain or have the “social circuits” enlarged and become more effective or less reliable? Can we become as well networked as ants? Can we achieve a high level of social organization that is stable over hundreds of millions of years?
From a computing perspective, we can admire the small brain of the bee and the ant that is capable of organizing a complex working and construction-based society that has been successful for hundreds of millions of years. In terms of social stability and success over time, a large brain is not necessarily better than a small brain. Human engineers now understand that linking a number of “small brains” into a large interconnected network is the evolutionary path of human societies. Ants perfected the social network a long time ago. Oster and Wilson described ant society in these terms: “Caste and division of labor lie at the heart of colonial organization in the social insects. What makes an ant colony distinct from a cluster of butterflies is its internal organization:

“The differentiation of its members into castes, the division of labor based on caste, the coordination and integration of the activities that generate an overall pattern of behavior beyond the reach of a simple aggregation of individuals.”

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason

Empathy and Love

2010-06-03T13:27:00.000-07:00

Empathy is the ability to recognize the sentience and suffering in another being. Empathy is the basis of high-level altruism that does not depend on the barter principle. The ethic of empathy is the Golden Rule: do onto others, as you would have them do to you.

Empathy depends on knowing that the other person feels pain as much as you do or will feel happiness as much as you do if they are well treated. If another human is grieving, you feel their suffering and offer help. If another human is injured, you stop everything to help them and you treat their injured body with care to avoid increasing their pain. This ability to feel the experience of others in your own consciousness is one of the great accomplishments of brain evolution.

There is no doubt that more empathy is better than less. There is little doubt that empathy is one feature of human nature that competes with other more powerful and more adverse features of human nature. Empathy is not evenly distributed among humans, nor is any individual constantly empathetic towards others. Some humans lack empathy and are selfish, impulsive and do harm to others with no remorse.

The human tendency is to treat only a few other humans well, members of your immediate select group, and to be suspicious of and hostile towards everyone else. Empathy can turn on in one situation and turn off in another. Once a group establishes that outsiders are enemies, empathy is turned off and members of the group treat the outsiders cruelly as if they were non-human.

You might observe that children are naturally empathetic and that this feature of their nature can be cultivated by well informed, empathetic adults. A the same time, you will notice that children are naturally possessive, competitive, and fight often. Observant parents and teachers will realize that encouraging empathy and discouraging conflict is a challenging task that is never complete.

Love is often identified as the solution for human conflict. You might argue that genuine love requires big empathy. But, the word “Love” is fuzzy, because it refers to any and all the emotive and cognitive forces that bind people together. Love includes different ingredients such thoughts, feelings and several emotions. Love is not a single emotion nor even a coherent mix of emotions. Love is a biosocial complex inflected at different levels of intensity and meaning. Sometimes, love is just a word that fails to have much meaning.

Romantic love is temporary glue that sticks two people together and is most evident in younger people choosing a mate. Successful bonding creates feelings of contentment and a sense of long-term commitment to the partner. The essential feature of falling in love is a fascination with one other person coupled with a drive to be with them and to protect them. This exclusive focus is deviant from all other social involvements that require lower intensity attention to many people. Both lovers will tend to fell euphoric and powerful; their devotion can overcome all obstacles and accomplish wonders.

Falling in love is not a smooth ride. There are existential love problems. As soon as a couple falls in love, the freedom of each is constrained. The progression of the bond requires the exclusion of other mates and is regulated by a potentially destructive force, jealously. The lover’s problem is not letting the other person exist as a free being. As humans become more conscious and more sophisticated in their understanding of relationship, a deep paradox emerges. While pleasurable feelings, tenderness and concern tend to occur in the early stages of falling-in-love, the pleasant feelings soon diminish and are interrupted by more routine, negative feelings that emerge in the mix and will often dominate the couple’s experience. Lovers will display a variety of emotions: affection, laughing, crying, anger, fear and grief will all be displayed in the course of a romance. Jealousy is another cognitive-emotional complex that accompanies love. When you examine the experiences of lovers, you identify a big problem with empathy – it is temporary, conditional and can be replaced by conflict and hate.

The problem of freedom versus captivity continues to plague more insightful married couples and is not resolved by the marriage ceremony enforced by moral authority that insists on life-long fidelity. Women will often feel trapped in servitude and will hunger for more self-determination. Men will feel trapped and obligated to relinquish most personal choices in favor of wife and children. A person who is no longer free replaces the more desirable and alluring person with the freedom to say no to an aspiring mate.

Even deeper challenges facing couples involve the underlying assumptions of the self. Every human has an overriding sense of his or her own importance. There is prevailing sense that I am the center the center of the universe and what I believe to be true is true always and forever. When two people form an intimate, dyad they confront each other with this deeply imbedded premise. Their interactions are necessarily tense because each has the same conviction that "I am center of the universe." The primordial conflict among self-centered human beings is about whose version of the universe is the most valid.

One model of altruistic love is maternal devotion to children. The ideal mother is deeply bonded to her children, is self-sacrificing and unusually attentive to the needs of her children. While romantic love briefly contains the elements of maternal love and may lead to lead to marriage, pregnancy and life-together, the biological basis appears to be short-lived leaving the bonded couple in need of other motivations and constraints to sustain their relationship. The ideal mother attracts a supportive man and sustains his interest in the children by providing affection, sexual favors and sharing the labor of maintaining a home. The ideal mother’s love for her children tends to be less conditional and lasts a lifetime, but the love of the father or fathers of the children is conditional and may be short-term. The ideal father provides protection and support, devoting all his resources to one mother who has given birth only to his children.

Home should be the refuge where each family member feels safe but often becomes the battleground where diverging interests and experiences conflict. The family formula sent males and females on divergent paths that guaranteed little common ground, except at home, evenings and weekends. The different worlds are also full of other humans who may attractive and will often appear to be more compatible and available because they share work schedules and environments. There is no couple commitment that blocks interest in other potential mates. The search for an alternative mate and fantasies about other lovers continue daily in the minds of every happily married couple. As discrepancies in the couple's experience accumulate and conflicts escalate, the partners create distance that protects each from the other. Once the home is no longer a safe refuge, dysphoric feelings dominate and the relationship is in peril. Most humans will tolerate unsatisfactory relationships for a while, but eventually a threshold of no-return is reached and the relationship collapses. This is an avalanche effect. The timing of the avalanche is unpredictable, but once it starts to move, no one can stop it and the relationship is over.

Continue with next Post On Compassion

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Breaking News - Meditation and the Buddha

2010-05-26T16:46:00.002-07:00

“What do like to do best in the whole world, Pooh?” “Well’, said Pooh, what I like best…” and then he had to stop and think because although eating honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn’t know what it was called.” Winnie the Pooh. AA Milne

When I am asked on a census form to state my religion, I will write Buddhist. I was not born a Buddhist, nor am I recognized member of a Buddhist group. My wife is a real Buddhist from Thailand and does not discourage my claim to be a Buddhist, although we have many discussions about the differences between my version and her version. My wife’s name is Sanskrit, Sumala (Rathaporn) Pawakanun. She recites devotional chants in Sanskrit and Pali, the ancient languages of Theravadan Buddhism.

Thailand was Siam until 1939. Human history in this part of the world, extends back thousands of years. Pottery and bronze tools have been found that date to about 5000 years ago. More recent settlements by Thai tribes came from southern China as early as the 4th century. Deshpande described Siamese Buddhist history in terms of the prolific art that emerged: “In the 13th-15th centuries, Thai tribes were assimilated, absorbing the cultures of their predecessors that had arisen from Indian religions, Hinduism and Buddhism. Mediaeval Siamese art reflected the ideas of Theravada Buddhism. The distinctive character of Siamese Buddhism lay in its ethical orientation, the pursuit of bun - religious merit - that improves the believer's karma. One common form of bun was the creation by one's own hands or by commissioning of sculptures of the Buddha that were presented to a temple. The most popular Buddha image depicts a key moment in the process by which the earthly prince Siddhartha Gautama became the Buddha - a being who discovered Sublime Wisdom. Sculptors made use of a language of symbolic gestures - mudra. A combination of pose and gesture pointed to one particular episode in the life of the Buddha, some particular aspect of doctrine.”

Many years ago when the Tibetan Karmapa visited Vancouver, I attended a Bodhisattva initiation ceremony and he placed a red string around my neck that signalled my new status. The task of the Boddhisattva is to develop compassion in the service of fellow sentient beings. I have studied Buddhist texts from many countries, practiced meditations and developed a personal version of Buddhist philosophy which I will outline here. This is the sunshine coast school of Buddhism circa year 2550 (Buddhist calendar):

The Buddha’s path directs you toward disengagement from goal-oriented activities so that you can explore your own mind, develop insight into the really real and emerge with equanimity and compassion. Meditation is one method of understanding how our mind works, how we know things and what conclusions we can derive from our knowledge.

I prefer sitting on a beach, on a mountain, in a garden, in a boat, or floating on an inflated tire on a lake. Sitting inside buildings is not so appealing. One of my practices is sky and cloud watching which requires you to lie on a grassy or mossy patch of ground and looking up. One of the rules of mediation is not to look around and become distracted. Sky watching requires you to look up at the same patch of sky and let events such as birds, clouds and insects pass without following their paths.

The practice of meditation is based on a fundamental disinterest in the redeeming possibilities of language. Meditation leads to ineffable experiences and away from the beliefs, demands and rules of the local group. The Buddha manifests his identity as a professional philosopher by sitting upright in the Lotus position, poised, calm and alert. The lotus position is stable and can be maintained for hours. He has a gentle smile and his philosophical work looks effortless and natural. The Buddha required no books, wrote no books and said nothing during years of intense mind study. He studied the processes of his own mind and focused on being present in the world. His PhD thesis required seven years sitting under the Bo tree.

The Buddha recognized selftalk and all the other spontaneously arising contents of mind. He discovered the reactive aspects of mind and all the manifestations of selfish desire.

The Buddha discovered the constant contest between self-interest and generosity.

The Buddha explored the causes and nature of pride, greed, criticism, anger and hate. He explored the illusions of self.

The Buddha revealed the truth of spacetime as a ceaseless and integral flow of events.

The Buddha discovered the meshiness of events all interconnected; causes and effects without beginning and without end.

He developed, compassion for sentient beings caught in Samsara – needs, desires, passions, confusion, conflict and impermanence.

The Buddha discovered the way out – enlightenment. Even if we do not know exactly what enlightenment means, we all have a glimmer of hope that there is a state of grace available to us characterized by peace, happiness and profound understanding.

The Buddha’s path does not point you to a college course, a career, an investment, a new car or big house as way stations or destinations on the path toward enlightenment.

Much of the work on the path is solitary and has little or no outward manifestation. The path of enlightenment is a non-event and is boring. We can develop a sketch of how a highly developed mind might work and refer to an ideal or enlightened mind.

The enlightened mind sees all, knows all, and identifies with none of the local conditions that would limit knowledge and understanding.
The enlightened mind creates the best conditions for the greatest insight, understanding and greatest opportunity to experience rapture.

The enlightened mind recognizes the interrelationship of all living beings; cherishes life and treats others with tolerance and compassion.
The enlightened mind thrives in the natural world and never kills other sentient beings.

From Religion for the 21st Century by Stephen Gislason.
Persona Digital Books 2010.

Music Unites Humans

2010-05-17T12:35:00.000-07:00

Recently, I promised to stop writing and speaking and to rely only on music for communication. But, the time has not yet come. I am a language addict. The compromise is to create music and also write about music, even though I have been convinced for years that my writing mind competes with my music mind. Some of the best musicians I have know could hardly speak and used only a strange morse code to communicate musical ideas.

I will argue that human dynamics can be described Wittgenstein-style as simple statements. For example, Humans can play games or they can do battle. Humans can dance, sing and play music or they can fight.

I wrote in my Music Notebook:

Music is a powerful ingredient in human societies that facilitates group bonding and conveys feelings more poignantly than other forms of communication. Shrock suggested:” As a college student, my eyes would often well up with tears during my twice-a-week choir rehearsals. I would feel relaxed and at peace yet excited and joyful, and I occasionally experienced a thrill so powerful that it sent shivers down my spine. I also felt connected with fellow musicians in a way I did not with friends who did not sing with me. I have often wondered what it is about music that elicits such emotions. Philosophers and biologists have asked the question for centuries, noting that humans are universally drawn to music. It consoles us when we are sad, pumps us up in happier times and bonds us to others.”

Pinker suggested that music offers a system of communication rooted in emotions rather than in meaning. Oliver Sacks in his book Musicophilia suggested that music is as important communication as language and gesture. I prefer to recognize that music is a collection of powerful languages, gestures, and whole body movements.

A scholarly investigation of music will emphasize the efforts of highly skilled professional musicians and forget that music begins with full participation of all members of local groups. Singing, dancing, chanting are aspects of group identity and group cohesion.

An ideal human group is coordinated by rhythmic expressions; they play instruments, sing and dance often. Music, as a performance by skilled musicians who play to silent audiences sitting in chairs is a recent innovation that only partly represents the deeper meaning of musical communication as a group experience.

Schrock suggested that music “is almost always a communal event: everyone gets together to sing, dance, and play instruments. Even in Western societies, which uniquely differentiate musical performers from listeners, people enjoy music together in a wide variety of settings: dancing at a wedding or a nightclub, singing hymns in church, crooning with their kids, Christmas caroling and singing “Happy Birthday” at a party. The popularity of such rituals suggests that music confers social cohesiveness, perhaps by creating empathetic connections among members of a group.,, music’s power stems from its tendency to echo and synchronize our activities.”

Singing

Humans have a strong tendency to bond to sounds early in life and prefer to hear or sing simple songs they learned earlier. Popular songs can be repeated throughout their life with the same strong feelings of identity and comfort. Simple melodies have the greatest appeal and widest audience, because they are easy to remember and resemble the simple phrases of ancient animal communication. Songs, of course, combine words and music and are potent in eliciting emotional responses.

A singer communicates emotionally with the audience, using gestures and dance to emphasize the emotional values of a song. I must admit that singers who indulge in exaggerated and strenuous gesturing and frantic dance steps often offend me. In contrast, I am enchanted to hear and watch Andrea Bocelli, the blind and eloquent Italian tenor. He stands motionless on the stage with his eyes closed. Bocelli sings with a perfect composure that is consistent with the mastery of his art. He is a Buddha.

Chanting is soothing to humans and group chanting can induce euphoria that some humans call a “religious” or “mystical” or “spiritual” feeling. The benefits of chanting are independent of the meaning of the words, although meaning can enhance the experience of chanting. Words used in chants are simple and often have a musical quality of their own.

Repeating the same phrase rhythmically has a trance-inducing power. If you combine chanting with dancing or just holding you arms in the air, swaying back and forth, you become euphoric and feel bonded with others in your group. Music induced trances work at Woodstock, folk concerts, rock concerts, support groups, churches, all night voodoo dances and on camping trips, sitting around a camp fire.

Philosophy for the 21st Century

2010-04-19T17:28:00.001-07:00

Since the Greek Philosophers three thousand years ago, the subjects usually included in philosophy are logic, aesthetics, ethics, metaphysics, sociology, politics and the philosophy of the mind.

You could argue that the proper concern for 21st century philosophy is the destructive aspects of human nature and the possibility we will cause our own extinction. To be properly qualified as a philosopher, you need to be a generalist with an expansive overview of all human activities. You are willing to be informed by any and all sciences, academic disciplines and by the chatter of modern discourse which takes many forms.

These credentials, of course, are demanding and few would qualify for the position. You could not, for example, belong to a religious group dependent on faith in historical fictions. You could not belong an academic group that limited your exploration of any point view that conflicted with the groups norms. You could not live in a society that censored your writings and limited your access to information.

I would argue that progress in human affairs requires a new approach to education that is universal, persuasive and complete. The knowledge and ideas in this book are basic ingredients for the new education. How can this be achieved? Not by philosophers employed by universities or even book writers that gain an audience. Idealists with a commitment to realize universal civil and free societies will need to pause and consider that progress in this direction is not possible without dramatic change in the way humans think and behave.

Walter Kaufman described liberation philosophy, a prescription for 21st century advances in human cognition:

“Philosophy, like poetry, deals with ancient themes: poetry with experiences, philosophy with problems known for centuries. Both must add a new precision born of passion. The intensity of great philosophy and poetry is abnormal and subversive: it is the enemy of habit, custom, and all stereotypes. The motto is always that what is well known is not known at all well… The poet's passion cracks convention: the chains of custom drop; the world of our everyday experience is exposed as superficial appearance; the person we had seemed to be and our daily contacts and routines appear as shadows on a screen, without depth; while the poet's myth reveals reality... Newspaper reports, and even scenes we have seen with our own eyes, are distorted images in muddy waters of reality. We live upon the surface; we are like ants engaged in frantic aimlessness pursuits until the artist comes, restoring vision, freeing us from living death. Philosophy, as Plato and Aristotle said, begins in wonder. This wonder means a dim awareness of the useless talent, some sense that ant-likeness is, This wonder means a dim awareness of the useless talent, some sense that ant-likeness is a betrayal.

"But what are the alternatives? Vary the metaphor. Men are so many larvae, crawling, wriggling, eating - living in two dimensions. Many die while in this state. Some are transformed and take flight before they settle down to live as ants. Few become butterflies and revel in their new-found talent, a delight to all. Philosophy means liberation from the two dimensions of routine, soaring above the well known, seeing it in new perspectives, arousing wonder and the wish to fly. Philosophy subverts man's satisfaction with himself, exposes custom as a questionable dream, and offers not so much solutions as a different life. A great deal of philosophy, including truly subtle and ingenious works, was not intended as an edifice for men to live in, safe from sun and wind, but as a challenge: don't sleep on! there are so many vantage points; they change in flight: what matters is to leave off crawling in the dust.”

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason (now available as an Amazon.com download for the Kindle.)

Also Read Religion for the 21st Century

Fusion Jazz

2010-04-13T17:09:00.001-07:00

Wittgenstein, a student of Bertrand Russell, attempted to reduce philosophy to a compact collection of brief statements in the style of mathematical equations. Russell favored the rigor of mathematics and expressed extreme doubt that natural languages could ever represent the really real. Wittgenstein recommended silence when you realized that could not say what you meant or when you did not mean what you might say. I share Russell's doubts about natural language. Indeed the second use of language (to deceive) usually overwhelms the first use(to inform). My solution is to move away from language back to music (where I believe I came from). While I was immersed in classical music as a child and have just completed a recording of 14 pieces from JS Bach's Art of the Fugue, my real salvation lies in playing and inventing Jazz.

My interest in Jazz begins with Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. I have followed a meandering path from their bebop innovations through Miles Davis, cool jazz, modal and fusion jazz. The 1968 album “Miles in the Sky” introduced Herbie Hancock playing electric piano and Carter playing bass guitar. In 1969, electronic instruments dominated the next album “In a Silent Way”, an innovative fusion album.

The term Fusion still appeals to me. Fusion describes the merging of different musical styles and intentions. In the best case, Fusion is an open door to all music traditions everywhere to merge with novel, exciting creativity. Fusion is not always an easy path to follow. Musicians who are well established in one musical genre usually face criticism and degrees of rejection when they move in another direction. Dizzie Gillespie and Charlie Parker were criticized by fellow jazz musicians for their new jazz style "Bebop." Miles Davis also faced criticism as he moved from more "traditional jazz" into continuously evolving styles that incorporated world music and at times came perilously close to rock and roll. Davis attracted the best musicians available so that innovation was an eclectic group effort.

The musicians who played with Miles often continued to develop fusion styles. 1970’s fusion bands originated with Miles Davis alumni: Tony Williams Lifetime, Weather Report, McLaughlin's Mahavishnu Orchestra, Corea's Return to Forever, and Herbie Hancock's Headhunters band. Herbie Hancock was one of the first jazz keyboardists to use synthesizers. Funk jazz emerged in his albums, Head Hunters 1973 and Thrust in 1974.

Weather Report, featuring Joe Zawinul and Wayne Shorter developed world music fusion jazz. Jaco Pastorius, the electric bass player, went on to great fame and a tragic death in 1987. Chick Corea, another of the great keyboardists, founded the band Return to Forever in 1972 with latin-influenced music. The band soon evolved into a jazz-rock band.

John McLaughlin was influenced by his guru, Sri Chinmoy and created the Mahavishnu Orchestra that merged psychedelic rock with Indian music. Carlos Santana’s band blended Latin salsa, rock, blues, and jazz. Pat Metheny started a fusion band in 1977 that produced popular recordings that made both jazz and pop charts. Cool jazz groups such as Dave Sanborn's bands and the Ripping tons become popular with more melodic pieces that appealed to listeners at home.

Marcus Miller, the multitalented musicians' musician collaborated with Miles Davis, played with Jaco Pastorius and carried forward a brilliant style of bass guitar playing, turning the bass into a versatile solo instrument.

I have arranged and recorded tunes made famous by several of the fusion jazz musicians. Tutu is a Marcus Miller/ Davis piece. Today I am adding another Marcus Miller tune Snakes to my song list. I have treated snakes as one of my anthem pieces, developing an energetic, big-band style arrangement with my Flugelhorn as a solo instrument. Snakes in this version is a description of the state of the human world. I have the image of someone asking me what I think about the state of the world. I cannot speak. When I open my mouth, out comes Snakes.

Hear Snakes, Tutu, Night in Tunisia - Stephen Gislason and the Trinity P2500 Band.
(http://www.reverbnation.com/tunepak/2560031)

Teenagers as Outlaws

2010-04-10T14:03:00.002-07:00

There are recurrent stories in the news about bullying at schools, teenage drug and alcohol use and suicides. "Experts" are interviewed and offer a variety of opinions about the causes of these apparent aberrations. I have a different view. There is a relentless consistency in destructive human behaviours that is ancient and universal. Each society develops strategies of coping with disturbances --some are more successful than others. I often remind my fellow humans that we are all narcissistic, critical of others, disputatious and unstable. We tend to destroy whatever order we create.

Children manifest these human tendencies and teenagers undergo extremes of narcissism and instability as they are transformed into adults. I wanted to share my point of view in brief, taken from two books Alcohol Problems and Solutions; Children and the Family.

Puberty changes the entire programming manifest by children and raises the ante so that the relatively safe play of younger children is replaced by the more dangerous and consequential play of teenagers. Parents are often unprepared for the major transformations that occur after puberty and feel estranged from the new person emerging awkwardly and contentiously in their own home. Teenagers are in the business of separating from their family and are drawn to the values, activities and norms of their peer group. They seek role models in the media and imitate examples of costume, values and behaviors that attract them. Movies, "music" and television programs are stronger influences than parental example or advice.

Teenagers have a tense mix of old primitive features in their mind and new modern ideas. They tend to manifest tribal behavior and at the same time develop individual, modern personalities. Adolescent society is stratified, competitive and relatively unforgiving. Teenagers cluster in small groups with strict inclusion/exclusion rules. They manifest ancient animal and human social patterns quite spontaneously and the importance of group affiliation with their peers takes precedence over family affiliation. Family values and teenager group values often conflict and the conflict is seldom resolved in favor of the family unless parents are determined and on the job 24 hours a day.

Teenagers are risk-takers and seek excitement. Teenagers copy the behavior of other teens. Teens are drawn to drinking alcoholic beverages, smoking and try a variety of illegal drugs that alter their experience and behaviour. Teenagers drink alcoholic beverages as a matter of course, even when drinking is restricted, illegal and dangerous. Teenagers often get drunk and some develop high risk drinking behaviors at an early age.
Parents of teenagers will often doubt that they have any role to play except to offer custodial support and then recognize that their jurisdiction is limited. I noted a bumper sticker that said: "Teenager for sale cheap - take over the payments."

The process of becoming a civilized, competent, compassionate human is long and arduous and some teenager do not make it. Good parents are role models who moderate or avoid the use of alcoholic beverages, do not smoke and teach their children to prefer clear minds and sane sober behavior , avoiding intoxication with any drug. Good parents offer sustained custodial support of their adolescent sons and daughters, recognize the risks of drinking and drugs. They establish lawful conduct at home.

For decades, American literature has described and decried the alienation of adolescents from their parents and a host of studies have confirmed that peer group dynamics influence teenagers more than their parents. Teenagers "hang-out" together and spontaneously form groups that drift on the periphery of the adult society. Deviant, antisocial and criminal behavior emerges as a group expression. Even "nice" teens routinely experiment with alcohol, drugs, sex and other forbidden pleasures, commit minor felonies, conceal their activities from parents and teachers and lie when confronted with allegations of improper conduct. In the worst case, teens form gangs and kill each other with guns.

Adolescent behavior and teenage gangs in particular remind us that drama on the ancient African Savannas has simply time-traveled to contemporary cities and suburbs. Teen gangs are primitive clan structures that repeat human behavior thousands of years old. Teens who are not so nice, form gangs to commit crimes and murder with appalling ease. Teenagers are narcissistic and are often trapped in self-talk and case making.

Some teenagers are kinder than others and develop an idealistic view of human life and may be at risk because they are too trusting and suggestible. Other teens are more cynical and aggressive and believe that only they understand what is right and true. Teens form cliques or gangs and the greatest cause of teenage suffering is to be excluded from a desirable group.

Members of inferior groups are treated badly by members of superior groups and outsiders emerge who are isolated and alienated individuals. Inferior or isolated individuals are taunted, threatened, pushed, bullied, ridiculed, sexually harassed, beaten, robbed and sometimes killed even by nice children in affluent Canadian and American suburbs.

Alienation pushes an unwanted teenager toward one of four destinations:

1 creative alienation; scholarship, poetry, music, art, political activism
2 withdrawal, depression and risk of suicide.
3 revenge, antisocial ideas, affiliation with groups that express hatred
4 crime

Alienated individuals can form groups that develop and express their disappointment and anger. Often these groups borrow costumes, ideology, ritual and values from existing ideologies - the skinheads, for example, adopt fascist values and admire German Nazis of the 30's and 40's who now epitomize for most adults evil intentions and deeds.

Binge drinking often begins in adolescence. Some teenagers survive their drinking escapades and become more or less reasonable adults. Others continue on an alcoholic path. Some die violent deaths, mostly in cars they drive and crash while intoxicated. Giving a teenager keys to the family car and enough money to buy beer or whiskey to take to the party is a high risk mistake that too many parents make.

Young male adolescents have the highest risk of dying in car crashes. Intoxication with alcohol and other drugs increases their risk. In a US survey, about 1 in 7 Americans aged 12 or older in 2002 (14.2 percent, or 33.5 million persons) drove under the influence of alcohol at least once in the 12 months prior to the interview. Males were nearly twice as likely as females (18.8 vs. 9.9 percent, respectively) to have driven under the influence of alcohol. More than 1 in 4 (26.6 percent) young adults aged 18 to 25 reported driving under the influence of alcohol at least once in the prior year.

Even good parents tend to be unrealistic about their adolescent children and assume they have better judgment and self-control than they actually have. Drinking a few drinks erases the little judgment that a teenager may possess. According to Michigan Universities 1998 survey: "The use of alcoholic beverages by American teen-agers had been drifting upward very gradually in recent years as they came to see behaviors such as weekend binge drinking as less and less dangerous…. one-third (33 percent) of all high school seniors report being drunk at least once in the 30-day interval preceding the survey. The risk perceived to be associated with weekend binge drinking began to rise two years ago among eighth- and 10th-graders (after having declined for several years), which may help to explain the recent downturn in alcohol use at these grade levels."
Stroh wrote: 'Teens who joke about killing brain cells while downing beers may find the idea a bit less funny when they grow up. A report by the American Medical Association shows that adolescents and young adults who drink risk brain damage, especially when it comes to learning, memory and critical thinking… the number of young people who drink is increasing. In 2000, 3.1 million people aged 17 and younger took a drink for the first time, according to the AMA report. "The brain appears to be particularly susceptible to damage during high school and college -- the prime drinking years…After only three drinks with a blood-alcohol level slightly under the 0.08 legal limit, volunteers were 25 per cent less accurate on memory tests."

Some parents face a defiant, disruptive teenager who becomes an outlaw. Usually, binge drinking and other drug use causes their deviance. Writer, Martha Dudman described a crisis with her 15-year old daughter: "Three years ago I didn't know what to do to save my daughter. She was doing everything possible to hurt herself - dropping out of school, sneaking out of the house, running away, cutting herself, stealing, taking drugs, drinking and attempting suicide. I found a reputable "education consultant" - one of a legion of such advisers in a rapidly growing industry that caters to the parents of troubled teens… There are all kinds of programs for troubled teens - from simple farmhouses where gruff, kindly couples take in four or five girls at a time to residential educational institutions where teens get group counseling. There are places where kids are actually locked up like prisoners. There are hospitals. And there are wilderness programs run by avid outdoorsmen or former marines."

There are no easy solutions for teenage outlaws. They do need custodial care, but oppressive treatment will make them worse rather than better. I have the image of sending disturbed teens to kindly relatives on the farm, far away from city activities. They should work hard physically, live close to nature, eat the best foods, and form affectionate attachments with animals and other humans. They should stay on the farm for one or two years. The same approach tends to work for alcoholics at every age.

The problem, of course, is that most families no longer have kindly relatives living on a farm. Cities have obliterated natural environments and most urban adolescents are alienated from the deep values in their nature that would give them direction and purpose. Rehab centers in rural settings may partly replace relatives on the farm, but usually do not involve physical work, proper food or sustained, meaningful relationships with healthy humans. I not a fan of the "head games" played by counselors and with other intimates in rehab centers. Good therapy is based learning to live a normal, productive life without using any alcohol or drugs. Prescription drugs should be a last resort treatment.

Also read Alcohol Problems and Solutions by Stephen Gislason MD

A Cognitive Black Hole ?

2010-04-01T13:25:00.001-07:00

I have referred to it before – the cognitive black hole that consumes reason in the Less than United States (my neighbours to the south). Regardless of what I might write about those Less than United States (LUS), I hope my readers will realize that I wish the best for the folks in that troubled country.

Despite our win against the LUS hockey team in the winter Olympics, Canadians remain just one step behind LUS citizens in most respects. The 2 weeks of euphoric feelings of national unity that came to Canadians with the Olympics in Vancouver was a welcome surprise for a federation of 12 less than united provinces. When all is said and done, I and my fellow Canadians want friendship and collaboration with LUS citizens to continue and grow. A bilateral announcement this week of new automotive emission standards was the happy result of Canada-US collaboration.

Over many years, I have studied and written about human nature and the basic principles that govern human dynamics. When I hear about current events, I compare what is going on now with my descriptions of what has always been going on, with the view to improving or changing those descriptions. For example, I am convinced that humans do best living and working in small groups. As organizations grow larger, they often fail as a matter of course.

In Group Dynamics, I wrote:" The desirability of unlimited corporate growth and mergers is doubtful unless enlarging corporations re-organize around small, semi-autonomous groups. The inefficiencies and failures of enlarging human systems is a product of the distinct cognitive limitations of the participants. While smart and apparently well qualified people become CEOs of large corporations their limitations eventually become obvious. One paradox is that experts are people who focus their attention on details of small parts of large and complex systems, but do not understand how the whole system works. Another paradox is that managers develop competence in smaller systems and advance to the level of their incompetence as the company grows. Even the smartest, best-informed human cannot comprehend how large complex systems work overall."

Collins, writing in Fortune magazine’s annual addition that lists the top 500 US corporations, reflected on the ephemeral nature of big corporations. Only 71 companies of the 500 best listed in 1955 were still in business in 2007. Most of the 2000 companies that made the list in subsequent years have dropped out. Collins blames managers for the failures. He points to examples of corporations that faltered, adapted and continued on a successful path because of new and inspired leadership. While managers are often at fault for corporate failures, I would argue that even the best qualified, most honest managers are just people with distinct limitations who may not cope with the relentless recurrence and complexity of the problems they face.

There have been a succession of business Gurus such as Tom Peters (In Search of Excellence, Tom Peters and Robert Waterman, published in 1982) who have studied management styles and strategies. The main advice that emerged for executives was to stay involved with employees and customers; reduce the number of middle managers and empower productive employees to become innovators. A big problem that Peters identified was that executive officers withdrew progressively into their exclusive and privileged offices and clubs. Like aristocrats of old, they would not mingle with the commoners and were oblivious to employees and customers. They developed delusions of grandeur and collected false beliefs such as "my company is too big to fail."

I believe that Barack Obama is a great president. I am really happy that he is charge of the LUS. If someone offered me his job, I would decline without hesitation. Why turn down such a great job? The main reason is that it's difficult or impossible to succeed, especially if you are an idealist and want to turn the ignorant and belligerent into constructive citizens.

A great leader will motivate his audience with empowering suggestions, but will realize that inspiration alone is not sufficient to change the status quo. A big country with diverse regions has a terrifying inertia; it takes years of painfully slow, incremental changes to head in a new direction.

Barack is an idealist with amazing stamina. Now, he did not take my advice to get out of Afghanistan ASAP, but I understood why. The real reasons are not his stated reasons. I am sure he realizes that there is no need to travel half way around the world to find terrorists. He has plenty of people close to home planning to overthrow the federal government.

Sedition is not new to the LUS and other countries have the same problem, but there is renewed hatred emerging there and in too many other places on the planet. This hatred is a cognitive black hole that swallows reason and motivates property destruction and killing.

Governments (as overly large organizations) do fail. Federations of many states also fail as a matter of course. Top down solutions may sound good in theory, but, in practice, they usually fail.

If I am really perplexed, I consult the great LUS sociologists and philosophers such as P.J. O'Rourke and several New York Times columnists: Maureen Dowd is one of my NYT favourites because she combines local insider knowledge with insight and a skillful use of irony and sarcasm, a special ability of smart women who can outclass smart men in social commentary.

What is remarkable about human nature is the moral depravity associated with notions such as "national security." You might ask, how can any nation be secure if it is busy creating new enemies, especially in foreign poor countries who want what you have? What about the golden rule that recommends treating others the way you would like to be treated? Just turn that excellent rule around a little and you realize that if you travel to a foreign country to kill people and blow up buildings that you have given permission to to those people to come to your country and carry out the same acts of death and destruction. Tit for Tat.

In terms of LUS foreign policy, PJ wrote the definitive equation: "Whatever it is that the government does, sensible Americans would prefer that the government do it to somebody else. This is the idea behind foreign policy. "

Maureen is fearless in her writing. In her recent description of the growing hatred directed against Obama, she wrote: " I've been loath to admit that the shrieking lunacy of the summer - the frantic efforts to paint our first black president as the Other, a foreigner, socialist, fascist, Marxist, racist, Commie, Nazi; a cad who would snuff old people; a snake who would indoctrinate kids - had much to do with race. I tended to agree with some Obama advisers that Democratic presidents typically have provoked a frothing response from paranoids - from Father Coughlin against F.D.R. to Joe McCarthy against Truman to the John Birchers against J.F.K. and the vast right-wing conspiracy against Bill Clinton. For two centuries, the South has feared a takeover by blacks or the feds. In Obama, they have both. Don Fowler, a former Democratic Party chief stated: "A good many people in South Carolina really reject the notion that we're part of the union… when slavery was destroyed by outside forces and segregation was undone by civil rights leaders and Congress, it bred xenophobia. We have a lot of people who really think that the world's against us, so when things don't happen the way we like them to, we blame outsiders."

Read Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason http://www.personadigital.net/Persona/groupdynamics/index.htm

Football or Death in Afghanistan?

2010-01-03T13:42:00.000-08:00

The ethnologist, Konrad Lorenz, suggested that sports involved displacing destructive energy into more civilized activities. Football is easily identified as a war game with two opposing armies lined up in a field to do battle. Tackling replaces killing. Skill, speed and brute strength are prerequisites for success.

You might recognize that athletes are healthy, skillful humans who transform destructive human tendencies in more constructive endeavors. Sporting events have become very popular. The most successful athletes are highly paid and praised. Of all the events that inspire hope for a more peaceful world, the Olympic Games are near the top.

The Olympic Games

Olympic Games originated in Greece and were held from about 770 BC until AD 393. Stories of the original Olympics are partly history and partly myth. One story suggests that Heracles built the Olympic stadium to honor Zeus. The Greek Gods lived on Mount Olympus. Heracles, a mortal hero, became a god when he died. The goddess Hebe became his wife and they lived in a palace on Olympus. The Olympics involved athletics, sacrifices and ceremonies honoring Zeus and Pelops, king of Olympia. Winners of the athletic events were immortalized in poems and statues.

The games ended after the Roman Emperor, Theodosius I, proclaimed Christianity the religion of the Empire. The Olympic Games were outlawed as a pagan festival.

Rational humanism emerged about 2500 years ago in three manifestations – the Buddha in India, Confucius in China, and the poets and philosophers who emerged in the Greek civilization that shaped the culture of Rome and then Europe and then the colonies in the Americas.

You could argue that the Olympic Games were one of the strong expressions of humanistic philosophy which celebrated the best aspects of humanity. Athletes were young, healthy and beautiful. Athletic events replaced wars. Physical prowess could be expressed in a benign fashion by athletes or in a terrible, destructive fury by warriors. This choice remains with us today.

The Olympic Games were revived in Greece in 1859. An International Olympic Committee (IOC) was founded in 1894 and since then participation in the games involves over 200 countries. The 2008 summer games in Beijing had 302 events in 28 sports with 202 participating countries. China has emerged from seclusion and secrecy with a marvelous display of its history, its skills and aesthetic ability. Giselle Davis, the IOC Director of Communications stated that the Chinese Opening Ceremonies were the most fantastic she had ever witnessed…"one that we will remember for the rest of our lives."

Bono, who became famous as the lead singer of the band U2, and later became a roving ambassador for humanitarian sanity identified soccer as a good alternative to civil war and killing: He stated in his 2010 new year list of good ideas to solve all the trouble in the world:" It’s getting easier to describe to Americans the impact of the World Cup — especially the impact it will have in Africa, where the tournament is to be held this summer. A few years ago, Ivory Coast was splitting apart and in the midst of civil war when its national team qualified for the 2006 jamboree. The response was so ecstatic that the war was largely put on hold as something more important than deathly combat took place, i.e. a soccer match. The team became a symbol of how the different tribes could — and did — get on after the tournament was over. "

Read more in Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason

Information and Misinformation

2009-11-08T12:29:00.000-08:00

In my book Group Dynamics, I attempted to identify the basic principles that govern the interaction of the media with vested interests and with the viewer. My goal, as always, was to develop definitions and descriptions that could be applied to most if not all situations. Here is an abstract summary of what is happening today:

We know that the media audience, the "public", is made up of different groups with vested interests that conflict. We are not indignant when we discover that one storyteller has distorted the truth. We know that everyone makes up stories that support their own point of view, that everyone lies, that everyone plans to persuade and deceive others and that there is no absolute truth.

We know that a general audience contains individuals with different mental abilities and that most humans have distinct limitations on what they can and will understand.

We know that the root human struggle between self-interest and the interests of groups is ubiquitous, pervasive and is not going away.

We know that each new human is born with an old brain and has to be brought up to date rather quickly and efficiently and must learn to override innate programs to develop skills of peaceful co-existence.

We know that a small number of humans will be alpha animals and lead a much larger number of humans who are followers and will not have the inclination nor the ability to "think for themselves." We are not surprised. We are not indignant. We are concerned.

The best-motivated, fairest reporter or government spokesperson will face obstacles when presenting information and reasoning to a general audience. The best-motivated, brightest viewer will be overwhelmed by the mountain of daily information - mostly bad news - that he or she is asked to evaluate.

I see the human media world as competitive, noisy and confusing. Wrong ideas proliferate like weeds. This journalistic and promotional activity provides “pseudo-knowledge,” also known as "nonsense."

I advise everyone to treat media hype as the major obstacle to understanding what is true and really real. Obviously, we all like the idea of easy understanding and we like quick fixes to complicated problems. We are constantly tempted by promises that a quick fix is available; hawkers want to sell you something quick, cheap and easy to use -- you do not have to be responsible for yourself. All claims of quick fixes are false claims. This is a law of the universe.

One way to control the public mind is to use mass media to persuade entire populations to think and behave in specific ways. You could argue that the knowledge and skills used by good advertising agencies are the same tools of used by political propagandists. In the best case, advertising is more benevolent, designed to entertain, inform and motivate you to purchase a product. In an even better case, the skills of advertising can be used to persuade citizens to behave in a more constructive manner, improve their heath and to treat others with more kindness and concern. In the worse case, advertising is intrusive, dishonest and devious. In any case, skillful advertising works to sell products, just as skillful propaganda can turn lies into public policy. Since most citizens of affluent countries are tuned into multimedia every day, advertising and propaganda are pervasive influences determining their beliefs and behavior.

Weapons or Reason? in the 21st Century

2009-10-06T16:09:00.006-07:00

I am assuming that world leaders are eager to hear my advice, since they seem to be confused about the proper direction for their foreign policies. NATO troops should leave Afganistan. NATO should be reconfigured to support peacekeeping and development in failed nations. Governments should adopt rational policies of progressive disarmament and spend destruction money on constructive projects instead.

In my counterfactual world, here are only defensive military organizations and no adventitious killing. Nations are respectful, generous and tolerant of each others’ differences. Disputes are resolved by negotiation, grooming, gift-giving, concerts, sports and shared celebrations. There are no “terrorists” since all humans would have constructive ways of expressing and remedying their grievances. The United Nations would be reorganized and would flourish as a forum of cooperation.

Belligerent politicians would be given the opportunity to duel with each other in public displays of their skill and courage as warriors. They would not be seen as heroes but as irrational pugilists, atavistic misfits that need to do battle in ceremonial combat without harming others. If Bush disliked Hussein, he would challenge him to a duel. Let the best man win. You would save a hundred thousand lives and a trillion US dollars spend on destroying Iraq’s infrastructure. The domestic economy of the US would flourish with constructive, humanitarian enterprises and would not miss the vanishing munitions industry.

Of course, for some time, one of the political impasses in every society occurs between hawks and doves. While one group is directly or indirectly approving of solders killing others in defense of “freedom” another group is opposing combat roles. Weapon lovers talk about the enemy with great enthusiasm. They want to use freedom destroying weapons to defend freedom. Without an enemy, expensive weapons look ridiculous. Hopeful idealists imagine a different nonviolent world with an external nervous system that links minds in grooming and altruistic information sharing that will render the two military activities (killing and property destruction) obsolete.

Anyone who really wants peace will have to confront and constrain governments that spend their money on weapons. They will have to reduce and redefine the nature and conduct of military organizations. The power of the military industrial complex must be reduced. The international sale of surplus armaments must cease. Guns at home must be banned. The problem, of course, is that so far no country will agree to unilateral disarmament. In the USA, few citizens will give up their own guns. They are ready to fight. Everyone has to disarm at the same time to the same degree and so far, this is impossible.

Every country that can afford high tech weapons makes a substantial investment in armaments. As new weapons are manufactured in more affluent countries, older weapons are sold to poorer countries so that the ability to destroy property and kill humans is well distributed over the planet.

The Kalashnikov AK-47 is a hand-held automatic rifle; an agent of death that sprays bullets in the direction it is pointed. Little or no training is required to kill other humans. Several countries manufacture and export them. They are sold to governments, criminals, civilians, terrorist and are used by child soldiers. Hodges described Kalashnikov societies where the proliferation of the weapon “makes it impossible for civil society to assert itself and halt the killing.”

A report compiled by the US Congressional Research Service stated: "We are at a point in history where many of these sales are not essential for the self-defense of these countries and the arms being sold continue to fuel conflicts and tensions in unstable areas...Where before the principal motivation for arms sales by foreign suppliers might have been to support a foreign policy objective, today that motivation may be based on economic motives." In 2008, the United States was responsible for two-thirds of all armaments sales to other countries, valued at $37.8 billion, increased from $25.4 billion sales in 2007. Italy was second, with $3.7 billion in weapons sales in 2008. Russian sales were down from the $10.8 billion in 2007 to 3.5 billion in 2008. Sales from the US to developing nations included a $6.5 billion air defense system for the United Arab Emirates, a $2.1 billion jet fighter deal with Morocco and a $2 billion attack helicopter agreement with Taiwan. Other large weapons agreements were reached with India, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, South Korea and Brazil.

India and China, the two most populous nations on the planet are creating large, powerful military organizations with nuclear weapons. China has advanced missile and submarine technology that gives them the offensive capacities that rival the worst that the US and Russia have to offer. The balance of power is shifting to Asia.

The idea that dominates the human mind is not to avoid war, but to avoid losing a war. Eisenhower was right. The military industrial complex is a powerful parasite that absorbs inordinate wealth, dedicated only to destruction and death. The cover of national security and military honor keeps most citizens confused and docile. At home, military personnel wear attractive uniforms adorned with badges, and medals. They have bands, marches, and perform impressive funerals. Their cemeteries and national monuments to honor dead soldiers are often visited by patriotic citizens.

Soldiers are rewarded for destroying property and killing other humans; they cannot make independent evaluations based on deeply felt, personal expressions of caring, concern, justice and freedom. Military personnel have ethics or rules of conduct that control their behavior within military organizations. There are also “rules of war” that are often ignored in combat situations. An ethical soldier may do great harm to others as long as he protects his comrades and follows orders. Some soldiers are sociopathic criminals who take advantage of war to commit atrocities against civilians.

While you could argue that many soldiers are basically good people who commit socially sanctioned crimes, there is an equal argument that soldiers are the agents of evil and cannot be excused. There is another argument that soldiers are also victims. They are killed by the people they are supposed to kill, but more, they are agents of a political elite who chose war over negotiation and compromise. The politicians do not go to war, nor do their family members. High ranking officers stay at a safe distance from the battles and order others to kill and be killed.

As visiting paleoanthropologists, we recognize this reptilan behavior, still active in the majority of humans. Is there hope for a new human nature emerging from the military mind, still preoccupied by death and destruction?

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason

Civility and the Masses

2009-09-23T12:29:00.004-07:00

Conspicuous displays of irrationality and belligerence in the USA, and a "toxic" parliament in Canada where policians complete to win the prize for the most insulting, hostile behavior, I updated my notes on human conduct. I feel priviledged to live far away from the maddening crowd. I can enjoy a dispassionate view of my fellow humans, furry little creatures who seem unable to achieve any cooperative stability. In Group Dynamics, I wrote:

"The term “civil” refers, in part, to strategies and devices use to regulate the interface between individual interests and community interests. A civil society is characterized by a multilayered system of organizations that meet, discuss, vote and contribute to the well-being of the community. In an ideal civil society, individual and civil interests are congruent and there is no conflict.

The maintenance of civility requires the imposition of attitudes, expectations, beliefs, rules and the enforcement of codes of conduct. The main dynamic in a free society involves the defense of social civility by law and the defense of civil liberties by individuals and groups who champion personal freedom.

Socialism refers to political movements based on the idea that citizens of a state should own and manage the means of production and distribution of life’s necessities. In the best case, an ideal egalitarian society distributes resources equitably and provides safety and security for its citizens.

The problem with social idealism is that human nature cannot be changed. Humans naturally compete and distribute resources through hierarchical networks. To change a more or less spontaneous order, a revolutionary group needs to arbitrarily construct a political and economic system. There have been many versions of imposed socialism and many revolutions that failed. A reasonable historian can conclude that communism introduced by revolution in Russia and China failed and is being replaced by hybrid economies that combine “free enterprise” with state-owned enterprise.

What is remarkable about socialist ideas in the US is the paranoid resistance that arises from advocates of capitalism, a resistance organized by dominant humans who will fight to maintain control of resources and wealth. Ideological battles are disguises for real fighting to defend and expand territory, wealth and dominance.

Large aggregations of humans grew beyond reasonable limits in the 20th century. The tendency for the largest coalitions of nations to break up into smaller units is probably adaptive and represents an old primate tendency. The tendency in business for large companies to merge and form international conglomerates is driven by rational goals and means, but goes beyond human cognitive abilities. These large organizations are not likely to endure. Large assemblies become unfriendly and inefficient and eventually fail unless they are re-organized into subgroups that are small enough to allow individuals to work effectively together.

The Masses

From the viewpoint of a single person, only a small number of other humans can be recognized as individuals. Only individuals have thoughts, feelings, status and rights. All the rest turn into "the masses". As humans adapt to living in large groups, some peculiar attitudes emerge in an attempt to cope with a large number of other humans out there that you cannot know, cannot understand and cannot trust. While categories are inevitable, the human tendency is to rely on broad generalizations. A distinction has to be made between concepts, principles and axioms that reveal the essence of human tendencies and categories that lack cogent information.

Humans often lack a sense of appropriateness when they go beyond names and concepts that apply to a better-known, local community. Categories are improvised to collect faceless people of indeterminate numbers into imaginary groups. An American will tell about Europeans in a few sentences and a European will tell you about Americans. These broad categories have almost no informational value, but they do serve the cause of prejudice. Every human walks around with a collection of generalizations and categorical prejudices and generally feels comfortable with this "knowledge base."

The reader will be reassured to know that I have been on duty for many years, notebook in hand, studying the masses. One of my vantage points was a local café where I listened to conversations and studied human behavior as I read newspapers. One sunny afternoon on the café patio, a loud male speaker in his early 20's was holding forth about the "masses" and what the "masses want" and what the "masses don't know." There was a bit of conspiracy theory thrown in for good measure. This young man didn't score high on the impromptu coffee shop IQ test - he got 100- but his remarks epitomize an approach that is common "among the masses". Since identities blur as the distance increases, there is a tendency to use all inclusive, general and vague categories for everyone who does not belong to your inner circle. As you move further and further away from home, even these general categories blur.

The dangerous aspect of the young man's concern is the possibility that he, in all his wisdom, will figure out what the masses really need and, with a small band of trusted cronies, he will set out to save the world. Despots are people who know what the masses need and impose their will. As the distance from other humans increases, the other humans lose their humanity and may become victims of despots who treat them as tokens in the video game of life.

From Group Dynamics by Stephen Gislason 2009

Solving Big Problems

2009-09-14T09:48:00.004-07:00

An exoteric view of the human experience identifies three deeply embedded problems that require solutions.

1. The human destruction of nature.
2. The human destruction of humans
3. Dysfunctional Minds…ignorance, delusions, anger, hatred.

We have recognized that the key human survival is group cooperation, integrated with individual specialization and motivation. Education and government involve social devices that, in the best case, smooth out the negative effects of individual limitations and irrationality. The understanding and solution of “social problems” often involves the interaction of elite and educated groups with aberrant, dysfunctional groups. Human societies involve increasing specialization of individuals who are skillful at performing single tasks. Most humans, even highly skilled specialists, live with a minimum level of overall comprehension and tend to regress to old and innate patterns if societal controls are inadequate to constrain competitive and hostile behaviors. Anarchy can replace order, even in the most polite societies. Most humans remain misinformed and unreasonable as long as a small number of more reasonable and skillful humans build and maintain infrastructures that support them.

Science and Technology

There is little doubt that humans benefit from some technologies and suffer from others. We know in the most general terms that affluence and education creates more cooperative people. Clean air, water and healthy food produce healthy people who are more optimistic and cooperative. The problem, of course, is that small groups of smart, innovative, technically advanced humans face much larger groups who offer stubborn resistance to change or who destroy what others create. The economic crisis of 2008-2009 proved to be an opportunity for innovation with no shortage of ideas for providing renewable energy sources, improving methods of transportation, improving food production and distribution.

As the price of oil increased, alternative energy technologies became more viable in the marketplace. Good ideas and technical innovations proliferated in an encouraging manner. Big companies moved quickly in the direction of “green technologies” and some CEOs appeared to have experienced life-altering epiphanies. The favored sources of new energy are wind, solar, hydroelectric generation, hydrogen and nuclear. None of these technologies can soon satisfy the huge energy appetite of 6.5 billion humans. New designs may make nuclear energy more available, more affordable, safer and less expensive to maintain. One ingenious design creates a small 20 kilowatt generator that is delivered by truck, runs silently for several years and when it runs low on fuel, it is shipped back to the factory and recycled. The solution for spent nuclear fuels is to recycle rather than bury in the ground.

A hydrogen fuel infrastructure may develop, but only when basic problems are solved. Problem one is that it requires a lot of energy to create hydrogen from water. Hydroelectric plants are one solution. Solar and wind energy might be used to create hydrogen. Small,modular nuclear reactors could provide the energy for a hydrogen plants, well distributed in areas of energy need.

Scientists, in the best case, are people who make discoveries. They are curious, innovative and want to solve problems that have never been solved before. Most of the problems that I have identified have an existing technical solution or may be resolved by scientific discovery.

To be a good scientist, you have to tolerate uncertainty and enjoy entertaining a number of possible scenarios. Einstein suggested that he developed the Theory of General Relativity because he was curious and child-like; he continued to ask simple questions about essential phenomena – light, gravity, waves and energy. The best questions are “Why does…” What if….” I wonder what would happen if…” What is really going here?”

You cannot be a good scientist if you entertain too many improbable scenarios and get carried away with wild speculations, fears and fantasies. Sane reality testing requires you to live in the real and natural world as much as possible. If you do not test your perceptions and skills in the real world, you will become noumenal, delusional and will have a poor understanding of real relationships and real consequences. I do not trust humans who spend all their time inside buildings and who derive all their knowledge from books, journals and conferences.

An editorial in Nature described the need to support innovators with “crazy ideas’ since most advances in science are not planned in advance but happen serendipitously. The editor pointed to the Gates Foundation as a model for other research agencies…How many potentially groundbreaking ideas are dragged down a dark alley and quietly strangled by overly conservative peer review of grant proposals? Research funding should strive for a balanced portfolio that includes both safe investments and higher-risk work. While the world's financial system has been inflated with wildly excessive risk, research funding has had the opposite problem — exacerbated by ever greater competition for limited funds, it is overly wedded to safe, unadventurous research. This, in effect, ostracizes off-the-wall ideas, which often cross disciplinary boundaries and would have potentially big payoffs should they work. Researchers long ago learned that the last people they should tell about their big ideas are their sources of financial support. To be fair, there are exceptions to such conservatism. The US National Institutes of Health, for example, has systematically promoted risky research through several initiatives.

I have already discussed some of the advantages and disadvantages of the media, the internet and wireless communication links . While there are suggestions of benefit from social networks online, this virtual reality does harm by disconnecting people from the real world, and replaces real friends with casual contacts that promise more than they can actually deliver. The free access into the internet requires vigilance against malice, libel, and crime. You might argue that only in an idealized virtual world such as second life, where real people are replaced by avatars can benefit (as an illusion) be realized. Increasingly, safe participation in the internet requires barriers, enclosures, gates and other security measures that increase distrust and create distance. The ongoing challenge of using the internet is not seeking more exposure to others, but needing selective, non-intrusive, non-threatening exposure to others.

Hope for a Cure to Nuclear Insanity

2009-07-06T14:03:00.009-07:00

Congratulations to US President, Obama, and Russia’s President, Medvedev, who have just announced a preliminary agreement to reduce each country’s stockpiles of strategic nuclear weapons by as much as one third. Even more encouraging, they declared an intention work toward a broader agreement to put the world on a path toward eliminating nuclear weapons altogether. Finally sanity has returned to the international stage. Obama stated: “This is an urgent issue, and one in which the United States and Russia have to take leadership. It is very difficult for us to exert that leadership unless we are showing ourselves willing to deal with our own nuclear stockpiles in a more rational way.”

The US has 1,198 land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-based missiles and bombers, capable of delivering 5,576 warheads; an estimated 2,200 nuclear warheads are deployed for immediate use. Russia reported 816 delivery vehicles capable of delivering 3,909 warheads Both sides also have nueclear weapons in storage and thousands of smaller yield “tactical nuclear weapons” that are not reported.

We have cute, euphemistic terms to describe hydrogen bombs that can destroy cities in seconds and leave a lasting legacy of radiation and devastation. An apocalyptic, world-destroying weapon becomes a “strategic warhead” delivered by a nice missile – the same kind that NASA uses to deliver goods into earth orbit. I was born in 1943 and grew up with the idea that the human world could be destroyed by nuclear bombs. In recent years the reality of these bombs has disappeared from view. I want to share the section in my book, Surviving Human Nature, that deals with nuclear weapons:

Doomsday

My early life was dominated by three horrific preoccupations; the holocaust, the hydrogen bomb and the destruction of animals and their natural environments all over planet earth. By age ten, I knew in theory how to construct both fission and fusion bombs and knew how destructive they were. I would study civil defense maps showing the extent of destruction from hydrogen bombs of different strengths exploded above Canadian and US cities. Later, I took courses in nuclear physics and the medical management of radiation sickness. For many years, I belonged to organizations that protested the development of more nuclear bombs. If you asked me in 1970, I would have told you that I had little confidence in modern civilization and wanted to live away from urban centers and the madness prevalent in the world. For me, the natural world of coastal British Columbia was sane, rational and enduring. Here, I felt part of an ancient natural order that would continue even if humans departed. I could ignore, at least for awhile, the folly of self-destructive humans.

Albert Einstein revealed the stunning relationship of mass to energy in the famous formula, E=mc². The speed of light, C, is a large number so that a small amount of annihilated mass produces a large amount of energy. This equation explains the prodigious energy production of our sun and other stars. Einstein did not imagine man-made devices that suddenly convert mass to energy, creating gigantic explosions. The discovery of the neutron chain reaction in radioactive materials such as purified uranium suggested the possibility of a nuclear bomb. A physicist friend, Leo Szilard, who had patented an atomic bomb design in 1934, feared that Germany might construct nuclear weapons and encouraged Einstein to sign letter to US President Roosevelt, warning him.

A second Einstein-Szilard letter was sent in March 1940 and led to the Manhattan Project in 1942, designed to produce nuclear bombs based on the fission of purified, radioactive uranium. Scientist from all over the US were recruited to purify bomb-grade uranium and to work out the details of a denotation system under the direction of physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer. The scientists had been highly motivated to end the destruction inflicted on the world by Germany and Japan. Their work lead to the sustained proliferation of nuclear weapons in the US, Russia and six other countries. The US tested at least 1100 nuclear weapons and continues to maintain the second largest stockpiles of nuclear weapons in the world. Sensible humans were alarmed by the persistent belligerence of the US and the Soviet Union and sought to limit or abolish nuclear weapons.

Plutonium, the second fissile elements used to create nuclear explosives, is not found in significant quantities in nature. The production of plutonium started with the Manhattan Project and accelerated as nuclear reactors were built for weapons production and for power generation. Plutonium is created in a nuclear reactor by bombarding 238 Uranium with neutrons to produce the isotope 239 U, which beta decays becoming a neptunium isotope which again beta decays to 239 Plutonium. Uranium and plutonium are radioactive substances that release radiation – electrons, neutrons, alpha particles, X-rays and gamma rays.

When the bomb project began, scientists did not understand the health damaging effects of radiation. In the US, reckless if not cruel experiments were inflicted on naive “volunteers” to determine the effects of radiation on human subjects. Credit goes to the US Department of Energy who established the Office of Human Radiation Experiments in March 1994 to reveal the shocking story of radiation research using human subjects in the US.

The complete detonation of one kilogram of plutonium produces an explosion equal to about 20,000 tons of chemical explosive. Nuclear explosions produce blast effects, thermal radiation, ionizing radiation and delayed effects, such as radioactive fallout that can damage all living creatures hours to years after the blast. When a nuclear bomb is detonated on or near the Earth's surface, the blast destroys everything in a central zone, creating a large crater. A cloud of particles rises into the air and returns to the earth’s surface downwind as radioactive fallout.
An intense burst of thermal and gamma radiation travels at the speed of light in all directions. The flash of light is followed by a blast wave followed by hurricane-like winds.

Humans who survive the direct blast can be injured in many ways. For example, gamma radiation exposure causes radiation sickness and death. Thermal radiation and secondary fires will cause burns in many of the blast survivors. Third-degree burns over 24 percent of the body, or second-degree burns over 30 percent of the body, will be fatal unless prompt, specialized medical care is available. Fallout consists of particles made radioactive by the explosion, distributed at varying distances from the site of the blast. The fallout is greater if the burst is close to the surface. The area and intensity of the fallout are determined by local weather conditions. Winds and rain distribute radioactive particles.

Areas receiving contaminated rainfall become "hot spots," with greater radiation intensity than their surroundings. Radioactive isotopes enter the soil, the groundwater and accumulate in rivers and lakes. Lower level radiation exposure received by people hundreds to thousands of miles from the blast center leads to delayed consequences such as cancer many years after exposure.

The ongoing manufacture of plutonium is one of the many features of political processes that ran amok after the Second World War. While nuclear energy offered an alternative to burning fossil fuel to produce electricity there are contingent problems that have never been resolved. One of the problems is the increasing stockpiles of plutonium created by nuclear reactors.

Sherwin summarized the nuclear insanity:” Armed with tens of thousands of nuclear weapons capable of being launched from land, sea, and air, the United States and the Soviet Union became prisoners of a cold war process that neither controlled. Locked into a nuclear arms race justified by national security, they increased their peril, diminished their economies, and promoted an international atmosphere of impending catastrophe. While each government held the population of the other hostage to annihilation, both engaged in conventional wars on the territories of other nations. Occasionally, as in the Berlin crisis of 1961 and the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, they pushed each other to the nuclear brink. Living in the nuclear bull's-eye became a way of life. How to prevent the nuclear system from becoming a way of death was the question that dominated the debate over nuclear weapons from their inception. Most responses to it promoted the nuclear arms race, including the massive retaliation doctrine, limited nuclear war plans, the concept of mutual assured destruction (mad), the Strategic Defense Initiative, and even the salt and start arms control negotiations.”

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and the Federation of Atomic Scientists was founded in the fall of 1945 by scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project that produced atomic bombs in the US. The first two atom bombs exploded over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. The scientists had cooperated in an accelerated, well-focused program to build the atomic bombs, but realized afterwards that the US government and indeed all governments would not be competent to control the development and use of nuclear weapons. They wanted to insure that nuclear weapons were never again used. One of their tasks was to educate everyone about the unprecedented destructive power of these weapons. A “doomsday clock” has been a feature on the cover of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists since 1947.

The idea is that a group of concerned scientists would keep the rest of the world’s citizens informed about the danger of nuclear war. They estimate man's proximity to nuclear war and expressed this as minutes to midnight. The doomsday clock has hovered close to midnight since its inception. In 1947 we were 2 minutes to midnight. Just after the cold war ended, we were 17 minutes to midnight. In March 2005 we returned to 7 minutes to midnight, partly because of the renewed belligerence and irrationality of the Bush administration in the USA.

The Atomic Scientists stated: “We move the (clock) hands taking into account both negative and positive developments. The negative developments include too little progress on global nuclear disarmament; growing concerns about the security of nuclear weapons materials worldwide; the continuing U.S. preference for unilateral action rather than cooperative international diplomacy; U.S. abandonment of the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty and U.S. efforts to thwart the enactment of international agreements designed to constrain proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons; the crisis between India and Pakistan; terrorist efforts to acquire and use nuclear and biological weapons; and the growing inequality between rich and poor around the world that increases the potential for violence and war… More than 31,000 nuclear weapons are still maintained by the eight known nuclear powers, a decrease of only 3,000 since 1998. Ninety-five percent of these weapons are in the United States and Russia, and more than 16,000 are operationally deployed. Even if the United States and Russia complete their recently announced arms reductions over the next 10 years, they will continue to target thousands of nuclear weapons against each other. Furthermore, many if not most of the U.S. warheads removed from the active stockpile will be placed in storage (along with some 5,000 warheads already held in reserve) rather than dismantled, for the express purpose of re-deploying them in some future contingency. As a result, the total U.S. stockpile will remain at more than 10,000 warheads for the foreseeable future. Russia, on the other hand, seeks a verifiable, binding agreement that would ensure retired U.S. and Russian weapons are actually destroyed, a position we support… As a first step in moving toward a safer world, we urge the United States and Russia to commit to reduce their nuclear arsenals to no more than 1,000 warheads each by the end of the decade... Both countries should commit to storing and disposing of the resulting fissile material in a manner that makes the reductions irreversible. “

Luongo and Hoehn stated: “The cooperative threat reduction programs operating in Russia and other former Soviet states have been an unprecedented nonproliferation success. But the threat reduction agenda now faces a potential crisis driven by mounting unsolved problems and lingering policy disputes. If new agreements are not reached and greater flexibility is not introduced soon, major elements of the agenda could be derailed. Threat reduction--securing and eliminating weapons and weapons of mass destruction materials--is a unique post-Cold War tool, filling the gap between diplomacy and negotiation on the one hand and sanctions and military action on the other. “

You could argue that we need not worry. We have lived with nuclear weapons since 1945 and we are still alive. Or, you could argue that nuclear weapons remain extremely dangerous, evil and stupid beyond any stupidity that humans have previously manifest. If you tend toward the second argument, as I do, you will need to actively promote disarmament. The people who can best do this live in the US and, by numbers, are in the minority there.

Some of the smartest and most politically effective people I have known live in the US. I have admired their consistent activism that began in the 1960’s, liberated women, liberated black Americans, ended the Viet Nam war and put the country on a course toward disarmament. When Mikhail Gorbachev emerged as the great peacemaker from the Soviet Union, there were enough sane people in the US who were ready to negotiate disarmament to overcome Regan’s resistance. The problem, revealed in the US, is that Presidents and their administrations often act irrationally and arbitrarily without compassion or remorse. They can be, in other words, sociopathic. Belligerent attitudes in government are least likely to be constrained by ordinary political processes and must be opposed by citizen’s coalitions who are committed to rational and peaceful solutions to world problems and are willing to act with courage and determination close to home.

The organization, United for Peace and Justice stated in May 2005: “Sixty years ago, the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, killing hundreds of thousands of people. World leaders and citizens from around the world are converging on the United Nations to decide the fate of the endangered Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). The nuclear weapons states, led by the U.S., are hypocritically accusing other nations of seeking nuclear arms while ignoring their own disarmament obligations. The Bush administration lied when it went to war in Iraq by claiming Saddam Hussein had “weapons of mass destruction.” This war rages on, with mounting casualties on all sides, a country in ruins, and escalating costs here at home, Washington is turning its sights on Iran and North Korea, seeking again to inflame public fears of a new nuclear threat. At the same time, the U.S. is modernizing its nuclear arsenal and expanding the role of nuclear weapons in its “national security” policy. On Sunday, May 1, the day before the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review begins at the United Nations, United for Peace and Justice held a massive demonstration for global nuclear disarmament, culminating in a rally in New York City's Central Park. We call for an end to the Iraq war and the worldwide abolition of all nuclear weapons.”

In his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the United Nations' nuclear monitoring agency, suggested that the world should stop treating the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea as isolated cases and instead deal with them in a common effort to eliminate poverty, organized crime and armed conflict. He stated: "More than 15 years after the end of the cold war, it is incomprehensible to many that the major nuclear weapon states operate with their arsenals on hair-trigger alert. Despite some disarmament, the existence of 27,000 nuclear warheads in various hands around the world still hold the prospect of devastation of entire nations in a matter of minutes. No less dangerous, he added, are the presumed efforts of extremist groups to acquire nuclear materials. We cannot respond to these threats by building more walls, developing bigger weapons or dispatching more troops. These threats require multinational cooperation. “

The world economic crisis that began in 2008 became an opporutinity for world leaders to meet as crisis managers with a new willingness to overcome old obstacles, seeking greater cooperation. A 2009 editorial in the journal, Nature, stated:” Nuclear non-proliferation's moment has come. Scientists must help governments to seize a historic opportunity to avoid future apocalypse. Nothing poses a greater threat for creating further crises than nuclear weapons, either in existing stockpiles or through their acquisition by an increasing number of states — or by terrorists… UK prime minister, Gordon Brown, has signalled that he is ready to put cuts to his country's arsenal on the table. US president Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev are expected to sign a pledge at the G20 meeting to reach an agreement by the end of the year to make substantial cuts to their nuclear arsenals… But the world's leaders need to go much further. Over the past decade the whole fabric of the nuclear non-proliferation regime has begun to unravel — notably through the failure to implement ways to strengthen the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, such as through a Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. The situation is now dire. North Korea, which tested a nuclear device in 2006, seems set to test an intercontinental ballistic missile within days. Pakistan, which is estimated to have dozens of nuclear warheads, is politically unstable. And Iran, according to many scientists, now has enough fuel-grade low-enriched uranium to convert into a bomb's worth of highly enriched uranium, should it choose to do so. These challenges will only grow more acute if, as expected, nuclear power is revived around the world as a way to mitigate climate change. A solution is urgently needed to ensure that the fuel intended for civilian nuclear reactors, as well as the huge amount of waste they produce, is not diverted to military ends. Some radical solutions are already under discussion, such as bringing all fuel-production facilities under multinational control… scientists and engineers can play a crucial part by redoubling their efforts to create informal scientific and diplomatic backchannels. Indeed, there is cause for optimism on the nuclear front. Obama's pledge to work towards a world free of nuclear weapons seems sincere, and is galvanizing support for new multilateral efforts in non-proliferation. With quick action, moreover, there is still time to build enough political momentum and preparation to make substantial progress at next year's crucial review conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The United States could send a strong signal here by sending the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty to the Senate for ratification — as Obama has said he intends to do. As Brown said in a landmark speech on the topic on 17 March, it is time "to transform the discussion of nuclear disarmament from one of platitudes to one of hard commitments".”

See Surviving Human Nature by Stephen Gislason

Cities and Sustainability

2009-05-19T14:57:00.000-07:00

Human history is dialectical -- good and bad at play. There are progressions that look like we are improving and regressions that look like no improvement will endure. I have been working on ideas of technological salvation from such adversities as pollution, starvation and pandemic disease. The past 2 weeks has been ( let's be nice) a festival of confusion, exaggeration and misinformation about influenza viruses. Influenza was invented as a distraction from the US economic castrophe, and destruction and killing in many countries, far away. Let a us take a little holiday and imagine how cities of the future might become healthy, sane environments.

William Rees, an economist at the University of British Columbia took an ecological approach to economics. He is concerned that cities are growing too large to be sustainable. Cities are centers of consumption and depend on the surrounding environment to supply energy, food and to accept and disperse waste. Rees has measured the ecological footprint of cities and his results are not encouraging.

City states are depleting these resources at an alarming rate – fish stocks are depleted; soils are depleted, washed or blown away; fresh water supplies are marginal, depleted or contaminated; the air is polluted and ozone depletion combined with global warming from increased greenhouse gases threatens progressive and erratic climate changes. Climate changes threaten agriculture, as we know it.

At the end of the 20th century, 1.1 billion people live in large cities with populations in the millions; their carbon dioxide emissions are greater than the capacity of all the world’s forests to process the gas. One city person requires at least five square hectares of high quality land to support him or her. The 500,000 people living in the city of Vancouver on 11,400 hectares of land actually require the output of 2.3 million hectares of land. The real capital is not money but air, water, food and other resources.

Many scientists have imagined major disruptions of city-states with civil disobedience and armed conflicts arising from the competition for scarce resources. Solutions are available but are improbable, given our basic tendencies.

A sane, rational city-state would limit its growth; limit its pollution and progress toward food, water and air sustainability. If all long-distance supplies were blocked could the citizens of a city continue to live comfortable, healthy lives? One criterion of a sane city would be self-sufficiency. To make cities more livable and less polluted, car use would be reduced to less than half of current levels and car-free zones would restore healthier living conditions for many citizens.

For many urban dwellers, advanced electronic networking would reduce the need for commuting and long-distance travel would be considered a luxury and rationed. The need to transport food and goods would be reduced by increased local production. The transportation of goods would be streamlined into centrally controlled supply lines that achieve maximal efficiency. We could advance toward intelligent distribution systems such as large pneumatic or electromagnetic tubes that send containers between city centers at high speed with minimal pollution. It is absurd to have goods distributed in trucks, in traffic, chaotically with no cost effective distribution plan. Food can be grown and processed within a city by returning some of the land area to market gardens and intensive greenhouse technology.

Each city would have to renew and support a surrounding agricultural zone. Cities would essentially backtrack about 100 years when food supply lines were shorter and farmers living adjacent to the cities could supply most of the food. Cities, like cancers have grown unchecked, metastasized and destroyed much of the support system they used to enjoy. The humanity of a city can be restored by creating living arrangements that promote a return to groups of individuals that know each other and can relate to each other – small communities.

Local groups can relate to their natural environment and can return to an understanding of how to supply their own needs. If a group does not have a natural environment that they relate to, then the group will be dysfunctional and members of the group will be sick animals. If a group grows too large for individuals to know and relate to each, then the group will be dysfunctional – sick humans.

In poor countries, images of attractive, well-dressed people whose main job appears to be enjoyment and adventure create immediate dissatisfaction with local life. The happy and adapted poor become the dissatisfied and disenfranchised who abandon traditional ways of life for jobs that are often transient, demeaning and fail to deliver the wealth necessary to achieve the glamorous movie-magazine lifestyle.

Humans continue to have basic needs – shelter, food, safety and sexual privileges. Getting connected to affluent media in a poor village in Africa is counterproductive without opportunities to apply new desires, knowledge and ideas.

We would do better to encourage restoration of local economies and expand efforts to reduce overpopulation in areas that cannot support the population. New methods of resolving conflicts are required. Funds to rebuilt decaying agricultural and community infrastructures are needed. Before communication networks look attractive, their information content must be relevant and supportive of the recipients’ needs.

From Surviving Human Nature by Stephen Gislason