Pensées: Thinking while Running

These thoughts were started when running alone some awhile back. They finished by writing them down here. But then I started running again.

Thinking About Nothing

Today on my jog today I decided to think about nothing. My run is my meditation time and today I tried to do what Sensei Tanouye once taught me. I concentrate on my breath in and out, in and out, in and out. I empty my mind of everything and then gradually concentrate on nothing and let go of that as well.

Sensei told me that things/concepts would intrude but just accept them and let them pass by. And so I began thinking about nothing.

The first nothing that pops in is zero. How lucky humans were to discover zero which would found our math, our science and our technology.

I let it go and run on.

Jean Paul Sartre taught that consciousness or radical subjectivity is nothing, the opposite of something or the object. And Heidegger followed up with consciousness as time so time is not a thing but the background on which things appear.

I let it go and run on.

I am nothing. There is no ego entity but simply a collectivity of perceptions. My ownership and my control of these images or ideas are but illusions.

I let it go and run on.

Death is the final emptying out. There may be some worth in trying to prolong death, but ultimately it is futile. Life is simply Bede’s bird flying out of the darkness through the window into the lit mead hall and out the other side.

I let it go and run on.

Creation of the universe from nothing — perhaps quantum fluctuations of possible particles and boom! the big bang of birth towards entropy.

I let it go and run on.

Dark matter, hypothesized by its gravitational effects, is it the new ether? — the void through which galaxies and stars and planets and all things travel. Nature abhors a vacuum. There is no being without nothing; there is nothing without being.

I let it go and run on.

Philosophers say God is discovered through analogy, the biggest and best of everything, the Big Thing, the Ultimate Person, the Absolute Idea, the union of essence and existence, the Uncaused Cause. But Mystics of all traditions encounter God, not analogically, but negatively, as No Thing, as No Person, as No Idea, without both essence and existence. Total Absence. The Void. Consciousness itself.

I let it go and run on.

Thinking is nothing opposing things in the universe. It can say no to every idea that comes forth, every answer that is proposed, every law that is made. It is rebellion. It is transcendence.

I let it go and run on.

I begin to feel my body aching yet exhilarated. I begin to notice my breath labored yet inspiring.

But it is nothing.

Carpe Diem

Robin Williams is dead. The news startled many, including me. Because he was so admired. Because he made us laugh. At ourselves. At the world. At everything.

But for those of us who have suffered clinical depression, this event was special because he killed himself — something many of us have contemplated. And perhaps even those of us who have been treated, take medication, practice positive thinking, exercise regularly, get plenty of light, keep learning new things, socialize with friends, and maintain a project in life, still do from time to time. When the dark matter and energy overcome our outward expansion and start compressing us inwards.

We understand why. It is simply to flee the insufferable pain. It is a useless, irrational, purposeless pain we know when we think about it. But thinking about it often doesn’t help, and may make it worse. We know how fragile we are but don’t want to admit it for fear of using it to manipulate others which simply adds to our self-loathing.

Yes, self-loathing — a sense of self which is useless, incompetent, without value. A self that looks at others and grandizes their accomplishments, products and achievement we cannot even understand much less duplicate. A sense of self that is not a partner with or part of others, but a competitor in some sort of race to nothing. A sense that I am not God, in control. I’m not even Robin Williams or Barack Obama.

Stupid, of course. But whether caused by genes or memes, heredity or culture (and certainly both are related), there it is. I am what I yam, as Robin William’s Popeye says. And I am grateful.

So Robin died. And so will I. He died earlier than he had to. But don’t too many of us do so? — the kids shot at Sandyhook, the kids in Gaza shelled while playing football on the beach, the kids without healthcare, the kids killed in a car crash or in a drone strike or terrorist attack. Suffering and dying — that’s life. Unnecessary suffering and dying — stopping it should be our project.

I will keep up my regimen to overcome my tendency to ruminate in depression even when I see my depression as a heightened state of consciousness, an insight into reality.

But I will follow the greatest advice that Robin gave us from the dead poet: Carpe Diem!

Thanks, Robin. You were a gift to us all.

Mythic Consciousness

Myth is usually contrasted with truth or reality in common sense language. And so does calling the story of The Resurrection of the Christ a “myth” label it an untruth or fantasy? What about the stories of Krishna or the Buddha? Then I am also delighting in the writing of Terry Pratchett and his stories of Discworld resting on four elephants standing on a giant turtle. Myth is associated with religions. Are any of them true? Is there a universal religion true for all humankind?

There are many good scientific thinkers who have studied the role of myth in human society and find myth an alternate way of perceiving reality and even a foundation for other ways of perceiving reality, including science. Among those thinkers I count Ernst Cassirer, Paul Tillich, Mircea Eliade, John Campbell, Karl Rahner, and numerous contemporaries in communication with evolutionary psychology and neuroscience.

Myth is an imaginative narrative that gives meaning to a clan or society by expressing its sacred origins, destiny, place in the world, relationship to others, reason to be, and rules to survive. It is an expression in story form of the human reach for life beyond death and our pursuit of infinity. Myth requires an understanding of the self or consciousness acting in a particular environment through the use of symbolic artifacts that can permit both planning for the future and memory of the past for guidance. I consider it an expression of human transcendence.

Culture is a basic element of being human, being associational, preserving life, using language and other forms of symbolic expression to pursue and make meaning of our life and action in the world. The story telling of myth founds that pursuit and making of meaning in all it’s forms including art, religion, common sense, and science. Even “quantum fluctuations” and the “Big Bang” is a highly metaphorical way to describe a model for the origins of the universe — or at least one of them, ours.

So is there a universal story to which all can agree for all time? I think not. I think that would actually stultify our search for meaning and our transcendence. Art, religion, common sense, and science are progressive — and sometimes regressive, depending on your own story and the ethical principles that arise from that story. Nevertheless for the compassion and unity of humanity, we must try to share our stories, interpret them to one another, learn from each other’s stories, critique our own stories or others’ when they are used to dominate and disrespect, and include everyone in the unfolding story of the universe.

Does that relegate the belief that Jesus rose from the dead to be assumed into Heaven as the Christ and source of eternal life as a mere myth? A myth, yes, but not a “mere” myth. It is an expression of the human relationship to infinity, for our transcending spirit, for our faith in our Future, and for our ongoing pursuit of truth through science that both shapes and is shaped by our images and myths.

Is there or can there be a universal religion? The answer is yes if it is an inclusive dynamic sharing of narratives that give meaning to diverse groups with diverse languages and cultures. The answer is no if you try to take one story and freeze it in time, elevating it above all the other stories that give people meaning. The universality is not in the expression, but in the drive for meaning that we all experience as we encounter each other, our world, and our universe.

Manifesto for a New Mind and Morality

The Global Political Economy is failing. The dominant arrangements of doing business, creating and maintaining wealth, and providing the means of livelihood are now threatening humanity by threatening the very conditions of human life.

The signs of this threat are:

• The growing gap between the extremely poor and the extremely rich and a dwindling middle class.

• The numerous popping “bubbles” of boom and bust stressing families and neighborhoods.

• The reliance for profit on disasters including war and ecological adversity.

• The depletion of earth, social, and political resources.

• The rapid warming of the earth and change of climate threatening future generations.

• The growing volatility within and among nations and groups.

• The frequent resort to violence and militarism.

• The loss of localism in business and commerce; and the increasing concentration of power in transnational corporations with little allegiance to the community or nation of origin.

• The separation of owners, workers, communities, and the earth.

• The dependency on massive financial institutions that control the supply and value of money.

• The ideological clashes irresolvable because of the contradictions in the fundamental premises of the old global economy.

While the effects of this economy are already devastating to the extremely poor, the devastation to the human species as a whole is not that far away. This argues for a sense of urgency to change our behavior profoundly and quickly. The rising appreciation of the destructiveness of the present global economy presents an opportunity to consider a different political economy, a sustainable or post-capitalism, by which humans would act more in concert with themselves, their neighbors and communities, and the earth, which is the primary condition of their life.

Such a political economy would:

1 Maintain the relationship between economy and ecology

2 Support all the capitals of human being, not just financial assets, to build true wealth holistically.

3 Represent an inside-out strategy that builds wealth on local, earth-based and community assets.

4 Base itself on an ethic of integrity, which is neither relativist nor absolutist, but holds creative tension in all dimensions of human being.

5 Nourish a politics of inclusion through interacting voluntary associations or publics to build a wealth in which all people profit.

6 Use measures of success that relate to maintaining and growing true wealth and the personal and public happiness of persons rather than the accumulated capacity to use up or consume.

7 Allow all persons options for livelihoods that are risky, creative, instructive, and satisfying of their deepest aspirations without the necessity of sacrificing the basic needs and conditions of life.

The highway to a new economy is neither incidental reform nor absolutist revolution. Reform that keeps the present arrangements and institutions or Revolution that brings in a utopian new order through force will not lead to a sustainable economy. Acting for a living, humane economy must be systemic and holistic, i.e. an economy constructed on entirely new principles and consisting in totally new arrangements in the way we do business with one another, yet building on and with our present communities and institutions. It will come not from a powerful and enlightened elite the top, nor from radically dejected victims at the bottom. It will develop from the inside out, within local communities, demonstrating the link of gaining livelihood and fostering the life processes of the earth in accords with the basic integrity of human existence and nature.

While the move to a new economy is urgent, it seems at times to be impossible. There are overpowering delusionsthat are holding us back. These delusions include the “myth of the invisible hand,” some transcendent intelligence that arises out of and guides individuals working for their own selfish interests without interference from others or the community. Another is the “collectivist utopia” under the authority of some religious or governmental leader or party. Still another delusion is “absolute truth,” revealed by a World Spirit or Omniscient Entity, written in a holy book or constitution or philosophy that removes the human spirit from the responsibility of dealing with the messiness of matter.

More formidable are the institutions in which we have encased ourselves for our own survival that perpetuate the present economy: religious, educational, and cultural institutions, transnational corporations, and separate states whose officials are plutocrats or in the employ of oligarchs.

But this is not a time for the self-fulfilling prophesies of despair. It is the time for action out of hope in the regenerative ability of humanity.

A renewed political economy requires a new mind and a new morality that is happily revealing itself now in actual actions and events throughout the world. These acts of transformation are already transitioning our behavior towards a sustainable politics and economy.

These acts of transformation include:

• New ventures in “earth friendly” manufacturing and agriculture.

• Renewable energy enterprises to displace carbon-emitting producers.

• Urban planning and development for sustainable communities and agriculture.

• Government agencies partnering with local communities and cities to develop green energy and transportation infrastructure, universally accessible internet, and public education accessible to all.

• Private investment in community-building economic ventures.

• Community-oriented businesses and cooperatives. Corporations accountable to workers and community stakeholders over shareholder profit.

• Policies for security in meeting all basic life needs including nourishment, education, health, mobility, and shelter for all human beings.

• Experiments in liberating education that fosters innovation in science and art, creative earth-friendly technology, entrepreneurship in producing the means of livelihood, and shaping a personal and communal path to knowledge that is not measured by financial accumulation.

• Organization and development of voluntary organizations that promote a new, living economy and hold public and private institutions accountable.

Through these activities seeded, planted, and nourished in local communities, fostered by public and private investment and support, and exemplifying a new mind and morality, economic arrangements and institutions are organizing themselves that will replace the present unsustainable economy.

The mind and morality of the sustainable economy is founded on an emerging new image of human transcendence and a renewed ethic of integrity. Our task is to promote these acts of transformation through personal engagement and public policy (including investment and taxation). Our task is also to contemplate and disseminate the new emerging image of human transcendence and the ethic of integrity.

Our task is urgent and daunting. There is no time or place for cynicism. We need to engage in and promote thousands of transformational acts, large and small, and build a movement through which we are in communication with each other to nourish the emerging mind and morality of the new sustainable economy.

Thinking Ahead

Writing people’s genetic code runs into a minefield of ethical issues if we’re not careful. While gene therapy may be able to cure some diseases of people alive today or in the future, it is nearly impossible and extremely dangerous to change the genetic code of someone after they’re older than a zygote. As such, we run the risk of making “designer babies” possible where parents who can afford it can try to give their children the musical talent of Mozart and the athletic talent of Usain Bolt. Meanwhile, those that cannot afford these treatments will be stuck in a permanent underclass with economic inequality much worse than we see today. The movie “Gattaca” explored some of these implications a lot better than I’m describing them here.

And since the y chromosome surprised us with how essential it is to human biology aside from sex determination, trying to radically revamp the human genome and reorder millions of years of evolution will be a tough nut to crack. Add in all the surprises that epigenetics is giving us and trying to “improve” the human race through genetic engineering becomes a monumental task.

Sure, let’s get rid of the genes that serve no function aside from contributing to horrible diseases. But let’s say we identify all the genetic components of Autism for example. Would we want to eliminate them as well even though some of history’s greatest thinkers may have been on the autism spectrum? And if we take it further, “improvement” is in the eye of the people making the decisions of which genes to keep and which ones will be eliminated going forward. If there aren’t strong ethical safeguards in place, what’s to stop the genetic gatekeepers from deciding which ethnic / racial / gender groups will be taken out of the gene pool?

There are tremendous opportunities to improve the human condition through genetic engineering, but they need to be tempered by ethical principles. And since technology can move way faster than our ethics, we need to think long and hard ahead of time to keep potential disasters from happening.

Extinction

A great extinction is an event in which 70% or so of existing species are wiped out in a relatively short period of time as recorded in fossil remains in rock layers and analysis of DNA from bones and other biological material. The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert is a series of stories of the author who with other scientists (geologists, archeologists, and biologists) discover evidence for the five great extinctions and many more minor ones. They do this through archeological digs, analysis of rock layers, and review of evolutionary data, and hikes through tropical forests. The last well-know one was the Crustacean extinction when the great lizards were wiped out and mammals began their ascendency.

More, she with her colleagues are collecting evidence of a sixth great extinction in which we are already participating and that could well include our own species.

I’m not competent to review her work as a scientist. In any case she includes most of the diverse theories for the how and when of the past extinction events and also the diverse theories about the one we are now in which, following many of her colleagues, she calls the Anthropocene extinction. But as a participant of the current event, I have the following four reflections:

1. Time. In considering the geological clock, I am struck again by what a short time our species has existed. That gives me both a sense of wonder as well as great humility. The universe and the earth got along fine without us for eons and yet in such a short time we are having such a great affect — probably more than the great asteroid hit that wiped out the dinosaurs.

2. Anthropocene Age. Some want to mark its beginning with the turn from hunting and gathering to agriculture when lands became possessions to be stripped for growing or mined for extracting. Some want to mark its beginning with the industrial revolution when we began dumping tons of CO2 in the air and acid in the ocean. But in any case, human kind has radically changed the earth. Earth warming and its effects seemed to have been part of earth cycles since its birth, but the rapidity of the current warming and its resulting climate change means that large numbers of species do not have time to adapt and therefore survive — perhaps including our own. See the films on Welcome to the Anthropocene.

3. The Symbolic capacity. Now this is something I’ve studied and written about for fifty years. It’s at the root of my own philosophy, ethics, and politics. What is unique about homo sapiens is that we both discover and create reality through symbols, including metaphors and other figures of speech, images, models, formulas, manufactured forms by which we organize our world and bring meaning within the chaos of experience. A dimension of this capacity is self-awareness or consciousness. While this capacity has given us tremendous advantage in our evolutionary advance, Kolbert indicates “With the capacity to represent the world in signs and symbols comes the capacity to change it, which, as it happens is also the capacity to destroy it.” As a constructivist in epistemology, I would go further in saying that our very capacity to know the world is identical with our capacity to change it. For better or for worse.

4. Crisis. Crisis simply means choice. We choose between a constructive or destructive path. But what often appears constructive becomes destructive and vice versa. Or perhaps all our choices have a constructive and destructive side. All problem-solving creates further problems. In he Smithsonian article linked above, Andrew Rivkin was quoted: “Two billion years ago, cyanobacteria oxygenated the atmosphere and powerfully disrupted life on earth. But they didn’t know it. We’re the first species that’s become a planet scale influence and is aware of that ability. That’s what distinguishes us. We can reflect and weigh probabilities, predict possible future, and make choices that can be more constructive than destructive. Perhaps. But it does mean thinking, accepting evidence, and a willingness to change, getting over denial of reality to safeguard beliefs. And in a timely way.

When I consider other public health issues that had the capacity to wipe out our species, I realize that all insights into the causes of illness were met with denial, especially by those who had an interest in the status quo: e.g. the need to wash hands of bacteria before surgery, the need to purify water in which waste was being dumped, putting scrubbers on chimneys, smoking cigarettes, vaccinations, and now dumping CO2 emissions into the atmosphere. This last one is far more dangerous. Yet there are substantial interests, rationalized by quasi-religious beliefs, to deny that climate change is being accelerated by human activity. These deniers will reject the total scientific consensus and grasp a singular experience, e.g. increased cold in the East (which is really an evidence in support of the consensus) in order to deny it. They see it as a vast “liberal conspiracy” for what I am not sure. They are similar to, but much more dangerous than, the people who deny the moon shot, the round earth, or the existence of bacteria.

Since they seem to have the ability to block quick and resolute public policy (the kind that banned chlorofluorocarbons from widening the hole in the ozone layer), the time for adaptation, much less prevention, is shortening. Wisdom, Socrates said, is knowing that you do not know for sure. That’s commendable and shows a willingness to keep asking questions of oneself. But willful ignorance for material interest or political correctness, especially if you think that you do know for sure, is downright evil. It is the cardinal or mortal sin.

The Theology of Terry Pratchett

What? You don’t know Terry Pratchett, the author of the Discworld series? Well I didn’t either until Aaron and Carolyn introduced me to him. Now I am in his fourth book and laughing uncontrollably.

I’m a philosopher. And I agree with Richard Rorty who says that a philosopher is a literary critic. A little different from literary critics in writing classes, a philosopher considers the style, format, language, figures of speech, metaphors, symbols, memes of artists based on his or her own understanding of the nature and function of literary or artistic thought and expression in order to further understand the nature and function of human being, thought, and expression.

Philosophers mostly critique the writings of each other. Since we talk a lot to ourselves, it is recommended that we use earbuds connected to a smartphone that we hold in front of us, so we don’t look weird walking down the street. Or stick to the classrooms and google circles.

Theologian is just another word for a philosopher who mostly considers the literary and artistic expression of what we generally call religion. Theologians are philosophers who examine the stories, symbols, rituals of a social group in so far as they give meaning to human life, behavior, and action.

We call these literary critics “theologians” when they deal with the narratives for meaning of their own group, usually called fundamental truths or divine revelations. We call them “philosophers of religion” when they deal with other groups’ narratives for meaning, usually called myths, curiosities, or strange stories. But it’s all the same.

It is just a question as to whether it’s your story or somebody else’s.

Terry Pratchett has built a wonderful narrative for meaning or myth that he calls Discworld but is so very relevant to the myths of Thisworld. That’s what I want to point out in my “Theology of Terry Pratchett.” But, again, it is only a “pointing out.” The best expression of his theology is of course his own. Read it and enjoy. Bug look beyond the words.

Here is a theologian for our times. If I were a graduate student in theology, I would write my dissertation on the Theology of Terry Pratchett.

I will start with his cosmology which is best laid out in his first book

Pratchett’s theology in the literal sense (“study of gods’) is treated in his fourth book: “Small Gods.”

“Men in Arms” gives insight into the social theology of Terry Pratchett.

“Pyramids” is a theological treatise on science, technology and politics.

Kierkegaard says that a sense of humor is a sign of faith. Why? Because satire and irony dethrone the idols and prompts us to pass on beyond our grandiose thoughts that are the Truth, the Real, the Absolute. Transcendence is achieved through humor and so Terry Pratchett through his writings puts us in the way of transcendence.

Responsibility, Accountability, and Transparency

Recently I listened to Janice Stein reflecting on the notion of “accountability” which has all but replaced “responsibility” in our language. Since words not only express, but also shape thought and the worldview within which that thought has meaning, I found this a very useful reflection.

We have finally begun demanding accountability. And well we should, as presidents lead us to war on false premises, as financial institutions sell products with less than stated value, and religious organizations hide their officials’ wrong doings. We now speak of organizing for public or private accountability and of holding our leaders and institutions accountable. We use less the word of the responsible leader or organization or of the responsible self and society. Or we simply use the words interchangeably. And there is a loss in that.

To hold accountable or require accountability has a different nuance than to be responsible or take responsibility. To account for something to someone has a different meaning than to respond to someone for something. Rendering account focuses on measured worth. Being responsible focuses on value, but not the kind that can be easily quantified. Accountability connotes an external referee and a balance sheet. Responsibility connotes a more internal judge, a conscience. An accountable politics is one of checks and balances and looks at forms, processes, and regulations. A responsible politics is one of social justice and looks at the substance of human freedom and equality.

Elsewhere I wrote of five metaphors for ethics. And here are two: the scale or balance in commerce (accountability) and the foundation of a building (responsibility). These two are important to each other: responsibility will require accountability, which in turn can measure and promote responsibility.

Yet there is tension when we look as the behavior of corporations and encourage their social responsibility, when we look at voluntary organizations not just in terms of what we get for the money, but for what kind of a community they embody and promote. There is certain a tension in a leadership that is directing and supervising according to rules and one that is trusting and encouraging innovation. Education that teaches to the test may be accountable, but may not be responsible and educing responsible citizens.

Another word is being used a lot lately: “transparency.” Maybe that could resolve the tension between accountability and responsibility or make that tension constructive. Transparency does mean visibility — out in the open for all to see and judge. But it also means illuminating or glowing from within like a radiance you can see through.

Democracy requires a responsibility where we quit shoving the blame elsewhere. Democracy requires accountability where institutions, public and private, can be called to account for their consequences. But above all democracy requires transparency where all of us are connected and know what each other are thinking and doing, not to hold back initiative and difference, but to celebrate it. This cuts both ways. It means letting Snowden do his thing, whistle blowing, and putting out there for all to see the secrets of government and corporations. But it also means letting everybody know what I’m thinking and doing without fear of reprisal if I’m not injuring anyone, including their life, respect, and value.

The open society is here. Go ahead! You can know what I’m thinking and doing insofar as it might affect you or even to be sure it won’t affect you negatively. I don’t mind if the NSA is snooping on me as long as I can snoop on the NSA.

The key tension that must be maintained is that between individual accountability and social responsibility. Yes, you may learn about me but let me be me a unique individual. You may investigate us and our society and hold us accountable as long as you do not inhibit our creativity in carrying out our responsibility. And I want to know what you are doing to ensure that our being who we are is not curtailed.

Let’s take responsibility for holding ourselves accountable.

Justice and Law

The scene: Starbuck’s Coffee House, Silver Spring. Socrates walks in. Plato and Solon sitting at a table see him.

~ Solon: Socrates, good to see you, c’mon over and sit down. Have a Frappuccino. We’re celebrating.

~ Socrates: For sure! And what are we celebrating?

~ Plato: Solon just got word that he passed his bar exam.

~ Socrates (giving Solon a high five): Congratulations, Solon. So what does it mean to pass that exam?

~ Solon: It means that I can now practice law in the courts of the State of Maryland and the District of Columbia. I could even be a judge some day and dispense justice.

~ Plato: Now you’ve done it, Solon, you should never use the j-word around Socrates.

~ Socrates (laughing): And what is justice, Solon? Was that on your exam?

~ Solon: Justice is what the law says it is. Prosecutors prosecute, defenders defend, and judges decide justice based on the law.

~ Socrates: And where does the law by which justice is dispensed come from?

~ Solon: From the rulers. And in a democracy that is the people. They adopt constitutions many of which are based on common law or the usual practice of a society or commons sense, what people believe their practices should be and codifying what they believe their morality is.

~ Socrates: What about in a state that is not a democracy?

~ Solon: O Socrates, always asking questions! You know that Weber defined a state as a monopoly of the means of violence. So any ruler that commands the means of violence makes the laws. That’s why an unenforceable law or an unenforced law is no law at all. Even in an aristocracy or a monarchy, the rulers have to provide laws that can be enforced.

~ Socrates: Defining the state as a monopoly on the means of violence is a whole other discussion; and I won’t start that one here. Nevertheless, if most people don’t accept the law and it is still being enforced….?

~ Solon: Well, then they change rulers. In a Parliamentary government that means one government falls and another is established. But even dictators and plutocrats have to persuade most of the people that they have their best interests at heart.

~ data-blogger-escaped-comment-[endif]Plato: But in a good society, the rulers are those who choose what is best for the people in general.

~ Solon: Yes, of course.

~ Socrates: But that’s the point! What makes it good? Is there a standard of justice that makes some societies, their laws and their legal professionals good and others not so good? If the rulers think the law is just, does that make it just — it could be good for them and their faction but not others.

~ Plato: Some people speak of a “higher” law — like the law of the gods or of nature. And that’s the source of “positive law” or stands in judgment above it.

~ data-blogger-escaped-comment-[endif]Socrates: And how would we know that higher law?

~ Solon: Priests or religious ministers say that it’s in their Holy Books as revealed to their prophets and taught by their priests. God tells them what to write. So you have Mosaic, or Sharia, or Canon Law. However no pluralistic society in today’s world can be run by an appeal to Divine Law.

~ Socrates: Why not?

~ Solon: Every religion has its own prophets, priests, and holy books. And we have all kinds of nuts running around saying that God has talked with them and pushing different things. So in today’s world, people and their rulers have to decide what is best for all and make laws accordingly.

~ Plato: But they have to base their decisions on something! And that, I argue, is natural law — which is identified with Reason. If people still want to be religious, they can say that natural law was given by God. But actually it is the natural reason common to all of us that is the source of ethics and the law.

~ Socrates: Who tells us what natural law is? If it is the priests and ministers again, aren’t we back to the same problem? Or can we count on the common folk to use reason?

~ Plato: It has to be philosophers who have the latest science at their disposal — the educated people in the know. That why rulers should be philosophers.

~ Socrates: With so many people denying science as a way to understand reality whether its evolution or climate change, that doesn’t give us much hope, does it? Nor do all the philosophers agree with one another. I was told by the Oracle that the wisest of philosophers was the one who knows that he does not know. And philosophers are certainly not read, nor understood by most legislators.

~ Solon: Legislators can consult with philosophers and scientists, but really the only philosophy and science legislators claim is common sense, which is what they believe to be the best for people and themselves. So they make laws that they think fit with the customs and mores of their constituents, i.e. the people who will support them with money and votes.

~ Plato: Then let the laws be formed by common law or the mores and customs of the general population — but of course guided by reason.

~ Solon: That might be ideal. But is there a general population in a pluralistic society? All US politicians of all stripes say they speak for the “American people.” And even if so, there are some customs and mores repugnant to others and they are forever changing. And you can’t count on anyone being reasonable when their interests are at stake.

~ Socrates: And the mores and customs or the morality of the so-called general population often needs to be called into question. So are you are saying ultimately neither the gods nor reason define justice. Nor the mores and customs of the general population?

~ Solon: Right. Though legislators say that their laws are based in divine will or natural reason or the mores and customs of the people, really they are written to support the interests of the people who support their power. And whatever you say that they are based on, justice is defined by laws enforced by the police power of the state.

~ Socrates: And whether its natural law or divine law or common law, once it’s written down, doesn’t it become human law? We recognize now that language is a cultural artifact and it’s meaning is always subject to context of time and place.

~ Solon: Yes, that’s why we have judges to interpret the law. And we know from experience that the political orientation of the judges influences their interpretations. You can claim that the laws come from gods or nature or common law, but it is the written law of the state that is the measure of justice.

~ Plato: Whoops, there’s that j-word again.

~ Socrates: Can there be unjust laws?

~ Solon: By definition, no.

~ Socrates: What about the laws, some say even divine laws, which encouraged slavery? What about the laws that enforced segregation? Were abolitionists protecting runaway slaves acting unjustly? Was Martin Luther King Jr. practicing civil disobedience acting unjustly? Did Daniel Ellsberg in revealing classified material about how citizens were being lied to about the Vietnam War act unjustly? Would Adolph Eichmann have been unjust if he disobeyed his orders to send the Jews to their extermination in Nazi Germany? Was Nelson Mandela acting unjustly in rebelling against the laws of Apartheid in South Africa?

~ Solon: Civil disobedience and rebellion are illegal by definition and so must be prosecuted by legal justice system.

~ Socrates: So are there no unjust laws that should be resisted whether or not legislators claim they come from natural or divine law? Can civil disobedience or rebellion ever be justified?

~ Solon: I know this bothers you Socrates, because you have been accused of perverting youth by questioning the authority of certain laws. But if people don’t like a law, they should get rulers or legislators to change it through whatever means are available by the law. Sometimes people just have to go along with a law for the main purpose of the law, i.e. order.

~ Plato: Sometimes we speak of social or economic or racial justice over legal justice.

~ Solon: But that is usually people just saying they don’t like the law because it doesn’t serve their interest. And it is the same as appealing to some higher law as we said before.

~ Plato: Socrates, how do you permit your civil disobedience?

~ Socrates: I agree with Solon that civil disobedience and rebellion is not legitimate and so subject to prosecution. So a person rebelling or practicing civil disobedience will have to take the consequences of that. But I also think there is a difference between an action being legitimate and an action being justified.

~ Solon: If an illegitimate action can be justified, that means there is another justice outside the law.

~ Plato: Doesn’t this just bring us back to the problem of a higher law? And we’ve already established that higher laws if they exist are expressed by humans, priests or philosophers, and so can also be unjust.

~ Socrates: Yes, so I ask myself if an illegitimate action be justified. I ask myself whether I have not only permission, but also responsibility to disobey what I consider an unjust law. I ask myself if I have the responsibility to question the laws of a society that I consider unjust. Also there is a growing consensus concerning crimes against humanity over and above the laws of nations. And I ask myself where that comes from.

~ Solon: Where does it? You sometimes speak of your daimon. Is that it?

~ Plato: But that sounds like a god and we are back to divine law.

~ Socrates: No, my daimon is not a god, nor does it come from a god.

~ Plato: Unitarians speak of the “divine spark” that everybody is born with. For them a child is not born with sin, original or not, but in sin, the sin of the world that they inherit in culture and history; but they have a divine spark that can grow to counter that sin.

~ Socrates: That’s a good metaphor. A spark has to be fanned to grow. If it is neglected and allowed to grow cold, it goes out. But I think this spark is very human, not divine.

~ Plato: Then it’s what philosophers call the “light of reason.”

~ Socrates: Except reason seems to mean understood, having support of arguments, rationalized. Science is the height of reason with its formulas and laws.

~ Solon: And we know scientific laws are tenuous. They can appear to be opposed to other scientific laws and need to be incorporated in a new higher law, and that can go on and on.

~ Socrates: Yes, and again, I think it is more of a feeling, a sense of what is just and unjust that goes along with everything I do, not a matter of reasoned argument.

~ Plato: That’s what we mean by conscience. It’s the kind of non-rational knowledge that goes along with other kinds of knowledge. That’s why we call it con-science.

~ Solon: That doesn’t explain what this daimon or spark or conscience is and how it is superior to the laws.

~ Socrates: I’ve told you that whenever I have a conversation like this or one with adversaries, I go home and in my solitude confront the biggest adversary of them all, one that questions every position I’ve taken or advanced with others.

~ Plato: I know that’s what you mean by thinking and why you say you know that you do not know.

~ Socrates: yes, and why I keep coming back to you guys and anyone else who will engage me.

~ Solon: And that’s why you keep questioning the laws. You have a feeling that is not expressed by laws but by which you can challenge laws. That can be pretty dangerous. You are putting feeling above the law.

~ Plato: And feeling over against rationality.

~ Socrates: But not if I am willing to keep questioning and let others question my thoughts. Isn’t the real danger when people don’t question their thoughts, including their laws? And the feeling I am talking about is the experience of thinking and acting with others.

~ Plato: So, your daemon or spark or conscience is really yourself, or maybe your other self?

~ Socrates: I think it is a non-rational sense of what it means to be human, a thinking and acting being, not a thing that is used by others, not an object in the world out there. When I am thinking for myself and acting in community, I sense the measure that should stand against every formula, every proposition, and every law. But when I put it in words or rules, it eludes me.

~ Solon: Still sounds pretty dangerous to me. It can lead to anarchy.

~ Socrates: But if I bring my thoughts to the public for others to discuss and think about?

~ Solon: Then we are back to where I said that the legislators take what people are thinking and make the laws accordingly.

~ Plato: And it all comes down again to politics.

~ Socrates: Yes, but the important thing is that people are not only discussing and deciding, but also thinking — in touch with their daemons and fanning the flames of their sparks. And above all other interests is the desire to be fully human, to be treated fully human and treat others as fully human. The products of their thinking and acting are never hardened into sure things.

~ Solon: I’m confused. I am not sure where we are.

~ Socrates: That is not a bad place to be, I think. Plato, you are a good writer. How about you take what we discussed here and put it down on paper. Then you can e-mail it out and we can think about it.

~ Plato: OK. I will either send it out as the dialogue we had or I will write a sort of treatise and call it, Ethics and the Law.

~ Socrates: Great. Thanks, and congratulations again, Solon.

Hope

As the universe winds down, I come back to hope.

Hope is the last addition to Pandora’s Box — the one that remained when all of the evils and pains and fears flew out at humans when she opened it. Was hope a grace or just another curse like all the rest? A way out and beyond the evils of the world? Or a frustrating trap which kept humans within them?

Hope invites and invents belief: the gods, God, religion, pleasure, self-worth, drugs, cosmetics, body beautiful, universal knowledge, boundless sex, eternal soul, health and wealth, legacy and immortality. And dashes them to dust.

Is hope another trick of the gods, of the genes, of evolution, and the brain? Another illusion like the conscious self, the knowable world, and everlasting love?

I don’t know for sure. And sometimes when I think that I am thinking most clearly and honestly, I am on the brink of despair — and hope. Depression, like paranoia, becomes a heightened state of consciousness. But then again, so does bliss and hope.

Hope, fine friend, you lead us along promising us salvation — or at least some meaning and reason to hang in there with the experiment of human life.

But we won’t of course, fickle friend. We die, the sun dies, the universe dies. All your enticements are vanities vanishing. So, we hope against hope. Maybe in somewhere beyond — outside nature, outside reality, outside the universe, outside life itself.

Yet we are told “faith, hope, love — but the greatest of these is love.

The past orientation of faith,

The future orientation of hope,

Are not, except in the presence

Of love, right now, here, with you.

Asking the Right Question

How you utter the question makes all the difference in the world. It can open dialogue or end it. It can build ongoing relationships or destroy them. It can promote initiative and creativity or kill it?

I learned strategic questioning, as Fran Peavey calls it, as an organizer (Alinsky always pushed Socratic method) and as a teacher ( Freire and Dewey counseled “liberating” rather than “banking’ education). But I often forget it with my best friend and family, with my colleagues and employees, with fellow citizens and political opponents, and even with myself. So it is good to have this reminder.

Asking the question so that it is open, dynamic, empowering, relational, collaborative, and even self-questioning leads us to a world that is open, dynamic, empowering, relational, collaborative, and ever transcending. In both my family life and my work life, it promotes listening and cooperation. In politics and community action, it promotes free speech and social cohesion. In cultural endeavors of science, art, and religion, it promotes further inquiry and new insights.

The question starts the thinking process. The question frames the answer; the inquiry shapes the concepts and models of reality; the pursuit of personal and public happiness carries with it interpretations, along with assumptions. There are no “pure,” neutral, or unbiased questions. Therefore, the question itself needs to be questioned. “How,” I must continually ask myself, “in my conversations and discussions can I state my question, so it leads us both beyond where we are here and now and on to the next and better question?”

Strategic thinking requires strategic questioning. But I have so much to learn about doing it.

Myth or Hypothesis

Recently a new theory of life was conjectured that would have life and consciousness, not an unusual exception, but a natural outcome of the physical laws of thermodynamics and especially the second law of entropy. The second law portends a universe in which matter and energy are continually dissipating and reaching equilibrium which will ultimately end in uniform temperature and consistency. Life in which self-replication or reproduction seems to counter entropy through self-organization or what we might call “syntropy,” are actually modes of increasing overall entropy in the universe. (Certainly we high energy consuming conscious organisms are proving that daily!)

This new theory which is yet to be tested indicates that the lines between physics, chemistry, biology, and psychology are not impermeable. Matter/energy, under its own laws, is tending to life and consciousness. This would give another reason to believe that life and consciousness is discoverable throughout the universe. And this urges us to look for a theory by which the laws of physics found the laws of life which found the laws of consciousness which found the laws of social cohesion and culture, and so on.

Entropy is the “dismal law” (as is economics the dismal science) because it presages a ultimate state of dissipation without patterns and meaning into an eternal sameness; and yet it leads to.

Organic life that self-oganizes to counteract entropy, but which as it becomes dominant in humans begins to destroy the very conditions of life; and yet it leads to

Creative consciousness that solves problems and plans a future to defend life which develops bulwarks of conscious organisms in conflict with others; and yet it leads to

Social cohesion or collaboration that builds transhuman vehicles to colonize the universe and so destroys the human race; and yet it leads to

I don’t know what. A divine realm of universal transcending consciousness?

Geosphere with its laws of thermodynamics; biosphere with its law of natural selection; noosphere with its laws of pattern discernment and creation; polisphere with its laws of information communication; to theosphere.

The courage to face facts is also the courage to have faith, to act as if, to take a leap that there is meaning and that we can access it, to engage and enjoy the project.

Conning our way to goodness

We listened to an interview on NPR with Nick Tosches on his new novel Under Tiberius.

“A work of dangerous and haunting beauty by America’s last real literary outlaw. Under Tiberius is a thrilling story of crime and deceit involving the man who came to be called Jesus Christ. Deep in the recesses of the Vatican, Nick Tosches unearths a first-century memoir by Gaius Fulvius Falconius, foremost speechwriter for Emperor Tiberius. The codex is profound, proof of the existence of a Messiah who was anything but the one we’ve known — a shabby and licentious thief.”

We ordered and read it right away. It portrayed Jesus as a con-artist who began to believe the role he was personifying. I loved the book.

I don’t think I’ll send it out as a Christmas present to my Christian family and friends. They would be scandalized. If this were about Mohammed, there would be a fatwa against the author (which proves to me that most Christians are not idolaters and understand metaphor).

In the interview Tosches said he was exploring which came first — good and evil or the gods. It’s another way of asking my question of the relation between morality and religion. My sense from the interview is that Tosches believes that religion brings evil into the world without which there would be no awareness of good. The interviewer intervened, “but I have seen nuns and priests who have given up their lives for others.” Oh yes, said Tosches, but that’s the way they are. They did that not because of religion, but because of their goodness.

The interviewer asked Tosches about the darkness of his vision of humanity. “Isn’t there a place for hope?” Yes, of course, he responded. Hope is an illusion of our evolved brain. But it is an important illusion for the survival of humanity and perhaps of spirit.

I was reminded of the story of Pandora who opened the box manufactured by the gods and let out all the evils that were placed within by the gods. What was left however was hope. Perhaps an illusion. But one it is in our power to make a reality.

The Secular City

Jerusalem. City of shalom — sacred to Jew, Muslim, Christian who say they worship the same God — Yahweh, Allah, Abba of Moses, Jesus, Mohammed.

I listened to an interview today of Yossi Klein Halavi — born in Brooklyn, settled in Israel, journalist, contributor to the New Republic, participator in inter-religious dialogue, bright, moderate, educated. I understand why there is no progress for peace. He knows that fact is always interpreted and interpretation shapes facts. Yet he is so fixed in his interpretation. It is one thing to have identity situated in tradition; and yes historical interpretation — and to appreciate, assert, affirm that identity. But it is another to absolutize that interpretation — as I feel he does without critical challenge. If he cannot get past his interpretation, how can the orthodox, the keepers of the fundamentals?

He hopes for the transcendent — an event that changes minds and hearts. He thinks that now that there is a widening nonreligious or secular space, the religions will have to come together just to defend the religious over against the secular. But whose interpretation? Yes, shame on Jews, Christians, Muslims who war for their God as they interpret Him against their Gods under someone else’s interpretation. I think Yossi is a sign of the problem — the liberal religious who subjects the polis, the City, to a religious interpretation.

Jerusalem will only be sacred when it is ruled by no man’s interpretation — when it is an open city, a place for sharing opinions which no one holds absolutely.

And so will New York, Istanbul, Detroit, Cairo, Rome, Moscow, Tel Aviv, Beijung, and all cities, towns, and villages. The secular is the place of the sacred. Secularize bravely!

After Being Killed by ISIS

The Paris, Beirut, and other attacks by ISIS make me realize that it is quite likely that such an attack will occur here. The leaders of ISIS are choosing soft targets in capitals. And DC, the center of governmental and of corporate power with all its lobbyists determining the policies that will be chosen to stabilize their playgrounds, will probably be targeted.

I often work, worship, and play in DC. I ride the Metro and the busses. I could easily be caught up in such an attack and be killed, as could many of my friends and family. So just in case that happens, I want to reflect on my death now.

The purpose of terror is to incite fear and reaction. As we organizers learned in our work to support those left behind in organizing themselves: “The action is in the reaction.” First you must polarize in order to get respect to negotiate solutions to common problems. But we taught to do this nonviolently because we were acting to remove coercion from the system and believed like Ghandi, King, Malcolm X, Mandela, and Aung San Suu Kyi that we need to model what we want to achieve.

Yes, it is the duty of government to protect its citizens from the harm of foreign and domestic enemies, of criminals who want to take our means of livelihood, of epidemics and other illnesses, and of starvation and poverty. It is the duty of government to create the conditions where citizens can thrive in safety. But I believe that those of you who would have government react by stereotyping Muslims, by blocking refugees and immigrants, and by invading countries and leaving behind failed states are also perpetrators of terror.

It is you I blame for my death now. You, like ISIS, are polarizing the world into “my side, your side” simpleminded thinking and creating an atmosphere of hate and fear.

I beg my descendants to think. Please read the history of how the Middle East got to where it is with the cutting up of the Ottoman Empire and the creation of Israel, not as a homeland for the Jews, but as an Apartheid State that displaced existing residents.

I do want Israel to survive as a homeland for the displaced Jews of the world. And I would like to see the Middle East develop as a homeland for all peoples: Jews, Christians, Shia, and Sunni, and free from Western control.

But I believe this will only happen when all people feel respected and have the power to shape their environments. To do that we must remove the causes of violence and this will only happen when diverse groups understand each other and their interests and quit the demonizing along with the humiliation and cruelty.

I do not see this coming from ISIS. ISIS has declared war. It is to their advantage that Europe and America see this as war and especially a war of civilizations or religions. But I hope that we can be great-souled enough to change the metaphor. I hope that, while containing ISIS and their violence and brutality, we will work to build the structure for a lasting peace built on justice. I know that will take time — maybe decades. I would be happy to know I was dying for that.

Ironies

On my last run, a bunch of ironies and paradoxes popped into my head. Here are some off them:

· Realizing that the self is an illusion fosters respect for the selves of others.

· The self may be a valuable concept. But it sure gets in the way.

· Getting lost in others is the way to find your self.

· Understanding the soul as the body-in-motion doesn’t deny soul; it constitutes it.

· Matter (and materialism) isn’t opposed to spirit (and spirituality); Matter is the condition for spirit.

· The secular humanist builds the divine city.

· An authentic theist is not.

· The weak build walls.

· Knowledge is the obstacle to thinking.

· Fearing strangers makes fearless enemies.

· Patriotism weakens love of country.

· I am most conscious when engaged in the world.

· Righteousness is contrary to an ethical life.

· An ethical life contradicts morality.

· The greatest warrior is the one who will never war.

· Fighting a war is an admission of defeat.

· Theism terminates transcendence.

· Want order? Appreciate chaos.

· Ardent belief is the loss of faith.

· The best teacher remains a student.

· The ugly is the frame of beauty.

· To hold on to loved-ones, we let them go.

· Keeping others outside puts us in prison.

· Open boundaries make better neighbors.

· A disaster is never unprecedented.

· Exaggerate evil and you reinforce it.

· Exceptionalism makes us less than ordinary.

· Accepting limits is the beginning of infinity.

· Want beauty? Wallow in mud.

· When you think about them, all truths are false.

· To exist we need to believe in others.

· When we know everything, we know nothing.

· Common sense is sometimes nonsense.

· All is fiction, even nonfiction.

· Authentic experts are amateurs.

· Myth is the path to reality.

· Most that matters is invisible.

· The real is the relational.

· Only God knows truth. The rest of us make it happen.

· Expectation breeds disappointment. Hope calls to action.

· To affirm is to deny.

· To posit we have to negate.

· The positive is found only in the negative.

· Thinking is putting out majorana particles — where matter and anti-matter meet.

· Happiness is the pause in suffering.

· Suffering is source of solidarity.

· The supernatural is nothing around everything.

· Empathy suffers. Compassion acts.

· When you say yes to someone, you say no to something.

· Belief makes gods human. Thinking makes humans divine.

· To know the gods, I must deny them.

· The future is now and never then.

· Theists are too serious about their beliefs. Atheists are too believing in their seriousness.

· When we vigorously affirm the gods, we deny them.

· The objective world is mass illusion.

· Only the imperfect can reach for perfection.

· Discontent is the secret of contentment.

· Starting at the end is the beginning.

· Reconstructing the past is planning the future.

· What we are getting at is always between the lines.

· Artists depict what cannot be depicted.

· The obvious is the unknown.

· All tall tales are short.

· Wholly out there is holy in here

· When I am absorbed in the present, I transcend it.

· To become human, seek the divine. To seek the divine, be human.

· Only an empty vessel can be full.

· To never give up, give up.

· Slavery is the road to freedom.

· A liberated mind thinks everything and knows nothing.

· A horizontal mind hits walls. A vertical mind is infinite.

· Every point is an entry to infinity.

· Zero makes everything count.

· When I touch some body, I feel my own.

· Bodies in love have no bounds.

· Giving away my body is the essence of love

· You don’t need feet to dance.

· To enter another’s soul, flow in her style.

· To appreciate the canvas, paint with the artist.

· Criticism is the height of praise.

· You only respect those you can disagree with

· To disagree is to respect.

· Odor is in the nose of the smeller. Do I stink if there is no one there to smell.

· The best of games keep changing the rules.

· Without rules you don’t need rulers.

· To be thoughtful, give away your thoughts. To be thoughtless, hold on to them.

· To have love, give it away. To have everything, give way to everything.

· To create things is to abandon them.

· Only the random is certain.

· Order is overrated.

· The wager itself makes the bet pay off.

· There are no natures in nature unless we put them there.

· Never let a god get in the way of the divine.

· Playful gods are more fun than a Mighty One.

· Use rules to subvert them.

· A friend is always there when she isn’t.

· Keeping rules dulls the game.

· Only when I am right am I wrong.

· Uncertainty is the acme of life.

· The only absolute is contingency.

· Relativity is just a new absolute. All absolutes are relative.

· We are created in the image of friends.

· To discover reality, imagine it!

· The way to truth is error.

· Magic and mystery leave when we know it all.

· A good friend is one I don’t have to hang on to.

· Playing the game is winning enough.

· A fence, like violence, is sometimes necessary but always bad.

· When passion leads, bliss follows.

· Accepting the finality of death is the pinnacle of life.

· Being careful reduces care. Curiosity requires carelessness.

· The Mind of God is a tabula raza. So go write on it!

· Can’t know beauty without ugly. Can’t know evil without good. Can’t know light without dark. Can’t no without yes.

· To know is to mix a no with a yes. Consciousness is nothing put to being.

· The universe runs on alternating current.

· Language is a cookie-cutter. It cuts the world into bite sizes. In a cut something stays and something goes.

· A concept is a category cutting the flow. It cannot be without the flow. It cannot be at all.

· Mind is concept cutting. Mind is image making. Mind is fictionalizing.

· Not all valuable concepts are true. Indeed, none of them are. They are products of imagination.

· Mind is thingifying. There is nothing to something and something to nothing.

· If you know consciousness, you’ve missed it.

· When you solve the mystery, the book is closed.

· If you have solved the mystery, you have closed your mind.

· Irony is the humor of contradiction, the silliness of logic.

· Physics, including neuroscience, is contemporary alchemy. If alchemy turns gold into lead, so what?

· A sincere leader is a crazed animal. Keep your distance.

· The one who shouts the most has the smallest stick.

· Beware the man who keeps his principles,

· Clear immovable principles make a serial killer.

· Evangelists are terrorists. They scare the hell into people.

· If education isn’t fun, it isn’t education.

· Creation is just letting nothing out to play.

· We can make something out of nothing, that’s creative art.

· We can’t make nothing out of something, only God does that.

· Entropy and syntropy are always at play.

· When we make too much of things, we belittle everything.

· Playing with ideas is the ultimate sport. Taking them seriously kills the game.

· Enjoy today. It’s all there is right now.

· True believers are a danger to faith.

· Keeping faith is letting go of beliefs.

· Know your illusions and you know most everything.

· Share your illusions; they are probably better than mine.

· Gravity is a force that isn’t. It’s the fabric that brings us together.

· Force is compulsive motion. Energy is voluntary motion.

· May the Force be not with you!

· Every stance I take is a step in an ultra-marathon.

· When I am running from my self, it is sure to catch me.

· When I run toward nothing, I will never be caught.

· If you hear gods’ voices, enjoy the trip. If you believe in them, please pass by.

· They, who worship their prophets, make them lower than animals.

· To root out an evil, change the system. To change a system, change the rules. To change the rules, change the paradigm. To change the paradigm, create a new one. To create a new one, use imagination.

· The problem is usually how we are identifying it.

· Attacking it directly seldom solves a problem.

· The problem isn’t what we think it is until we think about it.

· The last thing I need is another thing.

· Infidels are those who attack infidels.

· Violence is often caused by pacifiers. War is usually waged by peace-makers.

· He who humiliates another dehumanizes himself.

· There is no such thing as universal love. Love is always specific and personal.

· Solidarity comes from shared suffering.

· Cruelty is a product of those who believe God is on their side.

· Those who claim that the US is a Christian nation have a bad opinion of Christianity.

· Authentically religious people resist religion.

· If you want to be in balance, reach for both extremes.

· If you want to be present, hold the past and grab for the future.

· To know anything, you must imagine it.

· Only through fiction do you achieve nonfiction.

· Freedom is an illusion of being, an actuality of becoming.

· We are not given freedom by God or nature. We achieve freedom by striving with others.

· Reality is what we imagine it to be and what we make it to be.

· When you are here you are not there, but when you are there you are here.

· To thrive forward, thrust backwards.

· All these sayings are true until you think about them.