Shadow's Tome

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Latest Articles in this Channel:

06/26/09--10:37: Article 24 (chan 2284626)




07/03/09--14:54: goodbye Sarah (chan 2284626)

I'm sorry to see you go.
Can you believe I typed that with a straight face?




10/03/09--18:28: shooting stuff (chan 2284626)

I went down to check out the outdoor ranges at the archery club today. I spent the first few hours shooting with the longbow my friend Tim made form me. In the last hour, I decided to try out the new bow I picked up after I got my off campus storage unit (the sherwood armory). this new bow is a 40 lb recurve, compared to the 30 lb bow my friend made me.
Now, when shooting my longbow, I have to aim high and to the right. When I went to shoot my new recurve for the first time, I realized I would have to aim a little low, as I shoot traditional style without sites.
I apparently did not aim low enough, as the arrow flew over the target and imbedded itself 3/4" into a maple tree 35+ yards down range
The effect was really a "omg I can't believe how freaking powerful this bow is"

Of course, now I have to make some decisions
1) do I invest in a site, or continue to try to shoot without?
given the power of the bow, and the fact that recurves generally shoot high, I might need to have a site to keep from constantly overshooting my target
2) if I do go with the site, should I go with a professional hunting/competiion sight, or should I make my own?
Sights are easy to make on a recurve using tape and straight pins. hunting/competition sights are neet little devices that can be calibrated and adjusted.


10/12/09--09:57: The Wisdom of the Green :Or everything I needed to know about life I learned from watching trees. (chan 2284626)

Over the weekend, I was helping to clean up the outdoor range at the archery club. As I was clearing the leaves from around the targets, I began to think and marvel about how gentle giants surrounding me had had reached their majesty. Often overlooked, these silent teachers provide us with lessons on how to truly stand among their greatness.

 

To create the world you want to live in, live the world you want to create.

 

            Trees do not speak of generosity; they are generous. Trees do not brag about strength; they are strong. Trees do not speak of balance; trees balance. As a result of all they do, trees create microclimates and microenvironments underneath them. In the summer, they provide shade to cool. During the winter, they block the chilling winds. They help to regulate the moisture of an area, and the presence of trees can actually increase and regulate the rain in the area. The leaves they drop create a blanket to warm the ground and keep it from drying.

When a tree wants, it does not ask, it gives. To spread its seeds, it entices help from animals by giving them food. An oak drops thousand of acorns to feed the squirrels to get the squirrels to plant its children for future growth. Apple trees offers its delicious fruit, and the animals that take its gift in turn plant the seeds that become new child trees. To care for the ground that feeds it, a tree will drop its leaves. The leaves provide food, warmth and moisture to the worms who will till and enrich the soil. The leaves also attract the animals and microbes who will fertilize the ground. Trees have even begun to tame the destructive impulses of man by the gifts they give, as people have had to learn to preserve them to continue to receive their benefits. The baobab for instance, has become almost sacred in Africa, because it provides food, medicine, rope, dye, etc.

 

True strength does not come from destruction and violence, but through determination, struggle and community.

           

            An oak never threatens. An oak never brags. An oak never intimidates or attacks. And yet, despite all of this, every culture that knows of the oak uses it as a symbol of strength. But the strength of an oak does not come overnight, oaks take hundreds of years to reach full majesty. It’s strength comes not from the quick an easy, but develops over time. The strength of the tree, then, comes from its ability to endure, not to conquer. Like the heroes of ancient myth, trees are made strong by their trials. Just as the trials and labors turned the already mighty Hercules into an epic hero, the  harder growing years are what  pack rings together tightly, turning the oak into an invincible giant. Just as Odysseus, whose very name meant “man of pain,” gained his fame from the years of suffering he endured, the pain of a broken limb stimulates the growth that creates the tree’s giant crown.

            Every woodsman knows that the best wood comes not from the single tree in field, but from those in the grove. The single tree in the field gets all the water and sun it wants, but because there is not struggle, it grows to fast, and its wood gets too soft. It is unprotected, and ultimately grows twisted and gnarled by winds and attacking creatures. In the grove, however, the trees protect each other, they must share the resources, but they also share the burdens of protection. Sharing the water and sun caused the wood to grow slower, but it also grows stronger. To reach its share of the light, the tree must grow tall and straight. The trees protect each other from the wind and invaders. When a tree is attacked, it warns the others. When the wind hits one tree, it gets dispersed to protect the others.

           

No one problem has to be solved one way.

 

            Trees find their own strategies for solving the problems that face them. Where the oak has learned to endure through raw strength, the pine has learned to bend and sway, so that it moves around the forces it cans, and springs back from those that would try to bear it down. The apple bribes animals with a few treats to carry its seeds forth, the oak covers the ground with acorns, and the aspen clones itself underground. Where many trees have become virtually fireproof, some pines have learned to grow so that they use the fire to open their cones. There is no one way that things are supposed to happen for trees, but rather, trees surprise us with new and unique solutions to the challenges that face them.




10/23/09--20:35: Article 20 (chan 2284626)

so it turns out that one of the bigwigs  in my new archery club used to play the evil baron at the Paladin faires up in waterloo village. small world, huh?


10/28/09--09:28: Rutgers United against hate vs. westboro baptist church - repost this and make it Viral (chan 2284626)

On October 28th 2009, The Westboro Baptist Church, owners of the website godhatesfags.com targeted the Rutgers Hillel Center for a demonstration of intolerance and hate. Upon hear of this, Rutgers Hillel scheduled a counter protest event called Rutgers United against Hate.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/event.php?eid=180289130906&index=1
Instead of feeding into the conflict that WBBC was looking to provoke, Rutgers United Against Hate planned to make a statement about tolerance, love, and fellowship.
On the day of the protest, the church that stood across from the Hillel center, the church that would have stood behind the WBBC, decorated itself with rainbow flags and flags declaring the love and tolerance of God. Realizing that their message of hate would get lost against the backdrop of divine love and tolerance, WBBC moved down to the next street corner, where they were barely in view of Hillel.
At 8:30 am, when the actual protest began, 1000 students converged on Hillel center as a show of support. We joined together for a pledge of allegiance, then I went up on the main stage when they called for people of religious beliefs to read together a statement of unity. Jews, Christians, Muslims, Pagans, Heathens, Quakers, Agnostics, Atheists, Buddhists, Hindus, Pastafarians, etc all joined together to read in one voice the statement where we were reminded that we are truly one people. A choir group got up to sing "seasons of love" and then another group was called up to represent and read a statement of diversity of race and sexual orientation.
It was around this time that WBBC gave up, and went home.
The rally continued on without them. Rutgers came together as a show of tolerance and unity for an hour in the cold and the rain, and outlasted the hatred of Westboro Baptist Church. Faith in the false god of hatred did not have the endurance in the living power of love.

And now to paraphrase Bill Pullman from Independence Day:
We know how to take them down, spread the message across the world

repost this message to your notes, your blogs, your vlogs, or even your websites.
Whenever these bigots appear to start fights and preach hate, call together people to outshout them 100 fold with messages of love, unity and tolerance. The method works. It worked here, and now make it work everywhere.


11/14/09--22:11: Thoughts on 2012 (chan 2284626)

The date 2012 is going to be talked about for the next 3 years. A lot of claims are going to be made and refuted about an end of the world. The difficulty in seeing what will actually occur has to do with the perspective of the various proponents. The doomsayers are coming up with intricate scenarios of death and destruction based off of supposed celestial cycles and complex theories, often without a lot of evidence to back them up. Skeptics are doing what skeptics do, claiming that modern science says it can’t happen, ignoring any contrary information as random noise and forgetting that modern science is not as exact as we like to pretend. In essence, both groups are making the discussion ideological, probably because there is no direct way to observe what will happen on the date.
What is often misunderstood about the 2012 date is that this date is based off of cyclical calendars. Each cycle of the infamous Mayan calendar consists of approximately 5125 years. The other main cycle refers to the lining up of the Earth’s Poles with a dark zone in the center of the galaxy, a cycle that lasts 26,000 years. Logically, one could extrapolate what will happen in 2012 by looking at what has happened at the end of the previous cycles.
For this exercise, I am going to briefly analyze what has happened in the past during these cyclical periods according to history and mythology. For the sake of brevity, I will use the terms “polar cycle” to represent the 26,000 year cycle, and “Mayan cycle” to represent the 5125 year cycle.

Approx 8 polar cycles ago: First humans appear (theoretically. Some sources actually place this at 100,000 years, or 4 polar cycles, ago)

Approx 7 polar cycles ago: no significant historical data, but humans still around

Approx 6 polar cycles ago: no significant historical data, but humans still around

Approx 5 polar cycles ago: Ori plague wipes out most intelligent life in galaxy, and the ancients use the device at Dakara to reseed life in the universe and the second evolution of humans occurs
Just Kidding
No significant historical Data, but humans still around

Approx 4 polar cycles ago: no significant historical data, but humans still around

Approximately 3 polar cycles ago: Theorized supervolcano on Sumatra creates a volcanic winter that reduces human race to 1,000-10,000 breeding pairs

Approximately 2 polar cycles ago: humans driven from Africa because of drought and spread to other regions of the world.

Approximately 1 polar cycle ago: Neanderthals become extinct. Humans still around.

Approximately 4 Mayan cycles ago: Humans enter Greece and Alaska

Approximately 3 Mayan cycles ago: Ice Sheets melt, Europe warms, and Koreans grow rice.

Approximately 2 mayan cycles ago: Mythological destruction of Atlantis.

Approximately 1 Mayan cycle ago: First Dynasty of Egypt, birth of the Minoan civilization, beginning of the construction of Stonehenge, creation of the world according to Genesis

End of this Mayan cycle: an alignment will occur with the Earth’s poles and the center of the galaxy. Effects are unknown. There will be a large increase in solar flare activity which can disrupt our current power grid.

Conclusions:
Though there are 26,000 year cycles, Humans have survived through at least 8 cycles, and the earth has survived over 173 thousand cycles. It is unlikely, then, that there will be a purely nature or cosmic based destruction of the Earth or extinction of the human race at the end of this cycle.

Though there are certain disasters associated with the Mayan cycles (extinction of the Neanderthal, mythological destruction of Atlantis), several civilizations and advancements seem to start in association with the cycles. If the cycles have a significant effect on human civilization as theorized, then this effect is neither purely constructive nor destructive, but could go either way. This suggests that should such an effect exist, there is an aspect of human control that can determine the end result.

There is a known potential disaster in the theorized solar flare activity disrupting modern power grids. Should this happen, it could cause a disaster. However, the extent of the disaster depends on the human reaction to it. People could pull together to get through it, or society could self-destruct either through panic or through nations taking advantage of the confusion to initiate military aggression. In this scenario, the end of the world comes through human destructive impulses, which is what we’ve been dealing with for the past 50 years.

In short, we don’t have to worry about the world being destroyed because of some unstoppable cosmic force. We do have to worry about us destroying the world. If there is any cosmic significance to this date, it is one of a test of humanity, a trial that can bring out either the best or the worst in us.


11/15/09--12:18: YES!!!!!! (chan 2284626)




01/05/10--06:17: New Post to my Helium (aka professional) Blog (chan 2284626)

New Writing Blog post
Why Heterosexuals Should Support Gay Marriage


01/18/10--14:02: MLK (chan 2284626)

Normally every year, I write a piece about the legacy of Martin Luthor King Jr. and what it actually means today. Instead of a page or two essay, I'm going to ask people to follow his spirit, and reach out in the name of justice and care for your fellow man, and do something, even small, for the people of Haiti. There are a number of ways to help, even if its just texting the word "Haiti" to 90999.


01/29/10--07:30: Article 14 (chan 2284626)

So, I'm apparently what the child of Elizabeth and Jack Sparrow would have looked like.






03/19/10--17:14: translating the Healthcare reform reconciliation (chan 2284626)

I think one of the biggest reasons people are opposing the health care bill is that there is so much information and misinformation out there that confusion has infected the debate like a virus. So to figure things out, I'm developing this handy guide.
First of all, ignore whatever Fox news said. They have been the largest propagator of health care misinformation. simple rule of thumb: when in doubt, don't trust a news organization that won a court case by arguing that they had no legal obligation to report the truth.
getting that out of the way, one of the other confusions is that the reconciliation bill is changes the senate bill to bring it in line with the house bill. So, in order to understand it, you need to see what the senate bill says:
http://democrats.senate.gov/reform/patient-protection-affordable-care-act-as-passed.pdf
if you want to read the full bill
http://dpc.senate.gov/healthreformbill/healthbill52.pdf
for a detailed summary

next, look at what is in the reconciliation bill.
http://www.opencongress.org/house_reconciliation
this is admittedly difficult, because it is not a straight bill, but a list of references to the senate bill with changes.
Many of the changes have to do with implementation dates, or changes in some of the rates.

what health care reform will entail
Creation of the health care exchange
require health care coverage for individuals
financial aid for people whose basic health plan premiums exceed a specific limit on a sliding scale (what you pay for health care will be dependent on your income)
provision of assistance for pre-existing conditions
prevents future exclusion from health plans for pre-existing conditions
provide for preventative health care
fix existing problems with medicare
extend medicare and medicaid
provisions to make the bill self funding so as to not increase national debt


What is lacking:
largely, the public option. This lack of the Public Option is actually a big flaw in the plan. the public option would be a self funding plan designed to create an affordable competitor to keep market prices affordable, IT IS NOT SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, as people have been misinformed. however, it has been promised that this health care reform will be an evolving process, and new legislation is in the works to add the public option so it will be in place when the plan takes affect a few years from now.


03/21/10--11:11: Do you know who else believed in the separation of Church and State? (chan 2284626)

This Guy



“Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.” Matthew 22:21



STFU Fundies


03/31/10--21:13: Someone actually filmed and posted the Munchausen game from Wicked!!! (chan 2284626)







04/12/10--19:22: I need help preparring for an interview (chan 2284626)

I've been asked to be interviewed for an upcoming documentary, based of an article I wrote for last year's Green Word (the periodical for the Beneficient Order of the Greenman). Because the newsletter is usually small, I intentionally kept the article brief and the ideas generalized. to prepare, I not only need to hash out the ideas, but do so in a way that can be presentable in an interview format.
so I'm asking people to read it over, and then ask clarifying questions, or ask questions about ideas your are curious about and would like to see developed. Basically, turn this into a mini interview, so I can be prepared with actual ideas, and not turn this into a game of munchausen

Now More Than Ever, We Need the Mythic

Historically, there have been a number of sociocultural explanations for the cultural utility of the myth. Myths entertain, pass on cultural norms, act as cautionary tales, pass on oral histories, and inspire artistic creation. But what is often neglected is the inherent potential of the myth to initiate and fuel profound personal and societal transformation.
In psychology, one of the most crucial factors for successful therapy is the ability for the therapist to instill hope within the client. For transformation and healing to occur, there must be hope that the change can occur, and that the change will be for the better. There must be hope that it is possible for there to be something better than the current state of suffering the person is in. But for one to hope, one must have something to hope for. Not only can they believe they can have the change, they must know and want something to change into. They must have a direction for their hope. They must have a dream.
As we exit the psychologists office, and enter the greater world, something similar can be seen. At the head of every social change is a dreamer, someone who can paint a picture of what the transformation they wish to cause will be, and what the world they wish to create will look like. The greatest example I can conjure is the great reformer, Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. His leadership was so profound because he dared to dream, and what he dreamed could be shared with all those around him. From that came the hope and change. And even though the world he dreamed of has not yet fully arrived, we come closer to it every day.
Dreams fuel hope, and hope fuels transformation. But as injustice and pain still permeate the world, I can't help but wonder if this is not due, in part, of a failure to dream. And sadly, as I look at our world of fear, terror, instant gratification, pettiness, loneliness, sorrow and depression, I have begun to believe that the world is losing its ability to dream. This is where we return to the transformative power of myth. As children, we first learn to dream through the stories we are told. Our bedtime stories, our fairytales, our legends, and, in short, our myths inspired our imaginations and taught us how to really dream. Just as our hopes fuel transformation, and our dreams fuel our hope, it is our myths that fuel our dreams. And if what I fear is true, if we are truly losing our ability to dream, then now, more then ever, we need the Mythic.


04/25/10--11:09: Urgent action needed (chan 2284626)

Please Write or Call your Senator to protest the Corporate giveaway in this bill


There is a Bill going to Senate Floor soon known as The “Global Food Security Act” (S.384). There is a clause in this bill that earmarks billions to promote GMO foods in the third world, and excludes specific provisions for any other farming technique or agricultural technology. What should have been a very good bill has been hijacked by corporate interests that will damage third world agricultural economies.

The use of GMO and related biotech is specifically contraindicated in third world economies by the scientific community. What has been supported by the scientific community is small scale local farming that encourages biodiversity, focuses on intensified natural practices, and traditional seed sources. (http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=26223 for the summary, and http://www.agassessment.org/reports/IAASTD/EN/Agriculture%20at%20a%20Crossroads_Global%20Report%20%28English%29.pdf for the full report) Essentially, this clause in the bill ignores scientific opinion and will corrupt the international aid it looks to improve.

Why is this a problem?

The corporate claims are that GMOs are equivalent to natural foods, and the engineering process is analogous to traditional farming practices like selective breeding. However, there are stark differences between GMO’s and traditional farming techniques scientifically, economically, and politically.
The scientific definition of GMO is that the techniques used directly manipulate the organism’s genetic code, usually through gene insertion. In contrast, traditional farming techniques may change genetic structure, but do so through an indirect means such as selective breeding (a form of assisted evolution), that encourages the presence of genes that are already present in the organisms population. The former is a new technology that is largely untested, and the latter is an application of a naturally occurring process. Because of this, the latter, traditional practices are known to be safe due to thousands of years of field testing, and the former’s safety has largely been brought into doubt by members of the scientific and medical community (http://www.aaemonline.org/gmopost.html).
Economically, the difference lies in the fact that GMOs, as opposed to their traditional counterparts, are subject to patent laws. Farmers who use GMO seeds have to agree to extremely strict usage rules, and biotech corporations are ruthless in their enforcement (http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/05/monsanto200805). Because of this, it is illegal, to collect seeds from GMO plants, destroying a cornerstone of sustainable agriculture. GMO seeds must be bought from the corporation every year. Furthermore, many of the GMOs are designed to depend on specific chemical fertilizers and pesticides, which, combined with the legal prohibitions on seed collection, means that anyone who uses GMO seeds will become completely dependent on the corporations for their food production. In the case of the above Senate bill, the offending clause is essentially selling the Third World to Monsanto.
Politically, GMO producing corporations have moved themselves into a position of political and legal invulnerability. The FDA as declared that GMO foods are Generally Regard as Safe (GRAS), and does not test or regulate them (http://www.caivn.org/article/2010/03/03/how-fda-failing-protect-us-genetically-modified-foods). As a result, the safety testing falls on the companies who declared Agent Orange was safe. Granted, the EPA and USDA to have a hand in some regulation, but their testing does not focus on consumer safety, nor is it always realistic, and the lack of quality of their testing has already almost ended all life on the planet (http://www.cracked.com/article_18503_how-biotech-company-almost-killed-world-with-booze.html). What this bill does politically is repeat an old abuse American corporations have perpetrated on third world countries in the past. Like carcinogenic cyclamates and DDT, this bill is looking to create a market in unregulated third world countries as safety hazards are causing their markets to dry up in developed nations.

In the end, this clause, in what would otherwise be a beneficial bill, could potentially kill or economically enslave millions of impoverished individuals, while making biotech corporations fat using federal funds.

Please write your senator to oppose the GMO clause in this bill.


04/27/10--15:23: Interview prep take 2 - thoughts are more developed and hopefully comprehensible. questions please (chan 2284626)

There is a fundamental connection between mythology and what it means to be human. More than just stories, more than histories, there is something about mythology that speaks to the core of human experience, nurturing our transcendent development.

But what is meant by “myth?”

Too often, the word “myth” has been confused with “story,” “legend,” “lie,” etc. But all of these proposed meanings are inaccurate because they don’t extend into the realm of the mythic. Myths do contain a story, but “story” is too general, it could refer to any tale of any content of any quality. Legends begin to approach the mythic, taking on a timeless quality, but the separation between myth and legend begins to take shape in that legends are often folk histories, understood to be, in some way, containing a historical truth. Legends recount historical figures in historical events, with several embellishments to make the story captivating to the audience. Myths, in contrast, gain their meaning independent of whatever historical origins may have once held them. The substance of the mythic lies not in the details that may or may not be true, but in the themes that ring true to the human condition in spite of the reality of the details of the narrative. The equation of “myths” with “lies” is where we do myths the greatest disservice. Even though myths and lies are both not literally true, myths are not intended to be interpreted as literal truth. When one creates or propagates a lie, the intent is to have it accepted as a literal truth. But when one tells a myth, it doesn’t matter if you believe an ogre actually existed and was slain, or if a carpet actually flew, because the purpose of the myth lies independent of those facts.

Instead, where stories, legends, etc are meant to provide information to allow a person to know, myths are meant to go past the details and provide a person with the ability to understand. The symbolism of myth is intended to liberate the mind from the restrictions of the literal or semantic, and force you to mentally wrestle with a concept that extends beyond the details. The fantastic nature of the myth forces you to abandon the crutch that comes with being otherwise rooted in the rational world and forces you to reason creatively and truly examine those parts of the human experience that lies beyond the material and observable. The unreality of myths separates them from cultural isolations, and creates commonalities that transcend the divisions amongst men. Ultimately, myths are, as Joseph Cambell said “The world’s dreams”

Within the purview of  mythology is a figure that stands in specific relevance to any discussion of the connections of man and myth: the mythic hero. The mythic hero takes man forms in within the tales; the warrior, the wizard, the shaman, the knight, etc. What elevates the hero above the other characters of the mythic tale is the hero’s function to both transform and transcend. As Joseph Cambell often pointed out, the mythic hero was a man who first transformed himself, and then transformed the society around him. Whether it is the courage to liberate the self and then a people from terror, or the strength to learn and then spread the messages of mercy and justice, the hero’s first struggle is to fight to learn a great lesson that changes him or her, and then spreads that lesson onto the others in need. The second role taken is that of the world walking traveler. In this role, the hero is not just a citizen and master of the world he was brought up within, but learns to travel through, negotiate, and master the world of another. For some heroes, this manifest as a conquest against the world of the magical, or the realm of the dead. For those heroes who exist in a more magical realm, their ability to transcend lies in their ability to negotiate between the worlds of human intelligence, and the world of other intelligence. In creating these roles, myth not only describes the human condition, but creates figures that are the ultimate form of what it means to be human, and create a guide to human greatness.

 

 

The Philosophical connections between myth and man

 

The world of man is not just made up of the concrete and material, but also the immaterial and the abstract. Love, justice, duty, devotion, sacrifice, trust, loyalty, friendship, kindness, and other concepts valued so highly in the human condition do not exist in any tangible sense. In a purely rational world, these ideals simply do not exist. “Then take the universe and grind it down to the finest powder, and sieve it through the finest sieve, and then show me one atom of justice, one molecule of mercy.” (Terry Pratchett, Hogfather).  They, instead, exist in the world of the abstract. Abstractions are irrational; they can’t be observed. But despite them being irrational, they still exist. Since they can’t be observed, measured, or physically manipulated they cannot be taught in the traditional sense. We can’t portion it out loyalty for children to experiment with, we can’t give them rulers to measure duty. What we can do, however, is create intangible environments for them to explore, manipulate, and play with the abstract concepts. Myth becomes this environment. Through myth we are presented with models of the abstract, through heroes, lovers, fools, and friendships. Through myth, we are presented with dilemmas and problems that force us to test and apply love, loyalty, friendship, and justice. Myth, then, is the vehicle that teaches humanity to understand its greatest values. It is for this reason that the heroes, like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, invoke the mythic dreams, because in their invocations, they remind the world of the values of justice, compassion, equality, love, and duty.

 

One of the common philosophical dilemmas surrounding how man experiences himself and the world focuses on the separations between the objective world as it is in its infinity and man’s subjective experience as limited by his finite perspective. Thomas Kuhn offered that if one were to look at the raw world, the flood of information would be so overwhelming as to render your inquiry useless. For that reason, man builds paradigms, or mental maps, which filters the raw information of the world. Like a map, each paradigm chooses which features of reality it wants to deem practically important, and which features it wants to ignore. In addition, each paradigm creates a map key, a symbolic language, meant to quickly and simply relate larger concepts or information. Jacques Marie Émile Lacan saw the raw world, or “the Real” as not just overwhelming, but traumatizing and threatening to the sense of self. To protect against the trauma of the Real, man constructs “Reality,” a mutually supported consensus containing those aspects of the Real we are ready to accept, and defending against those aspects we find too traumatic to admit. Belief, custom, social rules, symbolism, and language all become part of the maintaining forces that support this Reality. Myth plays a part in how humanity relates to both these subjective constructions to filter the raw world, and the experience of the raw world itself in 3 ways. First, Myths serve to teach and enforce the subjective constructions by transmitting both the cultural symbols needed to understand the constructions, and by providing tales and allegories that transmit the customs and rules that maintain them. Second, myths acknowledge the constructed nature of our shared subjective filters by teaching us to evaluate, manipulate, reason through, and even temporarily suspend the rules and laws allowing us to learn how to take control of our constructed realities. Finally, through the portrayal of the hero/wizard/shaman, myths show us how to safely transcend the constructed realities, to either briefly view the world as it is, or to cross between and function within the differing constructed realities that exist within the world. This third and final role of myth is often understated in our society, partially because it violates the rules society uses to protect itself, but when you think about the most brilliant men of history, you will find that one of the ways their brilliance manifests is in their abilities to cross between paradigms, realities, etc. Darwin, Einstein, Newton, Galileo, and others we not only scientists who operated in the observable viewpoint, but were also religious men, openly exploring the realms of the spiritual realm. Their genius lies not in their utter mastery of a single world (the world of the “rational”, but in to their abilities to balance and negotiate the seemingly opposing worlds of the “rational” and the “irrational.”



 

 

 

The Theoretical connections between myth and man

 

Man is a creature of both symbol and meaning. The human mind processes and encodes information through representative schema. These schema link linguistic representations, known characteristics, related emotional information. For instance, when you see beagle, you know it is a dog. When you see a greyhound, you also know it is a dog. When you hear or read the word “dog,” you understand that the word is referring to a dog. This is because you have in your mind a schema of “Dog” that that is symbolically connected to the word “dog” as well as the various breeds of “Dog.” This schema of “Dog” becomes the archetype for everything you know about dogs, and the connections it symbolically refers to conveys the meaning of this schema symbolically. Despite the fact that the word “dog” invokes the schema of the dog, the word “dog” is not physically a dog. Individual dogs also symbolically link to the Dog schema. Even though a beagle is a dog, it is not every type of dog, and conveys what it means to be a dog without literally being the only kind of dog. The symbolism of myth is not just a literary tool, but a reflection of how man actually understands the world, connecting myth with the fundamentals of human experience.

            In addition, the process of the development of key human faculties is heavily dependent on the mythic experience. Human do not emerge from the womb fully capable of complex thought or analysis. In fact, due to the size of the human animal in contrast to the size of the human pelvis, humans actually are born comparatively underdeveloped. Were humans to develop to the point of other animals at birth, our heads would be too large to pass through the birth canal. Because of this, much of human development, especially brain development, happens after birth. Humans are born, and begin to experiment and explore with the senses. In these stages of development, rules are unformed, and so the world of the child is unbound by rational laws and ruled by creativity. As this exploration occurs, the child begins to make rudimentary and primitive understandings of connections and causality. Eventually, these observations and primitive rules develop into a very concrete, logical, and literal rule based thinking system. At around the onset of puberty, the brain structure matures to the point were it can cognitively connect the rule based logical thinking processes with the creative thinking processes, making them capable of comprehending abstract ideas. However, just because one is physically capable of a skill, does not mean that that person can exercise that skill adeptly. Cognitive processes, like all skills, have components which need to be learned and practiced. So even though teens and young adults have developed to the point where they can think abstractly and creatively, does not mean they have those skills. Myth is uniquely suitable for this purpose, as myth itself combines not only the creativity of the unreal and fantastic, but the reality of the symbolic, and the rule based reasoning of logic. And to truly understand a myth, you need to apply all of these faculties, practicing the skills needed for the most developed and mature forms of human thought

"If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales. When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than any talen...t for abstract, positive thinking." ~Albert Einstein~

 



 

 

The Clinical implications of the man myth connections

 

The themes inherent in myth have huge implications on clinical practice within the realm of the human mind. Often times, psychological dysfunction is caused because the individual has been forced to experience a situation they are developmentally not prepared to experience. As mentioned above, one role of myth is to train people to understand and think in the abstract. Exposure to situations that require one to apply skills that lie in abstraction can become problematic if one simply does not have those required skills. Pain and fear, for instance, are two psychologically debilitating conditions, but two people experiencing the same amount of fear and pain can react quite differently. Where one may fall to depression, despair, or debilitating anxiety, another may persist, or even grow because of the experience. The difference between the two lies in the meanings given to the experience. Those who are practiced in the themes of noble suffering, gaining strength through overcoming hardship, growth through facing the terrifying are better equipped to deal with the pain and fear. Those who are unprepared fall either into immature literal interpretations that involve shame or guilt filled systems of cause and effect, or collapse into utter chaos. The process of therapy, in many ways, is meant to train the client to both learn and apply new mature and abstract skills, helping them to reprocess the experiences in less damaging manners.

 

In therapy in general, the first thing that needs to be imparted on the client is a sense of hope. The less hope a client has, the more the client has surrendered to their illness and the less likely their recovery. The hopeless client is one that is mired in the literal and the present. Their pain is as it is. There is no vision of living without the pain because that possibility is not a literal truth. But in order for a client to heal, they need to have an idea of what living without the pain would feel like, and how they would move towards that change. To do that, they need to be able to form a dream of what it would mean to live without the pain. That dream in itself is loaded with symbolism and meaning, and its goal is not a physical goal, but an abstract and affective goal, placing it not in the realm of the literal, but in the mythic. The literal path that develops later becomes a side effect of this dream. The dream creates a mythic vision that something could be possible, and grants the hope. The hope inspires the individual to form the plan for recovery.

 

 

When working with trauma, this connection between literal thinking and difficulties become more prominent. Trauma has been frequently described as being maintained by an inability to symbolically encode the traumatic experience. As a result the traumatized client is mired in literalness of the experience. The terror that the traumatized experience is constantly revisited both because the inability to symbolically encode the experience leaves it in conscious attention, and because the literalness of thinking itself causes symbolic links associated with the trauma to become the trauma itself.  In the former, the inability to encode obstructs the minds natural ability to move past the event through its natural healing process. In the latter, things linked to the trauma become the trauma, such as the presence of any dog literally becoming THE dog that attacked the survivor because every dog is symbolically linked through the schema of “Dog.” As a result, the survivor is constantly retraumatized through his or her literal interpretations and understanding. Recovery from trauma occurs through a complex process of reexamining the  traumatic event, and transforming it from an event of literal experience to an even of symbolic meaning, restarting the healing process.

 



 

 

The Social impact of the loss of myth

 

It is here that we return to an old idea of mine, that society has endangered itself through its failure to dream on the mythic level. Increasingly, mythic components are being stripped from our society. Our media has chosen to abandon portrayals of nobler characters for the draw of more realistic, “grittier” characters, both in the creation of new programs, or in the watered down remakes that are becoming increasingly prevalent. We’ve begun to abandon programs with complex writing and development for “reality” shows. The shows marketed towards our children are largely extended commercials for toys, that not just sell toys, but curb creativity by telling children how to play with them. The majority of video games that have replaced creative play are designed to reward players to meet predetermined goals as created by the game developers, not inspire independent creativity. And prevalent through the media are focuses on material gratification, and visceral stimulation, not the more complex values. At the same time, our society is experiencing an epidemic of psychical and sexual abuse, bullying, mass murder, chemical and behavioral addictions, and multitude of other horrors that we normally associate with war torn and refugee nations. And in its worst form, this trend of the dying of the dream and the myth in our society has come in the from of the carefully crafted lies, which in contrast to dreams and myth, are intended to be interpreted as literal truth. Because of this, we have seen a resurgence of literal, fundamentalist thinking, in both religious and secular groups, which has lead to these same groups to intolerance, hatred and violence.

And worse yet, without the mythic, and without the dreams, we have lost our guides that would otherwise transform our society for the better. The greatest heroes and leaders of history gained their power because they learned the art of the mythic dream, and was able to craft the dreams of the mythic to enable transformation. Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.’s leadership, for example, was so profound because he dared to dream on the mythic level not of the literal interaction between blacks and whites, but of the higher, nobler and abstract values of justice, mercy, and equality. And what he dreamed could be shared with all those around him, not because he was making a literal prediction of the future to come, but because the mythic message involved touched the humanity of those who heard and rallied behind him. That leadership, that invocation of the transformative power of the mythic, is largely lost today, and we are suffering because of it.  


05/03/10--07:41: Pet irresponsibility (chan 2284626)

     My friend imaplatypus  is a heavy proponent of pit bulls, and often points out that pit bulls are a generally well behaved and generally non-aggressive. Doing some extra research on the debate, the offered counter to this is that the issue isn't the temperament of the dog, but the power the dog has to inflict its wounds. It's not that they are more prone to attacks, its just that their attacks are more dangerous.

     At first, this looks like a damning argument against Pit bull breeds. It basically is the same reason for many gun control restrictions: the more dangerous the gun, the more reason to ban it. However, this whole argument, and series of arguments has a huge flaw in that is focuses solely on the dog breeds. It becomes a back and forth between two groups drawing lines as they shout "Pit bulls: BAD!" or Pit bulls: GOOD!"  And as they participate in this singular, narrow focus, they end up ignoring the most important part of this debate: human responsibility.

     We, as a society, have become so obsessed with the concept of freedom, we give it a singular focus and cult like status. What we forget is that our freedom is not an entitlement, but a benefit we gain through social contract. but as part of that contract, we are obligated to meet certain responsibilities in order to enjoy these rights. Pet ownership, sadly, is one of those areas where far too many people neglect their requisite responsibilities. 

     If you pick an animal, you can usually find a pet rescue associated with it. These rescues are needed because 1) many people never bother to learn enough about their animals, and find their animals too difficult to safely control, or 2) many people just want to own another living thing, but don't care much beyond this. Huskies get abandoned because they are energetic dogs that people try to coup up in small homes, leading to damaged furniture. Parrots are often driven insane because they are incredibly intelligent creatures that people place in cages and ignore. Cats go feral because people just send them outside. And then you get to the really disturbing part about pet irresponsibility: neglect and abuse, both of which can turn any animal into a killer. Too many people believe a pet is something you buy, own, and enjoy at their leisure, and ignore training, breed specific needs, and other responsibilities. And though people will acknowledge this is a problem, when it comes to the debate around pit bulls, it largely escapes focus.

     If I leave a gun on a table where there are children playing, I'm at fault if the children find the gun and shoot it. If I own a car and don't maintain it, and it breaks down causing an accident, I'm at fault. If the sidewalk in front of my home does not get shoveled and de-iced, and someone falls and injures themselves, I'm at fault. We haven't banned guns, we haven't outlawed cars, and we haven't called for the destruction of sidewalks. Instead, it is understood that if I want to enjoy the rights to own a gun, car, or sidewalk, I have to accept the responsibility of safeguarding others against any dangers involved with the exercising of that right. So why does it not translate that if I were to exercise my right to own a dog, it should be made my responsibility to learn everything about the needs and care of that specific breed of dog, and know enough about the personality of that specific dog to own it safely? If, as it has been posited, the pit bulls, are more dangerous not because of temperament, but because of their ability to inflict damage, is it not then my responsibility to both train my dog and keep him controlled enough to render him safe?

       So why does the debate around pit bulls only focus on the pit bulls? Why is it that we are willing to damn a breed of living creatures while ignoring the human component in this danger? Why is it that the pit bull is the danger, while irresponsible ownership is not?


05/26/10--09:44: Thoughts on life and death of Isaac Bonewitz (chan 2284626)

Isaac Bonnewitz,  religious leader loved by some of my friends is dying of cancer. There is an effort to use prayer to help him get better. Although there is a definite value to a community coming together for such an act of will and compassion, it should not be ignored sometimes the greatest test of life is the way a person faces death. Because of this, there does need to be some preparation for a reality that he may die.

Now granted, I should admit that I have never been a follower of Isaac. I have great respect for a lot of the work he has done, such as his efforts in creating a standard for a realistic assessment of religious cults (the ABCDEGF that separates the truly dangerous groups from the ones people just disagree with). I have attended his lectures, and found his thoughts to be unique and enlightening. And i even volunteered at one of the charity shows to raise money for his treatment. However, in all good conscience, I need to premise my comments not as a particular follower of Isaac, but as a person who has spent a good part of his life studying religion.

Praying for the health and healing of another has a real benefit to individuals and a community. There are studies that do show such prayer can improve health (though also studies that show no effect). There are more supported studies that have shown that religious participation improves overall psychological, adjustment physical health, and general well being. Though the mechanisms are not agreed on, the positive effects of the religious involvement are there on the health of the member in question. On a more qualitative level, coming together to pray for the health of an individual joins the community together in an act of compassionate intent. It focuses the intent of the community on love and health (rather than such things as hate and violence).

However, their still needs to be included provisions for the acceptance of the inevitability of death.

How a person faces death is just as important as how one faces life. Death is the great equalizer. Every man in history, great and small, poor or noble has died or will die. Death is inevitable. When you acknowledge this you can prepare for the final test of your humanity, and meet death bravely and on your terms. Being able to face death frees your from it.

Failing to prepare for the inevitability of death is where such efforts to prolong life becomes corrupted by fear and hubris. It is Hubris to believe that death can be avoided, but many communities who focus on the power of prayer fall to this hubris. Even though there may be a reality to the power of prayer and powerful intent, we have to remember that such power does not place us into the position of gods ourselves. When we forget this, we fall from faith into dangerous delusions. This delusion can cause us to neglect our own personal development, because wish fulfillment is a child's desire, and maturity comes when one learns to sacrifice personal desire for higher causes. This delusion can become dangerous to others because if such attempts to heal don't work, the hubris of the practicioner gets challenged, and often that challenge is met through a narcissistic lashing out against the sick and his friends, claiming its their fault, their lack of face, and not the reality that we must all succumb to death.

In addition, failure to prepare and face death enslaves you to death and the fear of dying. When you accept death, you can deal with the fear and terror of it. You can ensure your life is not lived with regret. When finally have to face it, you can be prepared to face it proudly and with dignity. This does not mean rejecting life, it means not wasting life hiding from fear. However, when you fail to prepare for death, the fear of death begins to run your life. Every risks become too great, fear becomes paralyzing, and you become obsessed with the loss, not the gain. When you refuse to acknowledge and face death, your fear of death drives you, and you fall to powerlessness and helplessness before death.

Now I don't know what Isaac has said about his own death. If he has been making preparations, and if he is willing to face death proudly, he needs to discuss this in order to prepare the community for his passing. If he has not, then this discussion needs to be started, lest this refusal to face death entraps the entire community.


06/10/10--13:59: The Economics of Compassion (chan 2284626)

When offering criticism of programs often labeled as “liberal” or “progressive,” people generally draw on arguments of “who is going to pay for the program?” or “why should my money go to those people?” This is usually a compelling argument, forcing people to have to struggle between compassionately helping others, and preserving your own resources. However, these arguments have a flaw.

 

Most people understand economics in a very direct, limited, and simplistic way. They understand it in a very 1 to 1 transactional mindset. There are producers and consumers, there is supply and demand, and when it comes to aid programs, there is spend and tax. On top of that, we also have a very competitive mindset when it comes to business, turning it into a very adversarial system of dominance. Because of this, most people begin to conceptualize business in what is known as the “zero-sum” mentality. In this scenario, resources are strictly limited, and for one person to get more, another person needs to get less. The problem is, the Zero-sum scenario is antithetical to a functioning economic system.

            In a business deal, each member should benefit. If the seller gains, and the buyer loses in the business deal, the buyer will not be able to maintain himself as a stable participant, and eventually, the system will collapse because there will be a deficit of buyers, and the seller will eventually have no one to sell to. If the buyer profits, and the seller loses in the business deal, the seller will no longer be able to participate, and the system will collapse as well. As such, an economic system works best when all participants are able to benefit, and therefore must be mutually supportive. And because a functioning economic system needs to be mutually supportive, it also grows exponentially with the amount of economic participation. For instance, when someone buys a piece of leatherwork from my business, I am not the only one benefiting. My leather wholesaler makes a profit off it is, as do the farmers who sell them the hides. The companies I buy my dyes and hardware from also profit, and so does Etsy and my web host of the sale is though the internet, or so does the faire that is hosting my booth if in person. And at each stop along the way, a tiny bit is taken out by the government to pay for programs. Now this is a simplified example, but the more consumers there are actively taking part in an economic system, the more the economic system grows as a whole, and the more everyone benefits together.

            This is where the compassionate aid programs actually turn out to benefit society, because as we help those who are having difficulties, we empower them to participate in the system, and the money does come back to us indirectly. For instance, the USDA has reported that for every dollar spent on food stamps, we see $1.82 in economic growth, which makes the food stamp program akin to a loan program with 82% interest back on the loan. (Imagine what it would be like if we requested that much back on the bailout program). In Public welfare programs, over 50% of households are off welfare within 2 years, and over 80% are off the program with in 5 years, meaning that within those time frames, the recipients who leave the program are able to get jobs, and contribute to and help grow the local economic system, and in doing so, pay back the moneys they have received. When it comes to immigration policy, most economics experts don’t see a financial/resource drain in either legal or illegal immigration (Alan O. Sykes, The Welfare Economics of Immigration Law: A Theoretical Survey with an Analysis of U.S. Policy, in Justice in Immigration1995., http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/09/magazine/09IMM.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1274428812-kA6t1BNQCiy47d0kGkWWSA) and in reference to illegal immigration specifically see it as either neutral or even beneficial to the local economy as 90% of earned immigrant income gets reinvested into the local economy, promoting economic growth. Ultimately, a system that allows for compassionate aid may initially require the direct input from community members through such things as tax funded programs, but because these programs produce economic participants, that input returns through the economic growth.

            From here, you can expand on this idea of economic complexity to show the economic benefits of other ideas and programs. Lets look at, for example, drug abuse. Today, we regularly penalize drug abuse, leading to the arrest of users, drug screening for the basis of hiring and firing employees, and there is even a push to make welfare recipients get mandatory drug testing. The problem with this mentality, from this discussed economic mindset, is that it ultimately leads to incarceration, or poverty and starvation, which then creates a situation where the person is prevented from becoming an economic participant, and, in the case of incarceration, costing the state tens of thousands per year. Now, if we switched from the penalization model to a treatment or even prevention model, then we cannot only drastically reduce the costs of incarceration, but we can empower individuals to become viable economic participants. To understand how this is possible we must first look at the causes of substance abuse. Normally, substance abuse disorders are attributed to a form of moral weakness in our culture, an idea that stems from the fact that the cultural elites use intoxicating substances recreationally, and because of this, abusing the substance becomes a sign of lack of self-control. What this attributional model ignores is that intoxicating substances often have a medicinal origin, and that much of substance abuse is really a form of self-medication. Drug use is symptomatic of many DSM disorders, such as depression, anxiety, and PTSD. In surveys of individuals at drug treatment facilities, 70% had a history of trauma exposure as children.  Or, as one former crack addict and felon once stated in a presentation:

“I started drinking when I was 9, because I found it made me care less and feel less dirty about what those men my mother entertained did to me at night…”

If we redefine the substance abuse as a symptom, and not a moral failing, we then see we have causal element we can treat. And after investing in the treatment, we can have productive economic participants, instead of incarcerated individuals excluded from participation. To take this back a step farther, if we focus on programs of prevention, we can prevent the conditions that lead to the substance abuse. Home visitation social work programs designed at assisting impoverished and overwhelmed families have shown to cut child physical and sexual abuse rates in half, resulting in the reduction of traumatized individuals in the community, and then resulting in fewer individuals who became substance abusers.

Now, it should be noted that this does not mean a completely socialist state or non-discretionary welfare spending is warranted either. How money is spent is just as important as how much is spent, and money that is not directed properly can serve to aggravate problems. However, this does show that spending to aid others is neither a drain, nor an act of naïve wishful thinking, but rather an important tool to economic stimulation.


08/16/10--22:34: New Post on my Serious Blog (chan 2284626)

For America To Heal, It Needs the Muslim Community Center

Many see the so called "Ground Zero Mosque" as an insensitive reminder of 9/11. However, this community center may actually be what America needs to heal from and move past the events of 9/11.




08/20/10--12:12: new blog post (chan 2284626)

Why Smart People Do Stupid Things: The Science of Bad Decisions




08/20/10--12:17: Article 2 (chan 2284626)

well, I'm mostly moved into my new apartment, I have 11 of my 12 interviews done for my dissertation, my internship is set to start next month, meaning i'll have a paycheck soon, and things are going good with the lady. All this goodness can only mean one thing...


...All hell is about to break loose!!

I think I need to go find myself a bomb shelter to prepare...


09/26/10--07:25: Katy and Elmo (chan 2284626)

So I'm a little torn on the Katy Perry on Sesame Street thing




On one hand, her outfit wasn't all that horrible. Parts were covered and it looked like she was playing dress-up

On the other hand, we do have a problem with the over sexualization of our children in this country, and there is a problem if the target audience of sesame street starts wanting to dress like that at their age because they saw it on sesame street.

Discuss:


10/11/10--05:38: I would like to offer support to my gay friends on National Coming out day (chan 2284626)

Today is National Coming Out day
I'm not the type to offer fast slogans or simple gestures and then move on. So I'll have to say that growing up a freak (nerd, geek, dexter, dork, etc), I know all to well what it is like to be made a target for what you are and be ignored for who you are.

Also, in the spirit of my belief that you should never let the loudmouths and the assholes control the conversation, let me just point out that anyone who tells you that God hates you for being gay is reading their bible wrong:
The bible doesn't condemn real homosexuality
and
Abomination is a mistranslation