Anti-dream...or is it?

With the encouragement of a friend I fell asleep listening to Thomas Newton. The soundtrack quietly warped and woofed through the developing fabric of my dreaming.

It was dark outside on a warm summer night as I approached the small bungalow. She was waiting outside in a long cotton gown. She seemed to be having fun, taking care somehow.

When I saw her and walked up she turned and smiled.

"What are you going?"

She crinkled her little nose and said "I'm just taking care of the last."

"Okay," I said and went inside past the screen and regular door.

I could hear Newton's Mauve Antartica in the background, twinkling, dancing, a little sweep here. Beautiful. Like delicate cat paws on new carpet.

But the room was empty. I turned on the air conditioner but it made no sound. Just the music.

I lay down on simple soft bedding. The dark yellow glow of the lighting warmed the room. I felt at peace.

She did not come into the room. The dream was too short. But she didn't need to. I knew in her time she would, and lay down next to me. I would smell her hair, and enjoy the line of her jaw in the light, and she would stretch out and just want to be held.

And I felt happy. A room with nothing but a bed. A woman to trust. Crickets outside, and a winsome soundtrack.

Ah...if life were only like this.

But it can be, in a dream..or if we choose it...sometimes.

Darkness

It's not a place you wanna go to.

Unrequited love that becomes like a spell.

Its dark and grusome. You wait for it to end but it goes on.

It's a sadness that prevails and overlooks.

Few can fathom it.

Unrequited Love Part 1

She looks happy, huh?
_________________________________

Pepe Le Pew is instructive of many a male female catastrophe. He goes by outward appearances and falls for a feline of a different species.

She is not amused or enamored by his constant advances, which do not deter him in the least.

But his "love" for her is unrequited...unanswered, or if so, the answer is "no". Yet he continues on unwavering to pursue.

Napoleon Dynamite took lessons from Pepe, which is probably why he took Pedro under his wing.

Unlike our cartoon friend, most of us have experienced unrequited love at one time or another. Perhaps even many times and it begs a number of questions.

First, why would you want to be with anyone who would not truly desire to be with you?

That is the reverse of the old Groucho Marx joke that he would never "want to belong to any club that would have me as a member," which answers why some people abide years of unrequited love. They do not believe they deserve love from someone they admire and find beautiful.

Nonsense, I say.

Second, it often happens by mis-timing like the constant backfiring of your neighbors car which was last tuned in 1974. When she is ready you are not. When you become ready she is not. When it is corrected you are out of gas. It becomes something like Bunuel attempting to film Madame Butterfly or George Bush responding to New Orleans.

I know this from first hand knowledge. It's a little like the sketch in Woody Allen's Love and Death between Natasha and Sonya where Natasha spills her guts about unrequited love in Tolstoy's Russia:

Natasha: "I'm in love with Alexi
He loves Elisha
Elisha is having an affair with Leiv
Leiv loves Tatana
Tatana loves Simkin
Simkin loves me
I love Simkin but in a different way than Alexi
Alexi loves Tatana like a sister
Tatana's sister love Tregoran like a brother
Tregoran's brother is having an affair with my sister
who he likes physically, but not spiritually."

Sonya: "Natasha! It's getting a little late."

Natasha: "The firm of Mishkin and Mishkin is sleeping with the firm of Tuskoff and Tuskoff"

Sonya: "Natasha...to love is to suffer. To avoid suffering one must not love, but then one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer, not to love is to suffer, to suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love. To be happy then is to suffer, but suffering makes one unhappy. Therefore to be happy one must love, or love to suffer, or suffer from too much happiness."

"I hope you are getting this down."
_________________________________
God have mercy on us all in Part 2...

Unrequited Love Part 2

Part of the issue is the "romantic myth" grounded in the literature and song of 12th Century Europe...most specifically the province of "roman".

So we see here that the world has been conquered twice by the same word.

But where one held the sword in "Pax Romana" (peace at any cost) the other is a conqueror of hearts and minds in an almost upward viral way.

From the Medieval troubadours the virus of romantic love took Western civilization from the near primordial stories of Tristan and Iseult. With King Mark, this triad morphs later into Camelot, Shakespeare, and feeds a near Middle Eastern pipeline of energy into modern romanticism. Every television show, novel, film...or shitty magazine on the shelf at Safeway is informed by this romantic myth.

It is always a triad. That triad can be and man and woman and danger. That triad can be a man and woman and another woman, or man. That triad can be a man and a man and a disease. It can be Brad, Jen and Angelina, or it can be Scott, Lacey and the judicial system.

It sells. It attracts. There is drama in the triad.

And drama is what we want...and get.

But we do not necessarily get love. That's the trick.

And maybe why the divorce rate in California is like 60 percent, with another 25 percent just opting out entirely.

Maybe the myth is at fault?

Isn't it interesting that at the core of the romantic myth is unrequited love?
_______________________
Hmnnnn...

Unrequited Love Part 3

Some days it's best to stay on shore.
____________________________________

Surfing will be my new metaphor for awhile. Usually it's baseball, but I am studying surfing.

What do you think went through this surfer's mind when he saw that?

Yet he wants to catch a wave. Needs to catch one.

A lot like love in a postmodern world.

And I am not being cynical.

The Hummingbird Tolls For Me, Part 1

"To see hummingbirds in your dream, suggests that small ideas/concepts may possess much potential and power. Alternatively, it indicates your flighty thoughts and frivolous ideas. It may be a metaphor for your inability to commit to a relationship."
___________________________________________

Dreams are sometimes funny and at other times decidely not.

I was laying in bed and it was starting to get light out. I looked over at the wall and a hummingbird was perched on a small stand. When it saw me it flew straight over and landed on my head.

"Oh great," I said. "I'm dreaming again and there is a hummingbird on my head..."

I got up on the side of the bed and tried to decide if I was going to go for an early morning run. Then I woke up in my actual bedroom and started recollecting the various aspects of the dream. Unlike the dream I wrote about recently, this one had a different feel to it and I did not like it one bit.

But what are dreams? What are their aboriginal function in our lives? And when people give "interpretations" (like above...got that one online) how do they know?

I did some background research, which given my encyclopedic mind took the usual three to five minutes. More than long enough to reconstruct my dream and get a solid interpretation.

And this was, while not a nightmare, still a disturbing dream.

First, the hummingbird.

I'm gonna go with the latter interpreation. I have also been experiencing, lately, an increased ability to write and form longer projects and a much faster rate. What use to take me weeks to write now takes a matter of hours. This little series will be done before breakfast. They almost writes themselves.

But there are side effects to whatever is happening in my brainpan. When I awake I have way too many thoughts and images swirling around me brain and a general lack of clarity until I get up, sometimes throw up, have a drink and settle in at the computer.

From there things quiet down. But the Hummingbird felt like a warning.

"Flighty thoughts and frivilous feelings"...hmnn. Let's have a look at the rest of the dream.
________________________
More Hummingbirds...

The Hummingbird Tolls For Me, Part 2

"Alternatively, it indicates your flighty thoughts and frivolous ideas. It may be a metaphor for your inability to commit to a relationship."
_________________________________________

Earlier in the dream I had just dregged myself out of a swamp. In the swamp there were vagrants laying on the bottom of the pools of water..two of them. They did not look well. Above me was a long bookshelf and on the top I found a book in process that I had been writing with a few good friends. More on that later.

I walked out into a beautiful; courtyard and there was a display of pieces of art and silver. Inbetween each layer was a protective soft cloth. I would sit and peel back a layer and a beautiful piece of silver art was undersneath. I would set it aside and uncover and a long fluted piece of hummingbird art, garden art, was there.

I was most taken by the hummingbirds. Some had long porcelain shafts for placing them in the earth, then crystal centers then a metal or ceramic hummingbird always at the top. One in particular grabbed my attention. It was larger and inside the center of a crystal base was layered with salt, then beautiful crystals, then another substance then it may have been diamond at the top. Pewter handle and then, the hummingbird.

I sat and looked at it and thought, "This thing must have cost a fortune to produce. Amazing." It was as hefty and broad as a large dagger.

Layer after layer.

There was nothing frivilous about any of these hummingbirds, but then they were representations. Cold dead art.

Perhaps a picture or series of them of the beauty and value, yet coldness, of lost relationships.

I'm not very good with women long term. Oh I can be quite charming at first. But if you note from the TV series, it always seems that while it is good and good things happen, I end up alone. I think it's the exploits and the danger.

But it might be my "frivilous thoughts and inability to commit."

I may be chivalrous and frivilous.
__________________

The Book and the Pool...

The Hummingbird Tolls For Me, Part 3

I like to gamble.
_________________________________

To deconstruct a dream one must take what first comes to mind. If Francis Crick is correct (and he did a fine job on DNA and a variety of other subjects) then one purpose of dreams is to purge the brain and consciousness of unwanted information. It's like reverse-learning. You are unlearning things you will not need.

However, that is not the only function. There are many others. Another is to have a quick look at perhaps what you do not wish to see or things that, while good, you may also wish not to see.

Let's get back to my dream which began in the Bed, one not so different from my own.

To see your bed in your dream, represents you intimate self and discovery of your sexuality. If you are sleeping in your own bed, then it denotes security and restoration of your mind. You are looking for domestic bliss and peace.

My goodness. The hummingbirds and the bed seem a bit at odds.

Let's return to the swamp and have a look. First the book. It was not well-done and only mentioned me once, and under another pen name. The artwork was poor and done by someone I did not know. I was quite disappointed and it was also shabbely bound. It almost appeared as if it had been transformed into some sort of crude children's story.

That is when I saw the vagrants sleeping underwater. At first I thought they were dead, with their swollen eyes and stillness. But they roused for a moment.

I did know, in the dream, that water is the symbol for the unconscious. I did a bit of unofficial dream analysis right then (inside of the dream, which is a neat trick if you can get away with it). I decided they represented death.

Then I looked this up a few minutes ago.

Swamp:

To dream that you are walking through a swampy area, foretells that you will be find yourself in an adverse situation. Disappointments in love may also be implied from this symbol. You will suffer much displeasure from unwise conduct of those around you. On a less negative note, walking through a swamp, denotes that you will experience prosperity and pleasure, but through dangerous and intriguing means.

Well, The latter is what I am all about. Let's face it. The former not so very much but it may be closer as the whole din of this dream was dark.

What about the vagrants O Wheel O Dreams?

To dream that you are a vagrant, denotes that you are trying to escape from the confines of social expectations. It may also indicate your current condition of poverty and misery.

To speak and give to the vagrant, symbolizes your generosity and are surrounded by valuable friends.

This one is curious. I was not the vagrant and was immediately concerned for them both. Ironically, the fact they were sleeping underwater made me think they were temporarily safe, though some violence had been done to them.

I did not speak to them but felt for them.

In some ways I felt, at the time, that they were an advanced picture of me. Perhaps I would end up beaten and submerged along the roadside of the unconscious. But why two?

I have no idea. Dreams are funny that way in an unfunny way.
_______________
Next...

The Hummingbird Tolls For Me, Part 4

See what I have to endure...being a Saint?
_____________________________

Two last factors...the group and the book.

There was a group I was supposed to be a part of. But I got in another group and did class with them. It was good fun, but when the other group came out they introduced themselves to me and an old woman ploped down on the coach next to me and with bright red lipstick, gave me a grandma kiss.

It was sweet and kind.

Groups mean:

To see a group in your dream, refers to the merging of various aspects of your character and personality.

Well by now you can see that is certainly not the case. Okay, how about books and the Book in particular?

To see children's books in your dream, memories and a collection of personal memories from your own childhood. It may also suggest your desire to escape from reality and retreat into some fantasy world.

Well if I did not before, I certainly do now. Can I go back to my room now? No, not that one...the other one!
______________________

Simon Templar has left the building and will be back on Sunday.

Intermissions, Part 1

The first movie I remember was Bambi. In feeted jammies we waited in line for the Drive-In. Winged Fords and Chevys slung through the gate and parked, hooked up and let out kids to a playground in front of the screen.

There was almost a sense of community where you got the intimacy of your own car, food, drink and a movie or three. A slight party atmosphere prevailed and the usual inflated snack shack prices.

Warm summer nights in California. We kids did not have an inkling of the new avenues for sex that the drive-in brought. We were just little examples of the potential, and often the actuality, running around banging into cars which had their own internal bangings and laughing.

Years later It was just nice to hit a double feature in your car. Alone. Sometimes, as a young male I could actually see a movie that featured some sense of sex, because, well my dad's idea of sex education was "well son, have you ever touched yourself?"

"Sure dad," I said at age 12, "I combed my hair yesterday."

"Well I am glad we had this talk."

It wasn't till a year or so later that I figured out what he may have been talking about.
___________
next ...drive-in church...sheesh

Intermissions, Part 2

Okay, nobody has a car like this anymore, but then there are almost no Drive-ins anymore either.

I guess there are in Canada. My friend Mitzee actually posed this as a question to help me simply write. They still have Drive-ins in Canada.

Sometimes I really wished I lived in Canada. They have their own problems, but they do not do what we routinely do...and they are the world's richest resource for comedians.

______________________

What is so fun about Drive-ins?

Well, you get your own space, and get some anonymity. And that is exactly what a preacher figured out in the 70s.

That preacher's name? You'll know it right away, I think.

Robert Schuller, and he built that Drive-in church into something as large as any movie studio.

I'm not kidding...take a look!
_______________________

next..oh just look...

Intelligent Design Part 1

TK incinerating one of Mac's ideas. Kinda pretty.
______________

Two days ago there were a minimum of 17,000 posts on the Internet about "Intelligent Design" (ID) and no small controversy after some recent statements by George Bush Jr.

Two days I ago I was up at the Mac-Family cabin as a guest with a host of others, including a pack of at least 35 children, a fire-breather, an 8 foot tall woman, a dog that looks like a medium-sized multi-colored bear, a head of a Russian seminary, and an engineer who likes to write books about gay football players.

Mac's father (FM) was perturbed because a long article in the S.F. Chronicle never took the time to define what ID was.

Bad journalism to be sure.

One thing you have to say about this group is that they charge in where angels fear to tread. They eat well, drink plenty and then weigh in on any taboo topic they can find. If they get bored they get on stilts or spit fire.

Religion, politics, relationships...what-have-you...there is nowhere they will not go. But I noted also a deep undercurrent of respect that seems to allow for a wide array of views. In a very real sense I would say they are a living example of the "depth pluralism" I have written about elsewhere.

Anyway, it is not that bad ideas or theories are not decimated. It's just usually done in good humor. The above picture, in fact, is an actual picture of TMK incinerating one of Mac's ideas to the "oohs and ahhs" to some of the 37 children.

So FM had started it off in the morning by grumbling about the S.F. Chronicle article. Mac wanted no part of it because he knew nothing at all about the concept (or so he thought). In almost "Larry David" form though FM just could not quite let it go. It came up here and there throughout the day.

At one point I looked over at Mac and said, "He's not gonna let it go."

"I know," he said, "I like that about him, but I'm not jumping in. Better JK or TDK. Besides I'm at the part in the Bond book where he murders Drax at Bridge. Talk about ID! Er, can you pass the brie?"

The day was filled with all the beauty of the place. I watched the way that Mac swam with his sister, her kids and his own daughter. It didn't seem accidental or random at all, nor the beauty of the brown trout and the crayfish below my outstretched feet as I sat on the quiet dock watching with two eyes which are miracles all on their own.

A poem started in my head, then I thought of Pascal and all the design he saw, but also the false overlays of human experience...the "diversions".

Was this a diversion? Mac's daughter wanted him to watch her jump from the platform. When she emerged her face was laughing and aglow. He laughed.

Diversion?

Not buying it.

Later they played Scrabble and I thought of Walker Percy's views on language and semiotics. A "triadic view" that makes Scrabble and other things possible (like this article).

As usual, DM won at Scrabble. Her ID is to never stay at the table. As others sit and play she busies herself joyfully with grandkids, small chores, whatever...anything to detach from the game in almost Zen-like fashion until she comes to her turn very fresh.

It's definite ID.

Mac's a professional writer with an amazing vocabulary. I asked him later. He says he has never even come close to beating her at Scrabble.
__________________________

After dinner!

Intelligent Design Part 2

When I got back to San Francsico I picked up my mail. There it was again. On the cover of Time magazine: Evolution Wars. But I want to take this slow for a variety of reasons, so I am going to go back to a narrative version and then finish more as a journalist.
________________________

One thing was clear after that dinner, they were gonna talk about it. Mac saw that so clearly that he immediately left to take a nap.

But he later confessed to me he was still ruminating about it, although he said he was sure that just thinking about it would cause trouble for him down the way...perhaps something not escapable by either fire of stilt-walking.

He complained that he had many doubts about the theory of evolution as he did the cacophony of creation myths and theories. He confessed he thought there was severe category mixing going on...oh and it was all far too politically charged.

The latter I understood because while I am utterly appalled and daily dismayed by George Bush's actions and words, I couldn't yet find a way to tag him on this one.

And I wanted to...real bad.

But what real harm could come from students being exposed to a whole pluralistic view of the Earth? It could lead to open debate and actually make them engage their brains. Of course, a scientific view would prevail because it is, er, science.

Later TMK would make the serious point of deliniating science from theology and that science is about observation and demonstrating through replication.

But who was there to observe first life, or first consciousness? Can we replicate the core issues involved here?

Because science can only guess at what may have happened 1.5 billion years ago, doesn't that leave open the door for discussion given that Darwinism is a theory and only 150 years old at that?

And why are the scientists so rabidly afraid of such discussion? We will return to this later because as sketchy as some Creationists are, some Evolutionists are just as doctrinaire and that makes little sense in a random universe of pure chance.

That and ID apparently does NOT require you be theistic or a Creationist. That surprised me a great deal until I remembered that I once wrote that Atheists should be employed at the Vatican. But that is another story altogether.
_________________

After a glorious dinner of gourmet pizza by MM, caesar salad and three very nice Bordeaux's (er, for the whole table) the campfire was lighted, dishes done (Mac had somehow dodged dish duty because of some nasty deep-fried fingers from the night before), and the kids settled in for the night.

We sat around the campfire when I saw FM settle back and say "I just don't get it! What is up with this 'Intelligent design' nonsense?"

I watched Mac closely. His eyes rolled back in his head, then he took a sip of wine (or was it a gulp?), smiled and was silent.

Possessing no commitment to any view can be terribly helpful. One can always try out one small lifeboat and see how it feels, but skip over a few if it starts taking on water. It's an enviable position.

I was just an observer, a guest, so I kept my yapper shut.

I did however, an hour later, decide to do this blog and open it up your reflective thought and arguments. While this group of passionate people were able to argue for their views and actually listen, my gut told me that was not gonna be the norm around America and we have...sigh...one more thing to divide us (two wars, class struggle, a culture war and a huge political divide are apparentlty not enough).

I chalked up their ability to hang with each other in deep disagreement to two things. They seem to really love and respect each other, and they are...all of them...Democrats.

Which is an irony all in itself..but I am commenting too much. Let's get back Loretta!
______________________

They sat around the campfire at the conversation grew. JK had already given some good background information to FM. Mac had finished his Bond book where the evil Drax had used his own ID to try and destroy London, but instead had been demised by his own foul plan.

Others weighed in as they could, most notably RML, DM, HK and HM

"What do you think Mac?" I asked at one point. "I don't think they have enough Bond books around here" he said.

"You are truly the shallowest man I know," I said. "But nice party."

But then his sister, MM came around and joined the discussion. A passionate young woman, she directly engaged TMK in discussion and off to the races they went.

It's hard to describe wht happened for the next three hours, but it was kinda like watching the Olympics where there are many events all going on at once, some very similar, others not. So at the end all I can give you are some highlights and then I shall invite the others who were there to add their own highlights because, well it was late, I was not taking notes, and there was a lot of beer involved.
______________________

Highlights! next...

Intelligent Design Part 3 was lost

Yes. part three was lost utterly in a Blog downtime.

So in it's place a poem by Mac
________________________--

Gregory Bateson Died
From Intelligent Design

The scramble and political fray
Agendas on the Earth pounding
Temporary wells of darkness
We all hollow out here
And there.

Bateson called and left a message
We do not take his calls
So caught in our own webs
We cannot see his beauty.
We see the exampled child
In a schoolchair in Texas,
Not the sea horse or the
Soft-shelled crab or
The ribbed back of the armadillo.

No.

We invite and like chance
And that alone like some
Death-invited lottery
Lest we have to deal
With You.

I woke up this morning
And before I could argue
You placed your thumbprint on
My reddened pinky finger
As it oozed from some
Quick yellow fire.
You cooed in my ear
A song of love
Then quickly
Retreated.

Gone. Alone.
I hate it when you do that.

Gregory Bateson is your ace
But you turn away from his cards
And decide, on a whim
For some other game
Leaving us to our current hand
Now lost
Just ink on papered cards
I heard the droplet
Hit the bottom of
A cold hard bucket
As those cards were fanned open

You have already moved on.

Okay, okay
Just give me a moment
To catch my breath

I still think Bateson
Is the ace.
But You do not care.
Nice tell.

Here is my ace…
You are weird.
Deeply so.
And Gregory Bateson’s hand
Is much better than mine.

Intelligent Design 4

The current Time magazine cover.
______________________________

One thing I did notice and that was how politicized the whole issue immediately became.

Some see introducing ID into schools as just a cover for teaching Creationism and God in those schools. That is probably on someone's agenda docket, but it not necessary as I understand it. A God-less universe could still exhibit ID, just not one from a personal God.

Which is why scientists like Bateson are so important. They simply describing what IS. The problem is most people would find reading Bateson taxing. They want it simpler...so it's easier to just make it a quick political issue.

I myself really do not care about the God agenda. My reasons for believing in God come from experience not whether we have common ancestors who were apes. You cannot "prove" God, nor is there any reason to do so.

But I am interested, scientifically, in the complexities of eco-systems, systems theory, and the deeply complex and inter-related-ness of the universe at large. I am also intersted in how and through what lenses we use to explore these relationships, yes, and their inherent design.

Let the theologians and philosophers argue over the source of that design, but don't ignore the plain fact that such intricate design exists all around you. That is just ignorant.
_____________________________

Here is a good place to go and see some mindful and respectful debate. I learned a lot here and was very impressed by arguments from both "sides".

I may do one more in this series on the "eye", but probably not as I'm rapidly becoming bored with the whole thing.

Intelligence, Eyes and Epilogue

Okay okay...one last volley.

A key element for me, as stated is simple observation of incredible order. My own body knows how to repair itself with systems I have no conscious knowledge of; I interact with other living systems all of which have incredible complexity and beauty. Maybe this is why it is so much easier to see God in nature than it is on a paved city street.

I read once that the human eye made Darwin "shudder". And I think I know why. But here is a quote:

To suppose that the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest possible degree. [Darwin, 1872]

The point is fairly simple...no benefit could be gained by the slow mutated development of what several millions years later might begin to register some input (not the word) on the first live optic nerve.

Once the doggone things exists, in some form, sure, then natural selection would have something to work with.

But you don't just "blammo" have a fully function eye tied into a cerebral cortex.

The same goes for many other organs in the human or animal body that needed each other all at once to function independently at all.

It's pretty common sense, though I have recently heard some pretty great arguments from Evolutionists, which I will share here.

And I once again remind you dear readers that I really do not give a Galapagos Finch's ass about either camp or politics. I just wanna explore what is right in front of us.

Their politics be damned. Look at what is, not what others want us to see.

______________________

First, Darwin's quote above is one isolated quote and not in it's overall context (I suspect). Later he may have had more information, or we may have more today. If so, please post it here respectfully and we'd all like to hear it.

All I am suggesting is it is easier sometimes to attack the man rather supply new science.

I don't wanna be guilty of that. So I am gonna print the above with an asterisk and ask for responses.
_______________________

Time magazine rightly points out in a sidebar that the issue of the "eye" brings both sides into sharp focus. Personally, I did not know the editorial board there had any sense of irony, but apparently they do.

They work of of Michael Behe's work, and I have read him before (he is one who weighed in at the link in the last article...we will return to that).

In the Time article, he asks the simple question, "where did the first eye come from? How could a process of gradual improvements produce a complex organ that needs all its parts-pinhole, lens, light-sensitive surface-in order to work?"

To this we might also add, protective coverings, an aperture, saline from formed ducts to wash the eye, etc...

For those of you interested, I'd like to see a timeline explaining the coming together of such a marvelous apparatus...and then that it was across special lines and therefore independent?

The response in Time magazine is ascribed to no one, but is a general overview of evolutionary thought where a random mutation might have produced a patch of light-sensitive cells that helped a primitive creature tell day from night. From there they extrapolate.

A similar argument is used, and I think quite effectively in a rebuttal to Behe's assertions about needing "all the pieces" by Dr. Kenneth Miller who simply suggests that the various pieces of the puzzle can exist for other purposes before being combined.

I think it a good argument myself.

You can read it here.

But Miller intriguing answer aside, what follows at the end of Time magazine's synopsis is pretty crucial.

"The fact that there is no fossil evidence of the interim steps cannot be taken as proof that a designer-intelligent or otherwise-deliberately skipped them."

This statement not only utterly misses the scientific evaluation, it borders on a religious statement itself.

Science is about observation and evaluation based upon that. Philosophy and theology may play and dance about meaning and motive.

But in this we have the reverse.

The fact that there is no fossil evidence...NONE...ZIPPO...NADA for any intermediary stages of the formation of ANY eye that has ever existed (not to mention the task of species to species evolution) is where this folks turn an ironic blind eye.

That fact that there is no fossil record leaves us solely with conjecture and the begging question "where are the artifacts?" That's a scientific question.

The statement that the absence of any scientific data cannot be used to infer a designer exists is purely religious in nature.

We do not need one people. Take the holes in your fossil record and deal. And note that especially when you push your glasses up on your nose, because no one has yet been able to explain your beautiful eyes, why you dream what you dream, or the organic mystery of simply being alive.

Intelligence, Irony and Social Darwinism

"Don't make me come in there!"
___________________________
It is yet another irony that those who would use ID beyond its own scope (no pun intended) and would fight to disprove Darwinism, or at least undermine it, are at the same time model Social Darwinists themselves.

But before we continue we must delineate between Darwin's theories about physical evolution and those who then worked off those theories and applied them sociologically.

Thus the following quote:

It seems clear that Darwin felt that 'social instincts' such as 'sympathy' and 'moral sentiments' evolved through natural selection, and that these resulted in the strengthening of societies in which they occurred, so much so that "at some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world." (Descent of Man, ch. 6). Thus Darwin did believe that social phenomena were shaped by natural selection, although exactly how evolutionary pressure on individuals led to collective benefits is something that Darwin never clearly explicated. At the same time, Darwin did not hold the political views that many of those inspired by him would eventually affect.

(Wikipedia..hehe)

So let's be fair. Darwin had a rather optimistic view given the biological severity of natural selection.

Be that as it may "survival of the fittest" has become the modus operandi of those in power, and particularly our own government and its policies.

My own guess, and it is only that, is that Darwin would have hoped we had evolved, socially, to the point where "morality" and "sympathy" would lead to peace and not the bloodiest century on record.

It seems it backfired for him and even the current administration (like the American Puritans and others before them) are willing to ride any modified philosophy that will gain them superiority and power...even if it is modified Darwinism.

Go figure.

Now go read The Beatitudes of Jesus and weep...(Matthew the fifth chapter).

Solitude & The Laughing Buddha Part 1

I love the light, sea air and the feel of water wherever I can get it. I am a natural hedonist.

So when circumstances turned, I choose to visit a secret place, a haven few know about that is about as "other" from anything in Northern California as you can imagine. It is like taking a trip to Bali, a sort of NorCal Bali, but I love it.

I made the trip, and trudged in well equipped with packs and clipped gortex pouches, even a blue "Mac" expandible chair...like I actually know what the hell I am doing.

No one was there...well no one human but myself except the occasional one flying hundreds of feet overhead in a twin-engine Cessna.

So for blocks of time it was silent, or so I thought in the beginning.

___________________

I brought with me Gabriel Garcia Marquez's 100 Years of Solitude and Thomas Merton's Love and Living. Merton, a Trappist Monk, was a solitary.

I am, for now, a solitary of sorts.

Of the perhaps nine to eleven "cells" or bamboo caves, I found mine at the far West end.

I set camp within and under. Settled, I immediately heard the wind moving over the high layered roofs of bamboo like rain. It created that intimacy that one feels cacooned within a warm space while it coldly showers outside.

But there was no real rain. Just cool with warm sand five feet ahead and the beckoning cool waters just beyond that.

Rain would have been nice, on another day, but it was warm, almost hot on the beach, but cool and dark in the caves.

To the far right, by the waters edge, someone had built a tall sand totem to mark their visitation. Probably children.

I duly noted it as I passed , but did not bow (though tempted).

Funny how humans create art everywhere to mark their being. Andre Malraux said "Art is humanity's last defense against death." I like Malraux...In fact, I know his nephew several times removed. But in the end, art is no deterrent, or deferment for death. It is merely a signpost or protest that we actually matter, even in death.

Sooner, rather than later for some...but always soon enough.

But in the meantime, you matter. I matter. Art will not save us...maybe God will save us, maybe God does not exist.

I do think that if God can be found anymore it will be in the most unusual places. God has been driven out of most of the other truly human haunts..most notably the churches.

Want to find God? Go where no one else goes. Find a ridiculous place filled with irony...or a desolate place...just anyplace where the paving and branding of humanity has not squeezed out every last indicator, not broken every last true mirror, has not dried up every last small river or sliver of hope.

Find that place and wait.

God'll show...probably.

If not, you made the effort. Good for you.
_________________

Part Two coming...

Solitude & The Laughing Buddha Part 2

I waded out, still in my swimsuit. The water is not hardly deep enough here...just wide. It is hard for me to get wet enough...but I manage to find a place where I can be in the midde. and stand with only my upper chest in the cool sweet air.

SILENCE.

It moves in on me

the opposite way

noise does

like little invitations

to come out!

It is so quiet.

Everything stories down to almost nothing.

Quiet.

Has it been that long

I have not heard human voices?

Yes.

It has been that long

very long

too long.

It stories down

deeper further and farther

deeper still.

I feel suddenly

ENRAPTURED

How could I EVER

hate being solitary!?

I am simply in delirium as the water washes by, lazy and lovingly. The sun sparkes off the waters...the canyons sing. My head is feeling hot so I dip into the coolness like a kind of unearthly waterery invisible chocolate...and spray the mane back with my big hands and laugh!

In this moment I am not a christian, I am a buddhist, then in the next I am not a buddhist, but in love with the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Both are true. I laugh and splash about...alone but not at all so.

In silence it all storied down, then, after a time, it came back alive within new ears. I heard the slight woodpecker determined like a winged Sisyphus, and the finch dancing and darting in sweetness, the flap of dragonflies and the pheasants in their skiddish spray.

But always the water.

Then God took my head in his hands and kissed me on the forehead like a the father I never had, and I looked over and saw the Buddha winking at me from the shoreline.

And I was grateful...deeply grateful.

Solitude & The Laughing Buddha Part 3

After several hours of being alone I wanted to write...but had no pen.

My heart and mind were flooded with perception and I wanted to capture it all, but I have learned from years of experience that it is often this way. Sometimes it is best to just sit down and BE...and not write or chronicle.

The Buddha, sitting by the old rock swing watched me search for a pen, then let out a belly laugh, deep and full..

I stopped looking for it, but 30 minutes later he was distraced by a Grey Heron and I put on my diving shoes and headed for the truck to get my pen.

I am obviously not a very good buddhist. I am also not a good chrirstian. But I'm honest.