Appeal To Authority Is A Fallacy

A pyramid in Java?

One of the main things wrong with our current society is that our educational system is completely defunct.  Academia exists solely and completely to protect us from knowledge, rather than to expand it.  Piles of stogy professors lie around like so much dry kindling who have spent their lives and careers building fairy tales on which their tenure and grants depend, and they are completely unwilling to entertain any fact that challenges their cushy positions.

Take, for instance, the submerged cities off of India, Japan and Cuba.  Those stuffy professors all sit around humphing and harumphing in agreement that the last Ice Age ended about 20,000 years ago causing the oceans to rise several hundred feet.  However, discover a couple of very advanced societies lying at the bottom of the ocean that date to about that period and suddenly they are indignant and even terrified.

The problem is that humans are not supposed to have been more advanced than bone chewers and root diggers at that time.  The professors have developed elaborate fairy tales of how civilization evolved and no fact, not even those literally etched in stone, are allowed to upset their harumphing.

In 2000, a group of ocean surveyors discovered a massive city built with advanced techniques.  This alone wouldn't be so bad, but it sits more than 100 feet below the waves, meaning it must be around 20,000 years old.

Gobekli Tepi in Turkey is provably 12,000 years old using all the tools that those stultifying professors swear by, yet they refuse to accept the plain evidence that ancient Man had the ability to create fine stone carvings on massive stones that were mined and hauled dozens of miles to their current location.  On top of that, the whole complex was purposefully buried 2,000 years after it was created.

Now, right here in West Java, a geologist has declared that a hill called Gunung Padang is not only man-made, but that it dates to between 9,000 and 20,000 years ago.  Had the findings fit with the harumphing fairy tales, then a geologist's data would have been defended with the strongest of arguments.  But since it virtually destroys all the underpinnings of the fairy tales, then academia is screaming that a geologist can't possibly know what he's doing...that's archeology work!  Of course, no one mentions that the hill was discovered to be artificial in 1916, and that not a single 'archeologist' bothered to study it.

Then there's Schock and West pointing out that the weathering around the Sphinx enclosure can only be from water and that it's been 10,000 years since that was possible in Gaza.

Then there's Bauval pointing out that the three great pyramids and the Sphinx and the Nile combine to make an exact model of the night sky...as it was 10,000 years ago.

The submerged city near Cuba?  Archologies along the Bimini Road?  Ancient maps of Antarctica, not only ice-free, but some showing it as it looked during the last Ice Age, which was (wait for it) 20,000 years ago.  There's Nazca Lines, Nabta Playa and Paracas Skulls.  The list is huge and growing almost daily.

Of course, there's the work of Michael Cremo, who has thoroughly documented "ooparts".  There's Graham Hancock who has done the same with ancient civilizations.  There's Richard Hoagland who has done the same with ruins throughout the Solar System.  Joseph Farrell who has documented evidence pointing to human civilizations going back millions of years, and the development of our religious and financial systems.

Despite the work of capable and professional researchers, the ever-growing pile of facts and figures, and the massive collection of physical artifacts, the academics refuse to budge.

The harumphers' jobs are in danger.  Had they been in the field advancing knowledge and teaching the latest understandings, they have sat on their diplomas and collected their grant money and done nothing.  They are in a position to either admit that they have been useless eaters defending dead paradigms, or scream like hell and jump up and down claiming it's all junk science and hocus-pocus.

There's healthy skepticism that promotes further study, and then there's denial of facts and recalcitrance from a position of fear and ignorance.

It's high time we stop buying "higher" education from such ostriches and put an end to the need for blessing from "authority" before we can accept what our eyes tell us.  There is no reason why someone who has spent decades studying something is any less an authority on the topic than someone with a stack of sheep skins (sheep being the operative term).

Humanity is far older than the fairy tales admit and the evidence is growing faster than we can catalog it.  We need to reclaim our true heritage and leave the naysayers and humbuggers behind.

Rainin' All Over Da World

Ever get the feeling you live in a Magritte painting?

Been raining banksters lately.  Just goes to show you that when they say it's a dog-throw-dog-from-the-window world out there, they ain't kidding!

If you don't follow him regularly, it would be worth your while to pop over to Joseph Farrell's site and check out the brilliant job he has done of constructing a scenario involving global geopolitical realignments, tying bear bond scandals, gold repatriation and events like the Ukraine together.

Without a doubt, we are seeing the end of the world as most of us have known it.  In fact, you'd have to be well over 100 or so and able to recall Woodrow Wilson's administration to remember it any other way.

As for the banksters, it appears they are eating their young.  The thirty-something guys who are falling out of closed windows and popping nail guns into the backs of their skulls obviously pose some sort of threat to the new world order.

Now, when I say "new world order" without caps, I am intending to refer to an apparent shift that is not in the Western global hegemony playbook, commonly called the New World Order.  There is a shift going on that wasn't part of the Orwellian vision (which as we should know was based on the real thing).  The wheels set in motion by the Bavarian Illuminati back in the late 1800s is collapsing quickly, and there is a scramble to reshore the walls.

Imagine a giant game of Risk.  You build up your armies on the two or three countries you control, and when you figure you've got it together, you launch on a campaign to take over the world.  Things go great unless you are trying to hold Asia/Kamchatka.  The borders are long and open from a dozen different directions.  Not even Kublai Khan could hold it.

The Western empire, like so many in history, has dashed its ship on the rocks of Afghanistan and China.  Like an octopus when it touches heat, its tentacles shrivel and it retreats into its tiny cove, squirting a cloud of banksters as it goes.

The Western empire is collapsing under the weight of its own ambitions.  Having spent centuries building up armies, manipulating education and populations, testing with Hitlers and Mussolinis, and perfecting new/ancient technologies, it figured the time was ripe to venture forth.  With World War 2 having devastated most of the world (save the Americas), they Central Cabal saw an opportunity to set their plan in motion.

And it worked...for about a 100 years.

But like all empires, this one came up against the one intractable thing that brings down every attempt to dominate the world - human nature.

There are two things, outside of Maslow's Heirarchy, that guarantee failure of any group to ever gain complete control of the world.  One is greed, and the other is liberty.

No matter how true your believers are, there will always be those who have designs on the reins of power, or who look with envy on the wealth of the inner circle.  In either case, they will begin to draw others to their schemes and quietly undermine the Iron Fist out of simple greed.  This is the destruction from within.

Meanwhile, any dominated people will strive to gain freedom.  It is the core desire of any human.  Some will feel it enough to begin acting on it.  We generally call them patriots if they win, and terrorists if they don't.  In any event, they know that they have no hope of open assault on the Beast, so they chip away at it piece by piece.  It's like those video games where you come up again the big beastie at the end, and you have to keep attacking and running, attacking and running, slowly wearing down its hit points.

From these two forces eventually the octopus feels the heat and like lightning, shrinks back within its walls of safety.  Just as we see going on with the US-led Western empire.  Ukraine, Syria and raining banksters are just several of a great number of symptoms readily apparent to those who look for them.  The empire is crumbling.

The real problem, and what will become the biggest problem for those who just want to be left alone to live out their lives in peace, is this: so many people have been focused on stopping and dismantling the empire.  From my experience, the fight has been going on at least 50 years now.  Originally, it was what most folks called the "lunatic fringe", then it was the "conspiracy theorists", now it's a great number of "normal" folks.

There are plenty of folks out there now telling you to wake up and see what's happening.  But it's already happened.  Now we need to figure out what to do in the aftermath before some other New World Order or Illuminati step in to fill the vacuum.

See?  That's the problem.  This hydra we keep fighting doesn't die easily.  It backs off, licks its wounds and then comes on again in a slightly different form.  Meantime, folks think they get it whupped and head on back to the house to plow the fields and raise their kids.  The more you hack up this beast, though, the more little beasties come at you later.

The way we finally and completely kill this nasty critter that has plagued humanity for millennia is education.  We need to stop handing over education of our children to someone else.  Whoever controls education will be the one through whom the little beasties rise up again.

By education, I don't mean hugging trees and putting condoms on bananas.  I mean, "Here son, read Plato's Republic by the end of the week and be prepared to argue for or against, and why."  I mean controlling the content and quality of media.  I mean injecting real art and beauty into every part of our lives.  I mean working to bring every human up to the highest levels, rather than drag them all down into the most squalid (the current model).

Ultimately, it means taking full and complete responsibility for our own education.  Too many of us see a diploma as the end of something.  It is, in fact, only the beginning.  What that diploma means is that you should have learned the ability to think critically and to apply the greatest of human knowledge to any problem.  Now it is your responsibility to continue that process alone, reading, writing, gathering with friends on a Friday night to loosen the tongue and argue - by argue I don't mean fight, I mean state a position and defend it with reason.

Start a discussion group this week with some close friends.  Set the goal of reading something (preferably not junk fiction) and discussing it.  Invite the kids to sit around and listen, even join in if they have something valuable to add.  Turn off the TeeVee and take control of your mind.  Fill it instead with culture and art and criticism and reason.

The art of the dinner party is nearly dead, but I clearly remember sitting around with the old folks, and later at my own table, over a couple of bottles of good Cabernet and arguing the finer points of Kant, Chaucer, Joyce, Aristotle, etc.  The problem is we have allowed the nabobs and idiots to laugh us into submission, which is why the inmates now run the asylum.  We need to take it back and the war begins with dinner conversation and regular visits to the museum and theater.  It begins by taking your kids to Shakespeare rather than Disney.  It begins with the will to never stop education until you can't physically hold a book any more, but even then you can get someone to read to you, if you know anyone who can read big words anymore.

As a population of humans on this small planet, we are coming to a massive cross-road in history.  The ruling class is on its knees and their replacements have not yet felt strong enough to go head-to-head.  This is our chance, as free humans, to take back what was lost centuries ago - so long ago that none of us remember being free.  But we have books by folks who were free and who knew how to be free.

Now is the time to read those books.  Then start having close friends over for dinner.  Afterwards, pour out the libations and let the conversation begin!  This is the seed of freedom!

It used to be that you had to go to a friend's house with a good library in order to have ready references, but now we have the tool you are using this very moment.  The world's libraries are at your fingertips!  Use it!  Use your mind!  Take control of your destiny and end the centuries-long domination by a self-appointed elite.

And while you're at it...get a good umbrella.  I hear there's a storm a-comin' and those raindrops look awful big.

Into The Fray

Maybe you've been under a rock lately and haven't heard of the world's newest art center.  If that's the case, then you'll want to click over to the Ciputra Artpreneur site (after you finish here, of course) and take a look-see.  This is Indonesia's finest art and performance space, and it's set to open in a couple of months.  It will set the bar for the country's commitment to the arts and culture.

Why, you ask yourself, is this guy promoting the Ciputra Artpreneur.  Glad you asked.

If you've been a reader here for any length of time, you know that I promote the fine arts and culture as a way to save the world, and that's not hyperbole.  There are those who would coursen our civic lives in order to diminish the human spirit and have us all wallowing in filth and ugliness, because it serves their purposes.

I espouse the philosophy that fine art raises us above squalor and elevates the mind and spirit into realms that supersede the mundane.  Art is the highest expression of humanity, and there are those who don't want us to go there because it liberates our beings and gets us to see beyond our humble existence into worlds that can be and will be, if we have the desire.

Another reason I'm promoting the center is because, by the Will of Fate and Destiny, the reins have been handed to me and now I must put my money where my mouth has always been.

It is both a unique privilege and chore to be handed such a tool box as this.  In fact, I believe that only a Texan could handle such a wild pony.  There are three large galleries, a museum with two spacious chambers, a massive projection screen (60m x 9m), and a 1,300-seat international-standard theater.  In other words, this is one of the most flexible, diverse and modern art spaces on the planet, and I have the joy and responsibility of making it work.

Suppose you are a carpenter and you have spent most of your life grousing about how you could really do something if someone would just turn you loose with a good set of tools.  Well, I am that carpenter and someone has just handed me a set of state-of-the-art tools.  Now what?

What do you do with this kind of tool box that has never been used, in a country that has never had such tools at its disposal, and a large number of people demanding some of the finest furniture ever produced?  More than that, how can you take these tools and put the center and the nation on the map of global centers for artistic expression?  Furthermore, how long would/should that take?  Most importantly, what steps do you take to fulfill the promise without a misstep and wtih a shop that needs to train up in a hurry?

Talk about your wild ponies.

It's a rather daunting position to be in, to have someone hand you a contract and tell you that by signing it, you will have the ability to achieve most of your life-long ambitions.  How do you proceed?

Let's say you've dreamed all your life of reaching the top of Mount Everest.  Let's say you've clamored and climbed to the point where the peak is in sight.  Do you rush headlong and throw yourself at it?  Or do you proceed with the utmost caution to ensure success?  Do you want to be able to climb down again, or is simply reaching the goal enough?

Ambition screams at you to strike and get yours.  Prudence quietly reminds you that there is a team that got you here - parents, teachers, friends, and colleagues - people who pulled your ropes and whose ropes you pulled.

The most profound line in the whole recent Batman series is when Ra's al Ghul told Bruce Wayne that he had sacrificed sure footing for the kill shot.  But at what point do you balance risk with security?

In any event, it is now my task to lead a fine team of professionals in starting a new venture - one that will have extensive effects in the civic life and culture of a nation.  It is a task that can change history if done with the greatest of care and empathy for the society in which it is occurring.  It can lead to new understandings, renewing entertainment, profound revelations, and broader horizons for a great many people.

It is a task I don't take lightly.  I can make a very real difference in this corner of the world.  With the support of a great number of visionary and hard-working people, I want to step beyond the limits of commerce and profit, and into the realm of transcendence.

How does one do that?  What shows and exhibits would you choose that could achieve that goal?  If you could introduce the world's art to a people, and their art to the world, what would be your first step?  And the second?  How would you maintain sure footing while taking the necessary risks to achieve such things?

It is a fun position to be in for some, though without a doubt, there must be a very serious side to it.  What great works of art does one bring, how does one educate and inform, and finally, how does one take the same steps to introduce the world to the treasure in one's own backyard?

Stay tuned...this will only get more interesting.  Regardless of the outcome, it is a thrill to be at the front line of the battle between beauty and derangement, to take on the forces that would drag us all down into the slime so that they could sit on our sinking heads for nothing more than their selfish pleasure.

There are those who would reduce humanity to feudal serfs - unenlightened beasts of burden for the select few.  There are those who would lift all humans to great heights of knowledge and understanding.  I place myself in the latter camp and will use those resources at my disposal to achieve that goal.

In any case, I get to see a lot of great shows for free - as long as I don't end up like Father in The Mosquito Coast.

A LIttle Ash Kicking

Jakarta Air (ahem) Quality at noon today

When comes to finding places to live, one is hard pressed to find one that is "safe".  In a world obsessed with safety issues and teaming with squads of jack-booted 'safety' officers, you'd think we'd all be up to our blessed assurances in safety, right?

Here in beautiful downtown Jakarta today, you can hardly see half a kilometer, due in large part to suspended particulates belched out of Gunung Kelud all the way over in east Java.

Down here in the city, we've had some minor ashfall, but up in the mountains south of town, you could build ashmen with the stuff.  In fact, rooves and cars are dusted with ash that kind of looks like snow if you didn't know where you were standing.

As expected, everyone is hacking and wheezing around here, their bodies trying to expectorate the irritating volcanic dust.  All this despite the fact that the volcano is nearly 1,000km from Jakarta.  Go figure.

What makes us really nervous is that we have to fly to Singapore Thursday, and volcanic ash is notoriously bad for engines, upon which modern jets depend to stay aloft.  The ash also tends to concentrate at higher altitudes, as Mark in Washington State, USA reminded us, not helping the jitters at all.

So here were are.  We traded hurricanes and tornadoes and rampaging cattle for volcanoes and earthquakes.  Just goes to show ya that ain't no place "safe".  One thing that does make us feel at home, though, are the exciting annual Java floods that bring thrilling memories flooding back (pun intended) from our youth in the swamp town of Houston.  One significant difference is that here in Indonesia, you don't get mats of floating fire ants looking for anything sticking up out of the water to jump on.

Speaking of volcanoes, yesterday saw Bromo and Anak Kerakatau both huff and puff a bit.  To refresh your memory, Kerakatau is the one that blew the hell up back in the 1800s and caused "the year without summer" worldwide.  One reason we mention this is that over at the western tip of Java, a place called Banten, about 2km of sea disappeared about a week and a half ago, meaning that instead of a tsunami, the sea bottom is rising.  That area just happens to be a great place to sit and watch Anak Kerakatau, which means that it is likely swelling down in its roots.

There's nothing quite so reassuring as the knowledge that not only can the ground under you start shaking violently with no warning, but that it could also get blown sky high and come crashing down on top of you.

I love this country, as comedian Jakov Smirnov used to say.

One of the more pleasant side-effects of the volcanic cloud currently engulfing Jakarta is that morning temperatures are actually on the pleasant side.  The breeze is rather cool if you are lucky enough to not be gagging and choking on the ash and particulates to notice.

Over the weekend, we dashed up to the mountain retreat at the Far Side World Headquarters (FSWH), where overnight temps were down-right cold!  Remember that we are about 6 degrees south of the equator here, so a cold mountain night usually means roughly 70F.  The other night was easily 63F, which is highly unusual.

There just isn't any such thing as "safe".  One of our long-time faithful readers, Linda, wrote to say they are buried in snow and squatting in a deep freeze over in Pennsylvania, and what's worse is that all that snow will eventually turn to water and drown half the northeast US in a couple of months.

Unless our volcanoes keep it up...in which case we may all be facing another "year without summer".

When the next person comes up to you and says, "We need more jack-boots to keep us safe from terrorists," laugh long and hard at his face.  You can have all the jack-boots, cavity searches and butt-sniffing dogs your money will buy, and not a single one of them can stop a blizzard or volcano or hurricane or tornado.  What's more, there is no place on Earth you can move to that doesn't have some meteorological or geological time-bomb waiting to go off on your head.  What's more, none of them can stop hordes of hungry, frightened people from raiding the local grocery and convenience stores when these little life gems happen, so you're goosed no matter what happens.

Besides, all the goons do when life's little disasters happen is run to their hidey-holes and wait it out.  When it's all said and done, they emerge and start shooting anything that moves.  Where exactly is the "safety" these numbnuts are supposed to be selling?

So next time some slimy politician says we need to spend more on "safety", just remember that a volcano or hurricane or tornado or earthquake or blizzard could ruin your day and make rag dolls out of your "safety", and all that governments spending and gobs of jack-boots can't do a single thing to stop it, and even less to clean up afterwards.

So tell the nose-pickers to keep their "safety" tucked in their pants and leave us folk out here in the real world alone.  We're much better off sorting it all out on our own.

Speaking of which, thought you might like know that Indonesia has a group of money-sucking toe-lickers called "Centre for Vulcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation".  Ain't that a laugh?  We damn near split a gut every time we hear that one...kind of like a Monty Python skit.

Have a SAFE day!

Old Fart Tales

I saw the Beatles live at the Coliseum in Houston in 1968.

I went to Super Bowl VIII at Rice Stadium in roughly the same time frame.  It was between Miami and Minneapolis.
I watched every bleary-eyed moment of the Moon landings...all of them...live.  Thanks Stanley!
I remember Kennedy's and Churchill's funerals.
I was required to take a gun to school in order to participate in school activities.
I am a registered marksman because of it.
There was a time when grandads were old men, now I is one.
J. Paul Getty and Howard Hughes were once measures of ungodly wealth, now it's Bill God-help-us Gates and people whose names are unpronounceable and all foreign sounding.
I found a $100 bill outside a notorious Houston nightclub one time.  It was a fortune.  Now it's only a tank of gas.
I used to buy gas at $0.27/gal and cigarettes for $0.45/pack.
Once upon a time, cold winters were just part of the cycle of life, now they're conspiracies.
When I was a kid, a president like Obama would've started a revolution.
I remember when unwed babies and welfare checks were embarrassing.
My first rodeo was at the Astrodome.  Now spell check doesn't recognize "Astrodome".  It was also the fat stock show, not the livestock show.  PC language sucks.
Earth's coastlines are still pretty much where I left them, give or take a hurricane or two and global warming.
There was a time when surgeons only covered their mouths, but left their noses hanging out.
I was 2 years old when the last real president of the US died.
Remember when Polaroid pix were cool?
I was the family hero at 10 years old because I was able to disassemble the TV and take the tubes to Walgreen's for testing and made it work again.
I watched "Howdy Doody" and "Star Trek" in first run.
Remember Kaptain Kangaroo, Mr Greenjeans, Mr Rabbit, Dancing Bear?  Yeah?  You're old.
I remember when immortality was impossible, not a matter of time.
When I was a kid, smoking was cool.
China was once a place of incredible mystery...now it's the up and coming empire.
"Mandarin" still means "upper class".
I remember when Caller ID freaked me out.
To place an overseas call home from Europe, I used to go to the telegraph office, make a reservation and watch the meter spin while I talked to folks back home with a maddening time delay.  Now I dial my cell phone or send a text message.
They still haven't found a cure for time zones.
Once upon a time, every human could name the latest astronaut.  Now there aren't two dozen people on Earth who can name all the folks on the ISS.
They did that on purpose so we wouldn't know who's up there at any given time.
There was a time when the internet was called "teletext" and it came to a little screen attached to your phone.  It was so wild.
Every Friday the air-raid horns would go off at noon and we'd have to duck and cover.
Now we know that duck and cover only makes countable shadows on the floor for victim roles.
There was a time when underarm deodorant came in little jars that you scooped up and rubbed under your arms.  It was called "MUM".
I remember my first digital watch.  It had two dials with numbers and I couldn't take my eyes off it.  Back then, there was only the house clock and Mom and Dad's Wesclox alarm that was wound, not charged.
When I first started working on cars, I could open the hood and recognize every single part under it.  Now I can't even find the damn engine.
Back in the old days, I had to paste my hair with soap and draw lines on my face to play older parts.  Now I use nose putty to hide the lines and I still have to paste my hair to be bald...HAHAHAHA!
I still remember my first self-inflicted orgasm.
When I was a kid, dogs were man's best friend.  Now it's against the law to say "man".
I had to apply for my Social Security number when I was 16.  Most Merkans are born with them now.
My first drunk was on Wild Turkey at Kloesel's Steak House in Moulton, Texas,  I was 14.  I should sue them for serving a minor.
I had a pet cow named "Old Friendly" when I was a kid.
We used to sit around and listen to old folk tell tales.  Now we stick 'em in institutions so they won't bother us.

I used to seek advice, now I give it.  When did I cross the line of wisdom?  No one ever called me a young fart, so how the hell can I be an old one?