Blowback from Iraq War is Global
Topic: war in Iraq





And it's growing...


Tue, 14 Dec 2004 08:51:49 -0800 Blowback is a term invented by the Central Intelligence Agency to describe the unintended consequences of policies kept secret from the American people. Chalmers Johnson’s excellent book, Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire, helped popularize the term. Originally intended for internal use only, blowback increasingly characterizes global reaction to Bush administration policies in and out of the Middle East.

read more here.

Space Mixer
Now Playing: that "it's better in the matinee" song by Franz Ferdinand
Topic: Physics
I get some ridiculous links when I go to my blog, and I just had to share today's:

Gravity Breakthrough
New understanding of gravity solves today's greatest physics mysteries! TheFinalTheory.com.

The Theory of Everything
Learn about the quest to develop a theory of everything. space-mixing-theory.com.

Quick links to a grade "A" number one jerk.
Now Playing: "Joe Louis" by John Squire (live in Japan).
Topic: by Lenny
In order that you all will know what to avoid, I am offering a quick link to the postings that are original "Lenny" items (not just links) here.

And don't forget to check out our new project here in Pittsburgh, Blastfurnace Internet TV. Let me know what you think (and if it works)!

Convergent evolution
Topic: Evolution

If it walks like a flamingo and looks like a flamingo, it is not necessarily a flamingo - or even a close relative. A controversial genetic study suggests we have completely misunderstood how the majority of birds are related, and that some species that look almost identical are not related at all.

The discovery comes from an analysis of the evolution of the bird gene beta-fibrinogen. It suggests that the Neoaves, a group that includes all modern bird species except waterfowl, landfowl and flightless birds, actually comprises two distinct lineages called the Metaves and Coronaves, and that many birds which look alike are not in the same lineage.

New Scientist article: here.

Death Hyperlink: Internet Suicide Pacts
Topic: Psychology/Psychiatry
Medical Journal Warns of 'Cybersuicide' Trend

Dec. 2, 2004 - The car, parked on a deserted mountain road near Tokyo, had its windows taped shut from the inside. In the car were small charcoal burners -- and the bodies of seven people.

Within a few miles of the scene, another car held two more bodies.

WebMD article: here.

A series of scientific experiments ...the greatest religious discovery of the 20th century.
Topic: Physics and Metaphysics

"A series of scientific experiments in the early 1980s changed forever our understanding of the nature of matter. It is likely that it will also prove to have been the greatest religious discovery of the 20th century.

"Physicists call it entanglement, and it describes the state of two or more particles once they have interacted with one another. From then on, irrespective of time and space, a correlation will always exist between them. What happens to one will affect the other - even if they are now at opposite ends of the universe.

"The word entanglement is really a misnomer. Some scientists use "non-separability" to describe the same condition. And the difference is significant. For if matter emerged from energy in the singularity of the big bang, it would seem to follow that all the particles of which it consists are in that state of correlation. They have not become entangled, but at the fundamental level they have never been - and can never be - separated.

"Although it is now more than 20 years since non-separability was proved experimentally, its significance has yet to enter the public psyche. It seems to be too immense a concept, too remote from our everyday lives - until we view it from the spiritual perspective."


Guardian (UK) article: here.

St. John of the Apocalypse.
Topic: by Lenny


St. John of the Apocalypse.


      Human beings are social creatures. Isolate one from fellow humans, for even a short time, and strange things start to happen. Bio-survival terror kicks in, psychological imprints become suspended. Hallucinations and paranoia occur.


      John is alone - very alone - on a small chunk of lava floating somewhere in the Mediterranean. He has been here before, perhaps not on this very island but in this predicament. Following his muse, his God, he does things no other artist would ever do. These impossible gestures are the refiner's fire, his life an alchemical experiment. As his final hour arrives, he is more determined than ever to be more like God. To this end, the aging preacher has come to this rock, first to search his soul, and then to die.


In The Beginning...


      ...was the word.


      The word is a divine creation existing only among humans and the Gods. It is an abstraction, a painting, a poem, a ritual. One not only writes as a reflection of reality, one writes in order that they might create a reality. The first words were not words at all, magcal cave paintings with which man altered reality.


      The mystical experience (perception of reality) is one of self-transcendence: transpersonal identification, self-forgetfulness, and openness to things not literally provable. Revelation has a subjective quality: What you are experiencing is real because you know it is real.


      Words do not just describe reality, they are reality. Figures, abstractions, characters, letters and numbers endlessly recombine to spell out past, present and future: Thy Will be done.


Poison visions of a beast from the sea.


      Nearing death, John retires to the island to be moved. He writes furiously, stream-of-consciousness, hopped up on Wormwood, looking for something in the words, writing on current events, his hallucinations and his faith, as if it all were real, for it is real in the sense that William Blake, Finnegans Wake, the montage and the cut-up are all real. Real because you know it is real. More real than real.


      He understands inherently what students of the mysteries will codify in years to come: as above, so below. A talisman on the wall of the cave will find success in the hunt.


      His head is spinning. He takes the world around him, the politics, its Gods and Demons, breaks it down to its fundamental components. The mad man views recent history through a symbolic lens. As a rule these symbols must speak of what is to come, for what is to come has already happened.

George W. Bush: An Autopsy
Topic: the President
As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.

      -- H. L. Mencken

Will Smith finds his balls, makes sense.
Topic: police state
from New York Daily News:

"No. Absolutely not," Smith replied when reporter Johanna Adorjan asked if the events of 9/11 had personally changed him. "When you grow up black in America you have a completely different view of the world than white Americans. We blacks live with a constant feeling of unease.

"And whether you are wounded in an attack by a racist cop or in a terrorist attack, I'm sorry, it makes no difference."

...In the interview, in which Smith accused President Bush of lying to justify war in Iraq, the actor went on:

"In the '60s, blacks were continuously the victims of terrorist attacks. It was civil terrorism, but terrorism nonetheless. We are used to being attacked. That constant state of vigilance - a sort of defensive state - that hasn't changed at all. For me, nothing has changed at all."

Smith's PR rep, Stan Rosenfield, didn't respond to repeated phone calls and a detailed E-mail yesterday.

Lowdown was unable to reach interviewer Adorjan to verify the accuracy of the quotes. But I'm told by a mutual friend that Adorjan is a solid journalist who speaks fluent English.

"...unlocking the vast unused power of the human brain."
Topic: Evolution
"The Japanese macaques raised in Atsushi Iriki's lab are not particularly gifted. But intriguingly, he expects them soon to be communicating with him vocally, using simple linguistic rules. This isn't just an elegant Dr Dolittle curiosity: it holds the real possibility of understanding autism in humans and unlocking the vast unused power of the human brain.

"Iriki, head of the laboratory for symbolic cognitive development at the Riken Brain Science Institute, says his experiment will tap into neural systems monkeys always had, but have never been activated. He hopes to learn something about monkey thought, but more dramatically, about how language emerged in humans -and what happens when it breaks down in autistic children, for example."

Guardian (UK) article here.