Jason Louv, A Strange Mix of Scientism and Magick |385|

Well I took that quote directly from here (number 4):

http://opensciences.org/about/manifesto-for-a-post-materialist-science

I guess it just reinforces my point about no cogent single voice as alternative.

Ok thanks for clarification, browsed this manifesto, creeps me out a little. I hear so much double-speak and marketing in these efforts now, though I realize this is my lens at this time. While I agree on the basis of what's being 'sold' I am confused about all the appeals to authority. So we need to not throw the baby out with the bathwater, I've heard that enough times to see it in their appeals, but I still hear a controlling hand here, in every point. But just for the one you quoted, #4
"4. Scientific methods based upon materialistic philosophy have been highly successful in not only increasing our understanding of nature but also in bringing greater control and freedom through advances in technology."
I don't think the average man or woman understands nature any better, not by a long shot, thanks to advances in technology. Do you think you have a good understanding of nature? How much control do you have over your daily life now, and how much freedom, would you say?

I don't think this does reinforce any point about no cogent single voice as alternative, I think it does just the opposite. It tells us we will still be working through the maps and institutions currently laid out for us, but in a more integrated way. So to me this means, more waters infested with the same agenda but new fishes.
 
Any game player knows that playing by somebody else's rules is character building. The danger of SBNR is that it is easy to become seduced by one's own opinions.

Nice post, really appreciate your perspectives, much of it I'd comment on, but this in particular, as someone who is not a game player and hates playing by somebody else's rules to such a degree that I had to stop playing at all. For me the reverse has been true, the character building has happened as I moved away from the crowd, the institution, authority. I realize the 'enlightenment' angle is then you move back into it, 'seeing it for the first time' from your new perspective. It's hard for me to gauge that space, since I am not there, and have very little desire to be when I really look. I feel more of a nostalgia for a tribe I've never known, but nothing like a desire to 'get back in the game' as in the current paradigm offerings.

I think Ayn Rand really influenced me at a provocative time in my life and still I fantasize about the 'greatest individuals on strike', refusing to submit to the system in any way and creating something altogether apart.
 
anti-authoritarian objectivity

I like it, even though you've listed loads of topics here you haven't really researched. And your list smacks positively of a western bias of one whome doesn't have to worry at all where his next meal comes from. I'm very guilty of this and am pleased to be reminded of it at any turn. At the same time, I don't have to worry too much, and so I venture into such silliness as the moon landing and other fun topics. Entertainment.

When the weather warfare that is not on your radar (by design) comes right to your doorstep, then I suppose you will actually take this shit more seriously.
 
This is great, just out, a bit off-topic, perhaps, but right in line with the blind trust of science/tech and how you can't trust NASA!


Has this vid not been available now? Of the moon landing continued psy-op saga where the Buzzed Aldrin tells an 8 year old girl we never went to the moon?!
 
That said, there were legitimate disagreements where I would also affirm sides as opposed to simply sketch the disagreement - most notably Alex's climate change denial. Having expressed my views on this issue more than once, though, there seems to be little left to say (in summary: a risk management approach strongly suggests taking action to minimise greenhouse gas emissions whether or not you are totally convinced in the magnitude of the risk, given the magnitude of its effect were it to be realised).

"Climate change" is my favorite subject! I can talk the weather till the cows come home. :) Unfortunately I am not yet versed on your well-expressed views on this forum and don't have the energy to seek them out. I think we should start a forum topic on this subject, and I love it so much I'd be happy to be the one to start it, do you think you would care to contribute and repeat what you've already offered in the past in a new space for that purpose?
 
"Climate change" is my favorite subject! I can talk the weather till the cows come home. :) Unfortunately I am not yet versed on your well-expressed views on this forum and don't have the energy to seek them out. I think we should start a forum topic on this subject, and I love it so much I'd be happy to be the one to start it, do you think you would care to contribute and repeat what you've already offered in the past in a new space for that purpose?

It's a contentious subject on this forum and there have been several "hot" threads about it already - at least one person was banned in one of them. I might be willing to reiterate my perspective in a new thread, hoping the thread would remain civil, but I'm not sure there's much I can add, nor much to be gained given the topic's history on this forum!
 
"Climate change" is my favorite subject! I can talk the weather till the cows come home. :) Unfortunately I am not yet versed on your well-expressed views on this forum and don't have the energy to seek them out. I think we should start a forum topic on this subject, and I love it so much I'd be happy to be the one to start it, do you think you would care to contribute and repeat what you've already offered in the past in a new space for that purpose?
To me, the only relevance of 'climate change' to the primary subject of this forum is that it is an example of broken dysfunctional science (potential example, if you prefer). This is relevant to us because most people deny ψ because it is said to contradict science - so other examples of the way science distorts the truth are useful for comparison.

The problem is, of course, that each area involves a certain amount of probing to uncover the truth. Possibly the row about the best diet for type-2 diabetes can serve the same purpose as climate change for our purposes. The advantage is that the stark truth is that increasing numbers of people are reducing or reversing their own T2 diabetes simply by reversing the advice given to them - instead of eating a low fat high carb diet, they are recovering by eating a high fat low carb diet!

https://www.dietdoctor.com/low-carb

Behind the scenes there is a vicious fight going on

https://www.dietdoctor.com/noakes-trial-not-quite-finished

Where those favouring the traditional diet are using any tactic to suppress the facts - probably because the repercussions (legal and otherwise) could be dire. Even so, the truth seems to be reaching an ever larger number of people. Of course, one aspect of this is the strong suspicion that we wouldn't have the diabetes/obesity explosion if people hadn't been encouraged to abandon saturated fat in favour of carbohydrates!

The core fact you need to understand this, is that carbohydrates are digested into sugars!

As science became institutionalised, I guess the emphasis gradually changed from finding the truth, to a whole slew of other issues - such as not admitting a mistake, and profits for pharmaceutical companies became far more important!

The problems in science have been covered here in a long, long thread!

http://www.skeptiko-forum.com/threads/critiques-of-science-as-currently-praticed.2959/

David
 
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I like it, even though you've listed loads of topics here you haven't really researched.

If you have noticed, I have a lot of topics in the "wavering / doubting" section. These are the topics where I don't claim to have a truly strong, well-researched position. Most of them are known to me because of one of my basic interests - one in the sociology (as well as psychology, politics, economy etc.) of science.

And your list smacks positively of a western bias of one whome doesn't have to worry at all where his next meal comes from. I'm very guilty of this and am pleased to be reminded of it at any turn.

Is Russia a Western country? I think that it is a part of a Western cultural sphere, and should remain there. Yet most other Russians would disagree - nowadays they prefer to perceive themselves as the innocent victims of the Western (neo-)colonialsm. Such self-victimisation seems laughable to me, since Russian Empire and the USSR were as brutal colonial empires as British Empire and the USA were: for example, Russian treatment of the indigenous tribes of Ural and Syberia were as atrocious, sometimes openly genocidal, as the American treatment of the Native American tribes were.

And Stalin is still literally worshipped by many Russians as a kind of a heaven-sent hero, if not a messiah, while in historical fact he was a bloody tyrant on par with Hitler. Many of his Russian followers still refuse to acknowledge the Katyn Massacre (that's why I mentioned it in my "pro-mainstream" section).

At the same time, I don't have to worry too much, and so I venture into such silliness as the moon landing and other fun topics. Entertainment.

I am very cautious with my claims of veracity, and defend particular viewpoints only if I have really strong evidence and argumentation; otherwise, I put them in the "wavering / doubting" section of my worldview catalogue. I know too many people who jumped into the white rabbit hole too quickly and too deep, and arrived at the other side raving incoherent and baseless tales about of the global depopulation plan of the Illuminati, orchestrated by Reptilian alien shape-shifters and inspired by the fiends from Hell. Fringe-dwelling is like walking on a very thin ice: every next step shoud be made with caution!

When the weather warfare that is not on your radar (by design) comes right to your doorstep, then I suppose you will actually take this shit more seriously.

Well, I'm not against the alternative interpretation of the HAARP functioning - it is possible that weather-modification experiments were performed there (why not? once we had Manhattan Project, why not attempts to trick with weather today?). I'm extemely doubtful about the Chemtrails / Contrails stuff, however.
 
Scientific methods based upon materialistic philosophy have been highly successful in not only increasing our understanding of nature but also in bringing greater control and freedom through advances in technology."

This a very popular POV, but I do not think it is true. What we have got is a particular angle on interpreting nature. What we do not know is whether an alternative philosophical approach would have served us better. A thing to remember is that science has been around a long time - and practiced by religious men (usually). The advent of materialism did not improve the intellectual process so much as free it from moral constraints. Science became the slave of industry and it might be fairer to say that commerce has led the 'advances' in technology, rather than science per se.

Materialistic science appears to have been successful only because we have no comparison. In essence all scientific methods are informed by choices - intellectual, moral (that is why universities have ethics committees) and spiritual or philosophical - as well as cultural. And do we really have greater freedom and control through technology? In some respects this is very true, but in others it is not. To benefit from many technologies I have to be plugged into an elaborate system riddled with environmental and moral problems. So long as we buy the message that the tech gives us greater freedom and control we buy the tech. Who has control?

My point is that this kind of popular claim is made by proponents of materialistic science and it becomes a compelling and persuasive message that seems reasonable to accept - until you dig into it. The greatest scientific and technological achievements in human history were not created by materialists. Materialism just happened to be arising at the time when the glass lens was invented - in fact it might be fair to say that the lens enabled materialism.

Glass has been around 5,000 odd years but lenses that gave us the telescope and the microscope are way more recent. Do listen to the BBC's In Our Time podcast on The Science of Glass -https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05w456c

Glass gave us our technological revolution. The ability to magnify images let us see what the unaided eye could not see. That led to new theories. The conceit that pre-lens natural philosophy reflected a weakness of intellect is a vile conceit from people who are surfing on the waves of other people's attainments. What our ancestors achieved without the aid of our fancy gizmos should have us in awe of their attainments. We live in a glass age.

These days we cannot disconnect science from commerce, and even if the scientists have noble motive the people who employ them often do not. And science has become so narrow and specialist you can get a PhD and still be woefully ignorant of the world in general. My brother almost got a PhD in beer, but he felt his soul being depleted. He was on a scholarship paid for by a beer brewer trying to solve a problem. Interesting problem, but worthy of a PhD? For maybe solving a problem in beer production? Its a BS game that distorts and debases learning. I get the logic. Universities get research funds and researchers get the kudos of a PhD and calling themselves Doctor. But the Ph in PhD is Philosophy - the love of wisdom - not the acquisition of a highly specialised body of technical knowledge that has no, little or limited knowledge in the 'real world'.

How would the world be if we advance our knowledge and technology grounded in animism, as opposed to materialism? Would we and the planet be better off? There's a wonderful book called 'Out of Control' by Kevin Kelly, published in 1994. It is a classic in my view. In it Kelly talked about 'slide rule' technology - approximations that led to clunky machinery. Compared to machining of technology managed by computer the old tech was crude. But again, it was not an intellectual fail. That gave us the invention of the steam engine and the first internal combustion engines. Now we have electric cars.

I read Kelly about the same time I read on Chaos and Complexity. Slide rules shave off the extensions on the right side of the decimal point more severely than early electronic calculators. You can go from no numbers to only a few and make a huge difference in the precision of the measure. We assumed that the many numbers that were mathematically possible had zero impact on reality. In other words, you'd get pretty much the same if you had xx.yy as if you had xx.yyyyyyyy.

That might be so if you are talking measures for making a window box from pine. Our bias is to think that the numbers on the left side of the decimal point are the 'real' numbers - the ones that establish what is actual. In point of fact they are just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. Its the right hand numbers that are the real foundation to reality - and they knit with infinite extension into the fabric of the greater reality.

What we enjoy now is fundamentally dependent on the right hand numbers to some depth. We are well beyond the clunky slid rule stuff - but it is still with us in almost every aspect of our lives. Its like the difference between Newtonian and Quantum physics. The former is still the core, but the latter drives our growth.

At our cultural stage we are still at core materialistic, but the science that fuels our evolution is not - and this is the science that we will use to fix up and sort out all those awful messes that materialistic science has made us heir to. I will not beat around the bush here - there are no systems left on this planet that have not been not been adversely impacted by materialistic science. Yes we have greater convenience and apparent liberty - but at a cost we live with unflinchingly? Not for me.

Claims about science and technology are compelling and attractive. They make us feel good. Some of those claims are valid and good. Most are essentially PR spin bullshit.
 
It's a contentious subject on this forum and there have been several "hot" threads about it already - at least one person was banned in one of them. I might be willing to reiterate my perspective in a new thread, hoping the thread would remain civil, but I'm not sure there's much I can add, nor much to be gained given the topic's history on this forum!

Banned? Oh my, that must've gotten pretty ugly! I can get pretty ugly myself, and I consider that a virtue. :) But for the sake of the advancement of a new/better direction in the sciences and in society I will work hard to be on my best behavior!
 
Fringe-dwelling is like walking on a very thin ice: every next step shoud be made with caution!
Or get used to swimming in frigid waters! :)

I appreciate your reply. I don't waste time on shape-shifting reptilians, but that folks put it in this same "fringe" category as weather modification and weather warfare though this history is well-documented and immediately provable demonstrates to me this particular psy-op has been very well-played. Should you decide to put 'chemtrails' on your research to-do list, I'd be happy to provide you with some serious material to peruse.
 
Should you decide to put 'chemtrails' on your research to-do list, I'd be happy to provide you with some serious material to peruse.

I’d be interested in that material, if only to reinforce my thinking, which I have to admit, isn’t pro chemtrail. Will you need my email, or would a pm suffice?
 
I don't waste time on shape-shifting reptilians, but that folks put it in this same "fringe" category as weather modification and weather warfare though this history is well-documented and immediately provable demonstrates to me this particular psy-op has been very well-played.
That's the rub isn't it? I'm sure there's a pro-reptilian conspiracist who would have made your statement in reverse.
 
Or get used to swimming in frigid waters! :)

I appreciate your reply. I don't waste time on shape-shifting reptilians, but that folks put it in this same "fringe" category as weather modification and weather warfare though this history is well-documented and immediately provable demonstrates to me this particular psy-op has been very well-played. Should you decide to put 'chemtrails' on your research to-do list, I'd be happy to provide you with some serious material to peruse.

Well, I have a separate category for Reptilian shape-shifters, Satanic Illuminati, Flat Earth, Young Earth, overt neo-Nazism and neo-Stalinism etc. - I call it "far-out" and strictly differentiate it from the "fringe".

To clarify: "mainstream" and "fringe" are changeable social categories: both are sums of knowledge-claims that are empirically, rationally and morally accessible - this means, they can be tested in some (empirical, rational or moral) way and found to be right or wrong. Due to the complex network of personal, communal and societal factors, such tests are never perfect; so, some knowledge-claims tend to be dominant ("mainstream") and some marginalised ("fringe") in a particular culture and epoch because of such factors. Yet, since there is no fundamental difference between them, they can always be reevaluated and their cultural status changed: what once were "mainstream", may become "fringe"; what earlier were "fringe", may turn "mainstream". There is no clear border between them.

"Far out" is a completely different stuff: here reside knowledge-claims that, are, in the expression of physicist (and parapsychologist) Wolfgang Pauli, "not even wrong": this means, they are so comletely detached from veridical experience and/or intellectually meaningless and /or morally inhuman that no proper evaluation can be performed.

Yet where is a border between "fringe" (that may turn "mainstream", and vice versa) and "far out"? It is a question of an examination, which is performed by any individual; and such examination can also be wrong, of course. So one simply cannot make a kind of absolute and ultimate judgement what "right or wrong" and what is "not even wrong". Such categories can change as much as anything else.

But this unavoidable non-absoluteness is not a reason not to make examinations and evaluations: one's choices are inevitably fallible, but one have to and ought to choose something.

So, according to my examination and evaluation that is based on it, Flat Earth and Young Earth, Reptilians and Illuminatis, neo-Nazism and neo-Stalinism are so far beyond empirical, rational and moral reach that are "far out" through and through. They are not in the same category as parapsychology and itelligent evolution; as global warming, HIV-AIDS, GMO and vaccine skepticism; as capitalism, socialism, child liberationism, feminism and men's rights movement; as 9/11, JFK, HAARP or even Chemtrails / Contrails. The long list of the latter I may re-examine and re-evaluate one day; the very small number of the former is that is, for me, is "beyond the pale". The possibility that I may re-examine and re-evaluate any of these issues is reaching zero (even it is, still, not exactly zero).

This is not Absolute and Ultimate Truth - this is just the result of the most fundamental, existential choices I made as a human being.
 
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That's the rub isn't it? I'm sure there's a pro-reptilian conspiracist who would have made your statement in reverse.

Well, David Icke followers appear to believe automatically in any conspiracy-claim and paranormal-claim ever made by anyone, no matter how weak (at least, such is my strong impression after familiarising myself with their ideas), so they will hardly insist that "reptilians are real, yet chemtrails are not". If people see Icke and his ilk as a reliable source of knowledge (or turn to Stalin and Hitler for an ethical guidance), there are hardly any limits left for them.
 
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I’d be interested in that material, if only to reinforce my thinking, which I have to admit, isn’t pro chemtrail. Will you need my email, or would a pm suffice?

Sure, depends on you. I have a lot of photos/vids I've taken myself over our rural property which I don't think are shareable in the pm space on this site, or at least I have not yet figured out how to share them in a pm here. But I can leave my own photos out of it and just send a big mountain of links for you. I've been heavy on this one for about 4 years now. If you give me an idea what research you've already done I will craft the list around it for you. If you really do care about this issue I'll be tickled pink!

"It lays the predicate and foundation for a weather satellite that will permit man to determine the world's cloud layer, and ultimately to control the weather, and he who controls the weather controls the world." U.S. President Lynden B. Johnson, 1962
http://www.texasarchive.org/library/index.php/2010_00003
 
If you give me an idea what research you've already done I will craft the list around it for you. If you really do care about this issue I'll be tickled pink!

Michelle, I’ve no wish to fall out with you, but I fear that you and I are on different sides of this one. I was a pilot for around thirty years, and only rarely have I seen any aeroplane video that leaves me agreeing that these videos may be what the video maker says it is. Any that do are usually from the Vietnam era. I’ve been looking at planes in the sky since I can remember, I’m 57.

There may be underhand plots to interfere with weather but as far as widespread ‘chemtrailing’ by airliners, I’m not at all convinced. Condensation trails - they are to be seen nearly every day behind cruising jets (and some piston planes that flew high enough, or in cold air). :)

Btw when I think of the Kennedy assassination, I think of LBJ.
 
There may be underhand plots to interfere with weather but as far as widespread ‘chemtrailing’ by airliners, I’m not at all convinced. Condensation trails - they are to be seen nearly every day behind cruising jets (and some piston planes that flew high enough, or in cold air). :)

With all due respect for your illustrious career, which I really do respect as my father, husband and best friend are all pilots, this is not just about planes at all. That is some of it though. As I live in a very rural area it was immediately noticeable when these trails started to appear and very easy to discover most of them are not normal commercial flights. That took about 3 phone calls. When I was rebuffed, given the runaround and treated like an impetuous child, that's when I really got my panties in a bunch. I haven't let up since, and will not.

But as you are already quite convinced of your rightness, we will drop it there.
 
chemtrailsmall.jpg


for anyone still willing to do some research, happy to oblige. Here's one of many images over my rural home. Notice the trees are in full bloom as it is late summer, also notices the top of the pole in the right corner, so you have an idea how low this trail is. I do believe if you check the science you will find it's impossible to have a condensation trail in 90 + degrees, this low, which then spreads across the sky. It's officially called a 'persistent spreading contrail'. I ask you, what is it 'condensing' with here? That's no water vapor!
 
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