Rupert Sheldrake: Wikipedia Under Threat

Posted on by Frank DeMarco

Wikipedia Under Threat

by Rupert Sheldrake

Wikipedia is a wonderful invention. But precisely because it’s so trusted and convenient, people with their own agendas keep trying to take it over. Editing wars are common. According to researchers at Oxford University, the most controversial subjects worldwide include Israel and God.

This is not surprising. Everyone knows that there are opposing views on politics and religion, and many people recognize a biased account when they see it. But in the realm of science, things are different. Most people have no scientific expertise and believe that science is objective. Their trust is now being abused systematically by a highly motivated group of activists called Guerrilla Skepticism on Wikipedia.

Continue reading Rupert Sheldrake: Wikipedia Under Threat

Michael Ventura on his friend’s last quest, part two

Posted on by Frank DeMarco

MICHAEL VENTURA

LETTERS AT 3AM –

HE TOOK THE CAT TO TEXAS: Part 2

Austin Chronicle – Oct. 4, 2013

“It is my very strong feeling that real pacifism, real positive political change, cannot be effectively motivated by guilt, but must come instead from a joyful reverence for life, from a fervent desire to make our own lives more glorious and more ecstatic, and from the very selfish desire to share that joy with all the people and all the living things of the universe.”

Mayer Vishner wrote that when he was young, and, a lifelong activist, he lived those words, or attempted to, for real. Not in an ivory tower or a commune, but on the street.

Continue reading Michael Ventura on his friend’s last quest, part two

Light from within

Posted on by Frank DeMarco

I have come across a most remarkable book, And There Was Light: Autobiography of Jacques Lusseyran, Blind Hero of the French Resistance (originally published 1963), that I highly recommend. One of the heroes of the French Resistance in World War II was a teenager who had been blind from age seven yet who discovered within himself that blindness is not necessarily what it is thought to be. His story — particularly the story of his months as prisoner of the Germans and his survival (by the skin of his teeth) remind me in some ways of George Ritchie’s story of the Polish prisoner the liberating Americans called Wild Bill Cody, as told in My Life After Dying.

A couple of germane quotations (for this book is not really about the war or the camps so much as about the human spirit as a reality). First this:

And there were the poets, those unbelievable people so different from other men, who told anyone who would listen that a wish is more important than a fortune, and that a dream can weigh more than iron or steel. What nerve they had, these poets, but how right they were! Everything, they said, comes from inside us, passes through things outside and then goes back in. And that to them is the meaning of life, feeling, understanding, love.  (p. 71)

And this:

And now, in conclusion, why has this Frenchman from France written his book in the United States to present it to his American friends today? Because today he is America’s guest. Loving the country and wanting to show his gratitude, he could find no better way of expressing it than in these two truths, intimately known to him and reaching beyond all boundaries.

The first of these is that joy does not come from outside, for whatever happens to us it is within. The second truth is that light does not come to us from without. Light is in us, even if we have no eyes. (p. 311- 312)

 

Independence for Carol

Posted on by Frank DeMarco

For all my friends who joined with those of the greater Monroe Institute community in sending prayers, healing energy and loving support to TMI Executive Director Carol de la Herran:

TMI announced today that Carol made her transition to the other side at noon today.

As I said when I first asked people to assist as best they could, “healing” doesn’t always mean “return to the physical life”; sometimes it means, moving on to the next phase of existence. This is a lesson all healers have to learn, whether their medium is conventional medicine, energy work, prayer, or some combination of the three.

It is no exaggeration to say that Carol burned out doing her best to save TMI from financial and other disaster, and did not burn out until she had accomplished that task. Her very last week before she was taken to the hospital saw her doing a trade show in Washington, D.C, then immediately driving with a friend to a conference in Detroit, Michigan, and then returning to TMI thinking that she would take a week-long course, which in the event proved to be impossible. She was in harness to the last moment.

When I think of Carol, I associate her not only with TMI, but with my first experiences of her, both of which involved healing and energy work.

In 1998, she was one of the teachers of a Reiki I course I attended. Her attunement, as it is called, moved me deeply. It felt like what I had expected the Sacraments to feel like, when I was a boy. Indeed, I sometimes said it was my first experience of a Sacrament.

Then a few years later, Carol and I were among a dozen or so participants at our mutual friend Nancy Dorman’s. For many years, Nancy held what she called an “energy exchange” once a month, and people paired up to do whatever healing modality they preferred. I well remember lying on my back on the massage table with my eyes closed, and feeling, without any uncertainty, Carol’s hands a foot and a half above my body, balancing chakras. (I opened an eye to be sure her hands were where I was feeling them, and they were.) Never experienced that before or after.

Neither experience should be surprising, in light of the fact that she ran a Reiki Center in Spain for decades, among all her other activities.

And now, on this , Independence Day, she has freed herself from the limitations of life on earth, and moves on to other things. Join me in raising a virtual glass and wishing her bon voyage.

 

TMI’s statement:

Dear TMI Family,

It is with deep sadness that we are writing to let you know – Carol de la Herran made her final transition today at noon Eastern Standard Time. Her loving family was with her when she passed.

Carol’s unconditional commitment to, and love of, The Monroe Institute was expressed daily through her actions as leader, administrator, colleague, educator, trainer, innovator, and family member. She will be dearly missed by her TMI family.

 

Plans for a memorial are in process. As details become available we will share them with you.
Meanwhile, please know that your well wishes, prayers, and positive energy make a difference. Thank you for supporting Carol and TMI through this time.

With love and gratitude,

The Monroe Institute

 

Romans versus catholics

Posted on by Frank DeMarco

I have just finished re-reading How the Irish Saved Civilization, a book that raises in me alternations of admiration, exasperation, irritation and, ultimately,  profound gratitude. I suppose that shouldn’t be surprising in a book written by an Irishman! 🙂

His final paragraph rises to brilliant, prophetic insight:

Perhaps history is always divided into Romans and Catholics – or, better, catholics.  The Romans are the rich and powerful who run things their way and must always accrue more because they instinctively believe that there will never be enough to go around; the catholics, as their name implies, are universalists who instinctively believe that all humanity makes one family, that every human being is an equal child of God, and that God will provide. The twenty-first century, prophesied Malraux,  will be spiritual or it will not be. If our civilization is to be saved – forget about our civilization, which, as Patrick would say, may pass “in a moment like a cloud or smoke that is scattered by the wind” – if we are to be saved, it will not be by Romans but by saints.

How the Irish Saved Civilization, Thomas Cahill, pp 217-218

 


Ventura on the lost right of privacy

Posted on by Frank DeMarco

MICHAEL VENTURA

LETTERS AT 3AM

AN ARBITRARY NATION – PT2

Austin Chronicle – May 3, 2013

    In this series, I examine the Constitution of the United States to demonstrate that it is no longer a functioning document of law. While I’m making my case, entertain this question: If the Constitution is no longer the law of the land, what is?

   On to the Fourth Amendment: “The right of the People to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

    Item 1: Technology knows no checks and balances.

    “Police departments in Florida, Maryland, Texas, and Colorado are testing drones for surveillance and search-and-rescue missions. … [The drones range] in size from a small airplane to a hummingbird … [that is] capable of … landing on a window ledge, where it can record sound and video. … Drones can read license plates, spot body heat at night, or identify faces. The American Civil Liberties Union warns that drones [may usher] in an era in which Americans could be monitored every time they step outside. … [I]n separate cases in 1986 and 1989, the Supreme Court ruled that police don’t need a warrant to observe a private property from public airspace” (The Week, June 15, 2012, p.11).

    There is also a “growing market of off-the-shelf computer surveillance technologies” that “grab images of computer screens, record Skype chats, turn on cameras and microphones, and log keystrokes … Mobile versions of the spyware [are] customized for all major mobile phones” (The New York Times, Aug. 30, 2012).

   Item 2: There is no Fourth Amendment for Muslims, people who associate with Muslims, and professors who teach Muslims.

   New York City police “eavesdropped inside businesses and filed daily reports on the ethnicity of the owner and clientele and what they overheard. The program was not based on allegations of criminal activity. … Police also infiltrated student organizations. … Officers included names of students and professors in police files, even when there were no allegations of criminal wrongdoing. … At mosques, police recorded license plates and took photos and videos of worshippers as they arrived for services.

    “… [The NYPD] intelligence [division’s] … primary oversight body, the New York City Council, is not told about these secret programs and does not review or audit them. … The Obama administration … has tacitly endorsed the programs but does not review them. … Nor does Congress, which authorizes the money” (The Associated Press, March 12, 2012).

   The NYPD’s violations of the Fourth Amendment are supposed to make non-Muslims feel safe. They shouldn’t. A law arbitrarily enforced (or not enforced) according to the whims of the authorities is no longer a law.

   Are you immune from becoming the object of such investigative whims?

   The answer is no, as in Item 3: “President Obama’s Justice Department” has issued new rules for the FBI that apply “not just [to] terrorism suspects but [to] pretty much anyone. … [A]gents will be allowed to search databases [etc.] … [without warrants]. No factual basis for suspecting … wrongdoing will be necessary” (The New York Times, June 19, 2011).

   Even heroes are not exempt, as in the scandal that drove David Petraeus from the CIA: “What is most striking is how sweeping, probing and invasive the FBI’s investigation [was], all without any evidence of any actual crime – or the need for any search warrant” (The Guardian, Nov. 13, 2012).

   Item 4: “Every day, collection systems at the National Security Agency intercept and store 1.7 billion e-mails, phone calls, and other types of communications” (The Washington Post, July 19, 2010).

   “[T]his global surveillance system … collects so much digital detritus – e-mails, calls, text messages, cellphone location data [etc.] – that the N.S.A. is building a 1-million-square-foot facility in the Utah desert to store and process it. … Intelligence officials told [Senator Ron Wyden, D-Ore.] that they couldn’t determine how many people inside the United States had their communications collected because checking the N.S.A.’s databases to find out would itself violate the privacy of those people. In other words, the protection of privacy rights is being invoked to cover up possible continuing violations of those same rights” (The New York Times, Aug. 22, 2012).

   “Congress gave final approval … to a bill extending the government’s power to intercept electronic communications. … President Obama strongly supports [this bill]. … [C]ritics … said that they suspected that intelligence agencies were picking up communications of many Americans, but that they could not be sure because the agencies would not provide [to Congress] even rough estimates of how many people inside the United States had had communications collected under the authority of … the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act” (The New York Times, Dec. 28, 2012).

   Both parties are culpable. Thirty Democrats joined 42 Republicans to pass that bill, which was signed by a Democratic president.

    Item 5: “The Supreme Court … turned back a challenge to a federal law that broadened the government’s power to eavesdrop on international phone calls and e-mails. …Writing for the majority, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. said that the journalists, lawyers, and human rights advocates who challenged the constitutionality of the law could not show they had been harmed by it and so lacked standing to sue. … It is of no moment, Justice Alito wrote, that only the government knows for sure whether plaintiffs’ communications have been intercepted. It is the plaintiffs’ burden, he wrote, to prove they have standing[.] … The Obama administration defended the law in court, and a Justice Department spokesman said the government was ‘obviously pleased with the decision’” (The New York Times, Feb. 26).

   A Times editorial, the same day: “The 2008 amendments to the [surveillance] law give the government sweeping power to intercept communications of Americans without individualized suspicions, warrants based on probable cause or any administrative findings of a terrorism connection. The law does not require the government to identify its surveillance subjects. … [The Supreme Court’s] refusal [to let this case go forward] essentially prohibits constitutional review of the 2008 law and whether Congress and the executive branch have undercut fundamental liberties.”

   Item 6: Last month, U.S. District Judge Susan Illston “ruled that the FBI’s practice of so-called national security letters to banks, phone companies and other businesses is unconstitutional, saying the secretive demands for customer data violate the First Amendment” (The New York Times, March 15). Notice that Judge Illston does not question the FBI’s right to pry into our sensitive data without warrants or probable cause; her ruling is based on the First Amendment because the FBI “almost always bars recipients of the letters from disclosing to anyone – including customers – that they have even received the demands. … [This] gag order creates ‘too large a danger that speech is being unnecessarily restricted.’”

     Then Judge Illston put her ruling on hold so the so-called Justice Department can appeal. The Obama administration dearly wants its FBI to have warrantless surveillance powers.

   Shocked? Depressed? This might make you feel better: The Supreme Court just ruled that the blood in your veins is protected. Authorities need a warrant to extract it (The New York Times, April 18).

   However, when it comes to almost anything else, the Fourth Amendment is applied or not, arbitrarily, when the authorities feel like it, making it just words on paper and nothing more. It no longer functions as law.

Jung’s wisdom in his old age

Posted on by Frank DeMarco

From an interview with the English journalistFrederickSands in 1955.

“At my country retreat I do as I please. I write, I paint — but I spend most of the time just drifting along with my thoughts.

“It seems to me we have reached the limit of our revolution — the point from which we can advance no further. Man started from an unconscious state and has ever striven for greater consciousness. The development of consciousness is the burden, the suffering, and the blessing of mankind. Each new discovery leads to greater consciousness, and the path along which we are going is merely an extension of it. This inevitably calls for greater responsibility and enforces a great change in ourselves. We must draw conclusions from what we know and discover, and not take everything for granted.

Continue reading Jung’s wisdom in his old age