Can Green Passion Match Evangelical Passion?

The whole idea of being alive is a little terrifying. Here we are, trapped in these organic bodies. We are at the mercy of the fleshly shell that we live inside, as well as the environment that surrounds us. Add to this the certainty of death, and it's really too much to bear.

It's no wonder that so many people turn to tobacco, drugs, and alcohol to "get the edge off" or provide a new reality. But all these "life coping" chemicals have long-term effects on your organic body and they impact your health and the functioning of your brain, both physically and psychologically. Really, it's better to ride this mother out with no aids at all.

When I was in college I met the Jesus Hippies and saw how reality distortion was another way of coping with life. I went to one of their churches and as they were lifting their hands up and speaking in tongues, I saw how their religious rituals gave them comfort. I even tried doing Jesus drugs for a few years myself, but I was always too skeptical and questioning to get into the role.

Snapshot

What many people don't think about is that we are born into a time in history and we don't understand how our beliefs and behaviors developed over time — sometimes over generations and sometimes over millions of years. If we could understand better we might be more tolerant.

For instance, Christian evangelicals are a powerful political group in the U.S. that have aligned themselves with the Republican Party. As I write this post Georgia is in a political runoff for two U.S. Senate seats. The two Republican contenders are multi-millionaires who are using their senate positions to get even richer. Opposing them are two Democrats — one of God's chosen people (Jewish) and a distinguished minister. Now, it would seem logical that all the Christians in Georgia would support the minister and Jew, but instead, they will vote for two of the wealthiest people in Congress, who only care about trading their massive stock investments to get even richer. The love of money belies the teachings of Christ, but it doesn't matter.

Evangelicals are a relatively small percentage of the Christian denominations in North America, but they are well-organized, passionate, and vocal. Any Republican who wants to win has to court them.

Many evangelicals believe their way of worship is the "one right way," yet evangelicalism didn't even come into being until the 1700s, and was primarily created by John Wesley during the First Great Awakening.

Even more interesting is that the invention of the "rapture" was cobbled together in the 1830s by evangelists who pulled scriptures out of Revelations and Thessalonians to create a creepy end-of-the-world narrative. It is this narrative that has influenced U.S. foreign policy and the American Zionist movement, where supporting Israel's expansionism and continued suppression of the Palestinians will hopefully bring to them a self-fulfilling prophesy — Armageddon.

Dark Roots

Most people, including myself, assume that it was Jerry Fallwell Sr., the Moral Majority, and the abortion issue that made evangelical Christians a pillar of the Republican Party. But, no, the evangelicals began morphing into Republicans even further back, partly in thanks to a Christian political organizer named Paul Weyrich. He was actually the founder of the Moral Majority, as well as The Heritage Foundation, and other right-wing organizations. Shockingly, it was segregation that triggered conservative Christians to jump into the GOP bandwagon. Hey, wait, wasn't the segregation issue resolved in the 1960s? Supposedly, yes, but it continued on in a more sinister way. As Southern whites pulled their children out of segregated schools, they moved them into church schools, and churches, in turn, created universities that were thinly disguised white havens. Most notable among these schools was Bob Jones University. Starting at the end of Nixon's term big controversies broke out about the tax-exempt status of these racist institutions, which helped to engage evangelicals in the political process.

It was not until 1978, five years after Roe v. Wade, that shrewd political organizers dropped the issue of government intervention in racist religious schools and switched the focus to abortion and the "homosexual agenda." The gay-bashing campaign, disguised under the name of "family values," is now losing steam, but abortion still resonates and galvanizes the evangelical political faction.

You'll have to excuse me, but those of us on the left are mystified and horrified when people claiming to be Christians show cult-like support for a Sunday golfer who has had several extra-marital affairs and who lives a life the complete opposite of the example shown by Jesus. I don't get it, but when I see how evangelicals also fell behind Ronald Reagan, an infrequent church attendee who didn't even understand the term "Born Again," I can understand.

Where's the Passion

I'm not here today to judge, for I actually admire the Christian evangelicals for their passion, organizing skills, and powerful voting bloc. Along with them is the extremely passionate gun owners who are a cult themselves. In my 16 years of blogging, most of what I say is unread or ignored, but if I say something critical about guns or conservative religion, I suddenly receive some emotional comments. So, my question is: Why can't we environmentalists have the same kind of passion? The problem with the Christian Political Party is that they have to put their cognitive dissonance on full power and ignore their massive hypocrisy so that they can push for more millionaire Republicans to get elected, while most of the country is barely scraping by financially or even sinking. Suddenly, they want to be moral champions and they will rally behind the most immoral leaders to achieve their goals. But, yes, we environmentalists are stinking hypocrites too because we are part of this wasteful, materialistic world. Only if you live a carbon-neutral life with minimal waste can you not be a green hypocrite. But, you see, I at least acknowledge my hypocrisy and I grieve every day for the harm I'm doing to the planet. Evangelicals, on the other hand, use delusion, conspiracy theories, and confirmation bias to distort their reality until it accommodates their hypocrisy and religious fairy tales.

I am shocked that just 50 years ago African-Americans were required to use "Colored" restrooms and sit on the back of buses. This is appalling to me. I am shocked that even into the 1970s police were raiding gay bars to "clean up neighborhoods." Gay people are docile, kind, and productive members of society. To use them as a target to galvanize your political movement infuriates me. And you do this to force women to have their unwanted children, and you give votes to millionaire Republicans who buy their office with no political experience and primarily push tax cuts and other policies that only benefit the wealthiest 1 percent. And I am shocked that a political faction with a racist past would borrow the "pro-life" issue from the Roman Catholics and use it as their rallying cry for 42 years. I think it's time for some new political models.

Of interest, there is an evangelical megachurch in my town that's now for sale. It seems like all those rock concerts and "practical" message sermons couldn't keep the masses engaged. I'm not sure what actually happened there but if you want to buy a giant church, click HERE. If you want to read about how this former church engaged in right-wing political activity, click on the article below, titled, "A Nation Under God." If you want to find many more church buildings for sale, you can do a Google Search. The point being is that I'm hoping the dark era of minority-bashing, gay-bashing, and women-bashing, all under the Christian flag, is coming to an end. It's another sad period in our history. I applaud Jimmy Carter who has spent his long life modeling how a Christian actually SHOULD behave. God bless him.

And, funny, because now Christian evangelicals have switched roles and are claiming they are the persecuted ones. They falsely say that Donald Trump ended the "War on Christmas," even though such a war never existed. And now they are pushing "religious liberty" bills in state legislatures across our land. They have flipped the issue — they claim small businesses should have the RIGHT to refuse serving gays if it conflicts with their religious beliefs. I find this utterly disgusting. Screw your so-called "religious beliefs." Maybe just remove that nice-sounding label and say what you really are — a homophobe.

Summary

I appreciate Owen Morgan of Telltale, a popular YouTube Channel that examines cults and oppressive religions, for inspiring me to write this article. As he mentions in one of his videos, morality always flows in the direction of justice. We have made great progress against the persecution of minorities, gays, and women. I am proud of these accomplishments. I see climate change as a moral and social justice issue as well. I see the destruction of green space and woodlands as a moral issue. And I see the wiping out of other animal species and the pollution of our land and seas as moral and justice issues. I want to live long enough to see a Green Great Awakening where we consider the rights and wellbeing of our planet and all living creatures as part of green justice and peace.

An Excellent Documentary on the Evangelical-Republican Marriage

"How Evangelicals Became Republicans," by J.J. McCullough

Additional Sources

A Nation Under God, by John Sugg, Mother Jones

The Man Who Mobilized The Evangelical Vote | Al Jazeera

Owen Morgan of Telltale YouTube Channel.

The Great Tribulation, Wikipedia

Invention of the "Rapture" Idea, Prophecy Reformation Institute

Top photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash

Moving Trees

Life reminds me of the elevator on the starship Enterprise. As the elevator sped up you could see the lights of each floor out a window zooming by faster and faster. As I get older the days speed by and so do the months and years. My deep-thinking, pondering brain is destined to become ashes. So that's why I have this desire to "download" as much as I can into my blogs.

At age 7 my teacher called me the Absent-Minded Professor because I was always daydreaming and distracted. I was fascinated with outer space and spaceships, and mentally I was far away.

In my 30s I began to see the shortcomings of Christianity and I became obsessed with saving the world, so I joined the Sierra Club. I served on numerous committees and task forces and held various positions, and received 10 awards for my service.

By age 44, after 7 years of working 20 hours a week as a volunteer, I began feeling the burn. There are progressive people who want to move things forward and there are conservative people, who guard the status quo. I thought people would appeal to logic, but they do not. So, in 2004 I started blogging with one central theme — how do you change human thinking in a way that will stop the death of the Earth. I have written over 400 blog posts on this topic. 

Lately, it has occurred to me that humans are like trees, and, like roots, much of their value system and world view is buried beneath the ground. How do you make people environmentally and socially conscious? It's like moving a tree, and that's hard to do because of the root system.

When I began blogging 16 years ago I had a regular following of engaged readers and their thoughtful feedback helped me to move forward in my intellectual journey. But these days, few people read anymore and even fewer people read blogs. So, I now write with the hope that some future generation will benefit from my thoughts.

I have a desire to do some good with the remaining years of my life. But I fumble around and wander aimlessly because I'm not sure what I CAN do to make a difference. 

When my last day comes I won't have a headstone and there won't even be an urn. My ashes are going straight to the dipsy dumpster, which is fitting since I am just as much a criminal to this Earth as everyone else. I have no money and all I have to give is love to my rescue animals, family members, and friends. 

The 4th-century theologian Jerome tells one of my favorite stories about the last days of the Apostle John. John was old and frail, so his disciples carried him to religious events, and he would simply say to the gathering, "Little children, love one another."

But then I have read in social media this past week where Christians are saying they can't "love" anyone who voted for Biden and Harris because they "support abortion."

Fear

Hurricane Zeta recently passed over my home, leaving much of my county in the dark.  On the night after the hurricane, I was driving on back roads and I was amazed at how pitch dark it was — no streetlights, traffic signals, or anything. At first, I thought it was creepy, but then I thought, "Why am I afraid of the dark?" There's really nothing to be afraid of. It's not like in those prehistoric days before fire was invented, where predators would pluck you in your sleep and drag you into the forever darkness. Now we've wiped out most of the large land predators and can sleep safe and sound. So, what was I afraid of? Was it my millions of years of evolution talking to me?

I'm amazed at how fear drives human behavior. The fear of death became the inspiration for religion, and symbols that showed a belief in the afterlife began showing up at burial sites 40,000 years ago. Christianity really wasn't a new religion but rather a collection of ideas that began evolving in caveman days. It seems we don't like the idea of not existing, so we started coming up with stories, and the Egyptians and other Middle Eastern cultures created elaborate mythology about life after death. In fact, in Ancient Egypt, much of life was spent preparing for death.

Much of the political divide I see in America today boils down to fear. For instance, everyone wants to take your guns away. First, it was Obama, then Hillary, and now Biden. Maybe all three will just appear at your door at once. Then there's the fear of the riots, and news agencies and social media sensationalize them to the point where we believe the entire nation is going down in flames. We keep our doors locked and our blinds down, even in the day. Stalkers and boogeymen are everywhere.

My advice is to not let yourself be manipulated by fear. If we as a people can learn to sort through our irrational fears we can better learn to understand one another and find ways to work cooperatively to solve common problems. For instance, I commend President Trump on the work he did on criminal justice reform, which received support from Democrats as well. That was a great example of how both political sides could work together to solve a problem, and it gave me HOPE!

But when it comes to a women's right to choose or protecting the environment or providing a decent life for the average American, Republicans and Democrats are sharply divided and heels dig in.

Two Camps

So, the Christian evangelicals see us progressives as immoral for being pro-choice, and we libtards see evangelicals as hypocritical for supporting a president with a long history of wife-cheating and immorality and playing golf on Sundays instead of attending church. I personally see Trump as a sycophant who cynically uses Christians for their votes. Waving a Bible upside down and not being able to recite a single Bible verse is a little hypocritical to me. But then, the religious right tells me how God used King Cyrus to do great things. Impressively, God only needed Trump in the White House for four years — I guess his work is done.

I did come across a social media post by Kristen Heitzmann, an award-winning author. Since she's definitely a "public figure," I'm pretty sure I'm allowed to reprint it:

"I have thousands of Facebook friends I don't know. They have requested my friendship and I have accepted. When I see today that some are rejoicing in the face of enormous fraud that is destroying our election process, the potential of a presidency held by abortion and infanticide advocates who intend to subjugate America to the New World Order, I realize there is nothing in me that will receive grace or impart grace by continuing that relationship. I care nothing for the number of friends and everything for walking justly before God."

I have found her post troubling and it's stayed in my mind this past week. For one thing, no significant fraud has been found in any state, after a week of examinations. But I know we have to listen to how the election was "stolen" for the next four years. Secondly, she is suggesting that her God will view her more favorably if she tells all the Biden voters to screw off. This sanctimonious, self-righteous, and judgmental attitude is typical of the religious extremists I've run into. Marilyn Manson wrote a song about how people "can't see the forest for the trees," and "can't smell your own shit on your knees." I think about those lines all the time.

To address Ms. Heitzmann's comment about "infanticide," that's when a baby is murdered within a year of birth. No one supports that, so I guess she is using the term incorrectly to make abortion sound more horrible. The fact is that Jesus never mentioned abortion, but he did mention many other things that I do not see Christian evangelicals following. Secondly, sex education, access to contraception, and Plan B could greatly reduce abortions, but these initiatives are strongly resisted by Christian groups.

And as for the "New World Order," I see this buzzword used when "socialism" loses its shock factor. I'm guessing she means that President Biden will move us into alliances with other nations that will take away our individual rights. My belief is to the contrary — we need worldwide cooperation more than ever to address common challenges like climate change, rainforests protection, disease, and extreme poverty. I embrace a New World Order because the Old World Order sucks, and only benefits the super rich.

Are Humans Flawed?

This is a debate I've had with my environmental colleagues for 14 years, and it fits in nicely with Christian dogma. As a child, I was told that I was a bad kid because I had a "sinful nature," and I needed to ask Jesus to forgive me. So, at age 8, I asked Jesus to come into my heart. My interpretation of that belief has since changed. Humans are not flawed at all, but rather we are a by-product of the Big Bang and 13.7 years of organic and inorganic evolution. We are just one of millions of animal species and we eat, drink, poop, pee, and screw just like any other mammal. We are animals and our selfishness is part of natural human behavior, going back 2 million years ago to the African Savanna, where we needed to horde to survive. What Jesus is saying to me is that we are given a consciousness and as a species, we are unique in that we can override our animalism and live as an enlightened species. Jesus gave us an example to live by. So, are American Christians following that example? Yes, on the liberal left but "NO" when I see all the gay-bashing, Muslim-bashing, immigrant-bashing, green-bashing, prosperity gospel, and gun-worship. The level of hypocrisy is sickening and is leading to our global destruction.

I do understand that humans are trees and our root systems are influenced by our upbringing, our community, and millions of years of evolution. Trees cannot be moved without the risk of harming the roots. But if we don't try to move the trees we are heading to a dark future of extreme climate change, fouled oceans, and poisoned soil and air. Aside from wiping out millions of other creatures, ignoring our own problems is securing our own doom. 

If anything, maybe I can plant a few seeds of thought during my final years on Earth. I want my fellow countrymen to see the difference between "Christianity" and "Christian Nationalism," which is what's really being worshipped now. If socialism is evil, I would say that capitalism is far more evil because it has put the majority of the world's wealth into the hands of a few multi-billionaires. If you think that is "right" and "Christian," perhaps you should think again. 

Top Photo by Felix Mittermeier on Unsplash

Bottom Photo by Valentin Salja on Unsplash

Endgame II

I stopped blogging for a while in June because at the time I really wondered if humanity was going to make it. I still don't know the answer, but somehow we humans continue to slog forward. From the moment of the Big Bang we've been put on a path, governed by physics, and I'm not sure where it's going or how it will end.

During my last ramblings over the summer, I talked about how the pandemic will be a test for us. Somehow, despite all the denial, anti-maskers, hoax claims, and conspiracy theories, we seem to be surviving, for now.

What I learned from the virus is that it has evolved right along with our cells, going back millions of years. Learning how to exist by hijacking cells was an amazing feat, and as long as life has existed we've had to deal with viruses. They plague many living things, and we somehow all just learn to live with them.

So, why is the virus here? It just is, and we are here because we just are. This makes it harder for me to believe in God because everything appears happenstance.

Why?

Every day I still wonder if humanity even needs to be here. When I hike I find junk and trash in the farthest corners of the forest. Our oceans are full of plastic. Our soil has wastes from a thousand different chemicals. And the air we breathe is just as bad. We are just one of 8.7 million species on this planet. We have no more right to be here or more rights than any other species. Yet, we pillage and destroy, and kill and harm our fellow lifeforms every fucking day. What gives us the right?

When I started blogging in 2004 I wanted humans to survive so that we could colonize the Universe, but then I realized we'd be screwing up other planets too. Then I thought we should survive so that we could be the caretakers of the planet. Now, I'm thinking we do more harm than good.

While the science is solid, I still have to hear people question climate change. What these people are doing is simply denying science, often because it conflicts with the religious dogma that was drilled into them as children.

Being Alive

If I may say, just being alive is freaking weird. We are given consciousness, which no one can really explain, and we are expected to DO SOMETHING WITH IT. We keep making babies and growing the population as if everything is okay. Trump supporters boast about GNP and the stock market to show the success of "their guy," but all that means to me is that the rich are getting richer. And when the president removes environmental and labor protections to rev up the economy and Wall Street, all he's doing is making himself look good now at the expense of our future.

No matter how elaborate our religious stories are, we are still organic animals who must fight against cancer, viruses, bacteria, and, most importantly, each other. I suppose our end goal is to find happiness, horde junk, or find some inner contentment from reading the Holy Bible or an Eckhart Tolle book or the latest copy of Mad Magazine.

Every breath we take and every moment we are alive is special. Albert Einstein got the math right, and we know that time is a component of matter. Yet, we live and die, and our cells break down the moment the oxygen stops.

I recently watched a documentary where soldiers from five different wars talked about killing people. A few of them lamented on the fact that once they killed a person it was sobering to see just how dead they were — lively, happy men, with families and girlfriends, and maybe wives and kids, were suddenly a heap of deteriorating cells.

So, in this solemn reality, we all grasp for meaning in a world where there is none. I made the mistake of watching too many of Neil deGrasse Tyson's shows and videos. Neil doesn't like being called an atheist or a member of the "atheist community." He is just an astrophysicist, and I am just a curious learner, and what I learned is that there is simply no work for God to do — the universe runs by itself. But I desperately try to reconcile my childhood religious beliefs with my knowledge of science and, well, maybe God is the universe itself, and maybe EVERYTHING has a consciousness, and maybe EVERYTHING is alive and stays alive, in a weird sort of way.

I've also followed the work of Francesca Stavrakopoulou, the famous British biblical scholar, and she convinced me that Jesus really lived, although little else in the Bible is true. I now see Jesus as an evolutionary "marker" along with Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandella, and Martin Luther King Jr. What I mean is that these men were evolutionary social mutations that gave us humans examples and ideas that have kept us from exterminating ourselves. The teachings of Jesus Christ were hundreds of years ahead of their time, which leads me to believe He was truly someone special. An alien, maybe? Or an incredible thinker who saw how humans should really live to survive?

What I see in America is Christian Nationalism, which has nothing to do with Christianity. It's just like the National Socialism in Germany (Nazism) had nothing to do with socialism. Jesus never mentioned abortion, yet evangelicals make that their sole issue, along with gay-bashing, and ignore all the other teachings of Christ. In fact, to really follow the example set by Christ would make you a liberal and if you follow the teachings in the book of Acts, you'd be a communist.

So, I try to follow the example of Christ, and I love him for his humility. If people follow a leader just because he's "pro-life," but morally abhorrent in every other way, well, I think you are being played for a sucker. The real Christians in this world are author John Pavlovitz and Jimmy Carter. If we follow their examples we might have a chance.

Out of Place

All my life I've felt out of place. I'm the classical square peg trying to fit in a round hole. No one gets me. And, if I may give one message to everyone, I will say that we need to start thinking about some sort of new way of living where we can all have a warm shelter and enough to eat and that we can live in a way that doesn't harm the earth or wildlife. THAT'S ALL I ASK. Instead of following this logical path we get caught up in Trump's Tweets, misleading memes on Facebook, fear-mongering, and endless conspiracy theories. When a group of nutbags flew jets into the World Trade Center and Pentagon, we got distracted from the serious environmental threats and became obsessed with social threats. But what are the root causes of terrorism? Is it all about feeding families? It is all about making your diety happy? 

The irony of Christ and Christianity is that by the 1500s Catholics and Protestants were torturing each other, and by the 1600s massive land battles were being waged in the name of God. What got missed here? What are we still missing?

Endgame

Derrick Jensen, the author of Endgame, was one of the key people who helped me awaken in my early 40s. He still does short video clips that feed me. Maggie Sargent is a YouTube creator who gave me comfort in knowing that there are at least a few of us who dare to question and challenge our culture.

In summary, I don't know what to say. This year has brought humanity real challenges, primarily a global pandemic and a deranged president. Our reactions to both these challenges were poor, but in the end, we pulled out of the fog of craziness.

I think our species will find a way to survive, but then what? Are we going to get a grip on our 500 years of degrading the earth's atmosphere? Are we going to clean our oceans? Are we going to learn to live together? Can we get the poorest among us a meal and a warm place to sleep at night, or do we have to keep cowering to the all-consuming capitalists, who mutter "pro-life" to get the evangelical vote, and then continue their exploitation of the earth and cheap labor? 

The Fly

Just look at that little animal. He's a fantastic and efficient organism, brought to you 66 million years ago from the Middle East. One landed on Mike Pence's head to try to tell him that science is real, and religion is not, and that climate change is really, really real. But Mike didn't listen. Maybe Indiana will take him back, but I hope not.

Photo by Gabriel Manlake on Unsplash

Everything is Physics

Lately I've learned to release a lot of frustration and anger in my life by remembering a simple statement: everything is physics. On a typical day I feel that the Good Lord is clusterfucking me from the moment I wake up until I go to bed, and then sometimes even at night. God is up in Heaven throwing lightening bolts at me to teach me lessons and build my character.

But then I realize that things break and humans break because cells and molecules get stressed and go in a direction we don't like. As big-brained apes we have a large degree of control over our daily lives and we can limit how the physics affects us. If something is frustrating you, instead of getting stressed, think of a way to solve the problem.

Human Cell Collections

Even human behavior is the result of physics. The world is now packed with humans and every human is seeking comfort, pleasure, and idyllic happiness. When others take advantage of you and step on your head to gain some advantage, let them. Remember that we humans are simply a collection of 30 trillion cells, which is soon going to be the same number as the U.S. federal debt. For 2.9 billion years we existed as single cells and then 600 million years ago the first multicellular organism appeared and it said, "Hey, look at me, I'm more effective when a few of us cells join together." So for another 598 million years we kept getting more complex and our ancestors didn't even appear on the scene until a mere 2 million years ago.

So, your brain now becomes the spokesperson for your 30 trillion cells and when you say something crappy and hurtful to me I know you are just trying to relieve frustration or you get some kind of pleasure by being a little shit. But we are all just massively complex cell clusters, so I get it. People tell me that I should not take crap from anyone because it will only get worse, but I don't care because I'm an old man now and getting closer to having my ashes sent to Pluto.

I do notice that when people are hiding inside their automobiles or in front of their computers that they even get even more shitty and rude. To me, I know these people are just being their real selves and when they are nice it's actually just window dressing. So, come on people, let's always be civil to one another, even on the highway and online. Don't be a crap because you are representing mother nature's greatest disaster, which is the homo sapiens. You are the only species that can not only destroy its own habitat, but can also turn an entire planet into a dark cinder ball.

Christian Apologetics

So, I've heard John Lennox and Ravi Zacharias slice and dice atheists and spit them then out on the streets. But it's all based on straw man arguments because no one ever said or claimed the things they are shredding. Just because we don't know something is not an intellectual surrender. Science has only had 450 years to do its thing and in another 450 years we will know everything there is to know, and poor God will be squeezed out and unemployed. We don't know what caused the Big Bang and what space was like before it, but no one ever said that physics was creating something out of nothing. Then there is the entire topic of predetermination, which we might just need to force physics models to work, and it bodes well with some Christian denominations but not with others. 

But, my point being, is that I believe the universe is mechanical only and no supernatural explanation is needed to explain String Theory, Chaos Theory, or quantum entanglement. Either we just have to discover new theories or we don't truly understand the theories we've got. And as for the mystery of gravity, and Dark Energy and Dark Matter, well, maybe these things don't exist at all — maybe we are just looking at the problem wrong or haven't figured out the right questions to ask.

And to say that only a God could create a universe that's so fine tuned for life is total crap because, hey, in case you didn't notice, the universe is NOT fine tuned for life. In fact, we could be the only industrial society in this whole freaking place. So, trying to force religion in this cold, dark universe is simply beating up on straw men — those poor scarecrows who never said or claimed any of the things that the Bible defenders are attacking.

Critical Thinking

I harp on this over and over because it's our only hope as a species. I love those rare moments when someone I know is "awakened" and suddenly becomes a critical thinker and a sentient being. I figure that for humans to survive and to save the world we need to get critical thinking up to about 20 percent of the population, and it's only 5 percent now. I have to help awaken 15 percent of the world's humanity, and that's why I blog. A critical thinker is the person who has the courage to question all the mythology that's been shoved down their throats since childhood. Very few people do this because their delusional world makes them feel comfortable. Without your self-created world you will be naked. You will be shunned, persecuted, and in some parts of the world you'll be murdered. And your only crime is questioning mainstream society and all the lies you are fed. I'm starting to think that most people don't even have the capability to question because their artificial reality has been firmly built into them.

Nuclear Fusion

Fusion is the ultimate orgasm of physics and can help us solve the two big problems we have now with fission reactors — safety and dealing with the waste. Humanity really screwed up when we pursued fission technology instead of fusion. We did this because we wanted to kill millions of people effectively, and the electrical industry just sort of piggybacked on the war-making fission technology. If we weren't so obsessed with killing people and radiating our planet for millions of years we could have started building clean, safe fusion reactors, which could power the heavy industry needed to build millions of electric cars. We could have done it, but we didn't. Instead, fusion reactors are always "30 years away" from being commercially viable and the energy needed to create a fusion reaction is close to what the reaction creates, so we still have a long way to go. Solar panels and wind turbines are an interim solution but can't provide the energy to run a steel smelting plant. 

Reality

Physics are my only reality because when some human cell goes haywire and starts mass producing screwed up cells it's all about the genetic coding, proteins, and chemical imbalances. Eventually the cells-gone-bad create tumors, which interfere with critical life functions in the U.S.S. Human, until your ship sinks. No amount of prayer will change the work of gravity, genetic coding, and chemical reactions. From the moment of the Big Bang our existence was assured because we are simply an end product to the natural progression of physics. I know that Stephen Hawking is still getting beat up for the things he never said, but it's the things he did say, along with Einstein, that create my elusive reality, as best as I can grasp it. The truth is, physics doesn't care what you believe. And even though I was told at age 9 that Santa Claus was a lie, the North Pole is a real place. Do you get it?

As for Ravi Zacharias, he recently died a rich man with a net worth of $7.5 million, and all he did was say the things that Christians wanted to hear. It's true that he rubbed shoulders with the top theoretical physicists of our day but he found that he could make a bigger wad of dough being a Christian apologist. But now he'd dead and he gets to be a building block for the fourth iteration of our sun, which will come in a few billion years.

I've heard a few people say that God operates beyond physics, in another dimension. The fifth and sixth dimensions are small, weird places that must exist for Superstring Theory to work. I don't think any supernatural being would want to live there, but if you have proof, please do share.

Capitalism

Our current, failed economic system is another example of physics following its natural path. I am told that capitalism is good because it encourages efficiency and innovation. On the individual level that makes sense, but capitalism has moved to a new, corporate level where massive corporations just gobble up other corporations and there is little innovation, and only rich people getting richer. Because when you are rich and have capital it's easy to create more wealth. We are simply seeing the selfish and hoarding genes at work and while a few more people are joining the billionaires club the rest of us are struggling just to pay our bills. The billionaires are like the suns in our universe — the dust and particles gather from gravity and a great fusion furnace forms. Capitalism is the great failed system, and anyone who mentions socialism or Marxism is slapped down. Poor Che Guevara was hunted down and blown away in Bolivia by the American CIA because he challenged those rich, corrupt, filthy capitalists who kept getting richer. This is called "threatening our way of life," but the only people threatened are the top 1 percent. I am not advocating a French Revolution but I am suggesting that we move to a more fair and equitable economic system.

As for the Proud Boys they are simply a more presentable iteration of the National Socialists that controlled Germany in the 1930s. The language is spun differently but the ideas are the same. Physics drives animals toward more complexity and living cells toward a steady food supply and comfortable living conditions. The Theory of Relativity shows that space and time are intertwined, and quantum mechanics shows the mysterious and weird behavior of matter, which may be nothing but vibrations, but what is the energy that causes the vibrations? What do neo fascists gain by being neo fascists? It's all about resources and control, just like it was in World War II, and just like our cells were doing millions of years ago.

Photo by pawel szvmanski on Unsplash

A Symphony and a Virus

I hope that during this virus pandemic all of us will take time to reflect. Maybe we should think about the way we treat others, animals, the planet, and even ourselves.

I'm glad that I'm not hearing many religious explanations during this crises, for any kind of religious logic would be absurd. There is no point in praying since God obviously "allowed" this virus to spread in the first place. Is God going to now protect the ones who pray the loudest and most frequently? No, he will not. We are all chained to our own fate, and the virus doesn't care what you say or believe, or how rich or poor you are.

If anything, now is the time to admire evolution, which created the pesky coronavirus that is now spreading like wildfire around the world.

On a purely mathematical basis, the next two months will be extremely difficult for us humans. We try desperately to keep our economy going, for that keeps the poor fed and the rich wealthy. But so much of our economy requires human interaction and when that's taken away our civilization howls and screams hopelessly into the night.

Living cells and viruses have fought with one another for millions of years. Our cells know how to fight for their lives and have defenses against viruses and bacterias. Better yet, in the early days of our evolution our cells joined together as a team and created multicellular life, complete with immune systems. This took hundreds of millions of years to develop, but by golly we did it. Life will always be a struggle and we will always be at war with something, whether it be each other, ourselves, or microorganisms.

If the little corona mutates into something less effective it could just die out. Or, it could mutate into something more deadly. Early detection through testing and quickly sealing off "hotspots" is one way to control it. But, like we have in the past, the United States responded slowly and haphazardly to the threat, and our government now wants to send us all a check to make up for the disaster they allowed to happen. The reaction is so typically American.

The Loss of Rational Thinking

My latest epiphany is that I used to blame religion for "dumbing down" the population and sucking away humanity's ability to think critically. Religion and conspiracy theories are part of the brain's desire to take "shortcuts," in order to save calories. Your brain only weighs 3 pounds, yet burns 327 calories per day, so if all those pink cells inside your skull can figure out a shortcut, it might just take it. So, instead of your brain trying to understand the evolution of viruses, it's easier to say, "it's a sign of the end times," or "it was developed in a bio lab." I'm sure the ability to believe conspiracy theories evolved with us.

Religious Evolution

Religion is the result of social evolution. Judaism was influenced by neighboring nations and nations who invaded the Jews. While the religion was adapted from a Canaanite god, it was later impacted by Babylonian Zoroastrianism and even Greek Hellenism. Then, the Jewish community influenced the Roman Empire, and in particular one splinter group known as Christians began to take the spotlight. Eventually, the Romans adopted Christianity and Roman Catholicism dominated much of Europe for a thousand years. Around the 1400s some theologians began to challenge the Roman Catholic Church, and for that, a few of them were burned at the stake. By the mid 1400s science was born — hurray! By the early 1500s Martin Luther led the protestant reformation, and 26 years later the Scientific Revolution began to pick up speed.

Over the next five centuries the protestants splintered into many denominations, which, in turn, splintered into more denominations. Today, it's estimated that there are 47,000 Christian denominations in the world. And, lucky you, because the one you were born into just happens to be the "correct" denomination, right?

So, let's give the little virus a break when it's constantly mutating into something else because religion does the same thing.

Ludwig van Beethoven

I've always loved Beethoven, Brahms, Bach, and Mozart. The passion and energy they put into their music is amazing. For a moment I want to share the story of Beethoven. He was a tortured soul and these types of people make the best music. What a nightmare it was when Beethoven, a top Vienna musician, began to lose his hearing. It was horrible. There was also political upheaval, the French military invasion, and lost loves and broken hearts. Then there were more physical ailments. Yet, through it all Beethoven persevered. Why, because he had things inside him that he needed to get out.

Beethoven created the most beautiful love song, called Moonlight Sonata. He made a powerful political statement with his Eroica Symphony, and he went on to compose more symphonies, piano concertos, string quartets, choral works, and operas. And even when deaf he continued his work. He was driven by a powerful force within his soul. He wanted to create; he wanted to leave his mark on the world.

Just a few year before his death he composed the greatest symphony of all time, known as Ode to Joy: Symphony No. 9. The symphony pulled out all the stops and even included a chorus at the end. He had made his grand statement and three years later the brilliant master died. In his last days he said, "Plaudite, amici, comoedia finita est," a Latin phrase that translated into: "Applaud friends, the comedy is over."


Photo: Manuel Nägeli

The Addiction To Delusion

 

I started The Second Sun blog in 2015 to discuss delusions and to serve as my personal soapbox. This is my fourth blog and my most important one since I believe that the greatest threat to humanity is our own delusions.

I believe that the antidote to delusion is critical thinking, which is something I regularly see drifting away into outer space. We all believe what we want to believe, especially when it gives us comfort or confirms our own biases.

Sixteen years ago I started blogging because as an environmental activist I was frustrated with the constant pushback that I was getting. I just wanted to promote initiatives that made logical sense, to me, at least, yet my work was blocked, stopped, or argued down at every step.

By far, my greatest hero is Teddy Roosevelt who fought hard for the environment and working class. He worked on both liberal and conservative causes and his mantra was: If you see a problem, go after it and fix it. This is how I define a true progressive.

To make solid accomplishments you must have a firm grasp of reality, and that's where we've lost it here in modern America. Our current politics depress me and suck the life out of me. All we do anymore is rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic, and we spend more time arguing about where to put them than we do moving them.

The Anti-Greta

It's not surprising that a conservative think tank is now backing a young climate change denier named Naomi Seibt. This is the same organization that has a long history of being tobacco friendly. And where do they get their funding? I will just say their funding comes from nefarious sources who have a vested interest in fossil fuels. In other words, the funders are rich, greedy bastards who desire immediate profit at the expense of our planet's future. And again, it wasn't surprising to see the Anti-Greta speaking at the recent Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), which is the place where human brains go to die.

Cults

Let's jump forward to cult behaviors, which sucks the brain of rationalism and replaces it with some delusional mythology. Cults are a concern to me because they put a sizable portion of the world's population into a mythical Happy World. Once in some ideological cult a person's ability to address real world problems diminishes.

One of my favorite YouTube shows is called Telltale, hosted by Owen Morgan, which is devoted to cults and oppressive religions. According to the show's host, cults abound in our culture and even include a new one, called the Fat Acceptance Movement.

Morgan puts cults into three categories:

• Level 1 Cult - Decentralized, Non-Focused
• Level 2 Cult - Decentralized, Focused
• Level 3 Cult - Centralized/Hierarchical

Level 1 cults include anti-vaxers, essential oils promoters, flat earthers, and supremacists. Level 2 are groups like Trumpists, Bernie Bros, and other cults of personality. Level 3 cults are groups like Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Scientologists, Amish, People's Temple (Jones Town), and Heaven's Gate.

The criteria for the three levels of cultism comes from Steven Hassan's "BITE" model, which stands for Behavior Control, Information Control, Thought Control, and Emotional Control. In following this model I was definitely in a cult when I attended a fundamentalist Baptist church in central Florida for a couple of years. There was pressure in the church for me to keep my hair short and to wear double-knit pants instead of corduroy. I have no idea how double-knit pants made me a better Christian, but that was an example of how far these religious whack-jobs had ventured from reality.

And now, when the Jehovah's Witnesses come knocking at my door once a month I feel sorry for them. They are mechanical robots. I look into their faces and see the hollowness and emptiness in their eyes. I don't see how anyone would subject themselves to mind control, but yet most people do at varying degrees of severity. I want to look at these religious robots and say, "You know, you don't HAVE to do this. It's a beautiful, sunny day. Go do something you enjoy, or at least do something that really counts, like planting a tree." And what's more, I know they aren't proselytizing because they care about me, they are simply doing it to earn brownie points with their mythical being.

The point being is that any form of mind control is bad because you are injected with some sacred dogma and you're not allowed to question. When that happens, and when your free thinking is sucked away, the ability to critically analyze a problem in a balanced manner goes away.

Addictions

Self-destructive addictions are another form of delusion. I have seen people go to great lengths to explain away their drug, alcohol, and tobacco addictions. I can tell they've spent much time creating their narratives. Their first step was getting themselves to believe their justifications for self-harm and then they somehow think I'm going to buy their illogical reasoning, which now seems so real for them. But to me, it's an insult to my intelligence, and believe me, I've heard it all before. People will downplay, brush off, and rationalize their addictions. Please, you don't have to invest all that time trying to sway me. I know that tobacco, alcoholism, and drug abuse kills, or at the very least, causes permanent harm.

While it's devastating to see people I love caught in these negative feedback loops, it's equally heartbreaking to see our entire society suffering from addictions and then struggling to justify them. There are addictions to fossil fuels and affluence, and right now we are seeing the addiction to Camelot, which is a love for this idyllic place in American history where everyone was happy and everything was good. I have no idea when this time was but I see red hats that read, "Make America Great Again," so I'm guessing that Camelot was whenever "Again" was. Was it the Reagan era or the Kennedy era? More likely, it's a made up time when white people ruled and prayed in schools, while blacks were treated like second class citizens and gays were thrown in jail. There was no devil rock music then, except for Elvis, and everyone went to church on Sunday. Now, half of America has an addiction to the ethereal, mystical, time in our history known as "Again."

Reality

So, climate change deniers call themselves climate change "realists." And the new Anti-Greta, who has shown her support for the alt-right movement, is now being paid by a right-wing think tank to spout propaganda, which only feeds the delusions of the people who don't want to deal with the problem.

Let me drill through all the delusions and make a simple point: Climate change is based on science. Science is one of the few things in this world that is still hinged on reality, and I desperately cling to it. 

Now, when you get into Quantum Mechanics and String Theory there are a lot of weird, elusive things going on with matter and reality that we haven't pinned down yet. But our species is only 200,000 years old and we've only been doing formal science for 450 years, which is a tiny blink in our history. I am willing to bet that in another 450 years we'll figure out the remaining mysteries of the universe and figure out gravity, dark matter, dark energy, consciousness, and even the super-complex mystery of photosynthesis. In fact, just in the last two years scientists have taken major steps forward in understanding photosynthesis. And this process is important, since chloroplasts had to evolve to oxygenate the Earth, to allow complex life to begin.

And if you want to attribute the last remaining "unknowns" in science to a god, that is fine with me. Nature doesn't care what you do or believe. It only responds to what is real, which is why climate change is such a big issue with me. Yes, you can say that all four of my blogs have taken on the underlying theme of climate change, and, well, that is true. It's an issue that torments me day and night. You can call Greta and me climate alarmists, but I know that's just another addiction rationalization technique. I suppose you are just trying to protect your religious dogma or your way of life, and I get it. But if we don't all cling to reality then all hope is lost. No matter how many people the Aztecs sacrificed, their empire still fell.

Before you tell me that climate change is "bullshit," like several people have, I encourage you to educate yourself. The best starting point is the Union of Concerned Scientists website. Don't just drink the Kool-Aid propaganda — educate yourself. Be a critical thinker!

Sources:

• Heartland Institute Reluctantly Stands By Denial of Cigarette Smoking Risks, by Nick Surgey, PR Watch
• Who is Paying for Heartland Institute Climate Denial Palooza?, by Kert Davies, Climate Investigations Center
• Naomi Seibt: Anti-Greta Activist Called White Nationalist An Inspiration, by Stephanie Kirchgaessner and Emily Holden, The Guardian
• Telltale website
• The BITE Model of Influence, by Steven Hassan, Open Minds Foundation
• Finally, the Mysterious First Part of Photosynthesis Comes Into View, by Morgan Sherburne-Michigan, Futurity

Photo: Fares Hamouche

Evolution & Climate Change

As I meander through life one of my goals is to find that elusive thing called "reality." The polar opposite of this is a term called "availability heuristics," where people just plug in a preconceived notion rather than applying critical thinking. In other words, people take mental "shortcuts" and say what they believe, or draw from their own personal experiences, whether it's factually accurate or not. This is often done to defend their pre-installed belief system.

Now, rewind to 1967 and my uncle had just given my family a set of books called the Time-Life Nature Library. The books, published from 1961 to 1965, covered the universe, oceans, plants, and more. What an amazing gift! On rainy days or times when I couldn't find a playmate, I would dive into the books and learn. One book that I found particularly interesting was called "Evolution." Growing up in a super religious household I was already taught that evolution was bad, yet the Evolution book stayed in the bookshelf throughout my childhood and teen years. It was from this book that I first learned about Charles Darwin and the Galapagos Islands.

In my junior high school years I was told by church leaders that Carbon-14 dating wasn't accurate and that all this talk about the Earth being old was BS.  I later learned that this was simply a lie. A religious leader may slant or twist facts to defend the faith, but in the end they are simply liars, and the Bible clearly states that lying is a sin. That was quite confusing for a pre-adolescent youngster like myself.

Then, fast forward 7 years and I'm a college sophomore and it's the first day of class in Biology II. In his opening statements the professor says, "Now, we are going to be discussing evolution in this course. I want everyone to know that evolution doesn't replace God, and, in fact, God may have used evolution to create us." It was an 8 a.m. class and everyone was half asleep. No one seemed to care. We just wanted to dissect those poor frogs, get our grade, and get the heck out of there.

The HMS Beagle

Charles Darwin, a little known naturalist and biologist, started a major shit storm in 1859 when he published, "On the Origin of the Species, By Means of Natural Selection." Suddenly, the traditional religions and the conventional ways of thinking were seriously challenged. Poor Darwin was just doing his job. At every stop his ship made he collected plants, animals, rocks, and fossils, and took notes. His observations were brilliant and detailed, and even by today's standards his book is a fascinating read. Yet, all my life traditional Christians have framed him as a "bad guy." I would have thought that Anton LaVey, who founded the Church of Satan in 1966, would have been the target of Christian angst, but he hardly gets a mention.

Evolution Defined

Evolution is both simple and complex. By definition, it is the adaption of lifeforms to their environments through mutations. Or, put another way, it's all about having some beneficial mutation that increases an organism's chances of reproducing. In more complex organisms, such as humans, the goal is not only to reproduce but to also get your young to reproduction age, and even their young, which, as a grandparent, gives me another reason to live.

Many mutations create catastrophic results in an animal and they go quickly out of the gene stream. Other mutations are neutral. But every once in a while a mutation gives a creature a slight advantage, and over generations animals with that favorable mutation will multiply. In harsh, rapidly changing environments the mutations matter more to help creatures survive. In static environments, there's no need to change and Natural Selection is less relevant. So, alligators have hardly changed at all in 8 million years, but in 10 million years we went from ape-like creatures to modern humans, mainly because of the challenging life in the African savanna.

At this point, if you are a Young Earth Creationist, your conformation bias and availability heuristics will kick in and you will tell me that everything I've said is hogwash. But, let me continue.

So, evolution is taking place all around us all the time. There is social and technological evolution, and even religious evolution. We now have these hipster "contemporary style" churches everywhere that have rock music bands. Yet, even as late as the 1980s I was told by religious people that rock was "devil music" and that the drumbeat created sexual desires.

Furthermore, I have three dogs and I know that they came from wolves. Human breeders forced evolution along by picking desirable traits for various tasks. I know that my Labrador Retriever is a bird dog and that my hound-mix dogs were once and still are used for hunting. The hounds were used by nomadic people 10,000 years ago to hunt giant buffalo and other bovine-like creatures, but these animals were evolved into cows and herded, so the hounds had less work to do. And as for your broccoli, cauliflower, and kale, they were all bred by farmers from a weed. In the case of dogs and cows, people found animals with slightly more desirable traits and bred them, to create what we have now. In farming, farmers used the seeds of the more desirable plants for the next crop and over generations better vegetables were cultivated.

Even when you look at geological history you find fossils of the most primitive lifeforms at the lowest levels and life becomes increasingly more complex the higher up you go. Over the centuries shifting plate tectonics does twist and scramble the geological record some, which Creationists have gleefully used to make their cases.

Common Defenses

Now, I'm not sure how much of the anti-evolution movement is about protecting religious fundamentalism or simply built-in availability heuristics, but I do know that some of the favorite tactics of apologists are to twist information and use old facts. In addition to the "radio carbon dating isn't accurate" myth, here are some other creationism defenses I've heard recently:

• The Theory of Evolution is just that, a theory.
  Response: I keep hearing this line and it really annoys me. A "theory" in science is completely different from the common language use of the word "theory." I won't bother responding to this line any more other than to say it's disingenuous. I mean, did everyone sleep through science class growing up, or did all the Christian apologists simply "zone out" when these things were being taught? The fact is that evolution is one of the most well established and tested areas of science and is the foundation to many other scientific disciplines, like genetics, geology, etc.
• There's no transitional creatures in the fossil record.
  Response: Please allow me to step outside and scream. The entire fossil record is about transition. Dinosaurs are now birds. If you want a fish with feet, yeah, I can come up with that. The most famous transitional fossil, which is shown in most textbooks, is the Archaeopteryx, which is a transition between a dinosaur and bird. So, as Gomer Pyle would say, "Surprise, surprise, surprise."
• The odds of evolution creating a human are the same as a tornado going over a junkyard and creating a B-747.
  Response: Yes, but a million tornados going over a million junk yards a million times may create the basics needed for flight. Come on, the evolution of flight is right under your nose. A couple of hobbyists in North Carolina invented the first aircraft in 1903 and hundreds of engineers around the world contributed small improvements, and, in 1970 the first B-747 rolled off the production line. The fact is that evolution goes from the very primitive to the complex, and nature has millions of years to get things right. 
• If monkeys evolved into humans, why are monkeys still around?
  Response: I can't take this much more. We did not descend from monkeys. We are cousins that share a common ancestor. At 25 millions ago we were all cute little ape-like creatures.

Conclusion

I've learned that people who deny evolution also always deny climate change, and I find this troubling. What's more, in my discussions with these folks they use the same types of arguments. I am told things like "the science of climate change is unproven." False. Or, "it's part of a natural warming trend." False. "No one really knows what will happen." False. The amount of computer modeling and the number of climate scientists studying this issue is massive. To educate yourself on the real facts of climate change, and the disinformation campaign against it, I recommend you visit the website of The Union of Concerned Scientists. They do a great job of presenting information in simple, plain English terms. Please educate yourself.

I wish that schools, families, and everyone would place a greater emphasis on science education for young people. However, I understand that science challenges many religious traditions and that capitalist oligarchs would prefer dumbed-down and unquestioning consumers. I'd also love to see more religious education in schools. By that I mean there should be courses where students are objectively taught about the world's major religions. Opening kids up to different belief systems would be a big step forward in addressing intentional ignorance.

There are a lot of cool religions in the world. If I had to pick one I would follow Janism, which is a non-theistic religion that comes from India. The religion teaches salvation by perfection through successive lives and non injury to living creatures. It's pretty cool.

Source:
How Does Evolution Actually Work?, Arvin Ash

  Photo: Johannes Plenio

Can Other Planets Be Our Lifeboats?

As we melt our polar caps and turn our oceans acidic, some people might be thinking, "Maybe we can just migrate to another planet." Space travel is not an easy task because, among other things, the universe is incredibly large. In fact, it is mind-blowing large.

Now, imagine our sun was the size of a basketball and someone was shooting the hoop in New York City. To reach the next closest star, which is Proxima Centauri, we'd have to travel to Moscow. The star is a mere 4 lightyears away, and we'll talk about lightyears in a moment.

So how many stars are in the universe? I'd hate to be the poor assistant who has to count them, but his name is Wiggins and he comes up with a figure of 10 sextillion, which is a 10 followed by 22 zeroes. Just in our own galaxy, known as the Milky Way, there are about 400 billion stars. Our galaxy is 106,000 lightyears across and is considered a larger, but still average, galaxy. Our sister galaxy, Andromeda, is even larger with 1 trillion stars. Both of our galaxies, along with about 100 smaller galaxies, are in a group known as the Virgo Supercluster. I recently learned that some of the smaller galaxies actually orbit around our own, which is amazing. The size of our supercluster is 110,000,000 lightyears. It is estimated that there are 10 million superclusters in the universe.

Now, we can only see what could be a tiny part of our universe because the universe is expanding faster than light can travel. So, all we can view is a part of the universe that's 93 billion lightyears across. In 1998 we learned that the universe is not only expanding but that the expansion is accelerating, and the space between galaxies is expanding faster than the speed of light. Some people believe the universe will expand to a certain point and then contract. Or, each galaxy may spin out into the vast nothingness to the point where we can't see any other galaxy.

For the most part, scientists believe the universe is flat, but some researchers have detected a slight curve of 0.4 percent. If that is true, then the universe is a giant sphere and it would take 250 visible universes to complete the round circle. In other words, if the universe is a big ball it would have a radius of 11.6 trillion lightyears. If, however, the universe is flat it could go on for infinity.

Lightspeed

Now, in middle school, you probably remember the teacher telling you that light travels at 186,000 miles per second, which is really fast. Our spaceships are getting faster and the recent Juno probe travels at an impressive 46 miles a second, but that's only .0002 times the speed of light. At that speed it would take 20,000 years to reach the nearest star, which is 4 lightyears away.

Einstein said it's impossible to travel faster than the speed of light but it may be possible. After all, galaxies are somehow separating faster than the speed of light. Whoever came up with the idea of warp drive engines on Star Trek was amazingly prophetic because such an engine is theoretically feasible. In fact, in 1994 Miguel Alcubierre, a Mexican physicist, actually came up with a theoretical model on how a warp drive could work. In basic terms, the warp drive, also known as the Alcubierre Drive, would stretch the fabric of space-time in a wave, causing the space ahead to contract while the space behind expands.

There are also theories for spaceships that use wormholes or jump drives. The whole idea is that space itself is manipulated for Faster-Than-Light (FTL) travel. Right now these theories are highly speculative. I believe that when we figure out dark matter, dark energy, and gravity we will be a step closer to FTL travel.

Conclusion

When I talk to people about climate change I find it deeply troubling how they react to it. I hear comments like, "India and China are creating more emissions." But isn't the United States supposed to be a world leader? Or "We don't really know the effects of carbon emissions." The body of research is vast, yet this is an issue that is nebulous and distant to most people. By our evolutionary nature, we can't seem to react to danger until it's in our face.

It's possible that our grandchildren won't ever experience eating seafood because our oceans are becoming fouled, overfished, and the alkaline level is increasing. Every day I grieve over the slow death of our beautiful planet. As the Earth dies, I die. The dominant species that has exploded in numbers and is consuming our planet is only behaving like any other species. We will simply reproduce to the limit of our food supply or until a competing species, like a virus, outperforms us. Or until our ecosystem is too harsh and unstable to sustain us.

I thought a virus would be too smart to kill its host because, after all, then it dies as well. But it appears that a virus is no smarter than a human. Why a species destroys its own habitat is confusing to me, but the bottom line is that lifeforms just eat and grow with little regard for the future.


Sources:
Visualizing infinity. Is the Universe Infinite? The Largest Scales, Arvin Ash
Alcubierre Drive: Warp Speed - Star Trek fantasy or plausible?, Arvin Ash
How Long Would It Take To Travel To the Nearest Star, Universe Today
Scientists Are Starting To Take Warp Drive Seriously, Science Alert

Photo: Leon Rohrwild

Maybe Outside Reality Is Where We'll Be Saved

When things get real big or real small they get weird. Let's take a dive to the quantum level. I always believed that everything had to be made out of something, but this is only partly true.

As early at 400 B.C. Greek physicists had figured out the atom, but they thought it was a small ball. In 1897 electrons were discovered and 15 years later scientists learned about protons and neutrons. But what are atom parts made of? Researchers figured this out in the 1960s with the discovery of quarks.

But as the quintessential nerd, I have to ask the question, "What are quarks made of?" For some strange reason I keep hoping that diving to either the quantum or universal level may give me new insight on humanity's current poor predicament. So, let's keep going. More recently, scientists have discovered both up-quarks and down-quarks, and these are the little buggers that make up atom parts. To figure out what a quark is we must leave the world we know and enter the mysterious world of quantum mechanics.

The Big M

Theoretical physicists have been trying to come up with a Theory of Everything, but the mathematicians can't get all the math to work. For instance, String Theory was a good stab at trying to solve the mysteries of the universe and although useful, it doesn't explain everything. According to this theory the smallest particles are actually tiny vibrating strings, which come in and out of reality. For string theory to work mathematically the universe must have 10 dimensions. Most of these dimensions are believed to be small and "rolled up." Superstring theory includes an 11th dimension, and is nicknamed "M-Theory" because it's the "mother of all theories."

A variant of String Theory is another theory called Quantum Field Theory. I like this theory because it appears to explain more but I'm still trying to get my arms around it. According to the Quantum Field hypothesis, matter is made of fields and particles are waves in the field. As I had long believed, there is no such thing as "nothing," and this theory supports my idea. Rather, "nothing" can contain light, electrons, up-quarks, down-quarks, and vibrations. All together there are 17 fields, including a space-time field.

When you call Aunt Ellie on your cell phone you are bending a field in space and creating ripples. The signals you make eventually get to Aunt Ellie's ear, and she's delighted that you liked her apple pie. Putting it another way, particles are excitations in the field. Apparently, we all share the same fields, but that doesn't mean we can communicate telepathically.

While both String and Quantum Field theories may provide a piece of the puzzle, they still don't fully explain dark matter, dark energy, and the cause of the Big Bang. Or why do the fields have the properties that they do, and what made the fields. Is it possible to know everything? To learn more sometimes we have to know what questions to ask, and sometimes the evidence escapes us. For instance, the universe is not only expanding but the expansion is accelerating. Future astronomers won't be able to learn much about the universe because the sky will be dark — we'll be too far away from everything. And if the universe is expanding where are we going? One belief is that there are multiple universes and they are all like giant bubbles, and maybe our universe bubble will expand until it pops, causing another Big Bang.

Consciousness

In addition to the mysteries of dark energy, dark matter, and quantum mechanics, the other great mystery in the universe is consciousness. Physics explains chemistry, which then explains biology, but how in the hell do you explain consciousness? Some scientists say that consciousness is simply mechanical and lives in our brain. Others say there some type of emergence intelligence going on, which ants have brilliantly mastered. This is where intelligence functions collectively, where each of us holds on to one part of the overall consciousness, and is known as Emergentism. A third idea is that EVERYTHING has a consciousness, and perhaps this can be tied into String or Quantum Field theories. This line of thought fits in with those quantum particle experiments when a particle behaves differently when a consciousness is present. So, perhaps everything, even the universe itself and trees and plants, have a consciousness, or an awareness. I believe that all animals definitely have a consciousness — even simple lifeforms are "aware" and can make decisions based on their surroundings, rather than going with a pre-recorded script. What makes my dog sit in a certain spot or behave a certain way? She is conscious and making decisions, just like humans.

Conclusion

I know the current political climate in the U.S. is horrible, but we've gone through far worse. At one point we even ripped our nation in two and had a four-year bloody civil war, so at least now we're not killing each other yet. What hurts me most is that the continual partisan bickering simply distracts us from the things that matter, like climate change. As for religion, studies show that the more educated a person is the less religious a person is. Yet, in one study 7 percent of PhD scientists were still religious. This shows me that some people are simply incapable of changing their beliefs even when presented with hard facts. Thus, I need to show more understanding and compassion for people who are unable to change their belief structures. But my hope is that enough people will change before our oceans become too acidic and fouled to support life, and our atmosphere becomes too hot and unstable to support us.


Sources

Why Is Our Universe Fine-Tuned For Life, Brian Greene, TED Talk

Where Are Those Extra Dimensions in the String Theory?, Rob Knoops, TedXAUBG


Photo: Josh Gordon

The Species Self-Destruction Mechanism

Recently, I've had some deep discussions with Republicans and find that their worldview is the polar opposite of my own. The concept of saying, "everything is alright" and then cherrypicking data to support that view is troubling. I am trying to understand, but my gut feeling is that the conservative mindset is a built-in trigger mechanism that snuffs out a civilization once it reaches a certain technological level.

Now, there are plenty of things that can end us. Some of the top threats include an asteroid hit, nuclear war, artificial intelligence, or a pandemic. But what's hitting home now is climate change. At a time when we are tripling and re-tripling the world's population, the effects of climate change may make agriculture exceedingly difficult. Starvation is a horrible way to die, and even though population growth has hit a near standstill in Japan, Germany, and Italy, it is still exploding on the African continent. Universal access to family planning services and giving women 100 percent parity with men are two ways to quickly create a healthy and sustainable society, but political and religious conservatives fight these logical initiatives. Their mindset provides the catalyst for our self-destruction.

Pilbara

Allow me to digress. The Earth is 4.6 billion years old. It's impossible to know what occurred in those early days because plate tectonics and other forces have destroyed the earliest geological records. But there is a place in northwestern Australia called Pilbara, which is believed to be 3.5 billion years old. At this site geologists and biologists have learned a lot.

At about 2.5 billion years ago bacteria ruled our planet and emitted oxygen, and eventually oxygenated our world. The free oxygen then allowed more complex life to evolve and also created the ozone layer, which protected life from ultraviolet radiation. Today, you can travel to Australia and see the giant formations of dead bacteria, which form into stromatolites. Studying the fossilized stromatolites provides clues about life on ancient Earth.

With oxygen in the atmosphere the fossil record begins showing increasingly complex life and the history of humans is only a small spec on this roadmap — we've only been around a few hundred thousand years.

The irony is that now that humans are industrialized, several billion years of delicate and complex coevolution is going down the shit hole. In a most bizarre twist in our evolution, we are digging up the fossilized lifeforms that once created oxygen, and we are burning it and now creating carbon. And we are burning it to the point where we are actually changing our climate and triggering a mass extinction. And for a political conservative to be so flippant, passive, and nonchalant about this human tragedy makes me think twice about my volunteerism. I mean, if advanced societies are meant to extinguish themselves as part of the natural cycle, should I even TRY to save my planet and species? People tell me not to worry and that the Earth can handle it, but our ecosystem is delicate and making our planet lifeless is a real possibility.

Signals from Space

I need to make a small correction from a recent post. I said that radio telescopes have only picked up crickets and a few natural anomalies since they began scanning the skies in the 1930s. But, actually, there have been a handful of unexplained signals coming from distant solar systems. These signals are short and do not repeat. Are they distress signals from dying civilizations? Are they trying to warn us? What they hell are they trying to say?

Okay, I will pull myself together and get over the fact that the ignorance and indifference I see with so many people is not part of a species self-destruct mechanism. Maybe by setting an example I can get a few people to join me in my lifelong struggle to save the environment. It's not that I care about a legacy, it's just that I want to follow the example set by George Washington, who always believed in "doing the right thing," and Jesus who said "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Where I differ from others is that I believe the Golden Rule should also be applied to the Earth. Treat your home planet the way you would want to be treated. This is what gives me my morality.

The Stock Market Scam

Getting back to my initial point, in addition to playing down or denying climate change the second thing conservatives like to do is use the stock market as the metric for Trump's "great job performance." The stock market is not a good metric for gauging the economy. For one thing, if wages remain stagnant and the stock market goes up that just means the wealth is moving to the top, as usual. The middle class benefits some because 401k's are doing well, but that will reverse when the next recession hits. It's as if people are desperate to find one solid metric to justify their support for Trump, who, in reality, has accomplished almost nothing in his first three years.

Furthermore, I believe there is a conspiracy to keep the stock market strong to help Trump get reelected. The corporate tax cuts helped, but now our country is sinking deeper into deficit spending. But no worries, the stupid stock market only responds to the present and immediate future. Then there is the dark secret of quantitative easing, which is ultimately about printing more money, but it's done in a complex way. The quantitative easing helps to boost the stock market and lower interest rates.

In reality, the stock market has fared well under many Democratic presidents. In fact, it was doing slightly better at the same period in Obama's presidency.

Conclusion

The world is full of religious, political, and economic story packages. If anything, the conservatives are better at picking the packages that support their worldview, which is usually the view that was drilled into them during childhood. A conservative mind is static and locked in the present. At this point in our species evolution we need creative and "out of the box" thinking because the side effects of our affluent lifestyle are closing in on us. Are we the one-in-a-trillion species that will end it all in 50 years or is there a future beyond 2070? I don't know and I won't be here, but my grandchildren might still be surviving. Do I live in excess now at their expense?


Source:
This Ancient Rock Is Changing Our Theory on the Origin of Life, Tara Djokic, TED.com
Hey Trumpists, Stock Market Better Under Obama, David Pakman, David Pakman Show

Photo: Markus Spiske