Catalonia & an outre worry of mine

This is a riff sparked by a talk I saw by Noam Chomsky on Book TV & also by my reading of David Graeber's *5000 Years of Debt.*  Graeber is an anarchist & anthropologist and also an activist who participated in and chronicled the *Occupy* movement.    Chomsky talked about Catalonia & how when the anarchists set up a fully functioning anarchist commune in Barcelona that *everybody* in the world turned on them in order to crush them--the social democrats of the Loyalist forces, the Stalinists, the fascists & the Western powers,  to the extent they were involved.  Orwell spoke glowingly of the commune in *Homage to Catalonia* even though he was with the Trotskyist forces at the time.  The commune was quite successful in the few months it was allowed to live.  

To get to sleep, I often spend a half-hour or so obsessively surfing my kindle for books about some topic that captured my interest during the day & I came across a book by Matthew Tree about Catalonia and its current drive for independence.  Tree is a Englishman, but a 26-year resident of Barcelona who speaks fluent Catalan.  (I mean, I wound up staying up even later to get into the book).  Catalonia already has its own parliament and its own president although it is clearly still part of the Spanish state.    The Catalonian government has nevertheless already called for full independence and is trying to get the Spanish prime minister to approve a referendum for independence (in Catalonia) for November of 2014.

According to Tree, there is a huge prejudice against Catalonians and the Catalan language in greater Spain.  It's analogous to anti-semitism in pre-WWII Austria where it was said that you can't be a true Austrian unless you're at least a little anti-semitic.  It 's like that in Spain with respect to Catalonians according to Tree and other Catalan writers.   Spanish publishers usually refuse to publish books written in Catalan unless they are translated into Spanish.   Catalonians who visit in other parts of the country are often rudely confronted by Spanish speakers demanding that they speak Spanish, even if they are only speaking Catalan to other Catalonians who are with them.  In fact, some Spaniards regard Catalans "as a bunch of Jews."  According to Catalonians, the ancient kingdom of Catalan was as important or more important than Ferdnand and Isabella in driving the Moors out of Spain.  Yet prior to that Catalonia was a relatively  peaceful & tolerant place where Jews, Christians and Moors lived in relative harmony, where there was a kind of cultural syncretism where thinkers like Raymond Llul came up with a kind of semi-Christianized Kabbalah in an effort to reconcile the three religions.  I believe also it was one of the stomping grounds of the troubadours.  

But back to the present. In some ways, the differences in language seem slight.   "Good day" in Spanish is "buenos dias," in Catalan it's "bon dia."  Yet to my ear the latter has the kind of beauty I associate with the Italian language.  Tree mentions that Catalonians sometimes pass themselves off as Italians to escape Spanish hostility. 

According to the story in the link below, 74% of Catalonians want such a referendum to take place, although less than 50% say they want full independence.  Hmm...I would be willing to bet there is a silent majority in there somewhere.  

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/12/15/us-spain-catalonia-poll-idUSBRE9BE06B20131215

From here, according the observers I have read thus far,  the Catalonians aspiration for independence look fully justified.  

But I got to thinking.  If you grant the legitimacy of Catalonian aspirations--and for that matter those of separatists in Wales & Scotland, what if significant number of Texans--or Southerners--truly revived their secessionist aspirations?  It doesn't matter if such passions in the eyes of reasonable people are regarded as justified or not--they burn in the hearts of human beings any way. 

I'm reasonably sure that's an unnecessary and baroque worry, but I sure as hell would hate to have to move to Vermont or Massachusetts in my *old* old age.   I don't want to have to deal with putting chains on tires (merely a metaphor for the difficulties of Yankee winters and northern adversities in general).

And I wonder how the Basques and Galicians are doing.  

R. 

 

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Extremely important book

And the book is called *Multitude* by Michael Hardt and Antony Negri.  

It is a detailed analysis of how resistance to the global economic and social system that dominates the world is both already-and-not-yet taking shape.  A previous book of theirs, *Empire* is a detailed theoretical analysis of how the current global system dominates the world and also how it is different from the classic "territorial" empires of the past.   In particular, *Multitude* shows how local struggles preserve their own local identity and yet they are in solidarity with similar struggles elsewhere.  Or, to put it another way, the struggles of the  "multitude" cut across and transcend the old "identity politics vs issue politics" divide.   They contrast the notion of "multitude" with older leftist notions such as class, mass, and working class.  (The multitude is not to be confounded with certain concepts such as "new working class" either).  

The authors have a caveat:  The book is not to be thought of as a "What is to be done?" sort of book.  They have a book coming out next year called *Commonwealth*   I am hopeful the new book will provide some further suggestions regarding...what is to be done. 

I had some difficulty focusing on the previous book, *Empire,* but I found *Multitude* to be lucid and compelling and relatively easy to follow.  

The book resolved any doubts I had regarding the importance and efficacy of movements such as *Occupy.* 

R. 

Why'm not quite a Buddhist...

In the past couple of weeks, I've gone to the local Zen Center three times, once to a sort of orientation and twice to practice mindfulness meditation  for 35 minutes at a stretch.   I've also made intermittent efforts at home to practice, ranging from five minutes to up to 20 minutes.  It may be just placebo, but I do fancy it's having some beneficial results--notably, with my absent-mindedness.  I don't think I've lost my glasses even once since the first session at the Zen Center.  Also, the past couple of nights I've had some pretty vivid dreams in living color, assuming that's a benefit.  

Buddhism generally has always had a certain appeal to me with its intrinsic gentleness and its ethics of compassion, especially taken in its context, the Great Vow to refrain from final enlightenment, or Nirvana,  out of compassion for all sentient beings until all sentient beings have been brought to enlightenment, well, that is a great and strenuous ethic.  

But I have difficulty understanding the metaphysics of why that should be so.  I know the Buddha would likely say that metaphysics is just so much ego piffle, so perhaps that is not the best way to express what I mean.   Presumably, if a person's compassion is sufficient that in itself would lead one to the brink of the Final Enlightenment.   Yet, in order to develop that compassion,  I (and henceforward I insert my own ego for the sake of clarification) have to practice a sort of getting rid of the self by means of sundry mental exercises and disciplines, beginning with and including mindfulness meditation.  It would be a crude argument to state that I'm not being especially compassionate by sitting in a room somewhere and counting my breaths although I suppose you could say it may be a kindness to some that I'm not interacting with them during that time, but I prefer to think that would be a stretch.  And, if after I do achieve some desired level of compassionate near-enlightenment, apparently the most compassionate goal I can have is to bring people to the same state by means of the Buddha's teachings.   

Of course, I'm supposed to be compassionate along the way insofar as I encounter other sentient beings and have interactions with them so that I relieve their suffering as *they themselves perceive it.*  Somebody is sick, I try and comfort them or provide medicine.  Somebody needs water, I give them a drink, etc. But I'm not supposed to be "attached" to any of them, nor am I supposed to believe that, say, physical suffering is primary.  I am supposed to address that form of suffering and most others as somehow superficial--the direct or indirect result of their being "attached" to their desires.  To me, that stance denies the importance of history, of suffering, of the individual, and indeed the whole of reality as it is commonly understood.  

Robert Thurman in his book *The Jewel in the Lotus* has a most eloquent description of the concept of "emptiness."  It is not oblivion or nothingness, rather it is the recognition that everything is connected and that all beings have at one time or another have occupied the position of whatever the individual consciousness construes to be "other."   He also describes this state as "oneness" although I don't think he is being rigorous.  Other Buddhist and mystical writers, though, are insistent on the notion of non-duality and oneness & that is given as a "reason" for us to love the Other, to be compassionate towards the Other, etc.  To me, that's not very satisfying to think that my love and compassion towards the Other, such as it might be, is merely a form of loving myself.    Heaven knows, I got nothing against self-love, but the whole point of loving somebody, of being compassionate towards them is that "they," thank Heaven, are *not* me.    "Interconnectedness," as Thurman, describes it, is one thing, actual oneness is another.  Oneness as many mystics seem to promote it implies a kind of vacuous soup of things, where everything and everyone are all the same thing.  

(BTW, Robert Thurman is a professor of Indian Studies and the father of Uma Thurman, known to be a not unattractive movie star.  

Thurman goes on to indicate that the individual consciousness is *really* nothing more than a sliding nexis of interrelationships of all the other elements of the universe.  I can't help thinking that this implies that the individual consciousness, whether one thinks of it as having achieved "emptiness" or not, has no power of agency and is merely a passive epiphenomenon, just as most scientists believe on the basis of their metaphysical materialism.    Without some notion of a subject capable of enduring on some level or another, it also renders the notion of reincarnation...really implausible.  Therefore, the whole idea of the bodhisattavas has to be...an error--not to mention the doctrine of karma.

(And, if I can't recall any of my past lives, how can karma provide me with a useful moral education?   Or if karma is automatic and unconscious, what is the point of conscious striving of any sort?   If I have no sense of continuity from one life to another, it may as well be the case that my real identity only subsists in my current incarnation)

Strictly speaking, I don't think the Buddhists are completely wrong, but it is as if the Buddha had a great ethical insight about the importance of compassion but was unable to ground his insight in concepts other than those that are analogous to the concepts in Hinduism--of which Buddha's thought is a reformation.  

Here I think the advantage is with Christianity.  Christianity affirms the importance of history and the human subject in a way that the Eastern religions do not.  It also affirms the importance of compassion not as  a means to a transcendental end, but as an end in itself.   Actually, I think Buddhism does affirm the importance of compassion for its own sake as well--the notion of the Bodhisattvas is merely a  kind of a workaround "justification" for that ideal compassion that seems rather clumsy to me.   To elaborate a bit, Christianity holds out the hope that some day history, humanity and nature  will all be redeemed and transfigured and include a redeemed and transfigured humanity.  (I have negative stuff to say about a great deal of traditional Christianity, but I'll save it for another occasion.)

So there. 

   

 

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Solving all financial problems

tomorrow, as I am going to prospect for topaz at the Seaquist Ranch in Mason County.  

Actually, I don't really expect to find any.  But I have found some interesting quartz, chert and something that was arguably flint.  This time I'm also going to be on the lookout for agate and petrified wood.  (I did find a small piece of petrified wood last time).   I'm told there may be black tourmaline in the area also.  It's not the high dollar stuff, but I've items made with it on etsy.  I've also seen pendants made with flint on etsy with asking prices rather above some of the "prettier" stones.  

I've already made a couple of nearly satisfactory pendants.  One of them is a kind of macho thing, with a hammered steel wire abstraction and a black vinyl "chain"; the other is a reddish agate set (with glue) against a copper wire disc that I crocheted--the copper chain is something I purchased from Michael's.  (I crocheted a copper wire chain, but it was too stiff for the required aesthetics.)

For some reason, I am loath to try and make earrings or rings.  But bracelets are okay.  I must think about brooches and belt buckles also.

As I have said before, best not to trifle with me--I have crochet hooks and I know how to use them.  

But here's hoping for a ten pound blue crystal topaz. 

R.   

 

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Hee, hee, hee

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dI9KBLb_8ro

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rv1CTZSIU0

And this third one, oh, my: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUy8xbytCbs

For relief, try:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga_EP7RObKw

 

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Something to think about for both Left and Right

Professor Eric X Li on the virtues of the Chinese Communist Party...

I wonder if what he is saying reflects the official Party position or the *de facto* Party position;  or is it merely his own view as an academic?  

I'll spare everybody my reflexive critique because I'm wondering if there's any way to have the Party cake and eat it too...

http://www.ted.com/talks/eric_x_li_a_tale_of_two_political_systems.html

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Elderly Laotian Siri Paboun solves cases and pursues happiness

as the National Coroner of Laos.  Dr. Siri is the hero of a series of mysteries by Colin Cotterill. 

Dr. Siri is a hero of the Communist Pathet Lao revolution that kicked the French out of the country.  He himself has no illusions about the Party, but believes that Laotians have the right to be mismanaged by their own people--as opposed to the French or for that manner, the somewhat arrogant Vietnamese.  Siri started out as a medical student in France.  There he fell in love with another student who it so happens was an ardent Communist and supporter of the cause for Laotian independence.  So Siri joined the Laotian Communist Party.  What else could he do?   Subsequent to his training he and his wife spend years in the jungle waging guerilla warfare against the French.   Unfortunately, Siri becomes a widower in the course of the struggle.  When the Pathet Lao unexpectedly win, Siri is already getting on in years and wants nothing more than to retire.  But the Party insists on making him the National Coroner even though he has no training or background for it--but he is virtually the only person in the whole country with complete medical training.  

Given his age and his friendship with a member of the Central Committee (still powerful, but somewhat marginalized), Dr. Siri figures that the Party can't do much to him if he wants to do things *his* way.  Part of the fun of reading the novels is watching Siri slyly circumvent the often absurd impositions of the bureaucracy.  

As a western-trained medical doctor, Dr. Siri does not share the worldview of his fellow Laotians when it comes to, say, the existence and influence of the spirit world.  But at one point  he discovers he can see spirits (but maddeningly can't hear them) and moreover that he is the incarnation of a 1000-YO Hmong shaman.  This leads to considerable cognitive dissonance.  

There is some mystery about Dr. Siri's origins.  He has uncharacteristically green eyes and there is the suspicion that he may be Hmong or part Hmong himself.  

The setting for the novels is Laos in the mid-70's.  Colin Cotterill spent a considerable amount of time in the area and seems to be genuinely knowledgeable about Laos (as if I would know).  

Interestingly, Colin Cotterill illustrated the book, *Dude de Ching* touted by Jeff Bridges on the *Daily Show* not long ago as a Dudeist updating of Taoism.  

My favorites include *Disco for the Dead* and *Love Songs from a Shallow Grave.*  The latter is more serious in tone and brings home the horror of the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge.  

R. 

 

http://gg9-tto.blogspot.com/

Sweden is not perfect, but...

where in America? 

http://www.wimp.com/swedenpolice/

(I'm sure Inspector Wallendar would look the other way...Wouldn't he?) 

Thanks to Sally Jane Sharp-Paulsen--USA & longtime resident of Norway--not far from Sweden, you know.  

 

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Trekking through the Star Chamber: Autocracy next stop?

Until I heard Ezra Kelin on the Rachel Maddow Show last night, I didn't fully appreciate the significance of the secret court that has been ruling on the applications to spy on, well, everybody. There are bi-partisan bills proposed in both chambers to de-classify the proceedings of this court.

WTF? 

How about bills to *abolish* the damn thing. Out of 34,000 applications from various agencies to spy on whatever, only 11 have been refused. The court only hears one side--the government's side--and all the judges are appointed from the Federal bench by Chief Justice Roberts. Of the 11 judges on the court, 10 were appointed by Republican Presidents. 
How has the court managed to cast such a broad net? By redefining the word "relevant" in the Patriot Act to mean any damn thing the government wants to know. Okay, Tea Party liberty-lovers--it's showtime for you--as well as for a number of waffle-spined Democratic Congresspersons.

I admire FDR & LBJ (with some serious reservations).  I do not admire Reagan or Nixon.   But admirable or not, they were all very strong executives.   How could a strong executive, no matter how admirable, resist using a secret court like what we have now to enhance his or her power?   Always, no doubt, with a good end in mind--that is, his or her mind.  So, why not neutralize a pesky political enemy?  Or even a number of them?  Maybe most of Congress?  

R. 

 

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Did Willie really say this?

(Thanks to Russ T.) 

Poor  Lance Armstrong,

I  think it is just terrible and disgusting how everyone has treated
Lance  Armstrong, especially after what he achieved, winning seven
Tour de  France races while on drugs.

When  I was on drugs, I couldn't even find my bike.

Willie  Nelson

 

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It's going to be a blue, blue Texas

some day, and Gov. Wendy Davis may be the start of it all.  Well, there *is* a movement afoot to draft her.   The Castro brothers are biding their time (wisely IMO) for the national scene, but even among women who are generally conservative I bet there are some with fond memories of  Gov. Ann Richardson, our motorcycle ridin', turkey talkin' lady governor of yore, i.e. among those women who wouldn't mind seeing a woman become governor. 

R. 

 

http://gg9-tto.blogspot.com/

In search of an Archimedes's lever for an armchair leftist...

And please.  No jokes about prying me out of that chair. 

I found what I believe to be three worthy places to send a little spare change--in part thanks to Mary B. and her daughter.  

Now I'm looking for one more place to send my last few spare dimes.   I would like them to go to some outfit that has a mission that is as radical as it is possible to be in the direction of promoting structural changes that *might* promote democratic socialism and yet still have a realistic chance of implementation in, say, the next 30 years.  

Abolition or neutralization of the electoral college?   Proportional voting?  Public financing of all campaigns for national office?    National uniform regulation of voter registration?

(I reckon most or all of the foregoing likely would require a constitutional amendment)

And then there's the stuff below.  I'm going to ramble on about it a bit 

I am interested in an idea that I ran across in a book by Lynn Stout titled, *The Myth of Shareholder Value.*   Her thesis is that the current corporate ideology of promoting "shareholder value" at the expense of all other considerations is at the root of all current and recent corporate malfeasance & indifference to the public interest.  She maintains--and she is a legal scholar with a specialty in corporate law--there is nothing in current law that mandates the priority of shareholder interest and moreover that shareholder priority actually is damaging to the economic well being of corporations and the shareholders themselves.  

Not necessarily related to the issue of shareholder priority, there are laws in most states and a few at the federal level that could be invoked to rein in corporate excesses, but they are little known and seldom used to much effect--but that is yet another story.  

So I am thinking; therefore, federal legislation to mandate the re-arrangement of corporate priorities would seem to be a long stride in the right direction:   first comes the public interest, second comes the well-being of the firm's employees and third, the interest of the shareholders.   And, oh.  In determining the impact of the firm's activities on the public interest and its employees, it should be much easier for regulators to "pierce the corporate veil," that is, determine individual liability of the firm's officers in isolation from whatever penalties the corporation might face for screwing up.  

The trouble with such reforms is they are not even as sexy as abolishing the electoral college--and really hard to express support for on a bumper sticker.  But if anybody knows of a good organization devoted to furthering any of the above causes, let me know.  Or if anybody has any additional ideas.  

R. 

 

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Hume's Fork

is the name of a fun book by Ron Cooper.  

Legare Hume is the surname of the  central character and he hails from a place called Hume's Fork in South Carolina--the community was founded by some distant--and dubious--relatives of his back in the day.  

Hume is an assistant prof. of philosophy at a backwater college in Florida & he is having notable marital difficulties--a fairly common affliction among philosophers.  (Socrates's difficulties with Xanthippe are well known.   More recently, Louis Althusser "accidentally" strangled his wife while giving her a neck massage--even so, he's doing serious time.  I could cite others, but I'm sure y'all have heard of this sort of thing)   

Any way, Hume is slated to go to a conference of the American Philosophical Association in South Carolina not too far from where his family lives even though proximity to his family is the last thing that he wants.   By some stroke of luck, he has managed to get a paper accepted at the Conference.  If he attends the Conference and successfully defends the paper, it is likely that he will get tenure.  Even though he has never set the world of academic philosophy on fire--far from it--nevertheless, his college's expectations of their liberal arts faculty tend to be on the low side.  But he is not sure he is even going to the Conference and not sure if he even *wants* tenure.  On the day he must decide on departure, he has a fight with his wife that results with her beaning him on the forehead with a well-thrown dinner plate.  He decides to go.  

He calls his colleague, Grossman, to come and pick him up.  Now unlike Hume, Grossman is almost supernaturally brilliant (he may be high functioning autism spectrum)  He is also a professor of logic and philosophy of language.  Grossman publishes in very prestigious journals and is highly regarded among philosophers.  He could have had his pick of any college in the country, but due to Grossman's difficulty with ordinary conversation, he misunderstands what a recruiter said to him and he winds up accepting a position at this particular backwater college.  

Well, stuff happens and Hume and Grossman have to stay with Hume's family in order to attend the conference.  

Professional wrestling, much angst over critiques of Anselm's ontological proof of the existence of God, critiques of the critiques of Anselm's proof, drug-dealing & other crimes, a prof with Tourette's syndrome, a love story, the solution to the mind-body problem, the non-solution of the mind-body problem, synesthesia,...in short, everything a body could possibly want.   There's even some family drama. 

I urge y'all to read this book.  If you feel like it. 

R. 

P.S.  As an unrecovered philosophy major, I should like to point out the significance of Legare's surname, Hume.  David Hume was an 18th century British philosopher.   When Bishop Berkley "proved" that there was no such thing as "matter," Hume responded by "proving" there is no such thing as "mind."   This gave rise to the oft-quoted expression, "No matter, never mind."  

P.P.S. As an unrecovered philosophy major, shamefully, I did not know this, but "Hume's Fork" is also an allusion to David Hume's distinction between relations among things that are purely ideas and relationships among things that are actual existents.   

 

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Some fun findings about the *I Write Like* website...

You can compare yourself to the Great Writers--well, and some well known writers--by pasting a couple paragraphs of your writing to the *I Write Like* website at  http://iwl.me/

If you find yourself somewhat distressed at the results, here's an interesting critique of the results: 

 http://www.unlikelywords.com/2010/07/16/i-write-like/

Apparently, *I Write Like* has about a 47% reliability.  

Several famous writers are tagged as writing like Dan Brown...which may be okay, but I doubt few of them made as much money.  

I've entered my stuff several times and my writing is most often tagged as like H.P. Lovecraft, whose work is a precursor to the modern horror genre.  His critical reputation is somewhat improved of late, but his prose is generally considered to be somehow...excessive.  

But I must point out, as my fervent narcissism requires, my last entry was said to be *like* James Joyce--and he is one writer who's writing turns out to be most like...James Joyce.  I find this comforting, somehow. 

R. 

http://gg9-tto.blogspot.com/

Abreaction cast as an exorcism

An Exorcism

 

By the power of the Earth that nourishes all the souls of the biosphere

By the power of the Air that inspires all those self-same souls

By the power of the Water that sustains them

And the power of the Fire that warms them

And by the Power even greater than these

I command you,

Miasmic spirits who have strayed from your proper sphere

To depart in haste from certain bodies and souls;

For you are vile in our nostrils

Even as eggs left too long in the sun;

Or flesh left to the mercy of flies so as to become a nest for maggots;

And as your taint befouls

Both the City of God and the City of  Human Beings;

Depart hence for those environs beyond the Air to dwell amidst the darkness between the stars that is your proper Home;

Leave you now the bodies and souls of James Inhofe, Tom Coburn, John Cornyn, Ted Cruz, John Boehner, Lindsay Graham,  John Mccain, Paul Ryan,  Eric Cantor, and all their minions, known and unknown, and, yes, all their mentors, known and unknown;

So that they may again be innocent and teachable babes, ready to hear and learn the wisdom of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, and all their ilk that we know as the very souls and embodiments of Truth and the Best of the American Way;

For the Cost otherwise will exceed consuming Fires that burn all the wealth of all your tools, Winds that topple all their towers,  Earthquakes that powder their bones,  Floods that will swamp their souls and leave you, O, Dubious Spirits, Homeless and Bereft, far from your Places in the Comfort of the Eternal Dark…

 

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A Evidence against natural selection

as the primary motor that drives evolution continues to mount, we begin to see a crack in the facade of Neo-Darwinism.  

"Barely a whisper of this vibrant debate reaches the public..."  Well, that's interesting.  For one thing science writers simply don't write about it much.   Since they themselves are often not scientists, I suspect that may be because they are fearful of a backlash from the orthodox & the writers don't feel they have sufficient authority to discuss the pros and cons of the issue.  

I suspect that many science-minded folks also feel that to question natural selection is to throw one's lot in with the proponents of Intelligent Design and religious fundamentalism. 

30 April 2013

...We should admit that we don't fully understand how evolution works at the molecular level. ...In short, the current picture of how and where evolution operates, and how this shapes genomes, is something of a mess. That should not be a criticism, but rather a vote of confidence in the healthy, dynamic state of molecular and evolutionary biology. Barely a whisper of this vibrant debate reaches the public.
 Philip Ball, "DNA: Celebrate the unknowns" [html], doi:10.1038/496419a, p419-429 v496, Nature, 25 Apr 2013.
 Neo-Darwinism is a related local webpage.

I myself dislike the idea of natural selection on aesthetic grounds and also the uses to which it has been put--such as shoring up Social Darwinism.   None of that makes it false, but I'm glad to see that some scientists are beginning to voice opinions that support my philosophical preferences.  Well, not surprisingly, I do tend to be right. 

And poor Rupert Sheldrake.   He has formulated his idea of morphic resonance in a scientific way and an open-minded person who examines the evidence should be impressed.  Morphic resonance is no less and no more vague than the idea of gravity--they are both influences that are known only by their effects.   Now Sheldrake is on record as being something of a fellow traveler and an inspiration for some New Age beliefs--but that shouldn't affect evaluation of his scientific theories any more than Isaac Newton's belief in Biblical prophecy and alchemistry vitiated his physics.     

But I remain deeply disappointed they actually found the Higgs boson--or one of them--and hence shored up the Standard Model.  I was hoping (and still hope) the Standard Model would be devastated and hence that would be the undoing of the Big Bang Theory.  

There are plenty of other ways to do it, though, and I remain optimistic I will be vindicated vis a vis the Big Bang Theory one of these days soon.  

I like the old Steady State theory best and don't really understand why a little microwave radiation is such a big deal.  Couldn't it simply be the birth pangs of new matter coming into existence as Fred Hoyle suggested?   Or the ambient average temperature of starlight?   I know there are other weaknesses to SS also, but it seems to me that a few minor ad hox fixes would not be a big deal--especially given the constant stream of *major* ad hoc fixes that are invoked to shore up the Big Bang.  

Steinhardt and Turok's cyclical colliding branes is a little more appealing than the Big Bang, but it too involves some major inventiveness--invisible dimensions and an assumption (I think) that string theory (one of the 500+ versions) is correct.  

Happy May Day

R. 

 

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I like to think I have a cold mind and a warm heart...

And here's a recent thought from the cold mind department...

I wish the Newtown families would come to Texas to lobby the Texas legislature. 

Now I love my native Texas for reasons that would take me a while to research, but I am reasonably sure that such a visit would inevitably result in some jackass from the Lege (as we fondly refer to it here) piping up and saying something so incredibly gauche and and insensitive that national sympathy would rebound to good effect in Washington D.C. and (who knows?) result in the passage of a truly meaningful gun safety bill.  

The reason I assign this thought to the cold mind department is I really would not want the families to have to undergo the ordeal.   I also doubt there is any gun safety legislation pending in the Texas Legislature.  

The Dude De Ching & a fictional Laotian Communist

 

I came across the movie *The Big Lebowski* some years ago when I was channel surfing.  The first five minutes or so was full of effing this and effing that I was put off--not because of the obscenity per se, but because I simply couldn't see how the story could go anywhere with that kind of lame repartee.   In other words, I was unfamiliar with the aesthetic sensibilities of the Coen brothers as applied in this movie.   So I didn't watch it.  

But the last coupla years me & some guys get together every Wednesday night and trade lame repartee and watch movies--which is what we do instead of bowling (for we would be a danger to ourselves or others in a bowling alley--besides, none of us like strenuous exercise.)   ANYWAY, one night somebody brought the *Big Lewbowski* for their turn and we all watched it.  (It is an unwritten rule that we *must* watch the chosen movie even if we don't like it.)     Well, being obliged to watch it long enough to grasp the Cohen bros. way of making a movie (or this movie), I found the movie most enjoyable & pretty doggone funny.   The character played by John Goodman I felt was a real tragicomic figure.  I felt like I knew people who actually lived out those kinds of delusions about themselves.   (Actually , I don't really--it was just a feeling, or rather if I do know people like that I don't recognize them--or maybe I'm one of them).  

Just recently Jeff Bridges was on the Daily Show promoting a book that was put together by a friend of his whom he described as a Zen Master.  The book is called *The Dude de Ching* and it is based on an ancient Taoist text, *The Tao Te Ching,* which most of you have probably read--or possibly you haven't.  (If you haven't I don't know what will become of you--may turn out to be a President, a millionaire or an alligator wrestler in Orlando.) 

The *Dude de Ching* itself is simply(?) a re-writing of the *Tao Te Ching* using the lingo of the Dude as he spoke in the movie *The Big Lebowski*  The authors helpfully interpose the actual chapter of the *Tao Te Ching* behind each of the Dude's gloss on each chapter. 

I can almost promise you it won't help much unless you do have a serious inclination toward mystical contemplation.  

Now, I love both the *Dude De Ching* and the actual *Tao Te Ching* but mostly for esthetic reasons.   The sayings are wry, paradox-ridden and quite whimsical.  There are times when I even glimpse hints of deep meaning, but, of course, it is quite impossible to communicate those passages.  As the *Tao Te Ching* says at the beginning, "The Tao that can be known is not Tao."   

Much the same can be said of Zen Buddhism which as I understand it,  is sort of the half-breed offspring of the union between Taoism and Buddhism.    

Both Zen Buddhism and Taoism can give the light-minded excuses for non sequitur, ADHD-style remarks which may sound profound.  Or one may get in the habit of interpreting the random remarks of grocery shoppers or politicians as if they were speaking Zen or Taoist riddles.  Well, one takes one's entertainment where one can find it. 

But what I really want to do with this writing is call everybody's attention to the mystery novels of Colin Cotterill.  He has a couple of different series, but my favorite is the series featuring Dr. Siri Paiboun as the protagonist    The setting is post-Vietnam War Laos and Dr. Siri is in his 70's and he is the National Coroner of Laos, a job he did not want.   He spent many years in the jungle, fighting alongside his comrades in the Pathet Lao, the Communist Party of Laos.  When the Pathet Lao rather unexpectedly beat the French and achieved independence, all Dr. Siri wanted to do was retire and enjoy his golden years.  But the Party insisted on making him the National Coroner because, well, he is about the only native  Laotian with medical training.  Dr. Siri attended medical school in France which is where he met his late wife, a passionate Laotian Communist.  Naturally, when he fell in love with her, he found it necessary to join the Party.   Now a widower for a long time, Siri does not much believe in Communist doctrine--but since he can't see anything better for his country, he soldiers on.  It also emerges that Siri has the ability to see into the spirit world, a thing which *really* bothers him, since he does not believe in the spirit world either.  

Imagine my surprise when I opened *Dude De Ching* and found that it was illustrated by Colin Cotterill, for the man is an illustrator and cartoonist as well.  

The Dude abides.  As does the Tao.  Or Something.  I guess.  

R.  

http://gg9-tto.blogspot.com/

Immanuel Wallerstein on Hugo Chavez

(With thanks to Roger Baker and Movement for a Democratic Society, Austin, TX) 

Commentary No. 349, Mar. 15, 2013

"After a Charismatic Leader, What?"

by Immanuel Wallerstein

Pres. Hugo Chavez of Venezuela has died. The world press and the
Internet have been swamped with assessments of his achievements,
ranging from endless praise to endless denunciation, with a certain
number of persons expressing somewhat more guarded or limited degree
of praise or denunciation. The one thing on which everyone seems to
agree is that Hugo Chavez was a charismatic leader.

What is a charismatic leader? It is someone who has a very forceful
personality, a relatively clear political vision, and capable of great
energy and persistence in pursuing this vision. Charismatic leaders
attract great support, first of all in their own country. At the same
time, the very features of their persona that attract support are the
same that mobilize deep opposition to their politics. All this has
surely been true in the case of Chavez.

The list of charismatic leaders over the history of the modern world
is not that long. Think Napoleon and De Gaulle in France, Lincoln and
F.D. Roosevelt in the United States, Peter the Great and Lenin in
Russia, Gandhi in India, Mao Zedong in China, Mandela in South Africa.
And of course Simon Bolívar. As soon as one looks at a list like this,
one realizes several things. These persons were all controversial
leaders during their lives. The evaluation of their merits and faults
has constantly shifted over historical time. They never seem to
disappear from historical view. And lastly, they were not at all
identical in their politics.

The death of a charismatic leader always creates a void of
uncertainty, in which his supporters try to ensure the continuance of
his policies by institutionalizing them. Max Weber called this the
"routinization of charisma." But once routinized, the policies evolve
in directions that are always hard to predict. To estimate what may
happen in the immediate future, one has to start of course with an
appreciation of Chavez's achievements. But one also needs to make an
assessment both of the internal rapport de forces and of the larger
geopolitical and cultural contexts in which Venezuela and Latin
America find themselves today.

His achievements seem clear. He used the enormous oil wealth of
Venezuela to improve significantly the living conditions of the
poorest strata of Venezuela, expanding their access to health
facilities and education, and thereby reducing the gap between rich
and poor quite remarkably. In addition, he used the enormous oil
wealth to subsidize oil exports to a large number of countries,
especially in the Caribbean, which has enabled them to survive
minimally.

Furthermore, he contributed substantially to building autonomous
Latin American institutions - not only ALBA (the alliance of
Bolivarian countries) but UNASUR (the confederation of all states in
South America), CELAC (all states in the Americas except the United
States and Canada), and Mercosur (the confederal economic structure
that included both Brazil and Argentina), which he joined. He was not
alone in these efforts, but he played a particularly dynamic role. It
was a role for which former President Lula of Brazil constantly
praised him. The very large number of presidents of other countries at
his funeral (some 34), especially from Latin America, attest to their
appreciation. In seeking to create strong Latin American structures,
he was of course playing an anti-imperialist role, essentially an
anti-United States role, and he was therefore not at all appreciated
in Washington.

One should note in particular the positive appreciation of Chavez by
the conservative president of neighboring Colombia. This was because
of the important and very positive role Chavez had been playing as a
mediator between the Colombian government and its long-time guerilla
movement enemy, the FARC. Chavez was the one possible mediator
acceptable to both sides, and he was seeking a political solution to
end the warfare.

His detractors charged him with fostering a corrupt regime, an
authoritarian regime, and an economically incompetent regime. There
has no doubt been corruption. There always is in any regime where
there is abundant money. But when I think of the corruption scandals
in the past half-century in the United States or France or Germany,
where there is even more money, I cannot take this argument too
seriously.

Has the regime been authoritarian? Certainly. This is what one gets
with a charismatic leader. But again, as authoritarian leaders go,
Chavez has been remarkably restrained. There have not been bloody
purges or concentration camps. Instead, there have been elections,
which most outside observers have considered as good as they come
(think again of the United States or Italy or...), and Chavez has won
14 of 15 of them. Nor should we forget that he confronted a serious
coup attempt supported by the United States, which he survived with
difficulty. He survived on the basis of popular support and support
within the army.

As for economic incompetence, yes he has made mistakes. And yes, the
current income of the Venezuelan government is less than it had been
earlier. But remember we are in a worldwide depression. And almost
every government in the world is facing financial dilemmas and calls
to austerity. It is not at all obvious that a government in the hands
of his opposition would have done better in terms of optimizing
economic revenue. What is certain is that a government in the hands of
his opposition would have done less to redistribute wealth internally
to the poorest strata.

The one area in which he has not shone is his continuing support for
an extractivist economic policy, overriding the protests of indigenous
peoples about both ecological damage and their rights to autonomous
control of their locations. But he shared this fault with every single
government in the Americas, whether of the left or the right.

What is likely to happen now? For the moment, both the Chavistas and
the opposition have closed ranks, at least for the forthcoming
presidential elections. Most analysts seem to agree that Chavez's
chosen successor, Nicolás Maduro, will win them. The interesting
question is what will happen thereafter, first of all in terms of
internal alignments. Neither camp is without its internal divisions. I
suspect there will be some reshuffling of the cards, with defections
in each camp to the other side. In a few years' time, we may have a
different array of forces.

What will then happen to "21st-century socialism" - the vision that
Chavez had of what needs to be pursued in Venezuela, in Latin America,
and throughout the world? There are two words in this vision. One is
"socialism." Chavez sought to rescue this term from the opprobrium
into which it had fallen because of the multiple failures both of
real-existing Communism and post-Marxian social-democracy. The other
term is "21st-century." This was Chavez's clear repudiation of the
socialism of both the Third and the Second Internationals, and his
call for rethinking the strategy.

In both these tasks, Chavez was scarcely alone. But he sounded a
clarion call. For me, this effort is part of the larger task we all
face during this structural crisis of historical capitalism and the
bifurcation of two possible resolutions of the chaos into which our
world-system has fallen. We need to debate what is the nature of the
better world we, or some of us, are seeking. If we can't be clearer on
what we want, we are not likely to win the battle with those who seek
to create a non-capitalist system that nonetheless reproduces the
worst features of capitalism: hierarchy, exploitation, and
polarization.


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