Maha Shivaratri 2009

Today (22 February) is Maha Shivarathri in the Americas (it's tomorrow in India and some other places in Asia because they use a different calender or something, I couldn't find a detailed answer why). I've done all I could. Followers of the original Urban Mystic can appreciate this deviation from looking without to looking within, as the original posts were about my own spiritual discoveries. I look forward to next year and will train better for the fasting and sleep deprivation. Always Love. Om Nama Shivaya.

-Dee

How Many Degrees of Seperation?

The popular notion that everyone in the world is connected to everyone else in just six steps intrigues many. Just today on the Science Channel there was a program that could be described as a six degree polemic. When Prof. Judith Kleinfeld analyzed the data, however, she discovered something interesting.

First a discription of one of the experiments. Stanly Milgram had letters handed out to people all over the world and they were to pass the letters to their friends until the letters returned to Milgram himself. He said the average number of steps the letters had to pass through was six, hence the idea of six degrees of seperation was correct.

What Kleinfeld discovered was that Milgram cherrypicked the data. 95% of all the letters not only didn't make it back to him in six steps, they didn't make it back at all! All the similar experiments involving sending out letters revealed that only about 3% of all the letters made it back. Kleinfeld notes "If 95 or 97 letters out of 100 never reached their target, would you say it was proof of six degrees of separation?"

The documentary also made huge generalizations. They mentioned how every neuron in the brain is connected to every other neuron through only six steps. A second later they say that the only creature whose nervous system has been completely mapped out is a microscopic worm. They're extrapolating from a single individual to every creature with a nervous system. That's like when they say another Tunguska event is "not a matter of if, it's a matter of when," based on the only Tunguska event ever known to have happened! You can't extrapolate from a single datum to make bold generalizations about how the world works. I'm not even sure if they said the worm's brain exhibited the six degree trait or not.

Here is another paper on the six degree idea from someone who also doesn't believe in it.

Be careful what you take as fact (read: global warming, ephiphenomenalism, no UFOs, no Psi, etc.), it just may be academia pushing something onto you.

-Dee

The French Revolution

"...the French Revolution ironically was a failed revolution: Liberté, Egalité, and Fraternité quickly descended to the towering figure of Robespierre and his Reign of Terror as the revolution spun out control and began to murder itself.... 26 years after the 'Declaration of the Rights of Man' was written up, a Bourbon once more sat on the throne as the King of France - that is what I mean by 'failed' Revolution. Since 1793, France has had no less than 11 subsequent constitutions (while the United States still uses their first)."

The above is from an interesting article on the French Revolution, a favourite topic among the secular, politically correct, intellectual crowd the world over. Hailed by some as the birth of the greatest virtues humanity has ever come to understand, as outlined in the Declaration of the Rights of Man. They raise the revolution up to godly heights; the emergence of a reason powerful enough to liberate the world from God. William Wordsworth didn't share in those people's sentiments when he wrote "Head after head, and never heads enough;
For those that bade them fall."

The greatest evils ever, Hitler (20 million killed), Stalin (43 million killed), Mao (60 million killed), were the result of the French Revolution. They took their ideology from Jean Jacques Rousseau (who liked to sire illigitimate children and wine and dine with the ultra-rich while pesants starved to death), and were moulded in the image of Maximilien Robespierre. Every subsequent tyrant who preached equality and justice, and forced freedom on their subjects is the legacy of the French Revolution.

It marked the rise of the intellectual empire of atheism, which is destined to fall in the demographic winter (atheists aren't having enough children to replace their ranks who die of old age, whereas religious people reproduce with fervour).

The article goes on to say:

"Can you force a person or people to be free? Can one person - or small group of people - truly discern a clear 'General Will' which represents the entire people? Is this not in practice a call for dictatorship?"

-Dee

Dinosaur Extinction: After the Impact?

"The age of the dinosaurs ended 65 million years ago with a gigantic asteroid. No one knows precisely when or where the next asteroid will strike. Could humans be the next species to face extinction?" (From the Science Channel website)

On the Science Channel 2 July 2007 there was a docu-drama called "Super Comet: After the Impact" (the latest in the super disaster films, the previous being "Supervolcano"). It follows four groups of people in different places (Mexico, Hawaii, France, and Camaroon) trying to survive a comet of similar size as the one that impacted 65 million years ago hitting in pretty much the same place. What are the odds of that? I don't know but it can't be very likely, but for sake of edutainment let's assume this comet hit in the very same spot the last one did. There were a few bits of outdated science that were presented, and some continuity problems which I will present as follows.

1. The impact is said to have created a megatsunami 3000 feet tall after impacting the ocean near the Chicxulub peninsula, resulting in massive inland flooding around the world. However, about 40 minutes later when a satelite image is shown of the region, the crater is entirely on land. It was a land-based impact and therefore could not have created a megatsunami.

2. The film tells us that ejecta from the impact (debris shot out of the crater and into space) will rain down on the earth and raise temperatures to 600 degrees F, enough to ignite all flamable material on the surface of the planet. We know this is not true. The Chicxulub impact 65 million years ago was believed to have let do world-wide forest fires because a layer of ash was found all over the world's surface, however ash can be blown by the wind thousands of kilometers, and we know the huge impact created very fast winds. Charcoal, which cannot be blown far by the wind, was not found world-wide, meaning there were no forestfires consuming all flamable material on the planet. There would have been fires endemic to the region of impact but there could not have been fires all over the globe. There's just no evidence of it. If a similar sized object impacted the earth it would have to be made of napalm in order to turn the world into one big fire.

3. The impact is said to hit a region of carbonate rock, which combined with the water vapour in the atmosphere would produce sulfuric acid rain (H2SO4). This, too, is wrong. How do we know? Well, there's no evidence of it happening when the previous Chicxulub impact took place. If you'll remember your days from science class you'll recall that when sulfuric acid was poured into the container of sugar it turned into a giant black thing. Well if we are to believe battery acid fell from the sky it would have killed vunerable amphibians living in the shallow waters. And that's precicely what we don't see! The amphibians didn't go extinct when the dinosaurs did, even though they were more succeptable to the battery acid rain! In fact amphibians thrived following the impact since there were no giant lizzards roaming around eating everything.

So what? No megatsunami, no world-wide forest fires, no battery acid rain. What next? Well, did an impact really kill off the dinosaurs? The evidence is starting to look shakey. Prof. Gerta Keller of Princeton University and Prof. Wolfgang Stinnesbeck of the University of Karlsruhe have come up with some compelling evidence to toss aside the theory of a single large impact killing off the dinosaurs. Fossil records show a gradual extinction happening over millions of years. Furthermore, cores drilled from the Gulf of Mexico show that the Chicxulub impact happened 300,000 years BEFORE the dinosaurs went extinct.

Well, what did kill the dinosaurs? I'm getting there. 500,000 years before the K-T boundary, and 200,000 years before the impact, massive volcanic activity began in India. A flood basalt eruption produced millions of cubic kilometers of new rock over hundreds of thousands of years and created the Deccan Traps.

This massive volcanic activity exerted pressure on the biosphere and caused the gradual downfall of the dinosaurs and other Cretaceous creatures. The Chicxulub impact was just one of a long line of hits the earth took during this time period. It is believed a second impact (the K-T impact), larger than the one at Chicxulub, was the final straw that pushed the dinosaurs over the edge and produced the tell-tale iridum layer. The exact location of this second impact (which it will be called here until someone comes up with a better name than the K-T impact) has yet to be discovered, but tentative evidence points to somewhere in the Indian Ocean.

Next time will the producers of mega-disaster docu-dramas insert more science and less Jerry Bruckheimer? I don't know, but hopefully an equilibrium will be reached when "Super Sun Spot: Day of Reckoning" comes out.

-Dee

The Mahasamadhi of Adi Da Samraj

I have just learned that Adi Da Samraj, great spiritual master and possible Avatar (depending on who you ask), has had his Mahasamadhi on 27 November. While I would say his realization was not in doubt thee were some other issues, leading eventually to his seclusion on the island of Naitauba in Fiji. Following is a tribute to Adi Da provided by Dattatreya Siva Baba on 8 December.

-Dee

Jesus in India

I just saw the documentary Jesus in India, which examins the evidence that Jesus visited India during the 18 years of his life missing from the Gospels. While very good the producers made out on Coast to Coast AM the other night that whoever sees this program should be totally convinced that Jesus visited India after watching it. The documentary mainly consisted of interviews of people in the west saying that a document in a Buddhist monestary, The Life of Saint Issa, that was discovered by Nicolas Notovitch in 1894 is a fake and getting very angry for even bringing it up, and then there were people in India saying absolutely it's real but copies have to be protected so it can't be shown to anyone. Starting out as someone who already believes Jesus visited India I can say I am pleased that someone actually made a documentary dealing with the topic. However, watching this documentary is not likely to change anyone's opinions regarding the topic. Maybe the extra 80 minutes of footage on the DVD say something more convincing, but I don't yet know. If I can get my hands on a copy of the DVD I'll let you know how convincing or not it is.

-Dee

Veterans Day: Its History and Meaning

11 November 1918: after four years and 20 million lives lost the war to end all wars came to an end. Heroes rose and empires fell. In the years ahead wars would arise and heroes would once again be needed to heed the call of duty to protect those who need protection and to stop those who would cause others harm. This is what Veterans Day is about. We honour those who rose to greatness when their country, and the world, needed them.

It is now 90 years to the day since the war to end all wars came to an end. The last of those brave men who served in that struggle for freedom won't be here for much longer, so while I still can I would like to extend my deepest gratitude to you who served. And not only to those who served in the First World War, but in all wars since, and to all those who continue to step up when the world needs them most. Thank you.

-Dee