Science is a Process, NOT a Position - Evolution

The debate regarding Darwinism has taken a turn for the good! Texas high schools now require teaching scientific criticism of Darwinian evolution, thereby bringing the subject into the realm of REAL science, not scientism (the religion of reductionist materialism masquerading as science)! From Uncommon Descent (from Evolution News):

Big Win in Texas as State Now Leads Nation in Requiring Critical Analysis of Evolution in High School Science Classes
Robert Crowther

In a huge victory for those who favor teaching the scientific evidence for and against evolution, Texas today moved to the head of the class by requiring students to “critique” and examine “all sides of scientific evidence” and specifically requiring students to “analyze and evaluate” the evidence for major evolutionary concepts such as common ancestry, natural selection, and mutations.

“Texas has sent a clear message that evolution should be taught as a scientific theory open to critical scrutiny, not as a sacred dogma that can’t be questioned,” said Dr. John West, Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute. “Contrary to the claims of the evolution lobby, absolutely nothing the Board did promotes ‘creationism’ or religion in the classroom. Groups that assert otherwise are lying, plain and simple. Under the new standards, students will be expected to analyze and evaluate the scientific evidence for evolution, not religion. Period.”

The new requirements were contained in revised science standards approved today by the Texas State Board of Education. The science standards include language requiring students to “analyze, evaluate and critique scientific explanations…including examining all sides of scientific evidence… so as to encourage critical thinking by the student.” Equally important, the high school biology standards now require students to “analyze and evaluate” the scientific evidence for key parts of evolutionary theory, including common ancestry, natural selection, and mutations.

Discovery Institute has long endorsed the idea that evolution should be fully and completely presented to students, including its unresolved issues.

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Also, we here at The Urban Mystic have received our first ever comment on the post regarding Sri Adi Da. To Anonymous, thank you for your comment. We look forward to your patronage.

-Dee

The Four Kinds of Leaders

An Excerpt from "Discipline and Leadership," Pages 46-50, from A Student in Arms by Donald Hankey.

Of course the types vary enormously. At first it is generally the men who want promotion that obtain the stripe, and they mostly belong to one of two classes. They are either ambitious youngsters or blustering bullies. The youngster who wants promotion has probably been a clerk and lived in a suburb. He is better educated and has a smarter appearance than the general run of the men. He covets the stripe because he wants to get out of the many menial and dirty jobs incidental to barrack life; because he thinks himself "a cut above" his fellows and wants the fact to be recognized; because, in short, he thinks that as a lance-corporal he will find life easier and more flattering to his self-esteem. He soon finds his mistake. He annoys the sergeant-major by his incompetence and the men by his superior airs. Soon he gets into a panic and begins to nag at the men. That is just what they hate. The whole situation reminds one of nothing so much as of a terrier barking at a heard of cows. As soon as the cows turn on him the terrier begins to waver, and, after trying to maintain his dignity by continuing to bark, ends by fleeing for dear life with his tail between his legs. So the young lance-corporal begins by hectoring the men, and, having roused them to a fury of irritation, ends by abject entreaty. Finally he is reduced to the ranks. The career of the bully is different. He is generally a vulgar, pushing fellow, who likes boasting and threatening, likes to feel that men are afraid of him, likes to be flattered by toadies, and likes getting men punished. The men hate him; but he sometimes manages to bluff the officers and sergeants into thinking that he is a "smart N.C.O." Usually he comes to a bad end, either through drink or gambling. When he is reduced to the ranks his lot is not an enviable one.
A deplorable number of those who are first promoted finish by forfeiting their stripe. Then comes the turn of the man who does not covet rank for its own sake, but accepts it because he thinks that it is "up to him" to do so. Generally he is a man of few words and much character. He gives an order. The man who receives it begins to argue: it is not his turn, he has only just finished another job, and so on. The N.C.O. looks at him, and repeats: "Git on and do it." The man "curls up," and does as he is told. An N.C.O. of this sort is popular. He saves any amount of wear and tear, and this is appreciated by the men. He gets things done, and that is appreciated by the sergeants and officers.
Finally, there is the gentleman, who is the most interesting of them all from our point of view. He is generally a thoroughly bad disciplinarian in the official sense, and at the same time he is often a magnificent leader of men. He is fair and disinterested. He has a certain prestige through being rather incomprehensible to the average private. He does not care a scrap for his rank. He is impervious to the fear of losing it. He takes it from a sense of duty, and his one idea is to get things done with as little friction as possible. He often succeeds in gaining the confidence of his men, so that they will work for him as for no one else. But, on the other hand, his methods are apt to be quite unorthodox and highly prejudicial to the cause of discipline as a whole. His authority is so personal that it is very hard for anordinary N.C.O. to take his place.

Challenging The Aryan Invasion Theory

"The aryan invasion theory has been one of the most controversial historical topics for well over a century. However, it should be pointed out that it remains just that – a theory. To date no hard evidence has proven the aryan invasion theory to be fact. In this essay we will explain the roots of this hypothesis and how, due to recent emergence of new evidence over the last couple of decades, the validity of the aryan invasion theory has been seriously challenged."

When the Europeans came to India in the wake of imperialism (the Europeans who came over during the Roman and Hellenistic times heaped nothing but reverence upon Indian culture) they had to justify their racial superiority, and so they created the myth that people from either eastern Europe or central Asia moved into India and displaced the native population. They based this on the similarity between European, Iranian, and Indian languages. These languages needed a common source, and they all knew at the time that it couldn't be India, so they settled for central Asia. The new old langage they invented - "Proto-IndoEuropean."

Unfortunately none of the cities Indus Valley Civilization show signs of having been attacked by invaders. "Despite the extensive excavations at the largest Harappan sites, there is not a single bit of evidence that can be brought forth as unconditional proof of an armed conquest and the destruction on the supposed scale of the Aryan Invasion," Describes Prof. G. F. Dales.

Furthermore, none of the Vedas make refrences to places outside of India. If they had been written by invading Aryans the Vedas would speak of an Aryan homeland outside of India, which they don't, and they would spea, of religious sites and cities outside of India, which they also don't.

"The Puranas refer to migrations of people out of India, which explains the discoveries of treaties between kings with Aryan names in the Middle East, and references to Vedic gods in West Asian texts in the second millenium BC. However, the indologists try to explain these as traces of the migratory path of the Aryans into India."

Although the article presented at the top of the page (and again HERE) does tend to use some loaded language (isn't that my job?) it is a very good place to start your search into the truth about the Indian origin of Indian culture.

-Dee

The True Aritst

An Excerpt from "A Sense of the Dramatic," Pages 173-174, from A Student in Arms by Donald Hankey.

A sense of the dramatic is, of course, closely connected with a sense of humor. If you have this faculty for getting outside yourself and criticizing yourself, you will be pretty sure to see whether you look ridiculous. If you are a real artist in the exercise of the gift, you will also see yourself in your right perspective with regard to other people. The artist must not be an egoist. He must not allow the limelight to be centred on himself. He will see himself, not as the hero of the story, but as one of the characters – the hero, perhaps, of one chapter, but equally a minor character in the others. The greatest artist of all, probably, is the man who prays, and tries to see the story as the Author designed it. He will have the truest sense of proportion, the most adequate sense of humor of all. Undoubtedly prayer is the highest form of exercising this sense of the dramatic.

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