Friday, March 23, 2012

Education

Einstein, Bohr, John Locke, Anaximander, Heisenberg, even Stephen Hawking. Ten years after my official of official education, I came to realize how little was actually taught to us in schools, and how much useless crap was forced down our throats.

I hated physics in high school, these days I can't get enough of cosmology. Never did we get any lessons about any of the great philosophers, except maybe for Socrates, Plato and Aristotle as we brushed over them in history, but the facts we did learn about them were only limited to their dates of birth and death. What these great men taught and how their vision had such a fundamental impact on the 2000 years to come... Nope, not one word. I guess such a gem of information would not be interesting enough for a young adult.

People do have different interests so I can agree that a general basic education is needed which cannot cover all important facets of our civilization. But why teach kids the calculations of elongation of a spring, but not teach them anything about how mankind came to such insights and why every single one of them changed our world.

It's obvious then, that instead of making people think on their own, education is nothing more than training mere monkeys to be obedient and skillfull. The excitement of learning something new, gaining a new insight in a complex and overwhelming world is immediately repressed and shoved aside for a 20 years long instruction manual about how to conform to and support this absurd social mechanism.

And I wish we could give our younger fellow men a better, more realistic education, signs everywhere suggest a downhill slope. And I'm not talking about the surge in numbers of high school drop-outs, because those drop-outs are the ones that can make the most impact towards a better future, it's the ones staying in school we should be afraid of.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Evolution

For millions of years, life has evolved in a chaotic and brutal system, to finally bring forth an intelligent species of animal. To escape this brutal system and protect himself against the savage world around him, he formed alliances with other individuals, eventually leading to tribes, and as the agricultural revolution sprang to life, our forefathers settled down with their peers in tribes. These tribes and villages offered security in exchange for a little bit of freedom from the tribemembers, as the primitive laws were developed to maintain the peace within the community.

Well now, am I the only one that finds it strange that capitalism is around? Let me explain.

Our capitalist economy is based on the evolutionary process in nature, as the fittest, i.e. richest, prevail and will have lives long enough to produce better adapted offspring. So mankind has offered up some freedom for protection against the vicious games that nature had played on them, and now we have ended up in a eerily similar system, only with less freedom than once before.

Is it because man subconsciously needs this system? Is it a basic hunkering in his genes to oppress and exploit his fellow man if he believes himself fit enough to do so? And where there are the fittest, there are also the weak, but the weak in these days are not killed. Hell no! The weak are kept alive, most of em hopped up on anti-depressants, sleeping pills or painkillers, just so they can be good consumers, with a decent amount of debt and an overflowing collection of useless stuff.

This rich vs. 'weak', or 1 vs. 99% if you will, smells a bit like Nietzsche's Ubermensch, who he believed should rule and make choices that are best for themselves as superior beings. The interests of regular people couldn't bother them less. I keep seeing similarities... The Nazi police state is not far off, the Wall Street police has shown who it protects, who the Ubermenschen are.

Monday, February 6, 2012

Omne Nefas Mundi

I'm thinking of renaming this blog, but since I don't have a lot of blog-experience, I really don't know if it's a faux pas.

The new title will be 'Omne Nefas Mundi', latin for 'all that's wrong with this world', so it's more obvious what this blog is about, as I wouldn't call it a 'personal' blog', it's more of a rant on a crooked world.

My ranting today was mostly about possessions. I've been reading up on John Locke and his obsession with possession. It's sad that this man and his political views have become mainstream over the course of over 300 years, which is one of the main causes for the crashing ultra-capitalist system in place today. And we still see it today, the obsession with possession, especially in more conservative countries, where there are laws tolerating murder in response to theft of one's properties.

One of the main reasons I do not believe in capitalism is because of the existence of possessions. A system which thrives under scarcity of goods cannot be called a system to serve mankind's greater goals.
I can concur (more moderate) capitalism has led to gigantic leaps in science and industrialization, but we are now coming to the breaking point of that same system. Science is coming to a standstill, indicated by fewer science students each year at universities. (Yes it is my belief science is mankind's most important ultimate goal.)
But the cracks also shows in these latest times of economical crisis. A pragmatical system would not condone the deletion of jobs, distributing most wealth amongst less than 1% of earth's inhabitants, and even the destruction our planet.

It's amazing such a system is still tolerated, or should I say "enforced", after all those years of crises, poverty, war, sickness and hunger.

Monday, January 30, 2012

Another ACTA post

I do not want this to be an Anti-ACTA board, it's just so happens to be a big current issue when starting up this blog.

The world needs more awareness of the evils of this treaty. We need all to spread the word.




Friday, January 27, 2012

A Temporary Loss of Freedom

On my way home, I overheard two old ladies, walking their dog in the park, talking about how their hard drives are filled up and they now have to delete movies to create some free space. It's a strange thing to encounter, as this isn't exactly a well known topic for old ladies.

This shows us though, that everyone in the world who's got a computer and access to the internet, embraces it fully and makes use of it in so many different ways. And if even old ladies are hooked on the internet, it has become a full social platform, a fundamental human network that inspires creativity and freedom of speech.

Letting this all be controlled by huge media companies will put all of our futures at risk. So if there's any time to make your voices heard, it sure is now. There are protests lined up in Paris and Brussels for tomorrow (28 jan), if that's too soon for you, I've also heard about a possible global protest on Feb 15th. Keep your eyes and ears peeled for it! Oh, and if you've not already signed the Anti-ACTA petition, please go here:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/eu_save_the_internet_spread/


People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people. ~ V

Thursday, January 26, 2012

A Sad Day: ACTA vs. the World


Today has been a sad day for the internet. The Mayans were partly right anyway i guess, 2012 is the end of the free world. ACTA has been signed by the EU, lots of other countries still will follow, there seems no way back now. It's a sad day for the internet.

It seems none of the politicians are even willing to bring it up, and this while they should be representing us. It's remarkable that they didn't even asked us our opinion. Not the European government cared about its citizens' opinions, neither did the national governments care. They didn't even care to inform us about what ACTA entails, how it will affect us all and how we can learn to live with it. They just signed it and cracked a little smile while they stuffed the money down their pockets. It's a sad day for democracy.


What's also remarkable, is how little media attention was generated by the anti-ACTA protests, both in Poland as the online protests on twitter and facebook, and with other actions like multiple online petitions. It feels like journalists cannot or will not speak about this, either by external pressure, or by their own benefits in ACTA. They too should be the voice of the people, and bring an honest, objective look at the world to their readers. It's a sad day for our freedom of speech, and indeed all our liberties.



George Orwell will become a prophet.