Pretty Colors

If only people were like flowers, colors would take the place of strife.

Ideologues Don't Reason

Ideologues perform thinking and action based on an ideological template they rarely, if ever, deviate from. Not only their thinking is performed via ideology, but it's often their reason d'être. All too frequently an ideology has an object for hatred - on a small scale or large, it must hurt, punish or more, subtly or conspicuously. Most ideologies have no shame or guilt. The ideology justifies the ideologue. Notwithstanding all these characteristics, the most bizarre is ideologues believing themselves intellectually superior to others.

Nature

Nature abhors perfection or Nature would end.

Interior Design

A room without art is like roots to stem without a flower.

Simplicity

The fewer assumptions, the simpler life.

Socialism

Socialism: Where your neighbor is rankled you own something he or she does not own and reports you to a government official who is rankled you enjoy owning something he or she owns and enjoys, too.

IQ and Belief in God

Intelligent people 'less likely to believe in God' posted on StumbleUpon, Jun 13, 2008

This is an interesting article, which if drawn further would presume that those who don't believe in God have high IQs.

Yet for all this, those with high IQs are still susceptible to logical fallacies and irregular ratiocinations. The daily news is rife with examples.

IQ measures, without troubling ourselves with the Flynn effect, cognitive ability, intellectual ability, not raw native 'intelligence' which frequently manifests in circumstances and episodes of daily life. IQ tests only what it can measure: spatial, language, mathematical and memory abilities. Yes, the operational word is abilities. And there are many more abilities than are tested as are found in the arts or persausion as in salesmanship, oratory and leadership, all in their best performance frequently called genius.

Coming back to abilities, this would be like having a test for sports ability, measuring reflex, jumping, running, throwing and kicking, and weight resistance abilities. You'd probably say, 'But wait a minute, there are other abilities that can be measured, too.' Yes, for cognitive measures as well.

Nevertheless, in the end, cognitive ability testing distills into one number, called IQ. It would hardly be accepted if physical ability measures were measured and displayed as one number. People might say it's upsurd. I'd agree, even in the case of a number called IQ.

Without extending this, I'll get to the point. People with a high number in anything, whether money, friends, medals, trophies, or abilities are by themselves irrelevant to a belief in God. There is something else that's going on.

It is most likely that those with high IQs are socially comfortable under professional disciplines that obviate institutional religious discipline and, as a result, have no need for a 'master' called God, and find their cognitive status and access to modern auxilaries of technology gives them a sense of independent dominion over life - and a feeling they are the measure of all things.

And this now begins to touch on the subject of their belief.

Growing

Life doesn't grow to its roots, it grows to its stems. I'm happy to grow to my limits and let life's manure help through my roots.

INTJ

I am an INTJ, profoundly spiritual and respectful of all religions that serve and make wise, passionate and compassionate, with boundless curiosity, infinite zeal for freedom, undying allegiance to common sense and reason, contempt for intellectual bigotry, and a love for right like honey on my lips, and an undying hate for evil.

Genius II

I'm a genius for I admit my mistakes.

Lipstick

Women wear lipstick to protect themselves from warts while kissing frogs to find a prince.

Genius I

Creativity is genius, Everything else is iteration.

Ignorance

Ignorance is the eventual horror of bliss.

'I Want Your Money'

Paychecks represent our lives, for most of us, 8 or more hours of it a day. The percentage of our paychecks paid in Taxes represents a portion of our lives that we trade for the cost of law and order. We trade a percentage of our lives for this, and gladly.

When the government wants to Tax us more, it is wanting us to trade a bigger percent of our lives, a greater percentage of our existence that we trade in hard work, for the government's ideas, plans, programs, pet projects, paying off political IOUs, etc.

Lately, government doesn't propose, it requires, it compels, it threatens us or through subterfuge ruses us into agreeing to trade a greater and greater percentage of our paycheck, those precious hours of our lives, and in turn will not account for every penny it spends - every penny it spends from every minute of our existence we worked to earn them.

Think about it.

And they want more.

The Right View

Space is preeminent. Nothing may be without it.

Flower

By its very nature, a flower is erotic.

Flee

If you don't find friendliness, hospitality, and compassion where you live, flee.

Playing Games

never play chess with someone playing poker. never.

the poker player sees all you see on the board, but you will never see what they see in their hand. play poker and they will have as much uncertainty as you and will judge their risks with a great deal more caution. in deed, make this double-game player uncomfortable with uncertainty by playing their game and you will find they usually fold.

Theives' Honor

among thieves, honor is a pragmatic necessity, not a character trait.

The Science of Science

I love science. It fascinates me, continually pointing to truths tho never illuminating. The spiritual does this. And because I have such regard for the derivative understandings of existence science provides, I have little regard for those who close its books and make it their religion of hostility to everything science isn't. In a way, their belief system is a sacrilege to the pure motives of science. Take a look at all the science news; it is a cavalcade of discoveries, a process of learning, not just 'knowing'. And in its fabulous discoveries are discoveries of its errors. In deed, the history of science is rife with mistakes and its landscape littered with the bones of martyrs for its corrections. It would be well to see its landscape littered with the bones of those who continually attempt to make science an iconoclastic ideology.

Perfect Isn't

perfect grammar is not perfect truth
perfect mathematics is not perfect reality
and perfect structure is not perfect beauty

Remove Doubt

remove doubt. it is a broad and tall object but never weighs more than a seed.

The Low Door to Love

i once came to love by a gate
to a door i was too tall for
and ruminated on the chore
until it was too big to state,

then i recalled the old wooded gate
with its stone wall and door so low
and how i stooped and bent my back
and to the other side walked through slow.

A Petal Falls

is it a flower when a petal falls?
and can the same be true for love?

Natural Love

a natural source
knows its natural course
and can do nothing less nor more,
and in moving to its end
it moves to its beginning.
there is nothing new in this knowing.
we have known it before we knew,
tho in knowing it anew
we are astonished
because we see the other
in the mirror of our soul
and feel at home.