Darth Batman

Batman is a dark lord of the Sith. I'm watching Robin Hood (2006TV). It's ok, i still prefer the Kevin Costner movie and the 1980 TV show, loved the spiritual aspect that this doesn't have and it's also very PG-13. Somehow i ended up thinking about Batman and Robin and their history when i realized their relationship is the same as a Sith Lord and his apprentice. Batman demands total obedience, he is strict, almost militaristic. He only has one apprentice (Robin) at a time. Batman rules by fear, his anger drives him, he has embraced the Dark Side.

Then there's the apprentice. Always one at a time. Usually gets replaced after a tragedy. Unquestioned loyalty and actions. Very disturbing relationship.

Fortelling the future

Hi Keith and Rachel,

First off I would like to thank you both for the great service you provide every day with your shows, giving much needed analysis in these crazy and turbulent times (nothing like starting with an ego stroke to help get an email read).
I want to bring to your attention and hopefully encourage one of you or someone from your station to do a story on the possible current state of the country and the very real possibility that we might be halfway there.
Although Keith’s segment on the Dangers that Ex-governor Sarah Palin, others like her pose, and Rachel’s analysis on the birther and now “Grassroots” town hall mobs which she called hooligans, have been great, I think you are underestimating how much they have influenced the nature of our democracy to the point where were now headed to a fascist state and might possibly be halfway there.
I understand that the word Fascist has become the new black and has been overused so much, being associated with conspiracy theorist and wing nuts (left or right), that it makes it difficult to have a reasonable and intelligent discussion on the subject.
I want to assure you that I’m not using the word fascist because of it’s shock value (little that it has nowadays) or because I don’t agree with certain politician’s views which then makes me view them as Fascists, but because of the process in which a mature democracy changes into a fascist state as shown by Historian Robert Paxton, Emeritus professor of history of Columbia University in New York. His work, in particular a 1998 paper published in The Journal of Modern History (http://www.salemstate.edu/~cmauriello/pdfEuropean/Paxton_Five%20Stages%20of%20Fascism.pdf) was brought to my attention by an article in www.alternet.org (http://www.alternet.org/rights/141819/is_the_u.s._on_the_brink_of_fascism/) aptly titled “Is the U.S. on the Brink of Fascism?”
Paxton Defines Fascism as “a system of political authority and social order intended to reinforce the unity, energy, and purity of communities in which liberal democracy stands accused of producing division and decline” and “"a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion."
The article makes a extremely compelling case on how were might already in the third stage of the process which is characterized by an alliance of those in the government minority (GOP) with those that believe themselves disenfranchised and resort to force and intimidation to delegitimize legally elected officials (Birthers) and impede civil discourse and democratic policy making (Tea baggers, Healthcare mobs).
I didn’t mean this email to become so long but I wanted to ensure all my arguments were sound and persuasive enough to at least have you ponder this topic. I believe this is something that should be taken seriously and hope you see some merit to this.

Thank you for your time,

Victor R.

Aliens are learning from us,

Just watched awesome crapumentary on Shamans, consciousness and ancient cultures. It explored the interconnection between location of ancient worship with the effects on the brain and how that helped develop human consciousness, which gave us more complex temples of worship and a shift in types of worship. It travels through time and space, from the ancient caves used by the first shamans, to Mexican and Egyptian pyramids to laboratories of today where altered states of consciousness are induced and studied. What made the movie better than others in the subject is the actual scientific studies they performed in these places. They studied brain waves during recreation of ancient ceremonies and showed how ancient temples, including the pyramids were built to help induce altered states of consciousness. They didn't talk much about the use of Ethnogens which i considered a missed opportunity, but the show did a great job with just the science. Also, it ends with an interesting note, maybe the alien visitation theories have it backwards, they didn't help us build the pyramids, we were able to do that on our own. They are here to study/Learn from us?
Check it out (51min):

Is It Worth It?

I just finished watching "Manufactured Landscapes " (4 out of 5) It's a documentary, or crapumentary as my cousin says, about the work of photographer Edward Burtynsky. His photographs focus on the landscapes created by our civilisation, the three gorges dam, a strip mining operation, ship breaking region in India. It was a visually impacting film because it shows how we are changing the world. Aside... for some reason the phrase feels empty, we are always changing the world, what it should be described at is, the global impact of humans. After i finished watching the movie, my cousin challenged me on what i got out of it, which was, is it worth trying to stop the change?
I want to use change because using destruction will skew the argument. I got thinking while watching the movie, is this not what were supposed to be doing? Why is it bad the "urbanization of China" which is their goal? To have china be 70% urban, 30% agrarian. Is sucking up all the oil really a bad thing in the end? During the construction of the Three Gorges Dam, a lot of historical sites were destroyed, and neighborhoods that have existed for almost 100 years in shanghai are being destroyed and replaced by high-rises. Why not? What is wrong with continuing on our course? I read yesterday that Brazil has almost destroyed it's Atlantic rain forest. Yes, all that Bio-diversity is gone, but so what? I'm not being facetious here, it's just... the Dodo disappeared, are we worse off?
I'm honestly at a crossroad thinking about this now. I think the environmental movement has being going strong for two decades? more? I really don't think they have accomplished much.
I hope I'm just being pessimistic.

Longest Movie in the world

Sindbad and the Eye of the "Fucking" Tiger (1977 G): I swear i know i have been in movies that have felt longer but this one i will remember. I can't turn it off either, i just want to see them turn fucking Kassim back from a baboon and get it the fuck over with. Oh and the monkey is done in claymation... the whole fucking time, at no point do they use a real monkey. That takes balls. It's not a horrible movie, it's just loooooong. I just realized, it's like playing God of War with no fighting. I have the computer on, reading and now blogging and i still can't wait for the movie to finish. One thing, the chicks are hot, cute and there was a nip slip. Rated G, I love the old days.

Movie Time

Wolverine (2009): It met my lowest expectations. It earned it's PG-13 rating harder than any Disney movie could. That what this movie was, marvel combined w/ Disney. It wasn't a horrible movie, the action sequences were OK, the actors performed OK, the special effects were decent, but that is the problem. It could of had so much potential w/ what it had to start with. The problem was the fucking script. Horrible dialog and story. No Spoilers but they pretty much decided to make shit up on the go and somehow felt that the more they threw in the better it would be. Well they figured that wrong. I think that the director just didn't know what he was working with also. Not that he was a bad director, just that he misread what the character of wolverine is (rated R at least) and how to present his story. Well there's a sequel coming. Probably will see it and again hope for an improvement, but prepared for failure.

Youth Without Youth (2007): This movie was awesome. It's based on a novella by Romanian writer Mircea Eliade and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. I was watching after having some onh and it just sucked me in. Plot: Old humanities professor decides to commit suicide. On the way he gets hit by lightning (something I've always wondered about) and mutates into the man of the future (less cheesy than it sound). He gains incredible memory, de-ages to 35, and is able to absorb knowledge directly from books oh and limited telekinesis. He also stops aging and so begins to take up his life's work again. Locating and discovering the origins of language, culture and consciousness. Something i can really relate to. He experiences his adventure starting in 1940 at the beginning of the war. He gets hit on by beautiful women and ends w/ one that suffered another lightning strike and now becomes possessed by people form the past starting with a Buddhist scholar from ancient India and moving backwards. This gives him the opportunity to complete his research. He is also partially insane, talking to himself and having metaphysical discussions with his double that appears in mirrors. There is always a price for everything.

The 7th Voyage of Sindbad (1958): The effects are claymation, the main actors are white, and everything else about the movie looks cheesy but it kicks ass. Crazy action, romance, morals... everything a good movie needs. It exceeded my lowest expectations. :-)

Problem w/ Science in one paragraph

In Response to analyzing Indus Script to determine if it represents a spoken language:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1374

"Once again, Science falls for a glib magic formula that purports to answer a question about language. They would not, I hope, fall for a similar hypothesis in biology. They would, I hope, be skeptical that a simple formula could account for the complex interactions within an evolutionarily built system. But somehow it escapes them that language is such a system, as are other culturally constructed symbol systems, carrying lots of specific information that cannot be captured by a single statistic."

I think this can apply to all branches of science. Not only are they capable of ignorance, but of falling in love in the new shiny thing that promises to answer all their questions.

There's a name for it...

Panbabylonism.
School of thought within Assyriology and Religious studies that considers the Hebrew Bible and Judaism as directly derived from Babylonian culture and mythology. (Wiki)
Alfred Jeremias, in 1914, was already trying to do what I'm doing now. Create a comprehensive picture of human migration, rise of civilisations and origin of mythologies from the middle east (that sounded awesome). My hope in succeeding lies in not repeating his, and his successors' mistakes. They decided to base their hypothesis on astronomy and astrology. Astronomy i can understand and can see it being a reference to how their mythologies developed and then shaped their cultures. But Astrology? That's the pseudo in science and why Aliens end up in the books about Panbabylonism now days. Until astrology can provide better dates, bodies, texts and monuments of past civilization, I'll stick to good old science. I'm not saying science is perfect, they can be dismissive of different ideas, narrow minded to the point of obsession on ideas that haven't been proven (looking at you string), but it's better than guessing with numbers and stars. I do admit that I'll speculate on a lot of things, but I'll point those out and would gladly welcome proof that would disprove any proposed hypothesis.
It's also interesting that they are showing specials on 2012 on history channel.

A study into our Cultural Decline

I am always observing and commenting on the decline of our society, especially through the prism of our pop culture ( I watch way to much T.V.) and just finished watching Ben Lyons on E!. He was interviewing Byonce about Who knows I don't give a shit and of course i started thinking about him and what he represents to our culture. He is a Movie Blurb Whore, a phenomenon that drives me crazy insane. Great reasons of why they do are here:
http://www.stopbenlyons.com/2008/10/big-dog-smacks-down-poodle.html
and here by the great Mr. Ebert:
http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2008/10/eberts_little_rule_book.html

Well, as I was watching Mr. Lyons, the usual strong dislike started to come out until i had an insight. Instead of disliking Him i realized that he is a symptom of our Cultural decline. Not just any symptom but the final stage, and in his case it would be Movie criticism. The fact that he's the one that took over Ebert's spot and he "seems" to be America's top critic means that we have reached a "Systematic cascading failure of the system which manifests itself in the emergence of the One" and if he's a representation of the One's of our culture, we're in Deep Shit.

In the Begining...

That is going to be the name of my new project. I don't think it'll be 100% complete for the next couple of years which is why I'm considering it a work in progress. I do hope to get the bulk of the research and presentation out as soon as possible. I think 6 months should be time long enough. The purpose of the project is to analyze and develop a comprehensive theory of the spread and rise of Totalitarian Agriculture form the middle east till today. I think it's important to focus in this area, not out of a sense to attack the people or religion but because our current mythology, which is the basis of our treatment (destruction ) of the world, originates there. That's why these are the area's I'm going to focus.
Re-examination of Genesis, in particular:
Creation myth, fall of man/original sin and Cain and Abel. This will be done with Mechanical and interlinear Translation.
Comparison to Summerian Myth's.
Tribal movements of the Area.
Development of Agriculture and animal domestication in the Area.
Climate changes that could of forced the adoption of Totalitarian Agri.
Time span between 15,000 B.C.E - 1 A.D.
There is of course other items i will include (Geological landscape and impact on human migration?) but not enough space to list all.

One of my end goals, besides gathering all this information, will be to condense it into a visual representation (Animation) and maybe a book to make millions! I would also like to state this as copyright and intellectual ownership of this Concept.

Any ideas or suggestions will be gladly accepted but this is still my idea. I will give you slight credit.

Mark of Cain

I just thought of something. I started reading into Neanderthals, can't really remember what started it, but i might of figured out what happened to human culture. Neanderthals were absorbed by humans and the descendants of this union is where the Aryan's and the "Myth" of Cain came from (Ishmael). This would explain the aggressive behaviour, the "Mark" (Fair skin, freckles, Ishmael again) and where the Idea of Agriculture came from. Just remembered, was reading an article on new discovery of three different populations of Neanderthals (USAToday). Now, a flaw is believing that agriculture came from them, but not necessarily agriculture but the aggressive behaviour behind totalitarian agri. Another Idea i have a problem with or that should be reinterpreted, is that if Neanderthals being stupid or of lower intelligence, or of being docile or less aggressive than their homo sepiens counterparts.
The timeline would be:
Neanderthals and Sapiens appear (one did not follow the other, they co-existed)
They interbreed, Neanderthals are absorbed into Sapiens.
These descendants maintains physical and psychological characteristics.
They converge in Gobleki Tepe and organize the tribes there for constructing the Temple.
To sustain the large population that begins to gather, Agriculture revolution takes place.
Totalitarian agriculture develops and is maintained because through aggressive nature of Nsapiens.
Genesis Myth is Born (garden: Gobleki Tepe, Cain: Nsapiens)
The rest we're living now.

Now, all i need is to become and Paleo-archaeologist, geneticist, Religious scholar and several decades and I'm sure i can come up with a very convincing argument.

If anyone has any ideas would be welcome to hear them.