TedX Talk on the Emergence of Universal Consciousness

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AB85AFzqtOY&feature=youtu.be

Madiba Tribute

What a fighter he was.  Like many, I stayed up late into the night several months ago when the news broke that he had been admitted to hospital in a critical condition. But then he showed his fighting spirit once again.  Lots of people compare Madiba with Ghandi and that's valid.  But he loved boxing and I think he'd enjoy a comparison with Mohammed Ali. The Champ. The Greatest.
 

Why the final version of the Secrecy Bill is a problem for South Africa

Journalism has traditionally operated under a “publish-and-be-damned” ethic which means that journalists have a responsibility to publish a story only when they are reasonably sure of the facts and confident that disclosure would be in the public interest.
 
However, section 41 of the Secrecy Bill provides that any person who discloses or possesses classified state information is liable to imprisonment for a period not exceeding 5 years except where such disclosure reveals criminal activity.

An investigative journalist can’t investigate crime and corruption without first coming into possession of what might be classified information.  So the new bill shifts the risk of damnation back to the pre-publication stage.  It’s a case of “investigate-at-your-peril” because if you don’t uncover something criminal, you will have committed a crime yourself.

Compare this with the landmark case of New York Times v. United States (1971),in which the Nixon administration sought to ban the publication of classified documents about the Vietnam War secretly copied by Daniel Ellsberg. The US Supreme Court held that only proof that publication "must inevitably, directly, and immediately cause the occurrence of an evil kindred to imperiling the safety of a transport already at sea can support even the issuance of an interim restraining order."

ANC veteran MP Professor Ben Turok, criticised by his party for taking an initially principled stand against the Secrecy Bill, voted in favour of the final version of the Bill yesterday saying that he had been briefed by colleagues on the changes to the bill and was “assured that they are qualitative, not superficial”.

So said Professor Turok: “Because of the tortuous passage of the bill… I’ve been unable to track all the changes. This is no excuse, as I have a responsibility to know what I vote for, but there are limits to how much ground one can cover.”

Seriously, Ben?  You didn't even read the final draft before voting in favour of it? It’s a whole 28 pages. You could digest it faster than a Weetbix.

Props must go to “Super Mario” of the IFP who discharged himself from hospital to deliver this impassioned plea:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcTlG9PeA9Q 

 

 

In a democracy people get the leaders they deserve

The death of Margaret Thatcher has unleashed a torrent of criticism and protests in Britain.  But for all the criticism levelled at Thatcher in the wake of her death, it is worth remembering how she came to hold the position of prime minister for 12 years.

She was democratically elected to parliament by the local residents of the Finchley parliamentary ward. She was later democratically elected to lead the Conservative party by the members of that party and she held the position of Prime Minister from 1979 - 1990 by virtue of the fact that the Conservative Party won three successive democratic elections, securing more than 13 million adult votes in each election. 

It is not as though Britain suffered under an authoritarian autocratic government between 1979 – 1990 in which political criticism was oppressed. The 80's is in fact a decade marked by strong awakenings to human rights and freedoms, including freedom of expression, led by the West where even the harshest of criticism was tolerated and, (as in the case of Diana Gould below), even publicly broadcast.

My point is not that the policies now known as "Thatcherism" should escape critical review but that the British public democratically endorsed those policies at the time.

The outpouring of criticism against Thatcher is therefore as much a criticism of an era as it is of its actors. Our current era might be destined for a similar fate because, as Joseph de Maistre wrote in 1811, "In a democracy people get the leaders they deserve".  

 

 

The Obama/Romney debate that actually means something

The 3^rd US presidential debate takes place tonight.  It is intended to focus on foreign policy, therefore it is the only presidential debate of actual significance. This is not because economic policy is unimportant, but because the US president does not and cannot determine US economic policy. That is done by the US Congress over which the president has no control.   

Article 2 of the US Constitution vests the president with executive powers (the power to take certain actions), but not legislative powers (the power to make laws). The president’s executive powers include the power to enter into foreign treaties, to appoint foreign ambassadors and to act as Commander-in-Chief of the US armed forces.

The fiery debates about economic policy cast a lot of heat, but no light, on what sort of presidency each candidate can actually offer. Tonight’s debate is therefore the most meaningful indicator the world will get as to whom should command the world’s biggest military for the next four years.

Dawkins' Delusion

I recently purchased a copy of “The God Delusion” by Richard Dawkins. I had been considering reading it for some time.  The blurb on the cover by Ian McEwan: “A very important book, especially in these times… a magnificent book, lucid and wise, truly magisterial” certainly heightened my enthusiasm.

Unfortunately, the book was a magnificent disappointment. Though it is entertaining, it is certainly not important, Ian McEwan's views notwithstanding.

The essence of Dawkins’ book is this: old, religious concepts of God are wrong.  Thank you, Richard, for taking 420 pages to point that out.

Dawkins defines the “God Hypothesis” as follows: there exists a superhuman, supernatural intelligence who deliberately designed and created the universe and everything in it, including us. He then argues that “God, in the sense defined, is a delusion” and spends the rest of his book ridiculing the ridiculous.

The problem with defining God in such specific and limiting terms upfront is that what masquerades as an argument against theism is not an argument against theism at all, but merely some forms of theism, and already discredited ones at that.

Whether it is delusional to conceive of God as a responsive form of systemic consciousness is not something that Dawkins appears to want to consider. He argues, evasively, that to even begin to reconceptualise God is to commit intellectual heresy, because God has historically come to mean a certain thing and we should not permit the term to drift towards any newer meaning.

This is disappointing coming from an avowed evolutionist.

Why does he run from truly considering a more evolved concept of God, perhaps by pondering, even briefly, why Steven Hawkins ends his “Brief History of Time” with the words “For then we shall truly know the mind of God”?

Dawkins, by contrast, ends his book with an appendix entitled “A partial list of friendly addresses, for individuals needing support in escaping from religion.”

His book is not a genuine work of philosophy, but a political piece penned by an atheist activist.  He seeks to discredit traditional religion in the hope that he might undermine theism itself. Dawkins knows this is a non-sequitur, but he seems to have been incapable of resisting a devilishly easy chance to commit it.

Instead of expending his energy rebutting religion, Dawkins would better serve the cause of philosophy if he attempted a rebuttal of newer formulations of our oldest beliefs, such as are summarised in the Simunye Hypothesis, and left the “God Hypothesis” to the dark ages, where it probably best belongs.

The Myth of Cultural Overrun

People opposed to supra-national political integration often cite a “threat against national culture” as their primary reason.

A classical Marxist response is that “national culture” is a political construct designed to protect a ruling social class, rather than a cultural heritage. 

Fortunately, once every four years, a far simpler rebuttal to those fearing political integration presents itself.

Tonight Spain plays Italy in the final of the Euro championship hosted in Kiev, Ukraine.  Spain and Italy are both members of the European Union, with a shared supranational constitution and an open border policy.

Yet anyone in attendance at the Olympic stadium tonight will be under no illusion that cultural distinctiveness between the nations is alive and well. There may be a common passion for football, but diversity in language, music and cuisine remains along with a strong sense of national pride.

In fact, cultures seem to strengthen and grow from exposure to other cultures. As MK Ghandi said “No culture can live if it attempts to be exclusive”.

Like all things, cultures need to evolve to survive and evolution requires pools of diversity from which newer and better cultural practices can emerge.

Even the cultural explosion of the Renaissance was, in large part, the result of a rising merchant class in Italy stimulating demand for art at the same time as the West established significant contact with the East and global trade lanes expanded.

The belief that "they" will overrun us, or even turn us into "them" is a fear shared by two groups: the ruling class, who want to preserve the status quo, and members of the working class who have been taught to fear change by the ruling class.