HS2 Where?

31/07/202116/11/2023 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

Twenty Reasons Why HS2 Might Not Be the Promised Public Transport Option of the Future

There is a project in England called HS2. It stands for High Speed 2 and is a plan to build a high speed rail route between London and Birmingham and then beyond. The stated justification for it by the government is to move the political centre of gravity away from London and nearer to the Northern and Midland cities; the so called ‘power house’.

These cities have conventionally voted for the socialist or Labour Party and HS2 was originally a Labour government idea in 2009. Why it has not been cancelled by the Tories in my view is that there may be some political gain for the Conservative and Unionist Party in making Westminster ‘closer’ to the North. In the last election these cities did largely swing to vote Conservative for, no doubt, many reasons.

One skill that I believe is essential for politicians is ‘problem solving’. There is a science to this subject and the first question to be asked in solving a problem is; what is the problem? As much as this may seem obvious, it is heart breaking to observe how much money is wasted on national projects that turn out not to solve the problem. I am reminded the airport in Spain that has never opened and you can probably think of some ‘vanity projects’ in your local area. ‘Vanity’ may be one reason those in power do not ask the right questions. Or perhaps it is the Dunning-Kruger Effect…

(The Dunning–Kruger effect is a hypothetical cognitive bias stating that people with low ability at a task overestimate their ability), : source Wikipedia

…that makes politicians believe they understand the problem perfectly and have the perfect solution.

An Idiots Guide to Digging a Hole for Yourself
:
credit Reseachgate net

Another common pitfall for ‘problem solvers’ is the temptation not to apply a new solution when the original one does not work. This is known colloquially as to ‘dig a hole for yourself’. Rather than abandon the first location to dig, the blinkered view and or fear of admitting a mistake and or wasting time, money and effort… compels decision makers to keep applying the original problem solving technique. Feedback is rarely sought, dissenters are ridiculed and rational insight is lost in the rush to jump into the deepest hole ever dug…

The HS2 project in my view is a perfect example of this and even the PM used this metaphor…

Boris Johnson has suggested the only answer to the “hole” enveloping HS2 is “to keep digging”. BBC News 31 January 2020

So far three billion pounds has been spent on demolition and railway infrastructure. To change now would mean wasting all of this money and admitting a mistake. To admit to such things is political suicide, and career politicians need to impress upon their voters that they know what they are doing. This is what we see at the moment.

Personally, I would vote for any politician who is prepared to describe the white elephant under construction as just that. Here is my ‘off the cuff’ list of reasons to abandon the project. I am sure the list could be even longer but it hardly seems necessary. It is not all negative. It contains the precise locations where treasure can be found, should the current hole ever be realised to be just full of air.

Here is my list of strategic reasons to abandon HS2;

1.The people who live in the Midlands and North of England desire most to have better rail links between the East Coast and the West Coast of England and connecting the cities in between.

2. The people who live in the Midlands complain that the existing rail service to London is at full capacity and needs upgrading. This could be achieved quickly and relatively cheaply with additional conventional infrastructure and rolling stock.

3. HS2 is planned to go initially North South, adding a link to London which is contrary to stated intention to move the ‘centre of gravity’ of the country. The word ‘London’ is the clue.

4. The country has borrowed a vast quantity of money during of the Covid -19 pandemic. To reduce this burden ( and presumably vulnerability to any future rise in interest rates) it is proposing to reduce aid to the poorest countries in the world. In doing so it risks losing the ‘world leader’ status it aspires to. One obvious alternative is to admit it can no longer afford to pay for HS2.

5. Since the pandemic, people have become used to communicating using the internet. Moving physically between locations has become less important.

6. Trains are old technology. They have been improved as much as they ever can be and now only new technology should replace it.

7. High speed trains are at their most economic on long distances such as found on the continent of Europe, North America or Australia. As any continental traveller will tell you, the UK major cities are relatively close to each other and journeys short in comparison with countries where high speed trains have been a success.

8. Fast, long distance trains are rivalled by aircraft. In Spain, for instance, internal flights are cheaper and quicker than the extensive high speed rail network.

9. Trains are rivalled by new technology such as the Hyperloop. They are likely to become superseded in the next few decades, just as railways took over from canals. Technology and economics are more sustainable drivers than political policies. New technology by-passes the decision making processes of government. In the era of present rapid ‘advances’ in technology governments must work with new technologies in the way that voters do.

10. A large proportion of ‘clean’ electricity is produced by fossil fuel power stations and nuclear power stations. The first is neither clean nor efficient. The nuclear option is becoming more and more expensive (as decommissioning costs are included) and prone to the dual risks of nuclear accident and the problem of the indefinite safe storage of nuclear waste on planet earth.

11. The costs of major infrastructure projects can be reasonably expected to double by the time they are completed. The original estimate for HS2 in 2005 of 37 billion pounds has already doubled to 78.4 billion pounds by 2015! (according to Institute for Government statistics). At this rate of increase it will have doubled again by 2025 and that is only the estimated cost. There are inevitably going to be delays and unforeseen extra costs. This during predicted future decades of Covid 19 austerity.

12. Europe is joined to one nation by the Channel Rail Tunnel. The United Kingdom is connected to twenty seven countries by the Channel Rail Tunnel – and beyond. The train from Berlin to Manchester appeals to a minority who will either meet virtually, go by air or just not choose to do business in the United Kingdom.

The List Extends into the Tactical Reasons to Abandon HS2

What have the Victorians ever done for us? picture credit *Country Life*

13. When the Victorians built railway stations, they were able to build their palace-like stations in the centre of towns and cities; just where travellers wanted to arrive! Due to high land values and ethical (archaeology, listed buildings, city centre decay, the housing shortage ) concerns around compulsory purchase, this is no longer practical. Most HS2 stations will be built outside the towns and cities they serve. The connecting transport will take away some or all of the time gained (1hour 21 minutes reduced by 29 minutes) by using a high speed train. An example I experienced many decades ago, was in Brisbane. When you arrive in Brisbane rail station you have to stand and wait for a bus or taxi to get you to the centre of Brisbane. I believe a local train has now reduced this problem but the insanity of these slow ‘connections’ remains.

14. Simple analysis of the problem will reveal there are many means to connect the regions of the UK other than high speed trains. The best and perhaps most cost effective of these, is to improve connectivity using the internet. This has the potential to allow passengers to work during their journey on conventional trains. This will make the speed of the train less important.

15. A new train route will cause considerable loss and damage to the countryside and communities through which it is intended to pass. The least of these is the one hundred ancient woodlands which will be destroyed. At a time when the country has been promised it will be more self sufficient in food, farms will be significantly negatively affected.

16. One hundred ancient woodlands, fauna and flora and in areas of outstanding natural beauty and special scientific interest will be permanently harmed or eradicated at a time when the environment is being prioritised, not least because of climate change.

17. Trains are a less safe means of travel than flying and in the future, the hyperloop. The later will be so safe that the prototype has already been trialled over a short distance by it’s designers and backers, personally. Hyperloop is frictionless so will require a fraction of the amount of energy required to propel an ordinary or high speed train.

18. To fit the broader brief of ‘increasing connectivity’ within England, new trains and routes should be started in the North. Phase One HS2, starts in London and therefore does not benefit those in the North unless they want to go to London.

19. The money spent by the Test and Trace and PPE procurement was approximately 57 billion pounds. This is in the same ball park as the current estimated cost of HS2! If HS2 costs reach 106 billion pounds, then this is the same as the cost of running the National Health Service for a year. Politicians have to be asked why not run the NHS for a year with this money?

20. The High Speed train network will not serve the satellite regions of the United Kingdom; known as Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland. These areas already resent to control of an England-centric government based in the south of England. In my view this may become the straw that breaks the camel’s back and play into the hands of the Nationalist Parties of each country, the first to fall being Scotland followed by Northern Ireland, then Wales and then Yorkshire – Cornwall?!

I have not included any benefits from a High Speed train network in the United Kingdom.

Such as list should always be included in any rational ‘problem solving’ assessment. My problem is, I can’t see any benefits, except some good publicity photos of dolphin-nosed trains and grinning politicians in high visibility jackets.

If there ever were benefits, these should have been gleaned after the second world war when the UK’s industrial cities had been demolished. Despite ‘winning’ the war in 1945 the UK was bankrupt. Japan ‘lost’ the war and in the 1970’s built some of the first high speed trains – the famous Skinhansen.

The Right Technology at the Right Time in the Right Place – Shinkansen

Perhaps some would argue that an electric train speeding along the tracks is much greener than the cars on the motorway running parallel. With the proviso that the National Grid is powered by carbon neutral fuel sources, this is true, but certainly by 2040 (as phase 2 is due for completion), cars and lorries are going to be mainly electric or hybrid. Any ‘green’ advantage to all trains is slowly disappearing.

And in the midst of a pandemic and in preparation for the next, is not personal transport going to be preferred to public transport?

What would Robert Stevenson be thinking if he saw the final phase of his invention being acted out? What would he say about today’s ultra wealthy taking personal travel into the edges of space and is that why he called his invention Rocket?

1829 Rocket – Still the best public transport concept applicable two hundred years later?

Ancient Light Part Three

14/07/202121/08/2021 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

In Part One of this trilogy entitled ‘Ancient Light’, I have described the curious electrostatic qualities of many ancient monolithic structures. They appear to be designed principally to concentrate weight upon piezoelectric rocks. This produces subtle effects that can be sensed by the human body and mind, even to the present day.

I have also examined the unique design of the King’s Chamber in the Great Pyramid of Cheops as an example of use of this same principle. The highly selective construction techniques suggest that static electricity was intentionally generated, stored and exploited in the pyramid. The Arc of the Covenant operates as a capacitor potentially discharging static electricity as an ‘arc light’ and even lightning from the pyramid’s peak.

In this final section I shall describe the ancient knowledge of the production of monatomic gold shared (and possibly inherited) with the Mesopotamian civilisations.

There are depictions of gold mined by humans for the Anunnaki ruling Mesopotamia in ancient times. Humans were possibly created as a slave race mining gold for their rulers. Even as far away as South Africa, Zulu legends speak of a time when “visitors of the stars” came to dig gold and other natural resources.

For more insight into the mystery of the ancient gold mining across Earth the work of Michael Tellinger is the authority on the subject.

Interestingly there is little in the Mesopotamian drawings to suggest a use for their gold. What there is however is a remarkably common theme in visual representations of two ‘demi-gods’ standing either side of ‘the tree of life’ holding a bag and cone shaped object.

When examined closely the ‘cones’ appear to be made of many spherical objects which have been formed together into the shape of a cone. It is always held at mouth level as if in the gesture to eat. It is surely no coincidence that this same image appears in Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs.

Akhenaten Offering / Honouring Bread to the Sun god Ra and the life giving ‘solar energy*’ symbolised by the Ankh at the end of the ray.

The best line of investigation that allows modern readers to penetrate this mystery, comes from a renowned Egyptologist Sir Francis Petrie of University College London. He produced a report for his sponsors on a trip he made in 1904 to Mount Horeb in the Sinai Peninsula.

The full story is described in detail by Sir Laurence Gardener in the excellent video below;

Gardener describes Petrie’s discovery of an ‘alchemical laboratory’ in an Egyptian Temple on Mount Horeb ( later Mt. Sinai), dedicated to the goddess Hathor. Within the temple store rooms, is found 50 tons of a mysterious white powder, conical stones, metallurgists crucibles, tanks and basins. Much of the design stylisation on these and other objects is Mesopotamian. Inscriptions mysteriously refer to ‘Mfkzt’ (pronounced Muf Khut)’ and ‘bread’ and ‘light’.

Petrie decided that the use of this laboratory went back to the very first Ancient Egyptian Dynasty and continued in production until the final 18^th Dynasty. Laurence Gardener describes the story of the flight of Moses and the Israelites. Moses famously went up Mt. Horeb (or Mt Sinai, as it was later called) where there was seen fire and smoke at night. We are told that this came from an Alchemical Laboratory where Moses would have observed the transmutation of gold into a powder. Exodus describes how Moses burnt the golden calf in the fire and ‘ground it to a powder’.

We should be aware that Moses was trained as a priest by the Egyptians. His great grandfather was Thutmoses 3^rd, who reorganised the ancient mystery schools of Thoth and founded the ‘School of Master Craftsmen’ at Karnak. They were called ‘The Great White Brotherhood’ because of their preoccupation with a mysterious white powder.

In the tradition of the goddess Hathor, a cow and a nursing goddess, came the ‘powdered milk that;

‘…gave the Pharaohs their divinity’.

It is no secret today that gold can be transmuted into a white powder in a furnace and this powder confers good and longevity, (common to Royal families even to this day!). It is called ‘monatomic gold’ or ‘ormus’ and can be even purchased on E-bay!

‘There is nothing new under the sun’ – King Solomon

Is it possible that in large quantities over long periods of time, this powder may alter human consciousness to a higher ‘god-like’ level? Clearly the Mesopotamians and Ancient Egyptians thought so, to the extent that they must have processed large amounts of precious gold to deify the Pharaoh. After all, the role of the Pharaoh was to be both man and a god, and achieving this status whilst living, was his or her aim.

Just to explore the Old Testament, Moses story a little more, there is the narrative of ‘Mana’ appearing on the ground like dew ‘from Heaven’. This mana could be made into cakes and consumed and appeared when the Israelites had run out of food. Can we conjecture that this substance was also powdered gold placed there overnight by priests for the people, until we consider a clue from Mesopotamia. Here the name for powdered gold was Shemana and it is more than tempting to take this as being identical to Mana.

There is a discrepancy in appearance – or perhaps it appeared in two forms. The ‘mana from heaven’ described in Exodus as feeding the Israelites, is described as being ‘like a coriander seed in size and shape’. This appearance resembles the ‘seeds’ that make up the cone shapes in Mesopotamian reliefs.

And thou shalt set upon the table shewbread before me always’

Exodus 25:30

This extract from Exodus show us firstly how important ‘shewbread’ (or white powder cakes) was. The cone shaped stones found by Petrie in the Temple of Hathor on Mt Horeb, may well have been moulds with which to make cone shaped vessels to hold or mould the shewbread.

Laurence Gardener tells us that the 4^th Dynasty was the era of the pyramid building where Hathor is always depicted with representations of the Pharaoh. We can imagine a society in which the workers drank beer, the middle classes and aristocrats used a narcotic derived from the blue water lily and Pharoahs ate Monatomic gold.

With the Ark present in the King’s Chamber of the Great Pyramid, I have described in part two how high voltages and plasma could have been generated between the wing tips of the Cherubim. Such a high temperature might have been used as a furnace to turn gold into the precious white powder but I do not believe there is any evidence for this. Such a process would have produced smoke and waste materials and the interior of the King’s Chamber is remarkable for being clean.

The alchemical creation of white powder was in furnaces in the Temples, not in the pyramids, in my view. But there is another cleaner method for producing monatomic gold, which could have been one of the functions of the pyramids.

As a clue, one of the contents of the Ark of the Covenant, as well as the tablets on which the commandments were inscribed, was some Mana. According to the Book of the Epistles, this was possibly held in a pot made of gold.

Modern pyramid experimenters have found many extraordinary characteristics even in scale models of pyramids. Modern experimenters Mary and Dean Hardy of Allegan, Michigan took a gold coin and hung it at the King’s Chamber level of a Great Pyramid model. After some time the gold coin got a clear “oil” on it and the gold was etched away under the drops of oil. This oil can be reduced to the white powder known as Orm or Monatomic Gold.

From my own personal experience I once worked for an architect in Australia who described himself as a ‘modern alchemist’ and had a laboratory over our work place that he regrettably never showed me. I remember him telling me however, that it was possible to produce oils from metals, a fact that struck me at the time, as worth remembering.

An unlikely scientist in this story is Sir Isaac Newton. He was an alchemist for the second part of this life and deeply interested in the Bible and the pyramids. The following extract is from a recent sale of some manuscript belonging to the great scientist.

“He was trying to find proof for his theory of gravitation, but in addition the ancient Egyptians were thought to have held the secrets of alchemy that have since been lost. Today, these seem disparate areas of study – but they didn’t seem that way to Newton in the 17th century,” Gabriel Heaton, Sotheby’s manuscript specialist, told The Guardian.

The traditional quest of alchemists is that they tried to turn ‘lead into gold’. Such a ‘story’ in my view, is yet another example of a ‘red herring’ to hide the truth. The transmutation of gold using a ‘secret fire’, is the true ‘secret of alchemy’. Chemists such as Nicolas Flamel called the Shemana, Mana, white powder, Ormus – the Philosophers’ Stone.

Oil of Gold – picture credit Kymiaarts.com

The ‘secret fire’ may not be actual fire but the concentrated energy within the pyramid at the location of it’s inner chambers, where gold transmutes by the action of invisible fire or ‘energy’.

The findings and analysis of his ‘white powder’ by Sir Flanders Petrie where never published. This may have been because it contradicts some elements of the Old Testament. It may also be that the knowledge of the philosophers stone and it’s effects was desired to remain secret by those in powerful positions who already knew about it…such as the Freemasons and other Societies in possession of and trusted with guardianship of ancient secrets.

There is a twist in the story, because the white powder has been analysed in modern times by the physicist Andrei Sarhakov. He describes it as ‘exotic matter’ because one of it’s characteristics was that it weighed less than nothing! In other words it was not affected by gravity. It’s ability to levitate itself could be transferred when placed on other matter.

These gravitational effects remind us of the interest that Sir Isaac Newton took in developing a theory of gravity that has advanced civilisation to this day! Was he also exploring the possibility of ‘anti-gravity’?

Even more extraordinary is that Sarhakov found Orm could move into another dimension if we want it to, a concept familiar to Quantum physicists and modern mystics, but which the general public find hard to comprehend.

Interdimensional Travel – not new to mystics and of greater benefit than physcial space travel…

This three part story is one with many ‘loose ends’ as a pessimist would describe them or ‘exciting paths to explore’ for optimists. If we accept the possibility of knowledge, nay enlightenment, in the ancient past that is but a memory today, the narrative becomes just slightly easier to tie together.

The great unknown remains the ‘energy’ associated with the monoliths and large buildings from our past. We know that these buildings are found all over the world and were inspired by known effects on human consciousness . All of this was enhanced to a superlative level by the ingestion as ‘bread’ of a mysterious white substance which today is called monatomic gold.

I conclude with a quotation from the rear cover of John Michell’s classic book;

‘The View Over Atlantis’;

*’The entire surface of the earth is marked with traces of a gigantic work of prehistoric engineering, the remains of a once universal system of natural magic, involving the use of a polar magnetism together with another positive force related to solar energy’.

There remains a great mystery about this energy known as ‘Chi’ and many other names. What we can be sure of, is that there is no smoke without, fire.

Pandemos

13/06/2021 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

Common to all the people

The thing with pandemics is that they are far from being ‘unprecedented’ as many politicians offer as an excuse for making mistakes. Historically there is a long list including the plague or ‘Black Death’ as it was known in England.

So aware are public health experts today that, certainly in the UK, pandemics are regarded as the number one risk. Governments have to be prepared for even the most unlikely eventualities and there will be a plan, somewhere. This will describe the risks – particularly the level of harm – and how to mitigate and eventually, eliminate, those risks.

A well thought out emergency plan will include the ‘hardware’ and ‘software’ needed. Warehouses across the country will store vast quantities of ‘just in case’ resources, from dried baby milk to personal protective equipment. Software will be posters and public information announcements already prepared for broadcasting to worried populations. It’s a whole area of expertise and those trained will be employed in all levels of government, from national to local. Protecting the population of a country is, after all, one of the primary functions of government.

Let us examine, pandemics caused by viruses. To mitigate and plan for a new viral infection there are six stages;

Identify the origin of the virus and strictly control the contributory factors.
Analyse the virus and it’s methods of transmission between hosts.
Analyse the effects of the virus on the human body.
Identify ways of preventing and treating the virus and it’s transmission.
Share all of the hardware and software between countries of the World to do the above.
Initiate prevention and treatment programmes throughout the global population.

At the time of writing there is a pandemic which is estimated as causing between 100,000,000 and 400,000,000 infections a year, according to the World Health Organisation. There has been a dramatic growth of cases in recent decades and at least half of the world’s population are at risk.

*picture credit: thenativeantigencompany.com*

The virus causes mild symptoms but in some cases can produce acute flu-like symptoms in humans. There are four serotypes meaning it is possible to be infected four times. According the BBC News App, ‘explosive outbreaks can overwhelm hospitals.’ In it’s most lethal form, fatality rates are 1% of the population when proper treatment and care is available.

Readers will probably have realised by now that I am describing dengue fever or DENV.

It’s a viral infection that you certainly do not want to experience. It’s commonly known as ‘break bone fever’ as it causes severe pain in muscles and bones. Like all viruses it poses a significant threat to the human population.

The good news for those living in high risk urban areas in the tropics, is that a new method of prevention has given very promising results in trial. The BBC News App reports that infections in the city where the trial took place were cut by 77%.

The method used ticks item 4. in my list above. Researchers used a ‘miraculous’ bacteria (Wolcachia) to infect host mosquito’s that spread the virus. The bacteria makes it much harder for the DENV to survive in it’s shared host so the mosquito is less likely to cause an infection. The trial set about introducing this bacteria into the local mosquito’s; fighting fire with fire.

What we can learn, in common with most viral outbreaks is that the origin of the virus and it’s method of transmission must be thoroughly investigated (1. above).

With this understanding, whenever new virus’s are discovered, pandemics can be prevented more quickly and as we know – speedy intervention is vital to reduce transmission. In an ideal world, governments will work together. Knowledge and resources should be immediately sent to the centre of any outbreak and paid for by global contributions rather than the host country, in my view. NGOs and strategic public health organisations, I believe, should be given overall control of treatment of the outbreak, with politicians merely signing off the allocation of national resources. Each country contributes according to it’s means, the rich and those without any outbreaks (pre-pandemic) pay more.

And if one pandemic is given disproportionately more publicity and resources than equally serious concurrent pandemics, what could possibly be the reason? Mind the mind gap!

The Space Time Cage

21/05/2021 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

The standard monkey cage encloses a space using three dimensional planes; x,y and z.

Take one standard monkey, place him in the cage and it’s game over for monkey freedom.

Humans also occupy a cage only it is less simple to observe – because it is infinite. We live in an ‘infinity monkey cage’ in which we can travel in any direction – but with the restrictions of always coming back to the start.

Then it gets complicated. Scientists measure time; from leaky water clocks to atom accurate atomic clocks. This single act of measurement creates a past and a future – pressing our minds into an ever smaller space, or is that a larger one? Either way it puts human endeavour into a tight spot.

Things must be done ‘on time’. In a kind of cosmic act of cookery, we are placed in a dome shaped oven to cook for a measured period and then emerge as plump loaves of bread. The cosmic clock is not our friend but our enemy, for it cannot be beaten. It ticks inexorably in the background of all our endeavours.

This dominant dimension in our lives – I would argue it is not a dimension at all. The act of measuring a thing will not make it real if it is imaginary. Can you measure freedom?

Time picks us up and places us in a social order on a point of singularity within the Universe; it is called ‘being born’.

And as we grow into adults we accept this social order. We indulge in it’s whims which are justified as ethical (providing complexity and contradiction are ignored) and therefore acceptable. If you reject the ‘normal’ of that moment, you must risk being regarded as ‘not normal’.

An 18^th century normal is not a 19^th century normal. Slavery – which had been around for thousands of years – was voted out as unethical.

Humans were not learning but unlearning bad habits. It was never ‘natural’ to enslave your own species. Nature (if ever) rarely does it. This change in human consciousness was restricted by time. Slaves had been enslaved for millennia. Eventually, for ethical reasons – slaves were released to live in social equality.

It was just an imaginary game that had been played out by the victors at the cost of ruining millions of lives and their descendants.

Were there Roman aristocrats who refused to have slaves? I don’t know but such a person would have been described as ‘out of their time’.

Human societies evolve – not because of time but despite time. Some evolutionary steps are incredibly slow, but if you can not measure time, that is an invisible transition.

There is no ‘one direction’ for human evolution. We have freewill so do not hit the bars of the space cage, just as we do not hit the bars of the time cage. This fact alone should make us query the reality of space and time.

Are they not mere conventions?

Of course without matter and gravity we could not walk to the shops for a pint of milk, but physicality was only ever, a compromise. By shedding our acceptance of what is ‘normal’ or ‘fixed’ or ‘normal’ we edge closer to the reality of an infinite space.

The ‘man of the age’ who is lauded as a hero, is not a better human being. They are simply so much caught in the conventional illusion of what matters and what does not – that they go along with the fickle opinions of others – especially if they are being flattered.

The true ‘hero of the age’ is not of the age they appear to others to be in. Such a person acts independent of time either as a scientist like Nicola Tesla, an artist like Leonardo de Vinci or any of the prophets.

Examine the words of their words and their thoughts are independent of space and time.

They uncover / reveal / expound truths which are out of ‘time’ and ‘space’. Their starting and finishing point is infinite and exist in every reality.

Such truths as ‘love one another’ and 1+1=2, subvert corruption in human societies. They ‘unpeeled’ coverings that have been revealed as real in previous centuries. They will always be true.

Man has not been on Earth for long. If Earth was created in 1000AD then we came along on 22 December 1999. We are no more than a passing thought created just in time for the end of the year. It would do us well to remember how truly insignificant humans really are but some of us, sometimes, get a glimpse of infinity, a quality which is not ours to hold.

The Arc – part two

07/05/202114/03/2022 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

My personal interpretation of the flood-myth story departs from the account in the Old Testament of the Bible. I take issue with the simplistic account of wild animals compliantly lining up in pairs. We are told that the majority (seven of each) of the animals were domesticated, not wild and selected as food for Noah and his tribe. Therefore, I suggests that the only live animals taken onboard the ark were domesticated. Could it not have been that a considerable amount of work had gone into transforming wild species into domesticated varieties?

There was a strong motive to harness the power of a giant Aurochs in a ‘lite’ version which we now know in bovine form as bulls and cows.

Animals supported the burgeoning transition into settlements and farming. There is evidence from the excavations at Gobleki Teke in Anatolia that the monolithic structures there were created by agricultural communities 5000 years before the ‘official’ date. Nobody knows who these communities were but the appearance of the Mullilu ‘bags’ carved onto one stone, suggests an intriguing link with the Annunaki.

picture credit: Wikipeadia – Goblekli Tepe in Anatolia Turkey – the so called Vulture Stone

So we should not be surprised when we see mummified pussy cats in Ancient Egypt. Domestication of big cats to, presumably rid grain stores of vermin, lead to the creation of the domesticated feline. She was even elevated to the position of ‘god’ and many statues of her exist, as do mummified cats in such numbers their bodies were once burnt for heating.

The final step in this theory and certainly the most disturbing and controversial is that homo sapiens are ourselves domesticated animals, not for food but also as genetically engineered ‘gods’. Animals so beautifully perfect in their form that cosmic consciousness felt free to enter and inhabit human bodies as ‘soul’.

Let us return to the animals being selected to be preserved in the Arc. Should we take at face value the account in the Bible?

The reference to the animals going into the arc ‘two by two’ is a conspicuous detail. Why state this? Why not explain what happened to the plant, reptile, bird and insect kingdoms? And there is surely a fascinating tale to tell about the animals that did not survive, such as Unicorns.

The omissions are glaring, including the assumption that Noah and his family were the only humans at that time to own a boat. Many other races survived to tell the tale, one on similar lines as Noah only perhaps with smaller boats and their own food banks; we have their stories so no proof is needed on that point.

With reference to the Biblical version, we might ask why the precise dimensions of the ship were worth recording. If there is any detail we require it is its means of propulsion, navigation and anchoring. If we are examine the credibility of the Arc’s uncontrolled travels on a tempestuous ocean, it is hard to take it literally.

A boat, loaded with wild carnivorous animals, was always going to be an impossibility. How do you stop the animals eating each other like they do in nature? A powerless and rudderless ship was more likely to hit a mountain top and sink, than preserve life with a big L.

Picture credit: Pinterest King Solomon’s First Temple with the Molten Sea supported by animals in the foreground

Was the Arc really a ship? Since the proportions of the Arc in the Bible are given as a cubic rectangular shape, I personally think it more likely it was a giant building. The dimensions of the Arc are exactly proportional to the First Temple of Jerusalem, which of course, was a building. Not only that but there is a truth in the creation of similar geometric forms at different scales, what we call today, fractals. The proportions demonstrate a complete understand of the Divine mathematics that governs all Creation. Perfect mathematical proportions are beauty and beauty is Divine.

So perhaps the Arc was a beautiful and functional building. Perched on a mountain top it would have had a far better chance of surviving. There might even have been several such buildings scattered around the globe around the world erected by different cultures and described, we know, in their own myths. After all, there was no real rush. To flood the world would have taken several hundreds if not thousands of years.

What we are missing in the Bible is an overview. Perhaps it has been over redacted over time, but certainly the Annunaki put a lot of effort into fine tuning a wobbling world so that it could emerge from catastrophe completely cleansed of impurity.

An Annunaki with Tree of Life in background

When we look at the records of how the Annunaki Sumerian gods are repeatedly depicted in pictures, they are standing either side of a flowering tree, a ‘tree of life’. This firstly gives us an idea of a ‘family tree’ with it’s various branches – genetic connections – as in ‘royal family’. The ‘blue blood’ of the modern royals might well be a linguistic remnant of the reptilian DNA in humans.

The pictures are intriguing. In one hand the ‘god’ or ‘demi-god’ is holding one of those bags already mentioned, and in the other, something resembling a fir cone. The bracelet contains a clue; an eleven petalled flower and a central ovary, one for each month of the solar year.

Pine cones are counter clockwise spiral forms that obey the arithmetical, Fibonacci growth patterns. They hint, symbolically, of the process of genetic engineering and or horticultural hybridisation. The seeds of a pine cone are fractals of a tree in nascence, and seeds is where this hypothesis goes next.

There are very few contemporary descriptions of what the ‘fir cone’ and ‘bag’ represent. However there is one translation from the Acadian language which uses the word, BANDUDDU or ‘Turkish Pine Cone’. The bag is a MULLILU or ‘purifier’. If we accept that the Sumerian gods were active in global DNA management, part of that process would be to eradicate unwanted elements of DNA, or as it is known today, ‘gene editing’. It was vital that disease and inferior life was eradicated or ‘purified’, for future generations, whether prior to a catastrophe or in micro-management of earth’s delicate ecosystems. At another level it was vital that humans became able to access ever increasing levels of consciousness.

picture credit: Wakehurst Place, Sussex, the Millenium Seed Bank

The subject of genes returns us to this ‘two by two’ anachronistic detail. It is an interestingly similar mathematical picture of the double helix of mitochondrial DNA. Could Noah’s Arc have been a bank of DNA? Does the Mullilu contain genetically altered / improved pollen to fertilise the tree of life? Small bags, even today, usually contain light, high value items. (One of the strategy’s adopted by the scientists today in order to preserve life in the event of a global catastrophe is to create seed banks.)

Should we be surprised that DNA codes are binary and there are two sets of two letters to describe them; A and C = 0 / G and T = 1. As we know, 0 and 1 is the binary language of computers. This code and it’s most recent ‘quantum’ addition (neither 0 nor 1) is now understood by many scientists to be how not only life forms are described, but the whole fractal universe. This is why beings from infinitely large distances away can come to our small planet and know the deep structures, or programming, of our three dimensional existence. It’s the same everywhere in the binary code Universe…two by two.

The Bill

01/04/202102/04/2021 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

There is presently being considered in the UK parliament a ‘Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill’. It is wide ranging in it’s intended effects. So much so that citizens are worried and they are asking questions are;

Are these new legal powers necessary and if so are stricter legal powers the best way to achieve the intended result?

In other words, is shooting the cockerel the best way to have a lie-in?

It is coincidental that the timing of these proposals coincided with a public vigil for a murdered woman, Sarah Everard. Sarah was tragically murdered, allegedly by an off duty police officer, whilst walking home.

The vigil was held in Clapham Common in South London. Unfortunately there were ugly violent scenes when police enforced the Covid regulations, which ban such public events. The confrontation had been foreseen. Prior to the vigil, an organisation called ‘Reclaim These Streets’ approached the police and then the High Court. The High Court told the organisers to sort it out with the police.

The question has to be asked, how ‘negotiations’ failed to find a solution that eliminated the risk of confrontation and violence.

picture credit: thedailymail
comment: how the media encourage dualistic thinking

People with an iota of problem solving sense and mediation skills, will know that if you set up two sides with conflicting agendas, they will always disagree with each other.

The BBC News webpage comments; For almost a year, the ambiguities and omissions within the coronavirus restrictions have left both the police and the public grasping for answers as to what is possible in public. It’s so complex we’ve even seen people fined for walking while holding a cup of tea.

The Covid ‘regulations’ are already a cause for antagonism between the public and the police. The police are having a hard time maintaining public confidence in their impartiality and fairness. The Police are currently lumbered with issuing Enforcement Notices, fines of £200, under the Covid Regulations.

Personally, I can see good reason to remove the police from the enforcement of Covid rules.

Police are principally responsible to protect the public from those breaking criminal law. They stopped being responsible for lost dogs and parking on double yellow lines long ago, so why are they involved with Covid rules?

One possible solution would be to create a new temporary role of ‘Covid Enforcement Officers’. This process of specialist enforcement officers has already been successfully with non-criminal offences, such as parking fines. Police used to issue parking fines decades ago. Then Traffic Wardens were created for this purpose and currently used ‘Parking Enforcement Officers’ have the role.

The Home Office might be able to recruit volunteers to enforce Covid Rules, given the large number of community spirited citizens who have already put their names forward for public service during the emergency. Alternatively, or as well as, the Home Office could pay CEO’s in the full time role. Alternatively or in addition, the Home Office might use the services of those currently paid to ‘furlough’ at home. This at least would be a better use of tax payers money. The role might also be given to a strictly selected portion of those ‘homeless’ and living in hotels at public expense and even released prisoners. Both groups who might well rise to the being awarded public trust and benefit for the rest of their lives for some experience of employment. My point is that there are many avenues to explore before dismissing the role of CEO.

Let us next examine the subject of public protests during the Covid state of emergency. It cannot be denied that where there is a public protest planned over an issue of current high public interest, there is good reason for respecting public feelings. If the government restricts the human right of protest it runs the risk of appearing draconian. When the government and rule of law is perceived by citizens to lose the high moral ground, ‘policing by consent’ becomes difficult to impossible. We see this in Hong Kong and Myanmar at the moment where protest has effectively been made illegal.

The problem for the British government that the vigil in Clapham Common posed, was for a potential ‘mass Covid spreading event’ to take place. This was the fear and Police had a duty to prevent such an outcome. They would be sure to be blamed for not using their powers should there be a subsequent localised outbreak of Covid infection.

The problem solving method used was for both sides to line up against each other like in a medieval battle. Even the High Court ran from this confrontation. All were victims in my view of the process of dualistic thinking or ‘either or’ solutions.

The way I would look at this problem is that it is not only a ‘police’ responsibility. In most problem solving processes, problems will be found to be widely shared. Who might the other stake holders be?

Just of the cuff I would suggest that the problem was owned by the organisers, those attending, the Park Authorities and the by-laws, the National Health Service (local hospitals), Human Rights organisations, the Courts, scientists of the health and social variety, the local MP and London Mayor’s Office, Legislators and the Home Secretary.

The only intervention the government could conceive was a new law, because that is what governments do; a classic case of ‘digging the hole deeper’. This is how they intend to make the present police powers more stringent;

The Bill being proposed wishes to prevent public protest that creates “serious public disorder, serious damage to property or serious disruption to the life of the community”.

The lack of any nuance to this ‘nail – hammer’ thinking was, in my opinion, is woeful. If the complexities of solving a problem are embraced, then solutions are abundant.

For instance in the case of this public vigil by, say one thousand people, it can be be managed to achieve the clearly set out objective…to let people have their moment of remembering peacefully and without disproporthionate harm to themselves or others. After all, if strangers mix inside a supermarkets without creating mass Covid spreading events each day, then a single outdoor event is considerably less risky. Experience of public gatherings outdoors, including when not socially distanced, has shown that mass Covid events do not take place afterwards. This was shown to be the case at recent public protests in the USA such as the Black Lives Matter marches or the infamous storming of Capitol Hill.

Aside from the spread of infection it is hard to see why any peaceful outdoor protest should culminate in;

“serious public disorder, serious damage to property or serious disruption to the life of the community” if managed properly.

There are clear Covid rules of social distancing, mask wearing and hand washing and the attendees would willingly follow such rules as they Sainsbury’s where public disorder is not considered an imminent threat.

A vigil by definition, is a passive affair where people sit or stand with candles and placards to express their feelings of solidarity, sadness and, in this case, discontent that a young woman’s public murder makes many women feel unsafe.

Imagine how a Problem Solving / Protest Management Meeting that I am envisaging, might have taken place. There would be numerous attendees with multiple points of view but with a overlapping and shared desired outcomes. The aim of the meeting will be to express and examine all views in a spirit of co-operation to solve a shared problem. The fruit of such meetings is that solutions can be just as impactive as force, but in a subtle and almost invisible way.

So if you were the Superintendent of Parks, would you not be a good person to involve in how to make this peaceful event as safe as possible whilst supporting the Human Right to protest? You could provide detail maps of the park showing entrances and exits, toilet facilities, how previous public events had been managed, first aid and other emergency considerations (normal for large gatherings), catering etc. etc. in as much detail as you need and that’s just the Park Keeper.

The Fire Service say they could provide sand bags for people to sit on at the required distances…good idea…and safe bins to dispose of used candles. The local press and police might hire a drone to take photographs from above. The police use it to monitor events and the press get some great photograhps. Those attending are told that by staying on their sandbags they images will be spectacular visually, whilst respecting privacy and not spying on indiviuals. Instead of a grid, an local artist might design a shape for the sandbags and candle holders, like a flower of rememberance. You get the idea. It’s soft management designed to delight not draw battle lines.

The Covid Enforcement Officers might have produced some posters which will be clearly displayed at the entrances to the Vigil Arena, reminding attendees of the Covid safety rules and the fines for infringement.

I could list the inputs of each party but you get the picture. Towards the end of the meeting the person representing the local police, shares that there is intelligence that the an anarchist organisation are planning to attend. There is a history of them creating public disorder and damage to property. A few mug shots are shared.

Are These People Mourners or Political Activits?

The Police therefore commit to having 200 riot trained officers on hand but out of view, in case of “serious public disorder, serious damage to property or serious disruption to the life of the community”. They confirm that there are existing laws under the Public Order Act, Criminal Damage Act and Breach of the Peace to make arrests and allow the vigil to continue peacefully.

Dame Cressida Dick, Metropolitan Police Commissioner, is at the meeting and says that she intends to take part in the Vigil. Everyone applauds. Apparently, several other celebrities and leaders of Human Rights and Women Safety organisations are also going to take part. There is decided to be a VIP area next to the area designated for the Press.

In this hypothetical scenario the event takes place and the Anarchist ‘rent-a-mob’ do make an appearance. They are ‘kettled’ away from the vigil into an area that the Park Superintendent recommended which is surrounded on three sides by high fences. Flood lights had been secretly positioned their and their switching on allows for CCTV surveillance to begin and the press to get some good pictures. The police keep them there until the vigil has ended and the park is clear. Two anarchists are arrested are, both for previous offences using outstanding warrants.

My conclusion is that any public protest with warranted public interest and sympathy, should be allowed to take place under Covid regulations, and the Regulations should be amended to permit this. It is for the committee of interested parties to decide what level of public interest and support exists, not the courts or the police.

In summary, when the only parties involved are cast as protagonist and enforcer, the result will tend towards the violent scenes sadly witnessed on Clapham Common. Giving the enforcers more powers to enforce is no solution, and leads to the very thing purported to avoid, that is;

“serious public disorder, serious damage to property or serious disruption to the life of the community”.

So in answer to the question at the top of this essay which was;

Are these new legal powers necessary and if so are they the best way to achieve the intended result?

…my answer is no. The existing laws were sufficient for the nine arrests made at this vigil. Next time, organisers should seek the help of the ‘partnership approach’ to public protest event planning. Use it or ignore it at your peril.

Whose’s Afraid of the Big Bad Conspiracy?

01/03/2021 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

The Gunpowder Plot was possibly conceived and attempted by a group of provincial Catholics in England against King James I. They met secretly to plan an execution of the protestant King by blowing up the House of Lords. The plot was thrawted on the 5^th November 1605.

The Cambridge English Disctionary defines a ‘plot’ as;

‘a secret plan made by several people to do something that is wrong, harmful, or not legal‘

We might then define a plot as; ‘a plan with evil intent’. But in the 1960’s a new word was used to define a plot; ‘conspiracy’.

The Cambridge English Dictionary now defines ‘conspiracy’ as;

‘the activity of secretlyplanning with other people to do something bad or illegal: ‘

The difference between a plot and a conspiracy is not clear from these simple definitions.

Please bear with the writer for one final definition as this essay is building up to something which affects us all. What is meant by the term ‘conspiracy theory’ and should we dismiss such theories as ‘conspiracies’?

The Cambridge English Dictionary definition of a theory is;

‘a formal statement of the rules on which a subject of study is based or of ideas that are suggested to explain a fact or e7*-89vent or, more generally, an opinion or explanation: ‘

A conspiracy theory is therefore not a description of truth, although some may take it to be so. It is a ‘suggestion’ which is being applied to explain facts. This may be in a way previously discounted as new facts emerge or are reinterpreted.

Conspiracy theorists are easy prey for derision because of this confusion between a theoretical and and accurate description of an event. Wikipedia describes this well;

‘The term (conspiracy theory) has a negative connotation, implying that the appeal to a conspiracy is based on prejudice or insufficient evidence.’

The notion of a conspiracy theory has itself become the subject of biased logic, when it is derided out of hand without a fair hearing. An example might be it’s use as a term of derision by the United States CIA. They used and perhaps coined it, to discredit disbelievers in the findings of the Warren Commision. This was set up to investigate the assasination of President Robert Kennedy.

The use of the term as an emotional form of ‘mud slinging’ by those convinced to be on the side of rational argument, shows how the accusers can sometimes be as misguided as those they accuse of bias.

When bad things happen, such as a plane crash, there is often ambiguity due to the absence of information from a thorough investigation. Theorists have to match a set of facts with a most likely explanation of what happened.

During the sequential investigation process, various theories will adapt to facts. Eventually investigators will propose a theory that fits the facts more closely than previous theories.

Scientists produce theories which are reviewed by their peers and proven beyond doubt before being adopted as a scientific ‘law’. Einstien’s Special Theory of Relativity is a good example of a theory that could not be proven in his time. Einstien used mathematics to determine the proof of his theories but because the technology of the era was not able to test the theory by experiment, it was long after his death before his theories were proven.

Is it fair that conspiracy theories are given a reputation for being innacurate merely for being supposed to be conspiracy theories. The use of the term as derision is in itself troubling because logically, there is only ever one correct interpretation of events and a so called ‘conspiracy theory’ may be that one. Just as aircrash investigators reach a logical explanation of events so may conspiracy theories, eventually be revealed as true.

The State, or organisation within a State, which attempts to deny events that the theorists are getting right, puts loses trust.

Conspiracy Theories gain considerable credence by focusing on events for which there is no evidence to disprove the theory. For instance, you might suggest that Aliens are already on the planet Earth and have been for a very long time. The subject is so ‘taboo’ in modern societies that governments conspicuously share very little of what they know. Rationalisations are made to ‘explain away’ what witnesses have observed as being something else. For instance a moving light in the sky is explained to be a ‘weather baloon’. If the serving press officer admits on You Tube decades later that this was what he was told to say rather than the truth about a real crashed Alien craft, who are the public to believe?

We live in a time when information is being smoke screened as ‘fake’. We do not know what to believe. It used to be that books and newspapers, that is the written word, were trusted to report the truth. Authors and journalists would lose their reputations and careers if they printed as facts, something which was not from mulitiple, trusted sources. Since the rise of the internet and the general ease of access to all kinds of ‘information’, it is hard to determine between the real, the fake and the absurd.

This phenomenon has been compounded by a growing public distrust in ‘experts’. This is despite the fact that the training and experience of experts means they are right most of the time. After a small amount of research, it is possible to believe you have discovered a truth. What is commonly discovered is that after a large amount of research, you begin to doubt.

Conspiracy theories suffer from this ‘instant expert’ phenomenon and exploit the doubt of reasonably minded people. Complex events, such as the events of 9/11, require observers to be air traffic controllers, communication experts, pilots, air force strategists, architects, engineers, demolition experts, emergency reponse planners and practioners, intelligence officers, politicians, journalists and investigators. There are certainly more areas of experties than these but the point is that investigating the event and it’s motives are highly complex and require meticulously unravelling. Complexity can itself become a smokescreen to baffle the casual observer.

Even simple questions such as, ‘how could two aircraft be used to bring down three buildings?’ are ignored. When there is a pronounced silence from people who should and might know, or worse they start disappearing, citizens should become suspicious.

Fortunately the so called ‘free world’ is open to scrutiny at many levels and Freedom of Information Acts in countries like the USA and UK testify to this. However when clauses are written into these Acts that prevent the release of information publicly for ‘reasons of national security’ there is a window for suspicion to open.

The whole story around ‘Wikileaks’ is a testament to how there will always be room for alternative intepretations of facts or what is termed, ‘my version of the facts’.

If your government derides conspiratorial theories just for being ‘conspiracies’, ask yourself the question, who is hiding what? Perhaps by hiding the truth harm is being caused to citizens of that country? If your government acts in secret and causes harm to it’s populations by an act or ommission or failure to be timely in either or both, is that a plan, plot or a conspiracy?

For instance:why is the Gunpowder Plot so called? Gunpowder is inanimate and does not plot. Surely this was a conspiracy planned by the Spanish Catholic monarchy against the Protestant English monarchy? Or are we not meant to say that?

Is There Anybody There?

14/02/2021 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / 1 Comment

A ghost walks into a bar and asks, ‘do you serve spirits?’

Humans have currently been obliged to believe in invisible beings, viruses. We believe that the Corona virus is everywhere as if it were a spirit. The only difference is that with a microscope you can see viruses and know that they exist.

The similarity of this belief to the ancient understanding of the spirit world is uncanny. Modern science has not been able to prove ‘spirits’ exist, therefore we are encouraged to believe that they do not. But logically, not being able to prove something exists, does not prove it does not exist. Perhaps the observer has the wrong sensing equipment or it is not sensitive enough, or too sensitive?

If we take a more rational approach, based on the acceptance that what the ancients believed, may still be true today, we can explore the existence of spirits further.

A friend of mine found himself, many years ago, in a monastery in Tibet. He casually opened a cupboard and was shocked to be staring at a human skull. He closed the door hurriedly and moved on. He returned the next day but the skull had been removed. Had he been seen by a spirit in the skull? The Sumerians of 3250 B.C kept a spirit in their homes, tempted there to occupy a statue, figurine or sometimes – a human skull.

I recently watched the ‘Magic Flute’ by the Master Mozart. The music is wonderful but my principle interest is the story. The first scene in Act One shows three witches destroying a serpent that has captured the hero, Tarantino. The opera sends him through an initiation process from darkness into light. He is able, when necessary, to annul the influences of evil spirits by playing a magic flute.

My own interpretation of the flute is that it symbolises the energy centres of the human body known as seven chakras. The flute plays a seven note scale by vibration of a column of sound and is similar to the hollow human spine in it’s construction.

Such control of energy within the human chakras affects our moods, feelings, physicality and state of mind. When mastered the adept in Tantric Yoga completes the journey from darkness into light.

Tarantino’s companion is a humble bird catcher. He represents the ‘ordinary’ man who goes through live mechanically. He fails the initiation tests preferring wine, women and bird song.

Let us move on to consider spirits outside of the story book, real live spirits. They love to do human things and are generally envious of the joys humans have from living in a physical world. The ancient Greek gods appeal to us because they behave as badly as humans. Lepricorns and other nature spirits adore dancing in rings in the moonlight to fairy fiddles. They look into our dimension with envy for they too enjoy nothing more than ‘wine women and song’.

Just as the ordinary human is enslaved by the five senses, so are spirits enslaved to us. The Genii in the story of Aladdin is in service, not a master. But secretly they long to occupy our living bodies for the same reason that God created the physical world – experience of physicality.

Sometimes they do – when someone is intoxicated for instance; which is the esoteric reason for alcohol being forbidden to Muslims. An intoxicated person often changes character quite noticeably and their bodies have super human strength, causing the North American Natives to name alcohol ‘fire water’.

Carl Jung concluded at the end of his life, that psychological complexes were outside of the human mind. When someone is ‘not themselves’ we should take this quite literally. Many Shamanistic rituals such as Voodoo, concern the removal of malign spirits or the placement of unwanted spirits for malign effects. Even modern Christianity has continued belief in the efficacy of exorcism and certain sensitive priests are trained in it’s practice. If it did not work, surely it would not have continued into the present day.

When a spirit is invited into a body as a Faustian ‘pact with the Devil’, the human party assumes magical powers. They may use these powers for entertainment as a magician or more worryingly, to gain political power. Should we accept the extraordinary rise of Adolf Hitler in 1930’s Germany as at least in part, being due to his thirst for occult powers? Why else did he send expeditions into Tibet and Antarctica, if it was not to gain occult power?

You might wish to believe that the modern psychiatric view that external beings are manifestation of our own minds. A vision of an etheric being by a single observer may occur when there is a conflation of the inner and outer worlds in that persons perception.

‘That way madness lies’

To which my reply is both yes and no. Yes, because all of our perceptions are no more than stimulus, decoded by bodily senses, into electrical pulses which are streamed into the brain. They are no more real than the images on our television sets are real. No, because the Universe is so large that there must be consciousness outside of human minds.

Part of the vanity of humans is the conscious or unconscious belief that we are alone. If we have never seen a spirit then it does not exist, is the false logic. It is false because there are many things we do not see that we use everyday. Our eyes only perceive a small part of the electromagnetic spectrum. We use infra-red ovens in the kitchen without a thought of whether infra-red energy exists. We use the effect and that is proof enough.

So it will come as a shock to humans when beings from other planets in our galaxy, appear on Earth, shaking the hands of heads of State. In doing so they will also shake the belief systems of every society, family and individual to the core. Present dogmas of belief whether in religion or politics or science, will be realised to have been at fault all along. For this reason governments seek to manage the time and place of this information. But it must be revealed and I sense that the present pandemic is building a global consciousness of cooperation that has never existed in history.

Accepting that consciousness exists outside of the human body, whether in spirit form or in another corporeal body, is the next step for humans.

The Old Testament describes how our forefathers experienced gods thousands of years ago but like the magic of the micro wave oven, they did not understand the causes of the manifestations.

Ping

Instant Experts

04/02/2021 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

As knowledge expands through the centuries and decades, one might be forgiven for believing that, eventually, all that is possible to be known, will be known. It might be as a new dam which, after much rainfall, is full.

But like all oversimplified analogies, this one is flawed. As scientists discover more, they discover an infinity of new things. They have a job for life, for their subject reveals more, the further they explore. Hikers experience the same as they approach the apparent crest of a hill, only to discover more peaks beyond, what they call ‘false horizons’.

So, why are modern societies so confident? Well it is my contention that there is a part of the human psyche that is uncomfortable with the idea that it has only partial knowledge. I am referring to the ‘ego’ or ‘small self’. Ego’s have a tendency to take the easy route in life. They are for ever looking for the reward which requires little or no effort. Even dedicated scientists have been known to falsify their observations to promote their theories.

The present adulation of ‘celebrities’ in modern cultures is an example. An ordinary person, as we all are, may become celebrated for winning a competition or race or athletic achievement or something as banal as singing a song. The media and social glitterati turn on this flash of ‘success’ like sharks triggered by the scent of blood. The sometimes reluctant but usually eager victim, is propelled into a new world of abundance and admiration. Parties, limos, sex, money, drugs, interviews and media celebration all describe a voyage from the ordinary into an inflated fantasy world.

The truth behind this ‘yellow brick road’ is that this ‘celebrities’ are no different to any one of us. The only way out of ‘celebrity’ has sometimes sadly, been suicide.

Many fictional characters encapsulate the myth of ‘knowing all’ and the power that brings. A well known example is Arthur Conan Doyle s detective, Sherlock Holmes. Mr Holmes has a super human gift of observation and deduction which puts him way ahead of those not so empowered. Holmes is what today is called a ‘super hero’ because he wins every fight, whether physical or mental. He represents an aspect of the ego that all egos aspire towards; to triumph in every endeavour. When Holmes succeeds again and again, we are programmed to believe that this ‘hero’ is indomitable, all knowing, all conquering.

But Conan Doyle was clever enough to make the character of Holmes in some way, fatally flawed. Holmes lacked emotional intelligence and perhaps compensated for this by using drugs. Even the Ancient Greek heroes such as Achilles, demonstrate after many victories that no person is perfect and die at the hands of their adversaries.

We would do well to remember this today as we observe a new cult of ‘knowing all’ emerging. The true experts in a subject, such as academics and professional practitioners are being degraded as fast as the fools are being upgraded.

Whether you are talking about Presidents or Street Cleaning Operatives, people are being persuaded that they possess the super human powers normally reserved for ‘the experts’.

This illusionary level of confidence has even infiltrated the curriculum in schools. Children are being promised elevated careers way beyond their abilities. The premise appears to be that anybody is capable of anything. If this were true then only the top jobs would be good enough for young people. Filled with false expectations, they go willingly to University and pay for the privilege. At the end of the course, as their application forms are returned from the promised ‘top jobs’, they finally are given a spoonful of reality.

It is an old adage that ‘a little knowledge is a dangerous thing’ and yet this truth is forgotten or ignored today. Persons are deciding to build their own houses and argue with their architects. They diagnose their illnesses and argue with doctors. They become international Statesmen based on bluster and the blood of others.

The origins of this illusion are those employed by the ego when things begin to go wrong; deceit, threats, grabbing, bullying and other methods of gaining power over others. Many dictators today have achieved their position through these means. They continue to use them to remain in power for an indefinite period with extraordinary self delusion that the people like them. Any challenges are fought with a ferocity of a cornered animal for indeed, such people have cornered themselves by taking a false and harmful path.

The was a study by two academics which observed what is termed the ‘Dunning Kruger Effect’. The crux of this study is that people do not understand that they do not know things. It is the nature of how humans acquire knowledge and associated skills that in the beginning they find the subject rather easy. It is not until much later that say, a surgeon, realises the hidden risks, false avenues and areas of the unknown in their specialisation.

People who are not trained initially acquire a false confidence simply because it is impossible for them to know their short comings. A couple building a house might proceed with crayons and a cornflake packet to design their ‘dream house’. They sink their entire savings into the project. As the build progresses they make mistakes that are hugely costly and are driven into deep despair. These mistakes are of course well known pitfalls to professionals and would have known how to avoid making them.

Life teaches us the hard way for the arrogance of the ego by cutting us ‘down to size’. False pride and self confidence built on self deception, succeed in the beginning but slowly the mistakes and falsehoods creep in.

In life we learn that there are no true heroes. We are all vulnerable in our weaknesses and only become strong when we realise this. Instead of being a ‘know all’ we are better advised to ‘know how little we know’ in other words, adopt humility in everything we do.

Until our prizes, awards, honours, celebration, adulation, high office in affairs of state, are given to the meek rather than the bold, society will have the ‘instant experts’ and flawed heroes of that it deserves.

Real heroes are those who work within their limitations and admit mistakes or ignorance. They may not even achieve very much but what they have done has been done honestly.

Listen carefully to your politicians and leaders and see how often they express realistic aims tempered by humility. When a leader promises all and rarely delivers or admits to mistakes, use your vote.

Carrying the Sky

12/12/2020 / Matters Blog - Things that Matter to Me / Leave a comment

Question: how many stars can you see in the daytime?

Answer: One

That star is, of course, our sun and yet sometimes we overlook it’s splendour and magnificence. It becomes one of those many blessings that we take for granted when we consider ourselves poor.

The thief left it behind

The moon at the window

Basho

This poem was written by a mendicant monk in Japan after a thief took his only possession from his cave – his begging bowl.

Both the sun and moon represent powerful forces in our lives. They dominate our lives and loves in the most subtle of ways.

If you live in a part of the world where the appearance of the sun is unusual, then a ‘nice sunny day’ is one for being outside, perhaps even ‘sunbathing’. Deep in our beings we have a natural dependency and love of the healing rays of the sun that we wish only to be in it’s presence.

So strong was this connection in ancient times, that the Sun was regarded as a god by many cultures. The ancient Egyptians named him ‘Ra’. In their paintings and hieroglyphs, Ra is depicted spreading rays down to human figures, usually the Pharaoh. At the end of each ray is a hand sometimes holding an ‘Ankh’ or symbol of life.

One pharaoh called Akhenaten, ordered that the old Egyptians gods should no longer be worshipped expect for ‘Aten’. He referred to himself as the ‘son of God’ and is depicted with his wife, Nefertiti and children as a ‘holy family’, a theme later echoed by Christianity. Akhenaten even moved the capital city called Akhentaten. The temples had no roofs to allow in Aten’s rays.

He was not the last to conceive of a ‘sun city’. Louis 14^th bathed in the name of ‘The Sun King’ and adopted the sun as a symbol of his reign. He moved his royal court and government to the Palace of Versailles in 1682, from where his presence shone for all the gaze and wonder, at least until the solar eclipse which was the French Revolution.

The tradition continued into modern times when the French-Swiss architect, Le Corbusier designing a ‘radiant city’ or ‘Ville Radieuse’.

He too was had Utopian ideals but this time it was the common man who would bath in the all powerful rays of the sun. High rise buildings would be aligned in straight lines and wide spaces to allow light to spill into living spaces through large windows. All rooms were designed according to the proportions of the human body, as did the Ancient Egyptians, evidenced in the works of the mystic and scholar, Schwaller de Lubiz.

My point is that the Sun God has shone on mankind for thousands of years and it should not be hidden in ‘plain sight’.

If mankind needed a reminder, then the moon makes a perfect counter balance to the sun’s majesty. It has no light of it’s own yet can reflect with great brilliance in the night sky. The moon has an enduring power over humankind as a symbol of our ability to ‘reflect’ on ideas. This enables us to absorb and process ‘light’ as what we call ‘inspiration’ and underpins most of human development.

At some point in time, after the belief of Royalty being the sun God’s representative on earth, modern humans accept the reality that they, ordinary people, can do this as well.

Not only have we internalised the moon, but so may we swallow the sun.

‘The sun is in my heart

and I am ready for love,’

So sang Gene Kelly in the famous film, ‘Singing in the Rain’.

The place of abode for the sun is traditionally in the heart. The Indian Hindu mystics place the sun just below the heart in the ‘solar plexus’ chakra and it’s proximity is significant. The essence of ‘life’ is contained in the chambers of the heart muscle. It’s protein molecules are designed never to stop working – like the nuclear fission process in the sun; at least for the length of life of the human body. If a heart ever stops it can be powered back to life with a large charge of electricity from a defribilator.

Go sweep out the chamber of your heart.
Make it ready to be the dwelling place of the Beloved.
When you depart out,
He will enter it.
In you,
void of yourself,
will He display His beauties.

Mahmud Shabistari

I have quoted this beautiful verse before in my blogs as these lines, in my view, give humans all the information they need. They tell us that something is wrong in our hearts; they need to be swept out. Just as the skies fill with clouds and obscure the sacred sun the sacred moon, so too our hearts become obscured.

We get an idea of the size of the cleansing required in the psychological story of Hercules and his fifth labour;

The fifth labour (0f Hercules) was to clean the stables of King Augeas. This assignment was intended to be both humiliating and impossible, since these divine livestock were immortal, and had produced an enormous quantity of dung. The Augean stables (/ɔːˈdʒiːən/) had not been cleaned in over 30 years, and over 1,000 cattle lived there. However, Heracles succeeded by re-routing the rivers Alpheus and Peneus to wash out the filth.

Excerpt from Wikipedia

Note how the livestock are described as having ‘divine’ and ‘immortal’ qualities normally reserved for Kings. It is clear that even the cattle knee deep in their own dung, can aspire to being divine. Naturally, the cleaning takes place using the power nature, in this case water, a symbol of clarity, purity and power. Would it be too speculative to suggest they are the powerful arteries and veins of the human heart?

The Ancient Egyptians believed that Ra, the sun, was present in the heart of every human being; each human contained a small sun. They carried this divine power until death when the soul or Ra, departed the earthly body and returned to heaven and the afterlife.

This tradition is remembered in the Christian tradition as the ‘resurrection’ and in Islam as the ‘Mi raj’ or ascent of the Prophet Mohammed (s.a.s.) to heaven.

Note in this early painting the human headed horse on which the prophet (s.a.s.) sits. It is called the Buraq which means in Arabic ‘lightning’ or ‘bright’ with thanks to Wikipedia.

So we may reasonably conclude that we have revered the sun and the moon as symbols of our interior lives. We sometime express these divine principles in our buildings, our cities and our environment.

The sky is the most unchangeable, immutable presence in our lives and deserves contemplation and absorption where it can spin and shine for ever, if we let it.

Bring me sunshine
In your smile
Bring me laughter
All the while
In this world where we live
There should be more happiness
So much joy you can give
To each brand new bright tomorrow

lyrics by Sylvia Dee for Morecombe and Wise’s theme song

Matters Blog

Original thoughts on a variety of subjects that matter to me

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