Musings of a Middle Aged Man

With the return of the wolves, the Park experienced a trophic cascade leading to significantly healthier environs. Wolf predation on Elk led to a series of connected ecological changes. Fewer Elk resulted in healthier vegetation communities which drew in pond-making beavers, aquatic birds, better fish habitat, and more diversity in the songbird populations. Soil erosion was reduced...

Just Say No To Empathy?

The roots of tyranny are nourished with the blood of the innocents by random acts of unkindness that grow into rampaging rivers of destruction fueled by the raging flames of fiery hate frequently unleashed in the pitch of night to gain plausible deniability made possible by the absences of witnesses...the absences of living witnesses...for the dead see all...

It was while polishing up the first essay-story that I discovered a mechanism, a technique where reality holds no sway, allowing me to enter a canary aria world bordering on surrealism and create a beauty I was unaware could originate in my frog brain. The technique of which I speak is dreams, visions, dream-visions, vision-dreams, wherein the character enters a world that has absolutely no respec...

I am aware this can come across as nihilistic with the rejection of the generally accepted aspects of human existence, including objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value. I reject the notion that Ego-free existence has any relation to nihilism rather is an idealistic form of existentialism freeing us to reject societal expectations and create our own purpose and meaningfulness.

The live and let live in relation to a mosquito piercing my flesh does go out the window when I reflexively slap at the point of pain leaving a flat skeeter and a droplet of my blood smeared on my skin. And a mouse entering my home does so at its own peril but, for the meeses, I am exonerated because the executioner is a cat living in my abode. The cat is not bound by my preference to live life st...

While no culture functions flawlessly, there is always room for improvement, the culture works in its context otherwise the society would implode before rebounding with a new set of cultural norms built through trial and error into one that 'works' in their context.

The night of the mouse incident was cool so there was the very real possibility the venomous reptile, sensing the heat from the Mouse's body, might have crawled up and into my sleeping bag to avail itself of my body heat before slinking off for prey it was capable of swallowing whole.

Humans dream when the sun sets and the moon rises. Because Owls are denizens of the night, it is believed they carry messages between the physical and spiritual realms, similar to the diminutive hummingbird...

We operate under the assumption, the delusion, that everyone experiences life the same as we do. That assumption is as unprovable as the existence of a Supreme Being. Oh, we can speculate on the nature of another person as we speculate on the nature of God but there is no knowing with absolute, provable certainty...

It takes a special kind of evil to vilify the empathy necessary to live with understanding and harmonious coexistence. Neither political party desires harmony. It is by sowing the seeds of dissension they divide We the People to draw a majority to their side with the sole aim of winning elections allowing the elected to maintain power so they can control the laws that subjugate the electorate incl...

How do I worship thee? Let me pray the ways? No. Let me meditate the ways. I choose to sit naked on slickrock ensuring direct, physical connection with the beloved. Better, I lay prostrate, arms extended, toes pointed maximizing connection points to absorb Earth energy, to mingle my essence with Nature's marrow. For are Nature and Humans not one? Two seeds in the same gullet dovetailing with a...

There is a sadly humorous subReddit called "Shit Americans Say" containing a host of stupid utterances said by Americans in various posts both inside and outside of the Reddit platform. It is funny in the abject stupidity uttered by supposedly educated human beings. It becomes sad, very sad when you realize people actually believe the nonsense. Many show a complete lack of knowledge rega...

Fundamentally, creativity is at the core of becoming and being human. I do find it fascinating that the oldest religious figurines, the Venus', are all representations of the feminine divine, a truth that offends the patriarchy as evidenced by the male god religions that downplay the female contributions with some going so far as to label women unclean and inferior and objects to be subjugated...

A favorite Bible quote of the Christo-fascists seeking to undermine the essence of the American Republic, a constitutional Democracy prone to exploitation by a powerful minority, is: " God is the same yesterday and today and forever. " For some reason, they believe a stagnant deity is something worth bragging about, as if it makes their deity superior to one capable of learning and growi...

Any rendering of the infinite requires reductionism, trimming, and paraphrasing eliminating much of what makes the immeasurable unique so that the finite human mind can grasp at the whiskers of the entire entity. Hell, most humans have a difficult enough time understanding themselves, their acutely finite selves, let alone a boundless, eternal Master residing in the skies above...

My upbringing was decidedly European...perhaps...Western is the better descriptor. I am prone to categorizing and subcategorizing until everything fits into their nice little boxes of my own definition. Linear thinking. Box philosophy. Strictly illogical logic. One online troll I have encountered assumes I fit into the Dickocrat box because I am appalled by the words and actions of the Repricklica...

I am perfectly content to travel through life knowing there are gaps in my knowledge. I relish those gaps because they agitate my sense of wonder. Once the awe induced by wonder subsides, I am driven to explore and increase my knowledge toward understanding. To learn. Learning, rather than decreasing my sense of wonder, actually increases it...

The problem I have with holy books, scripture if you will, is not with the book itself. Much can be gleaned from the allegorical nature of the content. My problem lies with the people who elevate the human contrived works as absolute, inviolable truth despite the inherent errancy and inaccuracies in the text that are glossed over or rationalized...

We also assume Van Gogh took artistic liberty in his incredible painting, "The Starry Night" when he depicted the sky with curling and swirling light trails. We assume Isaac Asimov created a fantastical universe from his imagination rather than writing the reality of his Earthly experiences...

This morning I woke to the distressing news that the Governor of Florida has vetoed funds allocated to the arts in the latest budget. The surest evidence that art has the power to open minds to new realities comes when politicians defund art programs, especially in schools where young minds should be exploring possibilities rather than being constrained by political agendas...

According to 2015 Pew Research, 42% of Americans, up from 28% in 2007, have changed their religious affiliation from the one they were born and raised in. This includes switching to a different religion and crossing between affiliation and no affiliation. A University of Chicago study found that 35.7% changed affiliation to either another faith or no faith...

I prefer to experience life as a series of thoughts verified by direct interaction. I guess that makes me an empiricist where knowledge is derived from sensory experiences emphasizing observation and experimentation. I also fall into the Rationalist category believing logical reason and critical thinking are essential to evaluating empiricist experimentation when forming conclusions...

Conundrum: To be a big fish in a small pond lording your size to dominate the environment. Or to be a small fish in an ocean so expansive every day has the potential for new exploration while watching over your shoulder for bigger fish seeking to dominate you...

There are times I wish my mind acted like a prim, proper, pinecone, perfectly symmetrical housing a compact set of ideas perfectly encased waiting for the heat of knowledge to help the seeds burst forth then land in lush soil where they will germinate into a near perfect replica...