AMERICAN ZEN MEDITATION

In Zen Buddhist meditation, people focus on Konas, paradoxical riddles, to move beyond the analytical and egotistical mind.   Probably the most famous is ‘What is the sound of one hand clapping?’ 

These standard Konas might be fine for the oriental monastic mind who has far less ego, but it falls flat for the fast-paced Americans who live in a world of 280-character tweets.

Therefore I am suggesting some American Kona for American Zen meditation:

1.   Why does Superman have a cape?

2.   Why doesn’t Tarzan have a beard?

3.   Why is a nickel larger than a dime?

4.   Why are there no B-cell batteries?

Contemplate these questions while sitting in your five-minute meditation.

 

You can thank me later

The Ol’Buzzard

No Bullshit Zen 

 

Voting Conundrum

 

 

People believe what they want to believe, often facts don’t matter.

If you address an issue negatively that conflicts with someone’s belief, you have probably made an enemy for life. 

So many conspiracy theories and ‘alternative facts’ permeate our society that I consciously avoid commenting on the current controversies tearing apart this country.

It makes no difference to me if people want to believe the earth is six thousand years old, that Elvis is alive in Vagus, that UFOs will kidnap you and harvest your farts; but for the life of me, I can’t understand how a working, middle-class person can vote for Republicans.

 

Democrats passed Social Security, Republicans opposed it.

Democrats passed Medicare, Republicans opposed it.

Democrats passed VA funding, Republicans opposed it.

When George W. Bush crashed the economy and the two major automobile companies Dodge-Chrisler-Jeep and Chevrolet-GMC were facing bankruptcy.  Democrats bailed them out and Republicans opposed it.

Democrats passed the Affordable Care Act and Republicans opposed it.

Democrats passed funding for families and businesses hurt by the pandemic and Republicans opposed it.

Democrats passed a bill that limited the amount a senior would have to pay for medication and medical services, Republicans opposed it.

Democrats capped the amount that drug companies could charge seniors for insulin and Republicans opposed it.

Democrats passed the infrastructure bill that is paving our roads, repairing bridges, and creating jobs – opposed by Republicans.

 

What do Republicans pass?   Tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts that benefit the wealthy and major corporations.   They are a one-trick pony.   Republicans keep their base riled up by declaring that Democrats want to cancel Christmas,  take their guns, turn their sons gay, kill babies and make America into a black and brown majority country.   These are cost-free positions; but when it is time to pass legislation it will be to privatize Social Security, Medicare, and the VA. (turn these programs over to for-profit insurance companies to run) and of course: tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts for the wealthy. 

Ronald Regan declared it Trickle Down Economics: make the rich richer and the crumbs off their tables will feed the working class. 

It seems to me that working people voting Republican is like turkeys voting for Thanksgiving.

I can’t understand it.

The Ol’Buzzard

I READ THEREFORE I AM

 

I sometimes think that my reading is similar to people binge-watching TV.   I probably read at least thirty-five books a year, plus periodicals and articles that grab my attention.   There is never a time that I am not reading one or more books.    It is almost as if I am living in alternate worlds away from the realities of today. 

The human race is changing rapidly and I am not sure I like what I see.   Evolution throughout the animal world has required hundreds, if not thousands of years to achieve.   From African Eve to Homo sapiens required three million years.

 

 In the 1970s Alvin Toffler wrote Future Shock.  He proposed that changes in our knowledge and environment took many decades, if not centuries, before human acceptance.  He predicted that humans were incapable of accepting rapid change, and historically that had been proven.   This was probably true until the advent of computers.  Changes had always occurred slowly and, as a result, human evolution moved slowly.

  That has speeded up.

Because of technology and cell phones, the synapses in human brains are being rewired.  Where once we were social animals communicating through personal interaction, now our social interactions are primarily through technological devices.  Instead of talking we text. Our friends are followers.  We are rapidly moving to a virtual world.   We are evolving, and this is happening over decades, not centuries.

 

 Genome editing (CRISPR), pioneered by Jinnifer Doudna, has suddenly advanced human technology to an era of designer humans.    The Nazis dreamed of this; but now it is a reality.   Through CRISPR it is possible to manipulate the gender, hair and eye color, build, etc of an embryo.   A master race?    The moral implications are reigning in human experimentation, but the technology is here.  It is only a matter of time.  Like nuclear energy, what can be used for human benefit in defeating disease, can also be used to the human detriment.

   

Artificial Intelligence is another technology we have a tentative handle on.   Humans are limited by their acquired knowledge and the speed of access.   Computer speeds and storage capacity is unlimited and increasing exponentially due to nanotechnology.   As we advance in quantum technology all the knowledge of the world could be stored on chips no bigger than the point of a pin.    Supercomputers are being designed to teach themselves (AI) and through the internet could acquire all knowledge in the world almost instantly.  By the end of this century, computers will control every aspect of human life: energy, transportation, architecture, medicine…  Will computers become the herder and we the sheep?

 

That is if we survive this century.

 

The United States has 5,428 nuclear weapons, United Kingdom 225, Russia 5,977, North Korea 20, China 350, India 160, Pakistan 165, Israel 90, and France 290.   

How long before some unstable person does the unthinkable: the megalomaniac Donald Trump had the nuclear launch codes.   Kelly called Trump an idiot, John Bolton called him a moron.  The head of the CIA said it was like dealing with a kindergartner and that Trump was unbriefable because of his short attention span – we dodged that bullet (or warhead.)   Now Putin is nuclear rattling.

 

The world is changing rapidly and the human race is evolving. 

Science follows science fiction and the worlds of Ray Bradbury and Michael Crichton may be the step-cousin of the future. 

 

The Ol’Buzzard

 

It is not an asteroid, a super volcano, or climate change that will bring an end to the most destructive super predator to walk the earth;

NOT THIS ONE

THIS ONE

 it is the thousands of nuclear weapons in the hands of individual despots, religious fanatics, and outright idiots

   We dodged the warheads with four years of Donald Trump having access to the launch codes

But not to worry, the government has a plan to preserve the human race.

the Ol'Buzzard

THE ANTS WILL INHERIT THE EARTH

 

 

Except for the arctic, you can’t look around anywhere in the world without finding ant hills.   I know that people down south say that cockroaches will survive mankind, but they are wrong – it’s the ants.

In my yard, in the summertime, there are dozens of ant hills.   There must be thousands of ants beneath the surface. 

Ants operate in collectives, they can’t survive individually.   Neighboring collectives have been known to work together forming a super collective.

The Argentine ants were spread throughout the world via world trade.   When brought together Argentine colonies from different countries form super colonies, making them the most populated society on earth.

Regardless what you try, you can't get rid of the buggers.  When the nuclear apocalypse arrives, the aunts will survive to feed on us.  

By the way

Happy October 1st.