Photo: Hugo Antunez*
ANZA-BORREGO DESERT, SPRINGTIME
Dry sticks burst into blossom.
Flame-beaked ocotillos
wave in the warm wind.
In the scar of an arroyo
silvers a live stream.
This is the most precious garden:
not hothouse orchids
but a desert lavish with gold
brittlebush, our-lady’s-slippers,
bells ringing purple, indigo and mauve.
Just one season of unstinting rain,
and this place of thirst
blooms richest Eden.
Lilac-plumed grass tames to my hand.
Prickly pear opens its violet veils.
So after years without love,
tenderness makes us flower.
So our face
becomes the face of all,
unfolding petal by petal.
~ Oriana
*
MARCEL DUCHAMP: ALL WORKS OF ART DIE WITHIN ABOUT 50 YEARS OF THEIR CREATION
. . . essentially because the world has moved on and they cease to be contemporaneous. They become fossils. I remember hearing a famous art historian talking about Della Francesca's "Baptism of Christ" (that fabulous piece of work, now in the National Gallery, that so few people understand). He said that within a few years of its production it was put away in a back room with a cloth over it
— it had ceased to function.
THAT'S the point! Works of art FUNCTION! Art isn't some safe pet sitting there quietly waiting for you to stroke it and admire it — it is a beast. It bites. It is the visual equivalent of a book. It holds ideas and worldviews! It is shouting at you. The trouble is that art is also the product of a particular time and place. To understand it we have to understand the mind of its creators — their language. It isn't for the faint-hearted or the intellectually lazy — you have to learn the language!
You only have to look at the Cave paintings which we cannot hope to comprehend beyond the obvious. We're lucky enough to know a lot about Ancient Egypt but the real power of their art can only be guessed at because we don't think like them or see the world the way they did. The art of the past is ALL archaeology... we have to reconstruct its world in order to really understand it.
Our understanding of the World and of our existence is a construct. We create a rationale for it all because we cannot accept the idea that we just appeared as a consequence of reproduction and that we shall one day cease to exist. We believe that everything has a purpose — we always have, because that is a fundamental part of what being human is; we are matter contemplating itself. We see pattern, we see cause and effect. We want to be part of the "force" that runs the world, we have a desire to be in control; that is the animal we are. We create structures that take control; technology, language, religion. Art is part of that system of created structures.
If it isn't communicating then it is decoration.
I'm not dismissing "decorative art" because it also has a function — to bring pleasure into our lives. Life can be very ugly sometimes and a bit of pleasure thrown in there amongst the darkness can't be a bad thing. ~ Mieczysław Kasprzyk
Mary:
I don't think art ever stops talking to us. Beauty itself always speaks.
Jon Wesick:
Technology changes but human nature stays the same.
John Guzlowski:
I like the Duchamp quote about art being dead in 50 years because the world it speaks to is gone. I feel that way about a lot of literature. I loved reading 19th century American realists when I was in college. That stuff was written 150 years ago. Who remembers what the world or America or people were like.
My last teaching was about war lit. I looked at the American literature of war from the Civil War to the present. There were always students who knew little about our wars and weren’t interested in finding out more. I would lose about a third of the students every semester.
I can see that one of the values of that old stuff is as an experience of history. It helps us understand the world that the writing was created in but who’s interested in that world?
Mary:
Some things haven't changed much...some basics of human character and behavior. We still find meaning in classic Greek art and poetry, and that world was much more different from ours than, say, Dickens' or Mellville’s.
John:
We find meaning there and wisdom, but who’s interested in looking? Yesterday, I gave a poetry reading at a local high school. I read about my parents and their experiences in the camps.
Before I started a teacher asked, how many students have read Anne Frank or Elie Wiesel? No one had.
She then asked how many had heard of the Holocaust.
About half had.
This ain’t bad.
Roughly 43% of Americans don’t know basic stuff about the Holocaust. One in 10 don’t remember ever hearing the word.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/survey-finds-shocking-lack-holocaust-knowledge-among-millennials-gen-z-n1240031?fbclid=IwAR3AnP3wbymYVeQ7g6420wTYszqXCnNPK5QQv6TR6NK08CHetMxvAGUFAtM
Oriana:
It’s probably true: art dies within fifty years of being produced (if not sooner). That's true of most art, perhaps 99.9% of it. But there are those rare escapees, e.g. Mona Lisa or Van Gogh's Starry Night, that become immortal. Or Shakespeare's greatest plays — we can safely bet that at this time some theater somewhere is staging a play by Shakespeare. That such immortality is a real phenomenon is breath-taking, if you consider the odds.
Mary:
Just one more note about art dying after 50 years...yes, exactly, understanding art, even art just 50 years old, or even less, is all archeology....but looking at archeology can emphasize its communicating power rather than erase it. Think of the mosaic funerary portraits of ancient Rome, they startle us with recognition..these are people we feel we could know, or do know, from their exquisite images. The thrill of archeology itself lies often not in the strangeness of what we find, but in its familiarity.
Even in examples taken from a society whose values and celebrations differ from ours as significantly as those in Aztec art, we respond to the rhythms of pattern and color, read the stories they tell well enough to decide we don't like them. Most of the time however, even with different costumes, modes and manners, we recognize the basic human story....a child buried in a dress ornamented with hundreds of hand-cut beads, pottery with figures in sexual positions, those glorious cave paintings, so masterfully observed and executed, and other caves stenciled with hundreds of hands, a greeting we can't fail to see, there from the very beginnings of our time.
Of course if you're dealing with a determinedly ignorant population you have a situation of deliberate refusal to know and learn. That is certainly the case in the Tallahassee Classical school, where the principal was fired over students being exposed to DaVinci's David. The statement that parents rights are "supreme" and must be "protected" if it's even one parent who objects...is both ludicrous and dangerous. So education must be dictated by the lowest common denominator, the Least Educated??? This is the mindset taking root in DeSantis' Florida, and it's a disaster in progress. There is the idea no one should be taught anything that might make them uncomfortable. Nothing can be allowed to challenge even the most ignorant and unenlightened assumptions of the most uneducated. It can only get worse without making a whole lot of these folks more uncomfortable than they can imagine. And the state is aligning itself to prevent that.
Oriana:
Maybe the real point is the art that doesn't die in fifty years. What makes it different? And does it matter that the Odyssey appears to be a compilation of various folk tales, or that Shakespeare never wrote an original plot? What is it about Art with a capital A?
And for that matter, how come that when a piano virtuoso barely touches the keyboard it sounds different than when an average player tries the same piece? Or when a great actor enters the stage, and just sits down, before even saying anything? These are the mysteries of art -- the kind of art that survives -- and I'm content to have them remain mysteries.
*
Hans Baluschek: Train station, 1904.
Oriana:
I grew up toward the end of the era of the steam locomotive (though electric trains already existed as well). Fifty years from now, will people have any idea what a steam locomotive was? I already see the long explanation in a museum — the kind that people cease to read half-way through.
But when I look at Monet’s Gare Saint-Lazare, Arrival of a Train, 1877, I am so thrilled with the shapes and colors that the steam-engine technology becomes secondary.
*
MISHA ON NUDITY IN ART
~ Back in Leningrad, in another lifetime, our homeroom teacher in middle school, with museum tour guide's aid, took us on a tour of the Hermitage along a route charted out in such an immensely intricate way that we, the impressionable youths, would not once encounter a naked ancient statue or a painting with nudity in it.
On Thursday, the Tallahassee Democrat reported that the principal of a local charter school, the Tallahassee Classical School, was forced to resign after three parents complained about an art teacher showing a picture of Michelangelo’s 16th-century sculpture of David. “Parental rights are supreme, and that means protecting the interests of all parents, whether it’s one, 10, 20 or 50,” the chair of the school’s board, Barney Bishop III, told the paper. ~ 
*
THE WILL TO HAPPINESS
You make the mistake
of thinking you have to choose,
that you have to do what you want,
that there are conditions for happiness.
What matters—all that matters, really—
is the will to happiness,
a kind of enormous, ever-present consciousness.
The rest—women, art, success—
is nothing but excuses.
A canvas waiting for our embroideries.
~ Albert Camus, A Happy Death
*
HOW KHRUSHCHEV GOT DEPOSED
~ Khrushchev was ousted when he was on vacation in Pitsunda on the Black Sea for 5 months in 1964. Brezhnev phoned him for an emergency meeting in Moscow. When he arrived in Vnukovo airport, the KGB had surrounded the airport and KGB chief Vladmir Semichastny was waiting for him. He told Khrushchev that he was about to be deposed and told him not to resist. He was escorted to the Kremlin where Brezhnev and his clan presented to him a long list of accusations which included his unstable foreign policy, liberal reforms, agriculture failures, limited military spending, pushing the world to the brink of nuclear war and his shameful retreat from Cuba. Khrushchev responded,
Stop, I know what you’re going to do. Today you cover me with shit. But I won’t resist. I'm old and tired. Let them cope by themselves. I've done the main thing. Could anyone have dreamed of telling Stalin that he didn't suit us anymore and suggesting he retire? Not even a wet spot would have remained where we had been standing. Now everything is different. The fear is gone, and we can talk as equals. That's my contribution. I won't put up a fight.
Rather than letting himself be forcibly removed Khrushchev chose to resign by presenting to the Central Committee his old age and declining health as the reason for stepping down. He later wrote in his memoirs that he considers the decision to remove him and not execute him to be one of his greatest accomplishments in life. Considering the fate of people who fell from power struggles in the Soviet system before, it was living proof that Khrushchev had made a difference. ~ Jack Carver, Quora
David Norris:
My best Brezhnev story: when Brezhnev’s mother came he showed her his dacha and how beautiful it was, he showed her his limousine, his art work. But, despite this she just shook with fear. “Mother, he said, what is wrong?”
“My son”, she said, “But what will you do when the communists come?”
Wayne Huber:
Then how about this old Russian joke : Brezhnev says to his female barber he’d like a red dot placed on his forehead. Olga, the barber, asks why. Brezhnev explains the when he was in India, Indira Gandhi said to him “ Leonid, you’re a good man but there is something missing up here”, pointing to her forehead.
Richard Schrenzel:
Stalin still has a 70% approval rating in Russia.
*
THE MAN-MADE FAMINE IN RUSSIA 1921-22
~ More than five million people died during the catastrophe, which began in 1921 and lasted through 1922.
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as Lenin, had been in charge of the country since 1917. In a chilling disregard for the suffering of his fellow countrymen he instructed food to be seized from the poor.
Lenin's Bolsheviks party believed peasants were actively trying to undermine the war effort and taking their food away would reduce their strength.
The famine was able to take root with ease due to the economic problems caused by World War I, five years of civil war, and a drought in 1921 which led to 30 million Russians becoming malnourished.
As Lenin declared ‘let the peasants starve’, the result was to force them to resort to trading human flesh on the black market.
Russian academics have previously researched and catalogued examples of cannibalism and corpse eating and in one account described how a woman refused to give over her husband’s dead body because she was using it for meat.
The starving peasants were even seen digging up recently buried corpses to retrieve their flesh, as well as eating grass and animals that were previously considered pets.
The police took no action as cannibalism was considered a legitimate method of survival.
Eventually aid workers from America and Europe arrived and in 1921 one wrote a stomach churning account of what they’d seen: ‘Families were killing and devouring fathers, grandfathers and children.
‘Ghastly rumors about sausages prepared with human corpses, though officially contradicted, were common. In the market, among rough huckstresses swearing at each other, one heard threats to make sausages of a person.’
Other disturbing images from the famine show children suffering with severe malnutrition, their stomachs bloated and almost every bone in their body visible.
One of the worst hit places was the city of Samara, situated in the southeastern part of European Russia at the confluence of the Volga and Samara Rivers.
Polar explorer Fridtjof Nansen came to the city in 1921 and was horrified by what he saw — almost the entire city was dying from hunger.
He raised 40 billion Swiss francs and established up to 900 places where people could get food.
Lenin was eventually convinced to let international aid agencies in and Nansen was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts.
The American American Relief Administration, who were told they could not help in 1919, were granted access to the sick and starving in 1921 and provided great relief along with European aid agencies such as Save The Children.
Lenin died shortly after the famine, in 1924, and was replaced by Joseph Stalin who became the leader of the Soviet Union.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4076244/Distressing-photos-1920s-Russian-famine-turned-hopeless-peasants-cannibals-five-million-people-starved-death.html
Christine diBennidetta:
Lenin was using the great famine to wipe out ethnic minorities:
“The Tatarstan famine was the first man-made famine in the Soviet Union and systematically targeted ethnic minorities such as Volga Tatars and Volga Germans.” (Wiki)
Lenin wanted to break the will of the farming peasantry, so he terrorized them and often punished them by destroying their seeds. This exacerbated the natural famine.
“The Bolshevik government had requisitioned supplies from the peasantry for little or nothing in exchange, which led peasants to drastically reduce their crop production.
Aid from outside Soviet Russia was initially rejected. The American Relief Administration (ARA), which Herbert Hoover formed to help the victims of starvation of World War I, offered assistance to Lenin in 1919 if it had full say over the Russian railway network and handed out food impartially to all. Lenin refused that as interference in Russian internal affairs.”
In 1921 Lenin was forced relent and accept outside help for the famine, primarily from the USA.
A letter from Catholic Church archives discusses Lenin’s hesitancy to accept help from capitalists while his people starved, died, and dug up corpses to sustain themselves.
Famine victims, Buzuluk Cemetery, 1921
*
DIMA VOROBIEV ON RUSSIAN HIGHWAYS
~ Russian highways are accepted as “highways” in Russia, even though many of them would raise brows in the rest of Europe. Even those assigned a federal and republican level, often seem strange. While a large part of our roads in Western Russia—especially the ones slotted for carrying troops and military vehicles in a case of war—have reached the standard of the Alaska Highway, much of the rest is still in a state of disrepair that even in Finland, the sparsely populated homeland of Santa Claus and ice hotels, would cause the local mayor to retire on the spot.
A contemporary meme says: “Russian soil rejects traitors, invaders and paved roads”.
They reflect a unique disadvantage that Russian civilization had to live with throughout history. It’s the climate in combination with vast distances and our troubled history.
Until about the mid-19 century, the European concept of roads connecting human settlements seemed strange to an absolute majority of Russians. Our nation started along fluvial routes that went largely in longitudinal direction. Thick woodlands were mostly impassable. Our rivers were our roads. It was Varangians [Vikings] who blazed the trail for our first roads, dragging their longships over land from watercourse to watercourse, and in detour around whitewater stretches.
ENEMY TERRITORY
A massive logging and burning went on as our population grew throughout the relatively peaceful era of Turkic-Mongol rule and early Muscovy. The resulting deforestation opened up continuous stretches for land traffic. Especially Tatars, with their mounted troops and tax collectors, benefited from it greatly. While there is no forensic evidence of Mongol presence in the Russian heartland, southern Turks from Crimea and Caspian plains used these from the 14th century for frequent raids up to Moscow and further north until the House of Romanovs annihilated them in the 18th century.
This created a complicated attitude to land roads among our peasants, i.e. the grand majority of our nation in the Imperial era. For them, a road was the zone of uncertainty and risk. This was the favorite venue of Czar’s recruiters, taxmen, roving nomads, invading armies and highway robbers. Even after the waves of industrialization and modernization, this still lingers in many of us. Many remote, isolated communities strongly object when local authorities suggest building roads and bridges to connect them to the “mainland”. Torching and sabotaging of construction machines occurs.
DEFENSIVE ROLE
No wonder that maintaining land roads has long been just a crazy idea of dreamy-eyed modernizers and obsessive control freaks in the Kremlin. Starting from the mid-19th century, their energies were redirected to building railways in order to move around troops and industrial wares. Stalin also loved canals. As to the land roads, they were expected to kind of take care of themselves.
During the Napoleonic war, WW1 and especially WW2, our roads turned out to be an effective defense factor. Nazi Germans were mightily surprised to find thousands of kilometers of tramped-down dirt in places where their maps marked “roads”. The picture below shows a German military transport negotiating one of Russian highways.
The post-Soviet era saw a drastic improvement. Still, the Russian internet is inundated with memes, pictures and videos with appalling evidence of roads in disrepair
.
A hugely popular Soviet song about roads describes it as a spooky place leading to uncertain destinations, and filled with dust, fogs, cold spells, distress and occasional fire shots. ~
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrCxuYL_NAM
*
DIMA VOROBIEV ON THE EVOLUTION OF HIS OWN POLITICAL BELIEFS
~ I had been a devout Communist until I started working in propaganda in the early 1980s. When I was little, I couldn't quite understand why my parents never joined me in my imperialist fantasies about how the world would be wonderful, once Communism triumphs across the earth.
In 1984, I first read the Gulag Archipelago, and was shattered. It was too overwhelming. Yet, it didn't mismatch most of what I already knew about the system, and what my dad and mum told about their lives. I had to absorb it somehow.
Since I still wanted a career in propaganda, I never discussed what I read with anyone apart from my wife. Once you start working for Soviet rule, walls grow ears. Much of what you do and assume only you know about, in effect silently accrues into a solid volume of your personal file in some place you’ll never find.
I didn't want to risk it. I chose to think what happened in the era of Stalin was kind of an occasional apocalypse which the Communist idea somehow survived. Now, I thought, we were slowly recovering. All we needed was correct the wrongs. Which I considered my job: do it the right way.
Then, Gorbachev came, with his perestróika and glásnost. I rose up in ranks, and got to see the core of the system closer and closer up. By the early 1990s, a few doors that Gorbachev recklessly had opened to the hidden vaults of Soviet history, produced such an avalanche of skeletons that the whole idea of giving Communism a human face was buried for good.
Then, Yeltsin took power, and his men kicked me out of the profession. My country died.
Decommissioned from propaganda, I went into sales and never looked back. Ever since, I consider myself an ideological agnostic.
Photo: a Soviet propagandist in ideological AWOL, anno 1991. Quora
Oriana:
“Since I still wanted a career in propaganda, I never discussed what I read with anyone apart from my wife. Once you start working for Soviet rule, walls grow ears. Much of what you do and assume only you know about, in effect silently accrues into a solid volume of your personal file in some place you’ll never find.” You’d think that such knowledge ("walls grow ears") would be enough to make Dima quit the system for good. But never underestimate the power of early indoctrination (starting in preschool). There are times when I can’t help resist the impression that Dima shares the nostalgia for the Soviet Union, widespread among Russians (even though currently he lives in Norway).
John Bowser:
Communism can only function on very small scale. Unfortunately what happens when it's conducted on a national level, is the people up at the top when they get a taste of that power end up doing things that pervert the dynamics that idealistic communism functions under and then what you are left with is a totalitarian government. There has not been one example of a country that has conducted itself according the communist doctrine, although claiming to be communist. It's human nature that we are hierarchical and compete for resources and then use them to attract the best mates we can. There's something very capitalist about this part of the human condition.
Propaganda is about lying to the citizens of a country for the purpose of a political entity to increase of maintain its level of influence. The closest analogy I can think of is at the cattle slaughter house the cow is blind folded so it doesn't see what's about to happen to it. Are you subhuman? Or are your leaders demigods? Do you know what trust is? Do you know what love is? Would you lie to your children so they would do what you want? How can you follow the leadership of people who think of you as a cow?
Propaganda as a career… a career in lying to your countrymen and neighbors.
Jake Holman:
Your country didn’t die. Only the political system. Yes, no?
Dima Vorobiev:
The USSR was a radical progressivist project. Internationalist, forward-projected, rationality-based.
Nowadays, it's all about “Make Russia great again!”
My country definitely died on me in 1991.
Paul Delinger:
The more I learn and think about the difference between Soviet and Chinese communism, the more I become convinced that history and culture determined the differences.
In Russia, the most important part of government was the security services, and the best and the brightest went into the intelligence services. In China, the best and brightest were chosen through exams, and would go on to serve in the imperial court as advisors to emperors, or to become local representatives of the emperors as local officials.
While Chinese security services existed and were effective, they were the part of the government most officials did not want to talk about. For most people, the security services did not even exist.
Compared to today’s China and Chinese, the Soviet Communists were much more ideological and less pragmatic than the Chinese. Mao tried to be an ideological Marxist purist, but Deng Xiaoping locked away the ideology and threw away the key.
Xi is a very pragmatic Marxist who believes in the ideology but also understands the ideology needs to conform to the realities of Chinese society, not the other way around.
*
DIMA ON ARMENIA
Armenians have reasons to hate our guts after Lenin sold them out to the Turks after WWI. The deal robbed Armenia of most of their territory inside the Russian Empire, and of the access to the Black sea. After WWII, Stalin tried, but failed to take the territory back.
On top of that, the delineation of borders between ethnic Soviet Republics undertaken by the Bolsheviks created a lot of bad blood between the Armenians and Azeris. An utter incompetence of the Communist rulers during the 1980s led to bloodbaths and ethnic cleansings. All that contributed to the seemingly unsolvable conflict around the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
Armenians were the first who ran a classic terror attack in the post-Stalin USSR. According to the authorities, in 1977, a tiny group of nationalists allegedly exploded bombs in the Moscow metro and prepared more at other places.
After the 1991 declaration of independence, the landlocked, decimated and impoverished, Armenia was bought wholesale by Russian state-oligarchical clans. They ran much of the republic through their stooges in the local elites. This hurts the national pride of Armenians who try to claim back at least some control of their country. The 2018 Armenian revolution demonstrated that their civil society is strong enough to make things happen peacefully. But I know too little about the place to predict anything about their ultimate chances for imposing accountability on their elites.
The post-WWII poster shown below celebrates 25 years of Soviet Armenia. Fruits, tasty food, “cognac”, colorful cloths and prominent Communists demonstrate the best of Armenian contributions to the Soviet rule. On the horizon, we see the national symbol, the Mount of Ararat, that was given away to Turkey by Lenin.
*
DIMA ON COMMUNISM
~ Communism was shaped in the works of Marx and Engels, and tested by practitioners like Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and Kims. This is an extremely powerful political weapon for anyone capable to pierce its veneer of equality and social justice.
Many anti-Communists fail to appreciate the inherent strengths of Communism. They ignore its rich toolbox and principles that time after time have proven their usability in the era of mass politics:
Power is the absolute value. Anything you do must go towards one ultimate objective: taking all political and economic power there is. The State power is central.
You must always view society as a system of groups, competing for power, in an eternal dog-eats-dog fight. Ignore their narratives. Whatever they say, one thing always trumps everything else: ownership of the means of production.
There are always those who have things, and a lot of have-nots. Side with the have-nots. Organize them to grab power and the means of production. Have-nots are always more numerous, more hungry, more envious. If circumstances are right, they have a very fair chance to get an upper hand. Go in full throttle and have a blast. “If you tremble with indignation at every injustice, you are a comrade of mine.” (~ Che Guevara)
Money is important, as is other wealth. But what’s more important is your ability to use them as a means of production. You must be able to churn out things big time. Produce as much as you can, no matter the cost. The most important is the production of weapons. “Power comes from the barrel of gun” (~Mao Zedong).
You need people to wield your weapons. Therefore, you must invest a lot in education. They need to know how to build weapons and use them. You must invest a lot in indoctrination, so that they share your objectives and understand the commands of your generals and commissars. You invest a lot in health care so that your women give birth to a lot of Communist fighters, and your armies don’t get sick on the eve of great revolutionary battles.
Once in power, you atomize the society. People always tend to form groups, which is bad. Well-formed, cohesive groups lead to the class struggle. You don’t want class struggle in the midst of your troops.
In order to atomize the society, you need to strip nascent groups of their leaders. Made these individuals your servants, kill or incarcerate those who refuse. You need a strong police and spies everywhere to spot new nascent groups, and take measures.
Meritocracy is king. You must rotate your people relentlessly, based on their loyalty and performance. The right combination of fear and greed gives the best result.
Soviet Russia in the era of Lenin and Stalin diligently applied these rules. It was the failure of Khrushchev and the subsequent rulers to implement principles no. 6–8 that doomed the Soviet rule.
The poster below shows the ideal communist society. It’s a mass of strong healthy individuals who are inspired by the idea of building Communism. They move in disciplined military formations and have no other loyalty but to the Communist state.
The title says: “Sports parade of 1937. Regards to dear Stalin!”
DIMA ON COMMUNISM, CONTINUED:
Communism offers a set of recipes as to how to get to that most equal and just society of all. In order to get there, the Communists treat society as a giant laboratory where they implement Marxist theory on human guinea pigs.
The 20th century offered a whopping set of lab tests of the Marxist theory.
From his study room, Marxists suggest: let’s review the results, understand where the experiment went wrong, and figure out how to make it a success next time. A lot of people share this cold researcher’s view on the subject. They feel much affinity with Marxists.
As for me, I am one of those who lived through that experiment. I know it from the inside. I do both as a commoner and faithful servant to the system.
I was a witness, a chronicler, and a participant. I was a guinea pig for Communists myself, just like my parents and the rest of us.
If you run with guinea pigs, you take my side.
Marxists work a far unpopular end of the ideological jungle. They need to work hard and argue eloquently in order to be listened to. Sometimes they try to challenge my theoretical credentials in Scientific Communism. I understand them. There’s little that Communists love more than crossing horns around definitions, quotes, logical inferences, and the rest of Marxist scholastic wisdom.
But I don’t indulge them.
From the distance of three decades since the demise of Soviet rule, I now know full well how hollow and inhumane the progressivist lab approach is on humans—even driven by the best intentions and the most perfect of tools.
Having been a witness, a chronicler, and a participant in the Communist experiment made me an ideological agnostic. I try to see valid points from all colors of the political continuum.
I don’t take sides.
But one thing is totally clear to me. I don’t want for my kids a future with another lab test on human guinea pigs.
Below, a cartoon “Russian Roulette” by Viktor Bogorad. We can’t realistically get rid of the Communists and others who want to burn this house in the name of equality and justice, or just for fun.
But we can shove them as far in the margins as possible.
You see Mr. Big Smile to the right? He keeps a safe distance from the crazy on the left. That’s me.
*WHY THE CHINESE PEOPLE SEE MAO AS A GOD, BUT NOT DENG, WHO MADE CHINA RICH
~ One thing about Chinese culture that is very difficult for western people to comprehend is our casual attitude towards gods and religion. I would even argue the only thing Chinese people believe is Pascal’s Wager.
Yes, there are people who hang Mao’s portrait under their car rear mirror for “protection”. And you thought Chinese people had deified Mao and now they worship him like God. What you don’t know is the same person who hang Mao’s portrait for “protection”, also wear necklace with a Buddha pendant. And last Sunday, he went to a Taoist temple and bought a good luck charm. And if his friend invited him, he’d go to the local Christian Church and attend mass.
As we Chinese say, you never know which cloud will bring rain.
So it’s not worship as in Christianity worship, believing God as your true savior and all that, No. More like a shrug and say “why not, it doesn’t hurt”.
As for why Mao is diefied but Deng wasn’t, mostly because we see Mao as an emperor, while Deng as a strong minister. I often think Mao, not Puyi, was truly the last emperor of China. He behaved like many first emperors in previous dynasties. He defeated foreign invaders, he won the civil war, he established the new country, he married a troublesome woman and was never faithful to her, he fell for paranoia and started persecuting his supposed political enemies.
Other than not able to pass the crown to his son, he ruled China as an emperor. Deng was much more low-key in public. He’s more of a behind the scene kind of guy. He didn’t have the larger-than-life presence of Mao or charisma of Zhou Enlai. He just wanted to get the job done. And he did. Not really “god” material. ~ Feifei Wang, Quora.jpg)
*
CAN POST-PUTIN RUSSIA REPAIR ITS RELATIONS WITH THE EUROPEAN UNION?
~ Absolutely.
The history of the relations between Russia and Europe in the last few centuries has a pronounced pendulum pattern. It blows cold and warm with almost every power transition.
But don’t hold your breath yet. Even if our President isn't the first ruler to become immortal, he may still have a decade or two in the Kremlin ahead of him. Another thing is the prerequisites of the change.
What made the West and the USSR seek rapprochement in the last century?
Case 1. Soviet Russia and Weimar Germany
This is the 1920s. Communist-ruled Russia seems to be toxic to everyone. However, two former enemies having a blast killing each other by the million just a few years prior now decided to pool their resources. They started covertly rebuilding their armed muscle and kept doing it until the Nazis came to power. (Right beside Stalin, caught in the moment, declares Mussolini’s Italy our friend and ally.)
Case 2. The West builds from scratch the Soviet military production
In the 1930s, American, Italian, British, and German industrialists build for Stalin the military-industrial colossus. In a few years, it’s going to crush Nazi Germany in WW2. This happens despite Stalin keeping the global destruction of Capitalism as his ultimate goal.
The reason is simple. The crisis of 1929–33 crippled Western economies. Stalin’s money was absolutely better than losing industrial capacity and technical expertise to bankruptcies. The price paid by the exported imperial art and the blood of Soviet peasants was very good as well. As our classic allegedly said, “the Capitalist will gladly sell us the noose for us to hang them, too.”
Case 3. The Detente in Europe
In the 1960s and early 1970s, the French and German decided that the Americans wielded way too much power in their affairs. They decided they needed to balance it off somehow. The USSR, just next door, was all happy to help out. With a wealth of economic incentives—natural gas, remember?—this caught traction for more than a couple of decades. The thing survived both Thatcher and Reagan’s wrath, and the collapse of the USSR.
What does this tell about Russia and the time ahead?
Top three pre-requisites for a re-boot
A generational shift. This is not so much about getting Putin out of the Kremlin. A rejuvenation of the entire political class must happen. Young Turks, also in Russia, have a natural predisposition to try smarter, faster, cooler things than the crusty, senile old f@rts who hugged the road for way too long.
A common enemy or a common threat. We need someone like Germany vs. the Allies or the Americans vs the Europeans to cast a dark shadow on the continent. The Chinese seem to run out of steam to become a real scare of tomorrow. The warriors of the Prophet can’t do a single thing right, it looks like. Alien invaders, where are you when we really need you?
A sweet little something for the guys who decide in Moscow. In all three cases from the past century, becoming friends with the Europeans brought some cool memorable things to our men in the Kremlin. Frequent visits to cushy hotels in western capitals with generous per diems paid by hosts. A steady stream of useful things to wear, eat, drink, and use in homes back in Moscow, free of charge. A fair shot for an interesting life in the West for their kids. The problem nowadays is that the top crust in Moscow is consistently much richer than the elected leaders in the West. But no price is too high if you know the right price, right?
Below, a Soviet cartoon from the era of Khrushchev. A good-humored Soviet man in Sunday clothes reaches out to a much-suffering little Capitalist with a sheet of paper titled “Trade Agreement”.
Take note of the shy smile of the Capitalist and our man’s sunny disposition. Despite our rock-solid faith in the global triumph of Communism, and their hatred of anything Soviet, both glow with expectations of all the good stuff that comes along with trade, business visits, and celebration of contracts. ~ Dima Vorobiev, Quora
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MISHA FIRER ON PUTIN AND RUSSIA’S ACHIEVEMENTS IN THE LAST 20 YEARS
Presidential Secretary Dmitry Peskov was recently asked what are Russia’s achievements in the last 20 years. He said, and I quote: “… … …”
Nothing. Nada.
You are probably all familiar with kremlebots’ playbook about how Putin pulled the country out of devastation wrought by “liberals” in the 1990s and brought prosperity to millions with his iron fist.
Let me present you with an alternative narrative that is gaining some very serious traction with Russian people. The list is much longer than can fit in this answer.
It took the Soviet Union only 16 years to send the first man into space after the end of World War II. In the last 20 years, Russia hasn’t learned to design its own computer, a machine tool, pharmaceutical manufacturing equipment and much more.
Local factories have been shut down, and giant Western groups like VW, Citroen, BMW, KIA, etc. have opened factories in their place with ownership, management and technology coming from overseas. The profits are split between the Western corporations, oligarchs and officials.
The national currency, the ruble, has jumped from 28.16 to 74.02 against USD with prices rising accordingly, while wages stagnated, as more money hasn’t been printed, possibly to avoid a runaway hyperinflation.
Pump price for gas rose by 483% (from 7.2 to 42). In case you didn't know, most of Russia’s revenues come from exporting crude oil.
The number of officials quintupled: from 485,566 to 2.4 million.
The population of Russia is roughly the same as 20 years ago, while millions of migrants have received citizenship in that period of time. At least 150,000 citizens, many of whom with excellent education and sellable skills, leave the country for good each year.
Russia spends more budget money on defense than on education and healthcare combined.
The number of hospitals fell by 50% (from 10,700 to 5,300). This actually points out to a logical conclusion that the population of Russia is much smaller than officially claimed.
The number of schools fell by 21% (from 68,100 to 41,349). This highlights the fact that most of the country has seen decline in population. People migrate to bigger cities and towns in search of work where they overwhelm the existing schools. The quality of education inevitably suffers.
At the same time, the number of Orthodox churches had doubled from 19,000 to 38,649, while the level of religiosity in the population hasn’t risen. Why are they building more churches, then?
Because Russian Orthodox Church is a state corporation that exists for the sole objective of making its stakeholders and top management wealthy, which has been proven by photos and videos of high-flying lifestyle of thousands of priests.
According to just two polls: median salary is 15k/month or $200/month, and a third of the population don’t have enough money to buy footwear for all members of the family. When asked to comment, Putin claimed that 17k a month is a middle class salary.
At the same time, Russia is in the 3rd place in the world by the number of billionaires. The largest super-yachts and most expensive real estate in the world belong to Russian oligarchs.
Don’t listen to Kremlebots when they tell you Putin has built a country Russians want their children to live in. They don’t. They are just afraid to change things, because they are divided and there are three million law-enforcement officers, judges on the government payroll and hundreds of penal colonies from hell. ~ Quora
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SURPRISES WHEN KBG DECIDED TO SHARE INFORMATION AFTER THE FALL OF THE SOVIET UNION
1. The most shocking was the existence of Biopreparat, the agency running the enormous clandestine biological weapons program. The US had no clue this even existed.
2. The existence of two secret Main KGB Directorates: the 10th and the 14th. The job of the 10th was to protect Biopreparat and the 14th had to spy and check up on the 12th Main Directorate of the Ministry of Defence which was in charge of guarding nuclear weapons. “Who guards the guards?” … well, the 14th did.
3. When the KGB gave a copy of the East German Stasi files to the CIA (just to stick it to the Germans one last time), it turned out that at any time, the Communist Bloc had some 200,000 spies in Western countries.
4. These files showed that the USAF had been hopelessly infiltrated by communists in the 1950s and 1960s. The US already knew this, but not the massive scale.
5. The old joke that NATO defense information ended up in the Kremlin before it filtered down to the various NATO countries turned out to be true. Only nuclear planning had not been infiltrated.
6. The US had not been able to keep anything a secret from the Warsaw Pact. It turned out they knew exactly what kind of weapons the US was developing and what the military capabilities were. It was clear counterintelligence had been a huge failure (the same applies to the other NATO countries as well).
7. The Soviets did not plan on hitting most US cities with nuclear weapons, something military planners had suspected. Instead, they would have gone for the major conventional army and national guard bases. The idea was that food shortages and race riots might destabilize the US government. Since invading was never an option, internal strife was the only hope of bringing down the US government. Agitators would have been instrumental in trying to achieve this.
8. There had been a KGB plan to kill Pope John Paul II. It was abandoned as the Soviet Leadership feared a PR disaster and worldwide reprisals. ~
Thierry Etienne Joseph Rotty, Senior Controller at Nato; Quora
Benzion Inditsky:
Clearly full information down to every technical detail of the Manhattan project and bomb device. Even Truman had no idea of it before swearing to an office in April 1945, let alone Churchill. At Potsdam Stalin broadly smiled at hearing Hiroshima news from Truman.
Bob Zentrails:
Yes this is true they had a spy, Klaus Emil Julius Fuchs, who single-handedly gave Stalin everything he needed to build his own bomb. (Image: K.E. Fuchs's Los Alamos Badge)
Guy Vantresca:
The GDP, General Defense Plan, of each side was well known by both sides. It's simple : if the Soviets invaded West Europe, it would have limited goal: get to the Ruhr industrial area, dismantle the factories, move them to the Urals (something they knew how to do), then withdraw. Our goal was to hit the invaders with everything we had, short of nukes, stay alive for 72 hours, until the CONUS (U.S.) forces arrived to protect the Rhine. If the Soviets made any move to cross the Rhine, then the button gets pushed…tactical only. They knew it, we knew it. Germany would be toast.
A interesting discussion of a KGB plot to murder all USAF interceptor pilots in their homes and base quarters on the night before the attack on NATO, can be found on Youtube: it is titled "Who Won the Air War” The author's veracity seems impeccable as he is known as a bonafide ‘cold warrior ‘ with a lengthy career as an employee of US intel agencies.
‘Pobst' a West German firm manufacturing the highest of quality flying boots had a a record of their customer contacts including their normal places of residence. The boot making firm was a front for Russian military intelligence.
If the Eastern Bloc onslaught had ensued, hundreds of assassins would have struck and the USAF interceptors would have sat on the ground with no aircrew to man them.
James Page:
The destabilizing of the US has been going very well, and is perhaps the most successful operation to destroy America. To negate the gains of equality throughout the country is the main goal. If Americans can be convinced that the Constitution is a worthless piece of paper, and that its founding fathers, judged by today’s standard instead of their time, were hypocrites, then the world will slowly slip into another conglomerate of dictatorships.
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GERMANY DID NOT INTEND TO START WW2
~ Remember that Germany didn’t intend to fight WWII. At least not in 1939. Hitler was absolutely furious with his foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop, when France and Britain declared war on Germany. Hitler did intend to fight the western allies, but in two years time.
The two were also puzzled. It was obvious to them that if the Allies had meant to stop them, it should have happened the previous year over Czechoslovakia. Poland was strategically much less important and difficult to defend than the Sudetenland with its well developed heavy armaments industry.
So, when Field Marshal Erich von Manstein presented Hitler with a long-shot plan to conquer France, Hitler claimed it as his own and poured the country’s resources into making it work. The military had gleaned valuable experience during the Spanish Revolution and had been training in the Soviet Union. When the plan worked, even the Germans were surprised at how quickly they had knocked France out of the war. Indeed, if Churchill had not been in the British cabinet, the UK probably would have accepted a peace deal.
Winston Churchill engineered a cabinet coup because he had spent his entire career trying to forestall just such a person as Hitler. He was also an ardent imperialist and wouldn’t abide seeing Britain thrust aside by Germany.
So Germany attempted to win the war because they had no other choice. It was that, or play second fiddle to, as Napoleon put it, ‘a nation of shopkeepers’. ~ Harold Zwanepol, Quora
The Munich Agreement: "peace in our time"
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STUCK WITH THE SOUL
~ Few ideas are as unsupported, ridiculous and even downright harmful as that of the ‘human soul’. And yet, few ideas are as widespread and as deeply held. What gives? Why has such a bad idea had such a tenacious hold on so many people?
Although there is a large literature on the costs and benefits – psychological and economic – of traditional religion, there is a dearth of comparable research on religion’s near-universal handmaiden, the soul. As with Justice Potter Stewart’s non-definition of pornography – ‘I may not be able to define it, but I know it when I see it’ – the soul is slippery and, even though it cannot be seen (or smelled, touched, heard or tasted), soul-certain people seem to agree that they know it when they imagine it. And they imagine it in everyone.
Viewed historically and cross-culturally, there is immense variation regarding the soul, although some patterns can be discerned and are nearly universal. Souls are said to reside inside their associated bodies and are pretty much defined as immaterial, thereby contrasted with their fleshy habitations. Immortality is another close, but not quite universal, characteristic.
Also widespread, but not invariant, is the soul’s ability to travel independent of its body, sometimes after death but often during sleep. Dreams are widely seen as demonstrating not only that the soul is ‘real’, but that it occupies its own unique plane of reality.
Jewish doctrine says almost nothing about the soul. ‘[T]here is no way on earth,’ wrote the influential Jewish philosopher Moses Maimonides, ‘that we can comprehend or know it.’ This agnostic attitude is consistent with Judaism’s lack of specificity regarding the afterlife generally and of heaven and hell in particular.
By contrast, Christianity and Islam are clear when it comes to the soul, conceiving it as immaterial as well as immortal, the two perspectives being, as it were, soulmates. Although Islam has a variety of views when it comes to the soul, there is greater diversity within Christianity – between Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox conceptions – and also within Protestantism, ranging from evangelical fundamentalism to the more relaxed and philosophical approaches of modern-day Quakers and Unitarians.
The Hindu soul resembles its Abrahamic counterpart with regard to immateriality and immortality, but with two major differences. For one, the soul (atman, or ‘self’) is conceived as a personalized part of a greater world-soul (brahman, closer to the Western ‘God’). Second, the Hindu soul is subject to regular reincarnations following the death of its body, including excursions into different kinds of animals, depending on its accumulated karma. The final desired destination of this process of repetitive birth and rebirth – oversimplified as nirvana – somewhat resembles the Western concept of heaven, although it is conceived more as a respite from the cycle of birth and rebirth than as an abode of ongoing bliss.
When trekking in the Himalayas, I often followed the sherpa advice that one should pause every third day, ‘to let your soul catch up with your body.’ It made a kind of intuitive sense. One needn’t be a Buddhist or traveling at extreme elevation to appreciate this wisdom. As a metaphor for mind, consciousness, one’s deeper beliefs and desires, the soul is serviceable. But its appeal goes beyond linguistic or conceptual utility.
Whatever else the soul is supposed to be, it is immaterial: ie, lacking physical substance. That doesn’t necessarily mean it doesn’t exist, because other ‘things’ without structural reality are real as immaterial concepts: love, fear, hope, and so forth. Some things exist only as genuine objects, rather than in the realm of the ideal or the conceptual: chairs, fire hydrants, trombones. There is no reason to discount the soul simply because there is no universally accepted sense of what it is. Just as one person’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter, one person’s conception of the soul as possessing a spark of the divinely supernatural may be another’s mind, free will, conscience, and so forth.
But no one claims that personal memories or the Pythagorean theorem are imbued with a God-given spark, or that they exist in the sense that they can be bartered and commodified like the soul, which can by some accounts be sold to the devil (suggesting that it is at least somewhat concrete). Nor are immaterial concepts supposed to reside within each person, to disappear – and then re-emerge elsewhere – after the death of the body. Soul-zealots do not accept that it exists only in a hazy, ectoplasmic plane: our unique dose of fairy dust. It is purportedly real, albeit not quite like the body in which it resides.
Immateriality – especially when blindly accepted but not seriously interrogated – is useful to the soul’s mythology, because failure to see, hear, smell, touch or taste that which is immaterial isn’t a dispositive argument against it. For believers, the fact that the soul cannot be perceived by the senses becomes an argument for its superiority, because it doesn’t partake of the messiness and dross of our everyday, fallen world. That is one of the soul’s great attractions.
It is also deeply flattering to be told that part of oneself is a chip off the old divine block, all the more so given that the devil is desperate to get it from you, while religion – acting as God’s representative – is equally eager to save it for you. How empowering to be told that we possess something uniquely our own and, moreover, that it is of inestimable value, no matter one’s station in life. Like the Colt-45 in the Wild West, souls are great equalizers. At the same time, souls are paradoxically delicate and must be guarded like a Victorian maiden’s virginity, lest it be lost and you ruined – not merely excluded from a secular marriage market, but consigned to ruination that is potentially eternal, deprived of union with God and, in the worst case, consigned to eternal torment.
In many conceptions, the soul is that which breathes life into a body, and even modern science hasn’t yet come up with an alternative answer to what, precisely, makes something alive. (Worth mentioning at this point: soul-believers are inclined to point to what-science-doesn’t-know as evidence for the supernatural. This is the ‘God of the gaps’ argument, namely that God is posited to explain gaps in our scientific knowledge, a viewpoint that is discomfiting to theologians because it brings two big problems. For one, attributing what we don’t understand to God hardly suffices as an explanation. And, for another, as science expands, the gaps shrink – and in the process, so does God.)
Soul of Roland carried by angels to heaven
Life-death transition isn’t the only popular testimony for the existence of some sort of immaterial, internal component of the self. Cartesian dualism, whereby mind is believed to be somehow distinct from body, is uniformly rejected by scientists and even by much of the lay public insofar as they acknowledge that mental activity derives strictly from the brain. And yet we experience ourselves as something different from our material body, speaking of ‘our thoughts’, ‘our desires’, ‘our memories’ and the like, as though each of us resides inside ourselves, along with a concatenation of thoughts, desires, memories, rather than the disconcerting truth that there is no ‘self’ separate from the material functioning of our neurons.
Add to this the universal experience of feeling disconnected from our bodies, not as a result of psychosis, but just in daily life. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak: ‘we’ might have plans, but our body disagrees. On occasion, an erection (or its absence) is inconvenient; ditto for a nursing woman’s letdown reflex, or any number of cases in which it appears that one’s body doesn’t cooperate with what we perceive as our hopes, inclinations and desires. Given all this, it’s hard not to be a dualist, hence hard not to feel that there’s something about ourselves that is distinct from our bodies, the Cheshire Cat’s grin after the cat’s body has disappeared.
Moreover, we know our bodies to have been mutable, while also feeling that our inner self has remained independent of any merely meaty transitions. Our memories yield a kind of mental continuity, a persistence of personal identity that feels separate from whatever happens to our bodies. This is why, even as we recognize the absurdity of Gregor Samsa being transformed into a giant insect, or Odysseus’ crew into pigs, we also readily accept that Samsa et al somehow remain themselves underneath, or inside. Even those of us who don’t accept that souls exist, that they commute, transmute or travel, can nonetheless find such ideas emotionally comprehensible. Somewhere (deep in our souls?) we are intuitive soul-sympathizers.
There is more. The allure of the soul goes beyond its attractive immateriality. Take death. Admittedly, most of us would rather leave it, and that’s the point.
Immortality is a big deal. It is impossible, at least in the Abrahamic traditions, to imagine a soul that isn’t immortal. A consistent defining feature is that, whatever else it is (how it arises, when it arises, where it resides, what it does to facilitate the functions of our body, where it goes after that body’s death, whether or not it is corruptible), a major appeal of soul-belief – probably its greatest – is that it promises eternal life. Not for the body, of course, but for itself, and thus, somehow, for each of us. No one would yearn for immortality if it were not for death and the near-universal desperation to avoid it, or at least to transcend it by having some part of ourselves persist afterward. Somehow. Somewhere. Some time.
Even the most devout believers in a truly divine afterlife do what they can to keep from dying. (‘That’s the last thing I’ll do,’ quipped Groucho Marx.) And those who don’t, or who claim that they don’t, announce that they don’t have to, because death isn’t such a big deal. In his ‘Holy Sonnet 10’ (1609), John Donne proclaimed:
Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou are not so;
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
The poem ends: ‘And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.’ It may be churlish to point this out, but Donne did in fact die, while death didn’t. Although the evidence is now overwhelming that many different species of animals such as elephants and chimpanzees are aware of death when it befalls others, and some even appear to mourn when a relative or sometimes an unrelated group member dies, it does not seem that any animal except ourselves is afflicted with awareness that someday they, too, will die.
Despite numerous Donne-like assertions about overcoming the fear of death – not to mention transcending death itself – the effort, energy and hope thereby expended speak eloquently of how real and threatening is that fear. Hence the paradox that even those who deny its importance go to great lengths to delay if not prevent it. Moreover, even the most religiously devout are most concerned to establish and reinforce confidence that eternal life is available, unspeakably delightful, and just around that final corner. Just waiting for their souls to get there.
In many non-Western traditions, funerary rituals are required for the deceased’s soul to make it to heaven. I have witnessed ‘sky burials’ in Tibet and northern Nepal, in which the corpse is laid out on a high, flat plateau, its body ritually sliced open and made available to vultures, while mourners chant encouragement to the deceased’s soul, which is thought to take flight along with the newly engorged birds, thence to proceed, after taking its obligatory tour in the upper air, to relocate itself in other bodies, either human or non-.
When I asked one of the celebrants what would happen to the soul of the dear-departed if these procedures were not followed, the response was that it would remain trapped within the decaying body, where it wouldn’t be happy. And that, despite being eternally imprisoned, it would somehow exact revenge upon those who let it down. (Another English-speaking Tibetan said, with a wry smile, that she thought the only unhappiness would be some underfed vultures.)
Despite all the Christian gospel (derived from the Old English for ‘good news’) about post-mortem souls cavorting happily in heaven, there persists a widespread assumption, also cross-cultural, that after death the deceased’s spirit becomes frightening, as witnessed by the expectation that anyone whose sky burial is ignored or inadequately carried out will revenge themselves on the living. Ghosts are nearly always feared and unwelcome, except when they are made the butt of humor. Ghosts bad; souls good. Both are inseparable from the fear of death and the hope that mortality can somehow be avoided or at least shoehorned into eternal life, via our undying souls.
The second malign allure involves the threat of eternal punishment. The soul has been an especially useful arrow in the quiver of religious institutions, inducing terrified followers to do as they are told, or else: ‘Nice soul you’ve got there. A shame if it ends up in hell.’ A long tradition, especially in Christian and Islamic theology, anticipates that evil-doers will get it in the end, if not in this life, then in the next. The Hindu and to a lesser extent Buddhist concepts of karma apply here as well, although with somewhat less terrifying resonance: be good, and your soul will end up in a happy, admirable body, or perhaps even achieve nirvana. Be bad, and you (ie, your atman) will find itself stuck inside a cockroach or a snake.
In the Abrahamic world, it is entirely possible that holding hell over the heads of malefactors results in behavior that is more prosocial than it would be otherwise, leading many to claim that without God and the threats that he imposes, morality would be defunct. (Cue Ivan Karamazov.) If so, then the soul serves many masters in addition to satisfying a need for immateriality, immortality and facilitating our abuse of other animals. The hard-working, multitasking soul provides a handle whereby the major religions induce people to do their bidding, not merely to avoid disappointing God but to keep eternal damnation at bay.
When hell is invoked literally, as it has been for most of the past 2,000 years, notably in the Christian and Islamic worlds, it is taken seriously indeed. It is worth emphasizing that damnation after death presumes that souls are real because there could be no suffering in hell without some sort of, well, something that persists after death and is available to be punished.
Those truly lost souls must carry with them responsibility for sins committed when their bodies were alive. So, let’s not lose sight of the conceptual realities hiding in plain sight: no sinning, no torments. No soul to have sinned, nothing to punish post-mortem. In short: the soul is a necessary, sufficient and convenient handle whereby religious authorities browbeat their followers, whether – according to doctrine – for the salvific benefit of those souls or for the functional benefit of those authorities.
Soul-based admonitions have traditionally focused on the prospect of misery after death rather than during life, mostly because it is all too apparent that bad people often do well in this life, while good people suffer, with no sign that justice ultimately triumphs. Hence, it can be helpful to think that sinners and other evil-doers will eventually ‘get theirs’, while the righteous will receive their just rewards. Perhaps claims of a punishing afterlife satisfy a widespread need to balance the scales of justice, to make the Universe fair when our mortal life isn’t.
As a way of manipulating the living, its power has long been recognized, by, among others, non-Christians such as Voltaire, whose sardonic Philosophical Dictionary (1764) includes the following reply to someone who had the effrontery to question the existence of hell: ‘I no more believe in the eternity of hell than yourself; but recollect that it may be no bad thing, perhaps, for your servant, your tailor, and your lawyer, to believe in it.’ The narrator goes on to observe the following:
[T]o those philosophers who in their writings deny a hell; I will say to them: – Gentlemen, we do not pass our days with Cicero, Atticus, Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus … In a word, gentlemen, all the world are not philosophers. We are obliged to hold intercourse and transact business, and mix up in life with knaves possessing little or no reflection, – with vast numbers of persons addicted to brutality, intoxication, and rapine. You may, if you please, preach to them that there is no hell, and that the soul of man is mortal. As for myself, I will be sure to thunder in their ears that if they rob me they will inevitably be damned.
More than two centuries before the Protestant Reformation, a popular focus on hell and its punishments had been especially intense, of which the most renowned and influential depiction was (and still is) Dante Alighieri’s magnificent poem The Divine Comedy (1308-21). It is interesting that Inferno, with its exuberantly graphic depiction of the tortures of hell, has always been read more widely and enthusiastically than Purgatorio or Paradiso, the other two parts of Dante’s masterpiece, although the latter are written with no less verve and brilliance.
Maybe this is testament to a deep-seated fascination with the grotesque, combined with a hefty dose of Schadenfreude along with genuine concern about what might be awaiting the sinful, even though – in its specificity – Inferno simply reveals the immense imagination of Dante and his yearning to get even with his Florentine enemies rather than any particular teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, then or now.
Robert Burton’s 17th-century treatise The Anatomy of Melancholy is a prescient account of what today is labelled depression. In it, Burton noted: ‘[I]f there be a hell upon earth, it is to be found in a melancholy man’s heart.’ For all the presumed psychological payoffs provided by soul-belief, it seems that one way to increase human melancholy is to bring hell upon Earth by threatening one’s soul with a forthcoming helluva hard time.
So, where does this leave those of us who maintain in our hearts and non-existent souls that the whole business is a load of nonsense and hurtful to boot? Let’s face it: soul-belief is liable to persist about as long as souls themselves are purported to endure. Soul-skeptics can make their arguments but should probably also recognize that this concept fits so neatly into the human psyche that it will not be readily dislodged. We’re not stuck with souls, but most people are likely stuck with believing in them. ~
https://aeon.co/essays/why-are-most-of-us-stuck-with-a-belief-in-the-soul?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=8c7cd373cb-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2023_03_16_11_15_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-e7995480d9-%5BLIST_EMAIL_ID%5D
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But then there’s Jung:
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"Leave the door open for the unknown, the door into the dark. That’s where the most important things come from, where you yourself came from, and where you will go.” ~ Rebecca Solnit, from: 'A Field Guide to Getting Lost’
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ONE PHYSICIAN’S “SHOCKING” EXPERIENCE
~ It was a cold night.
I was on duty and this 55 year old lady was admitted in ICU. She had breast cancer spread to her lungs and was literally struggling for breath. I went to check on her, as her saturation was dropping. There was nothing much I could do. After asking the nurse to give her some medicines, I turned to leave.
That was when I slipped and fell, as there was a little water on the floor, probably from a leaking iv fluid bottle. The lady, while struggling for her breath, asked me:
'Son, are you all right?’
You may call it touching rather than shocking. Whatever, it was indeed shocking to me that even gasping for the last breath cannot stop a human being from caring for someone else.
She passed away that night. ~
Jewel Joseph, oncologist, Quora
Eric Stein:
Without ever knowing who she was or what she did in life you know she was a great mother and spouse and was surely missed by many. All by that one interaction on the last day of her life.
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“THE JOY OF BEING HUMAN”
~ When Bobby Bostic was released from prison in November, 27 years into a 241-year sentence, lots of things seemed strange.
From wireless earphones ("Why are dudes talking to themselves?"), to people talking to their speaker ("I'm like, what is Alexis?"), to self-service drink machines ("You wave your hand and the water comes out?"), the world is much changed, compared to December 1995.
But strangest of all were the people.
“It's how friendly they are, compared to prison," the 44-year-old says. "You go into a grocery store, and it's 'Sir, can I help you?' In prison, you got nothing but mean mugs [faces] and harassment…”
He is still adjusting to hearing "Hey, how you doing?" instead of "Don't walk too close to me."
"Out here, it's just good things. People smiling. Little kids waving at you. It's like, this is what life is. This is normal. This is how things are supposed to be.”
Presumably, then, it's hard to adapt after 27 years of ingrained, institutional aggression…
“No, because deep down inside, you always wanted that humanity. You wanted that human connection…that's life. That's beauty. That's the joy of being a human.” ~
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64926059
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NEW TRENDS IN ANTI-AGING
cold exposure
Whether you take a plunge into a pool of ice cold water, or try cryotherapy — which involves spending a few minutes in a below freezing chamber — cold exposure has benefits that may help slow down the clock.
Dr. Anant Vinjamoori, Chief Medical Officer of Modern Age, a New York-based healthcare company focused on longevity, told Insider that cold exposure produces effective results in the short and long term.
A plunge into an ice cold bath results in "a surge in the production of neurotransmitters such as epinephrine and dopamine" which have immediate rejuvenating and energizing effects, he said.
"Over the medium to long term, there is some evidence that cold exposure may reduce systemic inflammation, which is known to be a driver of many chronic diseases," Vinjamoori added.
fasting
In 2019, Jack Dorsey said that he only eats one meal a day and fasts all weekend — which might be bordering on an eating disorder, experts say.
However, research does suggests that time-restricted eating patterns can result in health benefits for those with diabetes and obesity or even enhance the body's defenses against oxidative stress.
"For me, the primary benefit of time-restricted eating is regulating circadian rhythms. Sleep quality almost always improves by limiting the consumption of calories in the evening hours," said Modern Age's Dr. Vinjamoori.
red light therapy
Red light therapy uses LED lights or lasers to expose the body to red light— the longest wavelength of light on the visible spectrum. There is research to suggest that exposing oneself to red light for 5 to 20 minutes may increase production of adenosine triphosphate, which is a compound that provides and stores energy for the cells.
"While more research is needed to understand the full benefits and mechanisms of red light therapy, there is evidence to suggest it may be beneficial in improving certain skin conditions including acne, aging, hair loss, wound care, and sun damage," dermatologist Laura Buford previously told Insider.
SUPPLEMENTS
NMN: Nicotinamide Mononucleotide, or NMN, is a supplement that can help boost levels of a critical coenzyme in the body called NAD+.
NAD+ plays an important role in facilitating metabolic processes and maintaining healthy cellular function.
Harvard Medical School professor David Sinclair — who has studied the relationship between NAD+ and aging — said in an interview with the YouTube channel Reverse Aging Revolution that the human body uses NAD+ as "a measure of adversity." As humans get older, NAD+ levels decrease, which mean the body's defense enzymes and repair enzymes take a hit and humans "succumb to aging" Sinclair said.
Since NAD+ is a large molecule, it's difficult to take it directly. Sinclair recommends taking its building blocks like B3, Nicotinamide riboside (NR) or NMN.
"What we've discovered in people, in clinical trials, is that the closer you get to the NAD itself, the better the boost in NAD that you get," Sinclair said, which is why he recommends NMN.
ASHWAGANDA
Ashwagandha is an herb that's long been used for anti-aging in Ayurveda, an ancient system of holistic medicine originating in India.
The herb, often classified as an adaptogen, has a host of health benefits that range from easing anxiety and stress to soothing arthritis to boosting cognitive function. Modern Age's Dr. Vinjamoori said that ashwagandha has been shown in research studies to reduce cortisol, a hormone associated with stress, and improve sleep in people without insomnia.
Recent research has also shown that ashwagandha could be a promising agent in anti-aging treatments. A study published in the Journal of Clinical Medicine in 2020 found that ashwagandha may help maintain the length of the key proteins at end of chromosomes known as telomeres. Telomeres are often shortened in the process of DNA replication which has been pointed to as the main factor that "speeds up cell aging and promotes degeneration processes" the study noted.
Rx DRUGS
METFORMIN
Metformin, a pill prescribed for diabetes, is increasingly being used by biohackers as a way to improve how humans age, and slow the onset of diseases like cancer, cognitive decline, and vision loss, Insider reported. The drug helps regulate blood sugar and decrease appetite, essentially giving the metabolism a boost and stimulating a cellular clean-up process known as autophagy, Insider reported.
In his book Lifespan, Harvard professor David Sinclair, said he takes a gram of metformin every morning along with his yogurt in the hope that it will regulate his metabolism and help his organs remain younger and healthier, Insider reported.
HORMONE REPLACEMENT THERAPY
The body's balance of hormones can shift with age and spur a variety of age-related conditions like weight gain, mood swings, fatigue, and lower sex drive, two longevity focused doctors told Insider. As a result, they've seen an increasing patient interest in hormone therapy.
Modern Age's Dr. Vinjamoori told Insider that testosterone replacement has gained popularity among men and women as its become clear that optimal testosterone levels can impact mood, libido, and even metabolism.
"The importance of testosterone for women, in particular, is underappreciated— testosterone is actually the most abundant hormone in a woman's body and is the first hormone to decline with age," Vinjamoori told Insider.
It's not just testosterone, but also sex hormone like estrogen and progesterone that are being sought out by patients. Vinjamoori said the options for hormone therapy range from pills to creams to patches to pellets. "The approach can be highly personalized to you and your needs.”
RAPAMYCIN
Rapamycin is immunosuppressive drug used to help treat some cancers. It's also used in kidney transplants to help the an organ recipient's body accept new kidneys, Insider reported.
The pill can slow down cellular growth and reproduction which means it might be a way for "aging bodies turn down troublesome age-related inflammation" which can contribute to age-related diseases like cancer and Alzheimer's, Insider reported.
Insider reported that researchers have already seen rapamycin slow aging in flies, crustaceans, yeast, mice. In humans, studies have shown that it may help improve immune function, especially in older adults, Insider said.
Despite its potential to be a "fountain of youth" no one has really nailed down the right way to regulate the drug for aging, Insider said.
Matt Kaeberlein, a longevity researcher studying rapamycin's effects on humans, previously told Insider "the doses that people are taking off-label are all over the place," adding that, "it's the wild west.”
https://www.businessinsider.com/anti-aging-longevity-trends-shock-testosterone-2023-3?utm_source=pocket-newtab
anti aging
Oriana:
I agree that it’s the Wild West when it comes to anti-aging therapies. As so often, MDs are the last ones to learn of any of this. A friend emailed to me, “Can you imagine asking your doctor for a prescription of metformin?” Of course not, unless my glucose reached the diabetic range. I’d known about the life-extending benefits of metformin for more than twenty years, but felt helpless about ever getting it. And then I learned that berberine works even better, and bioavailable curcumin (OMAX is the only brand I recommend) can be seen as an equivalent of rapamycin.
If there is one thing I’d like the readers to seriously consider is taking BERBERINE, a superior analog to metformin. Actually there are two things: Take berberine and Omax curcumin, an analog of rapamycin.
Ashwaganda, red light — maybe, maybe. I am certain only of berberine and Omax curcumin. I’ve seen my lab results, and experienced a wonderful decrease in chronic knee pain.
I'd also add the CBD oil — anything that reduces pain and improves sleep is likely to extend lifespan.
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BENEFITS OF N-ACETYL-CYSTEINE
1. essential for making the powerful antioxidant enzyme GLUTATHIONE
Along with two other amino acids — glutamine and glycine — NAC is necessary to make and replenish glutathione.
Glutathione is one of your body’s most important antioxidants — compounds that help neutralize free radicals that can damage cells and tissues in your body.
It’s essential for immune health and for fighting cellular damage. Some researchers believe it may even contribute to longevity.
Its antioxidant properties be beneficial for numerous other ailments caused by oxidative stress, such as heart disease, infertility, and some mental health conditions.
2. Helps with detoxification to prevent kidney and liver damage
3. May improve mental health conditions and substance abuse disorders
NAC helps regulate levels of glutamate, the most important neurotransmitter in your brain.
While glutamate is required for normal brain activity, excess glutamate paired with glutathione depletion can cause brain damage.
This may contribute to mental health conditions such as bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and substance use disorders.
For people with bipolar disorder and depression, NAC may help decrease symptoms and improve overall ability to function. What’s more, research suggests that it may play a role in treating moderate to severe OCD.
Likewise, an animal study suggested that NAC may minimize negative effects of schizophrenia, such as social withdrawal, apathy, and reduced attention span.
NAC supplements can also help decrease withdrawal symptoms and prevent relapse in people with cocaine addiction.
Additionally, preliminary studies show that NAC may decrease marijuana and nicotine use and cravings.
Many of these conditions have limited or currently ineffective treatment options. NAC may be an effective aid for people with these conditions.
However, all these studies are relatively old, and more research is needed.
4. helps reduce symptoms of respiratory disorders
NAC can relieve symptoms of respiratory conditions by acting as an antioxidant and expectorant, loosening mucus in your air passageways.
As an antioxidant, NAC helps replenish glutathione levels in your lungs and reduces inflammation in your bronchial tubes and lung tissue.
People with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) experience long-term oxidative damage and inflammation of lung tissue, which causes airways to constrict, leading to shortness of breath and coughing.
NAC supplements have been used to improve COPD symptoms, exacerbations, and lung decline.
A review of multiple studies found that 600 mg of NAC twice a day significantly improved lung function and symptoms in those with stable COPD and that higher doses were more effective than lower ones.
People with chronic bronchitis can also benefit from NAC.
Bronchitis occurs when the mucous membranes in your lungs’ bronchial passageways become inflamed, swell, and shut off airways to your lungs.
By thinning mucus in your bronchial tubes and boosting glutathione levels, NAC may help decrease the severity and frequency of wheezing, coughing, and respiratory attacks.
In addition to relieving COPD and bronchitis, NAC may improve other lung and respiratory tract conditions — such as cystic fibrosis, asthma, and pulmonary fibrosis — as well as symptoms of nasal and sinus congestion due to allergies or infections.
5. Boosts brain health by regulating glutamate and replenishing glutathione.
6. May improve fertility in both men and women.
7. May stabilize blood sugar by reducing inflammation in fat cells.
8. May reduce heart disease risk by lowering oxidative damage
Oxidative damage to heart tissue often leads to heart disease, causing strokes, heart attacks, and other serious conditions. NAC may reduce heart disease risk by reducing oxidative damage to tissues in your heart
It has also been shown to increase nitric oxide production, which helps veins dilate and improves blood flow. This expedites blood transit back to your heart and can lower your risk of heart attacks.
Interestingly, in an older test-tube study, when combined with green tea, NAC appeared to reduce damage from oxidized LDL (bad) cholesterol, another contributor to heart disease.
9. Reduces the risk of stroke
Best food sources of cysteine include pork, beef, poultry, fish, lentils, oatmeal, eggs, yogurt, sunflower seeds, and cheese.
Oriana:
The lowest effective oral dose of NAC seems to be 1200mg/day.
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ending on wisdom:
Ikkyu said, If you find it,
It’s not what you’ve been
Looking for.
~ John Guzlowski
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