Something to think about

For most of my life, I took human intelligence for granted. It never occurred to me that our intelligence, extraordinary as it may seem to us, might not be all that remarkable in the grand scheme of things.

This “discovery” came about as I made inquiry, in recent decades, into certain areas of metaphysics, cosmology and anthropology: specifically, the nature of God, the nature of time, and the nature of man’s much-too-common inhumanity to man.

Encountering several, shall we call them, unsolved mysteries in these fields, I finally realized I had simply assumed that we humans were about as smart as it was possible to be. In fact, I came to understand, it wasn’t necessarily that these mysteries or problems were unsolvable, but more that it was likely our minds were not capable of the types of formulaic thought required to deal with them. In other words, I concluded that our brains were simply not adequate to the task.

“How can this be?” one might ask. To which I would answer: what conceit of human beings would expect it to be otherwise? Do we actually think our minds are of infinite capability? Actually, that type of expectation would tend to point up our limitations.

I do not mean to suggest that we humans have reached the limits of our abilities to determine the answers to any specific questions, but rather that our minds were not expressly designed to deal with all such issues, nor is it realistic to expect our mental processes to be without limit.

I’m just saying: something to think about.

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No class?

CNN June 27, 2011 Washington DC  The Supreme Court has tossed out an Arizona law that provides extra taxpayer-funded support for office seekers who have been outspent by privately funded opponents or by independent political groups.

A conservative 5-4 majority of justices on Monday said the law violated free speech, concluding the state was impermissibly trying to "level the playing field" through a public finance system.

Arizona lawmakers had argued there was a compelling state interest in equalizing resources among competing candidates and interest groups.

Once more, and again by a narrow majority, the United States Supreme Court has decided that money trumps fairness in the question of free speech.

As I’ve made mention before, I can’t really disagree with this interpretation of the U.S. Constitution. Nonetheless, I know this: until such time as money is separated from elections, we will not have a genuinely democratic republic. At the present time, and for the foreseeable future, this country is and will be an oligarchy, with a government controlled by a relatively few wealthy individuals and corporations.

Whether you are conservative or liberal, Democrat or Republican, male or female, Red State or Blue State, gay or straight, blue collar or white, unless you are among the very rich, your influence among our elected leaders is far less than those wealthy few who make the large contributions to campaign funds.

We are not a classless society. There are the wealthy and then there are the rest of us, deluding ourselves that voting rights equal freedom. Have you ever wondered why politicians make campaign promises but never live up to them? It's because they can't afford to. They are bought off by campaign contributions, the official bribery system of the United States of America.

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