Monday 20 March 2017
Saturday 18 March 2017
Modern Western society has become a machine for damnation - it *must* change (and so must we as individuals)
Alienation is the modern curse - even if you are among the tiny minority of serious Christians; this applies to you.
(Except for a few brief flashes - if we are lucky); Everything in life is unreal, detached - nothing is, but is only 'about' - we cannot get to grips with our personal situations, because they are remote from us - on the other side of a chasm of imperfect 'communication'.
Religion - as it is here and now, is a necessary step in the right direction - but it is not enough: it does not suffice.
Have you noticed how shallow everything modern is - the people, and the institutions? Everything except nature and the finest art and literature and (if we are lucky ... the occasional religious experience) but even then only in flashes.
A life that is dead - perhaps pleasurable - but dead, meaningless and with no sense of lived-purpose, and dis-engaged, lacking in 'participation' except when we aren't thinking (in dreams, altered states of consciousness, intoxicated...).
Have you noticed how desperate people are not to think? The lengths they go to to forget themselves? Yet life will be dead and we will be alienated until our thinking is fully engaged with everything, when we live inside life and not as separate observers whose only joy is momentarily to forget our separateness...
This is an urgent matter - and non-negotiable: we must get to work and push for something better, something adequate.
And must means must - because if we don't solve this one, then - really - what is the point of modern life? On a spiritual level it is a machine for damnation, a locked-in-state of alienation and unreality and deadness.
That is of no use to us, no use to God; and if nothing better can be developed then He might as well wind it all up and start again - after all, what is the point of having souls born into such an environment that the best that can be expected is that a few people will manage to resist to the extent that they do not actively-will their own damnation?
Really, in an ultimate sense what is the point of that kind of world - of this kind of world? The world is meant to be a place of spiritual growth, not a state of siege with survival until death the only victory.
What is needed is not Utopian, not the blasphemous notion of Heaven-on-Earth - but simply a place where life is real and we really experience it - a world where we can learn and grow; rather than a world where we learn to believe lies and especially the lies we tell ourselves...
So the task is before us - and perhaps only a handful of individual people and no human societies have ever yet achieved it - the task of living life engaged, participating. and fully conscious of ourselves and our situation.
The task is a new and higher kind of human consciousness - that is what we must achieve; that is what the great 'Romantics' from Blake, Coleridge, Wordsworth, Goethe, Steiner, Owen Barfield, William Arkle, Colin Wilson and a few others have been telling us and trying to do for the past two centuries and more.
They did their best, they made many suggestions, they qualitatively improved our understanding; but when it comes to achievement... we are no further forward, indeed (since the accelerating totalitarian micromanagement of human thought via saturation with the media and bureaucracy) we are further back than ever before in the history of the world.
How? I don't know - but we simply must do it. It should be our number one priority now, today, this very hour, starting immediately.
(Except for a few brief flashes - if we are lucky); Everything in life is unreal, detached - nothing is, but is only 'about' - we cannot get to grips with our personal situations, because they are remote from us - on the other side of a chasm of imperfect 'communication'.
Religion - as it is here and now, is a necessary step in the right direction - but it is not enough: it does not suffice.
Have you noticed how shallow everything modern is - the people, and the institutions? Everything except nature and the finest art and literature and (if we are lucky ... the occasional religious experience) but even then only in flashes.
A life that is dead - perhaps pleasurable - but dead, meaningless and with no sense of lived-purpose, and dis-engaged, lacking in 'participation' except when we aren't thinking (in dreams, altered states of consciousness, intoxicated...).
Have you noticed how desperate people are not to think? The lengths they go to to forget themselves? Yet life will be dead and we will be alienated until our thinking is fully engaged with everything, when we live inside life and not as separate observers whose only joy is momentarily to forget our separateness...
This is an urgent matter - and non-negotiable: we must get to work and push for something better, something adequate.
And must means must - because if we don't solve this one, then - really - what is the point of modern life? On a spiritual level it is a machine for damnation, a locked-in-state of alienation and unreality and deadness.
That is of no use to us, no use to God; and if nothing better can be developed then He might as well wind it all up and start again - after all, what is the point of having souls born into such an environment that the best that can be expected is that a few people will manage to resist to the extent that they do not actively-will their own damnation?
Really, in an ultimate sense what is the point of that kind of world - of this kind of world? The world is meant to be a place of spiritual growth, not a state of siege with survival until death the only victory.
What is needed is not Utopian, not the blasphemous notion of Heaven-on-Earth - but simply a place where life is real and we really experience it - a world where we can learn and grow; rather than a world where we learn to believe lies and especially the lies we tell ourselves...
So the task is before us - and perhaps only a handful of individual people and no human societies have ever yet achieved it - the task of living life engaged, participating. and fully conscious of ourselves and our situation.
The task is a new and higher kind of human consciousness - that is what we must achieve; that is what the great 'Romantics' from Blake, Coleridge, Wordsworth, Goethe, Steiner, Owen Barfield, William Arkle, Colin Wilson and a few others have been telling us and trying to do for the past two centuries and more.
They did their best, they made many suggestions, they qualitatively improved our understanding; but when it comes to achievement... we are no further forward, indeed (since the accelerating totalitarian micromanagement of human thought via saturation with the media and bureaucracy) we are further back than ever before in the history of the world.
How? I don't know - but we simply must do it. It should be our number one priority now, today, this very hour, starting immediately.
Friday 17 March 2017
How to make difficult, strategic life decisions
How should we make big life decisions? - Given that the usual two methods - logic or gut-feelings - are each inadequate, yet they cannot be combined.
The logical method is most commonly represented - at the extreme it involves something akin to stating a proposed course of action then making a list of pros and cons - and subtracting the disadvantages fro the advantages to see whether the outcome is net positive or negative. The inadequacy of this is apparent from considering how it might be employed to decide whether or not to marry someone.
Yet gut-feelings, in many ways the opposite of logic - and regarded as tending to compensate for the inadequacies of logic - are also inadequate. Their main inadequacy is that they are unstable - they vary from day to day, often from hour to hour - also, they are easily manipulated. And furthermore, gut-feelings tend to favour short-termist and selfish courses of action.
*
Christians also have recourse to asking for divine revelation - and when this is clear and forthcoming it should be decisive. Yet it seems likely that there are many problems in life which we are meant (and I mean divinely meant - as part of the destiny of our particular lives) to struggle-with and work-out for ourselves. In such instances - for our own good - there will be no divine guidance forthcoming; and we will - for our own ultimate benefit - be thrown-back onto our own resources.
*
My sense of it is that we need to sort-out several aspects of a situation, before we can make good decisions. In the first place we need to have an understanding that there is indeed such a things as a right decision to make - and that this rightness is defined in terms of spiritual aspects.
For instance; the right decision is not defined as the one that leads to optimal health or happiness, comfort or convenience, in the short term - but the one which is most likely to help in achievement of our eternal spiritual destiny (or necessary personal development); and this is difficult for us to evaluate given our limited and distorted perspective.
This implies that we need the right motivation - or at least to aspire to the right motivation - if we are to make the right decision.
*
Having established this framework there are two main things to get right: The first is that it needs to be our true self which makes the decision; the second is that in asking for a decision, the true self must think in a way that is active - being both purposive and intuitive.
It must first be our true self that is doing the deciding - because only the true self is free, autonomous, an agent. Most people, most of the time, are working from false selves - habitual personalities that 'automatically' process information and make decisions on the basis of socialisation or training; and by being trammelled with external constraints, and learned or spontaneous compulsions.
Modern false selves are mostly materialistic - thereby ignoring or denying most of our experiences and thoughts - things known by instinct, inspiration, imagination, intuition etc. The non-materialistic 'subjective' modern selves tend to be distortions - sometimes inversions - of instincts; which we have been corrupted and propagandised into - or are the consequences of the artificiality of life.
*
So we need to do the two things of thinking actively, consciously and universally (in a way which includes all aspects - not just the material) - and this thinking must be done freely by the true self (and not automatically by false selves).
Since not very many people can - at present - do this combination - then difficult, strategic life decisions will usually tend to be made badly.
And our important decisions will, therefore, usually have bad outcomes. Bad - because the decisions have been made by false selves using false reasoning...
*
This analysis suggests that learning how to think properly is - or ought to be - a major priority for modern people.
Yet, of course, real thinking is not just a means to an end - but an end in itself; and if we treat real thinking as merely a means to an end, then we will not be able to find the motivations needed to develop it.
We need to recognise, we need to be convinced that - real thinking of the kind I describe above is something we ought to be doing for the highest, deepest, most necessary of reasons; that it is, in a phase, divinely-destined.
Which turns things around - because if real thinking is divinely destined and yet we do not do it nor do we strive to do it - then this failure is a defiance of our divine destiny: a very serious matter indeed...
This is why I feel strongly that real thinking - conscious, universal and purposive thinking by the true self - should be a major priority here and now, and for (almost) everybody.
The logical method is most commonly represented - at the extreme it involves something akin to stating a proposed course of action then making a list of pros and cons - and subtracting the disadvantages fro the advantages to see whether the outcome is net positive or negative. The inadequacy of this is apparent from considering how it might be employed to decide whether or not to marry someone.
Yet gut-feelings, in many ways the opposite of logic - and regarded as tending to compensate for the inadequacies of logic - are also inadequate. Their main inadequacy is that they are unstable - they vary from day to day, often from hour to hour - also, they are easily manipulated. And furthermore, gut-feelings tend to favour short-termist and selfish courses of action.
*
Christians also have recourse to asking for divine revelation - and when this is clear and forthcoming it should be decisive. Yet it seems likely that there are many problems in life which we are meant (and I mean divinely meant - as part of the destiny of our particular lives) to struggle-with and work-out for ourselves. In such instances - for our own good - there will be no divine guidance forthcoming; and we will - for our own ultimate benefit - be thrown-back onto our own resources.
*
My sense of it is that we need to sort-out several aspects of a situation, before we can make good decisions. In the first place we need to have an understanding that there is indeed such a things as a right decision to make - and that this rightness is defined in terms of spiritual aspects.
For instance; the right decision is not defined as the one that leads to optimal health or happiness, comfort or convenience, in the short term - but the one which is most likely to help in achievement of our eternal spiritual destiny (or necessary personal development); and this is difficult for us to evaluate given our limited and distorted perspective.
This implies that we need the right motivation - or at least to aspire to the right motivation - if we are to make the right decision.
*
Having established this framework there are two main things to get right: The first is that it needs to be our true self which makes the decision; the second is that in asking for a decision, the true self must think in a way that is active - being both purposive and intuitive.
It must first be our true self that is doing the deciding - because only the true self is free, autonomous, an agent. Most people, most of the time, are working from false selves - habitual personalities that 'automatically' process information and make decisions on the basis of socialisation or training; and by being trammelled with external constraints, and learned or spontaneous compulsions.
Modern false selves are mostly materialistic - thereby ignoring or denying most of our experiences and thoughts - things known by instinct, inspiration, imagination, intuition etc. The non-materialistic 'subjective' modern selves tend to be distortions - sometimes inversions - of instincts; which we have been corrupted and propagandised into - or are the consequences of the artificiality of life.
*
So we need to do the two things of thinking actively, consciously and universally (in a way which includes all aspects - not just the material) - and this thinking must be done freely by the true self (and not automatically by false selves).
Since not very many people can - at present - do this combination - then difficult, strategic life decisions will usually tend to be made badly.
And our important decisions will, therefore, usually have bad outcomes. Bad - because the decisions have been made by false selves using false reasoning...
*
This analysis suggests that learning how to think properly is - or ought to be - a major priority for modern people.
Yet, of course, real thinking is not just a means to an end - but an end in itself; and if we treat real thinking as merely a means to an end, then we will not be able to find the motivations needed to develop it.
We need to recognise, we need to be convinced that - real thinking of the kind I describe above is something we ought to be doing for the highest, deepest, most necessary of reasons; that it is, in a phase, divinely-destined.
Which turns things around - because if real thinking is divinely destined and yet we do not do it nor do we strive to do it - then this failure is a defiance of our divine destiny: a very serious matter indeed...
This is why I feel strongly that real thinking - conscious, universal and purposive thinking by the true self - should be a major priority here and now, and for (almost) everybody.
Thursday 16 March 2017
The Best TV theme and introductory sequence
John (James Bond theme) Barry wrote the music - but the editor was a genius too. Needs to be watched more than once to appreciate everything that is going-on here:
Another favourite (from the same era) - Gerry Anderson's UFO... space girls in purple wigs and metallic miniskirts never looked so good as Gabrielle Drake:
I later got to meet Ed (voice of Captain Blue) Bishop when he acted in my 1991 BBC radio program, Solitude, Exile and Ecstasy:
http://solitude-exile-ecstasy.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/solitude-exile-and-ecstasy.html
Another favourite (from the same era) - Gerry Anderson's UFO... space girls in purple wigs and metallic miniskirts never looked so good as Gabrielle Drake:
I later got to meet Ed (voice of Captain Blue) Bishop when he acted in my 1991 BBC radio program, Solitude, Exile and Ecstasy:
http://solitude-exile-ecstasy.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/solitude-exile-and-ecstasy.html
Wednesday 15 March 2017
Fear is a sin - I mean existential fear
Fear is a sin, and indeed one of the very worst of sins - a sin that is capable of singlehandedly wrecking the whole of a human life.
I don't mean fear as an emotion - that is just a matter of an evolutionary adaptation to threats... I mean existential fear: that is, fear as a mind-set, fear as a basic stance towards life.
For Christians, to live in a mind-set of fear is to deny the basics - to deny that God the creator is our loving Father. Fear is, indeed, a variant of despair - which is the assumption that God has placed us in a hope-less situation - which would mean that God did not love us or was not the creator of this world.
Fear is so basic, so pervasive, that it is a primary motivator for many people much of the time - whole religions, whole civilisations are built primarily on fear: fear of the gods or God, fear of Life, fear of reality...
Christians have often - and still do - deliberately create fear - and I mean existential fear, the worst kind, the worst kind of sin - as a way of supposedly enforcing faith. This is crazy if it is sincere... certainly it is wicked and counter-productive. When this happens, something has gone terribly wrong - sin has overcome the Christian message, the Gospel has been perverted.
Our lives can become absolutely dominated by fear; and this can even feel like a moral imperative. Morality gets mixed up with fear of hubris, superstitious fear that if we do NOT fear, then the fates will be revenged upon us...
Life, by this account, ought to be a continual submission, a continual propitiation, a continual attempt not to offend the tyrannical and jealous and vengeful forces that are assumed to control things... If we do NOT fear then we will be crushed, to teach us not to presume, teach us not be pride-full... The idea arises that continual and expected and mandatory fear is the core way of avoiding pride. Fear becomes a duty.
The fear-full are prone to inculcate this same existential dread in others - perhaps on the excuse that people need to be afraid or else they will not avoid sin... But this is an appalling thing to do to others - fear can rapidly and permanently get out of control, grow like a cancer in a person or a community - and kill it. Eternally kill it.
Systematically to inculcate existential fear is a double sin - because, unlike personal sins, it is deliberate and avoidable - and this requires repentance even more than fear in oneself.
Existential fear is NOT Christian, it is a failure of faith...
If we do fear then it must be repented; and I mean must - not because we will be punished by God if we don't repent our fear, but that by fearing we have already rejected God implicitly... we have already rejected the God of love and rejected our relationship with him... We have specifically rejected the fact that he is our loving Father and we are instead insisting that God is a tyrant who requires that we live in continual and systematic terror.
So fear is a sin, and a terrible sin which can destroy everything: it must be repented. We need to want to be free of fear, we need to aspire to a sublime confidence about life: that is what God wants from us.
I don't mean fear as an emotion - that is just a matter of an evolutionary adaptation to threats... I mean existential fear: that is, fear as a mind-set, fear as a basic stance towards life.
For Christians, to live in a mind-set of fear is to deny the basics - to deny that God the creator is our loving Father. Fear is, indeed, a variant of despair - which is the assumption that God has placed us in a hope-less situation - which would mean that God did not love us or was not the creator of this world.
Fear is so basic, so pervasive, that it is a primary motivator for many people much of the time - whole religions, whole civilisations are built primarily on fear: fear of the gods or God, fear of Life, fear of reality...
Christians have often - and still do - deliberately create fear - and I mean existential fear, the worst kind, the worst kind of sin - as a way of supposedly enforcing faith. This is crazy if it is sincere... certainly it is wicked and counter-productive. When this happens, something has gone terribly wrong - sin has overcome the Christian message, the Gospel has been perverted.
Our lives can become absolutely dominated by fear; and this can even feel like a moral imperative. Morality gets mixed up with fear of hubris, superstitious fear that if we do NOT fear, then the fates will be revenged upon us...
Life, by this account, ought to be a continual submission, a continual propitiation, a continual attempt not to offend the tyrannical and jealous and vengeful forces that are assumed to control things... If we do NOT fear then we will be crushed, to teach us not to presume, teach us not be pride-full... The idea arises that continual and expected and mandatory fear is the core way of avoiding pride. Fear becomes a duty.
The fear-full are prone to inculcate this same existential dread in others - perhaps on the excuse that people need to be afraid or else they will not avoid sin... But this is an appalling thing to do to others - fear can rapidly and permanently get out of control, grow like a cancer in a person or a community - and kill it. Eternally kill it.
Systematically to inculcate existential fear is a double sin - because, unlike personal sins, it is deliberate and avoidable - and this requires repentance even more than fear in oneself.
Existential fear is NOT Christian, it is a failure of faith...
If we do fear then it must be repented; and I mean must - not because we will be punished by God if we don't repent our fear, but that by fearing we have already rejected God implicitly... we have already rejected the God of love and rejected our relationship with him... We have specifically rejected the fact that he is our loving Father and we are instead insisting that God is a tyrant who requires that we live in continual and systematic terror.
So fear is a sin, and a terrible sin which can destroy everything: it must be repented. We need to want to be free of fear, we need to aspire to a sublime confidence about life: that is what God wants from us.
Tuesday 14 March 2017
Monday 13 March 2017
Micro-models have replaced theories - People cannot 'join the dots' because the dots cannot be joined
Fake theories are much worse than fake facts because people make sense of facts using theories.
But modern mainstream theories - whether in science, law, medicine, religion, politics or the mass media - do not deserve the name of theories - they are so small, so specific... let's call them micro-models.
Micro-models are the sound-bites of theory which we get everywhere. Each serves mere to fake-explain some tiny sliver of facts - and there is no possibility, no attempt, and no requirement that these micro-models should add-up to anything more.
In fact, if you even try to add them up - or to point out that they cannot be added up - you will be ignored, mocked or attacked (according to the perceived importance).
Micro-models replace understanding - their special quality is that they do not allow understanding. They operate everywhere - they are the norm not the exception.
And - with the best will in the world (which is, anyway, lacking) micro-models cannot be added-up to anything bigger, cannot be made sense of... they are dots which cannot ever under any circumstances be joined to make something greater.
Micro-models are, indeed, perfect mechanisms for demonic activity: a fake understanding of fake problems which makes no sense and cannot lead to either understanding of life or purpose in life: in sum - the perfect mechanism for inducing helpless despair in all matters across the whole population!
Moral: Metaphysics - the examination of our fundamental assumptions regarding the basic nature of reality, and the creation of theories of the utmost generality - is the single most neglected yet urgent subject of our era.
Note: See 'micro-specialisms' in science, as an example:
http://corruption-of-science.blogspot.co.uk
But modern mainstream theories - whether in science, law, medicine, religion, politics or the mass media - do not deserve the name of theories - they are so small, so specific... let's call them micro-models.
Micro-models are the sound-bites of theory which we get everywhere. Each serves mere to fake-explain some tiny sliver of facts - and there is no possibility, no attempt, and no requirement that these micro-models should add-up to anything more.
In fact, if you even try to add them up - or to point out that they cannot be added up - you will be ignored, mocked or attacked (according to the perceived importance).
Micro-models replace understanding - their special quality is that they do not allow understanding. They operate everywhere - they are the norm not the exception.
And - with the best will in the world (which is, anyway, lacking) micro-models cannot be added-up to anything bigger, cannot be made sense of... they are dots which cannot ever under any circumstances be joined to make something greater.
Micro-models are, indeed, perfect mechanisms for demonic activity: a fake understanding of fake problems which makes no sense and cannot lead to either understanding of life or purpose in life: in sum - the perfect mechanism for inducing helpless despair in all matters across the whole population!
Moral: Metaphysics - the examination of our fundamental assumptions regarding the basic nature of reality, and the creation of theories of the utmost generality - is the single most neglected yet urgent subject of our era.
Note: See 'micro-specialisms' in science, as an example:
http://corruption-of-science.blogspot.co.uk
Saturday 11 March 2017
Rudolf Steiner in 1918 on the mental sickness of atheism, the calamity of non-Christianity, the mental defect from denying the spiritual
There is in Man an inclination to know the Divine.
The second inclination in him - that is, in the Man of this era - is to know the Christ.
The third inclination in Man is to know what is usually called the Spirit, or also the Holy Ghost.
*
1. Where a Man denies the Father God - denies a Divine Principle in the world as such - there is an actual physical defect, a physical sickness, a physical flaw in the body.
To be an atheist means to the spiritual scientist to be sick in some respect... an actual sickness in a man who denies what he should be able to feel, through his actual bodily constitution. If he denies that which gives him a healthy bodily feeling, namely that the world is pervaded by Divinity, then he is a sick man, sick in body.
2. There are also many who deny the Christ. The denial of the Christ as is denial of something that is essentially a matter of destiny and concerns man's soul-life.
To deny God is a sickness; to deny the Christ is a calamity.
3. To deny the Spirit, the Holy Ghost, signifies dullness, obtuseness, of a man's own spirit.
*
So - atheism denotes an actual pathological defect. Failure to find in life that link with the world which enables us to recognise the Christ, is a calamity for the soul. To be unable to find the Spirit in one's own inmost being denotes obtuseness, a kind of spiritual mental deficiency, though in a subtle and unacknowledged form.
Edited from: https://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/atheism-is-actual-physical-defect.html
Entire text at: http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/FndChr_index.html#sthash.ddQ5kd7d.dpuf
The second inclination in him - that is, in the Man of this era - is to know the Christ.
The third inclination in Man is to know what is usually called the Spirit, or also the Holy Ghost.
*
1. Where a Man denies the Father God - denies a Divine Principle in the world as such - there is an actual physical defect, a physical sickness, a physical flaw in the body.
To be an atheist means to the spiritual scientist to be sick in some respect... an actual sickness in a man who denies what he should be able to feel, through his actual bodily constitution. If he denies that which gives him a healthy bodily feeling, namely that the world is pervaded by Divinity, then he is a sick man, sick in body.
2. There are also many who deny the Christ. The denial of the Christ as is denial of something that is essentially a matter of destiny and concerns man's soul-life.
To deny God is a sickness; to deny the Christ is a calamity.
3. To deny the Spirit, the Holy Ghost, signifies dullness, obtuseness, of a man's own spirit.
*
So - atheism denotes an actual pathological defect. Failure to find in life that link with the world which enables us to recognise the Christ, is a calamity for the soul. To be unable to find the Spirit in one's own inmost being denotes obtuseness, a kind of spiritual mental deficiency, though in a subtle and unacknowledged form.
Edited from: https://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/atheism-is-actual-physical-defect.html
Entire text at: http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/FndChr_index.html#sthash.ddQ5kd7d.dpuf
Friday 10 March 2017
Thursday 9 March 2017
Notice of X-Men 'Logan' Movie (No spoilers)
A violent movie, full of bad-language - with unexpected, beautiful and moving Christian themes and references:
http://www.jrganymede.com/2017/03/09/notice-of-the-new-logan-x-men-movie-from-fox-marvel/
http://www.jrganymede.com/2017/03/09/notice-of-the-new-logan-x-men-movie-from-fox-marvel/
Wednesday 8 March 2017
5 year anniversary of discovering the rapid, severe intelligence decline in The West
It was just over 5 years ago on this blog that Michael A Woodley and I published the discovery of a rapid and severe slowing of simple reaction times over the past century-plus; and the interpretation that this implied an equally precipitous decline in general intelligence ('g') which has been missed by IQ testing.
http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/convincing-objective-and-direct.html
I estimated the intelligence decline in England over c.150 years would be at-least (probably more) than one standard deviation (or 15 modern IQ points):
http://iqpersonalitygenius.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/taking-on-board-that-victorians-were.html
On my part, this led to a multitude of blog posts:
http://iqpersonalitygenius.blogspot.co.uk
And the whole story was rounded-up in a book co-authored with Edward Dutton
http://geniusfamine.blogspot.co.uk
On Michael's side, it led to a series of papers (one of which I co-authored) which - using multiple methods and measurements - are overall consistent with the proposed decline; and can be taken as confirmation of the thesis of that original blog post from Feb 28 2012.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3c4TxciNeJZaEY0UjluV1djOG8/view
The story of 'The Woodley Effect' was summarised recently on James Thomson's blog:
http://www.unz.com/jthompson/the-woodley-effect
So, a lot has happened in half a decade - which is not a long time in science!
http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/convincing-objective-and-direct.html
I estimated the intelligence decline in England over c.150 years would be at-least (probably more) than one standard deviation (or 15 modern IQ points):
http://iqpersonalitygenius.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/taking-on-board-that-victorians-were.html
On my part, this led to a multitude of blog posts:
http://iqpersonalitygenius.blogspot.co.uk
And the whole story was rounded-up in a book co-authored with Edward Dutton
http://geniusfamine.blogspot.co.uk
On Michael's side, it led to a series of papers (one of which I co-authored) which - using multiple methods and measurements - are overall consistent with the proposed decline; and can be taken as confirmation of the thesis of that original blog post from Feb 28 2012.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3c4TxciNeJZaEY0UjluV1djOG8/view
The story of 'The Woodley Effect' was summarised recently on James Thomson's blog:
http://www.unz.com/jthompson/the-woodley-effect
So, a lot has happened in half a decade - which is not a long time in science!
Epistemology is a snare - we need Metaphysics
The modern idea of modern philosophy assumes that epistemology is the most fundamental subject - questions about 'knowledge' such as how we know we know, or how we can be certain.
But the first and most important philosophy is metaphysics - the study of the primary, basic nature of reality - which is also the study of the key assumptions we make about reality.
Epistemology is therefore a waste of time, a damaging waste of time, without metaphysics. Epistemology is even more dangerous when it is based on the assumption that metaphysics is obsolete, childish and/or has been superseded by epistemology, or science, or something...
Examples of what I mean abound from high status to lowbrow bar-room conversation, the usual modern philosophical discourse fails to notice that it is only playing with a set of assumptions that create the outcome - meanwhile the assumptions are unnoticed or denied.
As when people assume a fundamental reality in which there is no order, consciousness or morality - and after vast arguments finally conclude that in reality there is not order, consciousness or morality... unaware that they themselves have assumed that which they believe they have 'proven'.
Most modern people simply refuse to admit they have any primary assumptions about the nature of reality - and they assert that their basic beliefs are forced-upon them by experience, logic, 'science' or whatever.
Philosophers generally get terribly unsure about the possibility of certain, reliable, communicable knowledge - without acknowledging that their metaphysical assumptions have already ruled-out anything of the kind.
Most modern people have a metaphysics which assumes that reality has no meaning or purpose - but they do not even realise that this is what they are assuming - and may become miserable and despairing about their failure to find meaning and purpose in experience, logic or 'science'.
The ridiculous tragedy of the situation is capped-off by the fact that those who call for metaphysics, who imagine that they are actually doing metaphysics; in practice themselves regard their assumptions as necessary and based on compelling evidence and logic (which would mean, if true, that they were not primary assumptions).
It would be absurd and amusing if the situations wasn't so tragic and lethal. The modern world has - in effect - laboriously constructed a perfect random number generator and is minutely examining the output to discover patterns.
In such a world of to ingrained, habitual and wilful self-blinding, to acknowledge the existence of our own metaphysical assumptions and those of others; to acknowledge that all knowledge must be based-upon metaphysics; to acknowledge that we cannot do epistemology without metaphysics - comes as a liberation: like waking from a nightmare delirium into the clear like of day.
But the first and most important philosophy is metaphysics - the study of the primary, basic nature of reality - which is also the study of the key assumptions we make about reality.
Epistemology is therefore a waste of time, a damaging waste of time, without metaphysics. Epistemology is even more dangerous when it is based on the assumption that metaphysics is obsolete, childish and/or has been superseded by epistemology, or science, or something...
Examples of what I mean abound from high status to lowbrow bar-room conversation, the usual modern philosophical discourse fails to notice that it is only playing with a set of assumptions that create the outcome - meanwhile the assumptions are unnoticed or denied.
As when people assume a fundamental reality in which there is no order, consciousness or morality - and after vast arguments finally conclude that in reality there is not order, consciousness or morality... unaware that they themselves have assumed that which they believe they have 'proven'.
Most modern people simply refuse to admit they have any primary assumptions about the nature of reality - and they assert that their basic beliefs are forced-upon them by experience, logic, 'science' or whatever.
Philosophers generally get terribly unsure about the possibility of certain, reliable, communicable knowledge - without acknowledging that their metaphysical assumptions have already ruled-out anything of the kind.
Most modern people have a metaphysics which assumes that reality has no meaning or purpose - but they do not even realise that this is what they are assuming - and may become miserable and despairing about their failure to find meaning and purpose in experience, logic or 'science'.
The ridiculous tragedy of the situation is capped-off by the fact that those who call for metaphysics, who imagine that they are actually doing metaphysics; in practice themselves regard their assumptions as necessary and based on compelling evidence and logic (which would mean, if true, that they were not primary assumptions).
It would be absurd and amusing if the situations wasn't so tragic and lethal. The modern world has - in effect - laboriously constructed a perfect random number generator and is minutely examining the output to discover patterns.
In such a world of to ingrained, habitual and wilful self-blinding, to acknowledge the existence of our own metaphysical assumptions and those of others; to acknowledge that all knowledge must be based-upon metaphysics; to acknowledge that we cannot do epistemology without metaphysics - comes as a liberation: like waking from a nightmare delirium into the clear like of day.
Tuesday 7 March 2017
Why resist totalitarianism? (What is it?)
Totalitarianism aims to control thinking - by a system of maximum monitoring.
George Orwell got us mixed-up about this; because of his emphasis on violent coercion and the assumption that it was the violence which was bad about totalitarianism - and the atheist assumption that the infliction of suffering by violence is the worst possible thing.
The upshot is that when there is no violence - and especially when there is no violent infliction of suffering - modern people cannot perceive totalitarianism: they simply don't notice it, or even deny its presence.
Phrases like 'soft' totalitarianism implicitly suggest that totalitarianism without violence is not really so bad - and nobody fought hard to defend against the triumph of 'soft' totalitarianism, because that didn't sound so bad.
But the badness of totalitarianism is, of course, spiritual - not physical. Totalitarianism is evil because of its effect on our souls - not because of its effect on our bodies.
Totalitarianism aims to control thinking by a system of maximum monitoring - to monitor the people down to a level of detail so fine that the only possible compliance is to think in the approved way.
It is nothing necessarily to do with the infliction of suffering by violence - violence is just one possible means to an end.
Modern Western society is objectively very highly totalitarian - especially in the workplace, compared with fifty years ago - because thought is very highly controlled. Absence, presence, threat of violence has nothing to do with the fact.
But why is totalitarianism bad? - if it isn't violent? Why resist it?
The only reason is if you believe that Life is about something more. The only reason to resist having one's mind controlled is if you believe that there is something very important to do with your mind.
Modern people do not resist totalitarianism because they do not believe they have anything better to do with their lives than to think in the approved way.
Modern people believe that Life is merely about the balance between pleasure and pain (maximising the first, minimising the second) - and altruism merely means wanting the same for other people. If totalitarian thought control can be imposed in a way that does not inflict suffering with violence - modern people are quite happy to accept, indeed embrace, totalitarianism.
Only religious people who believe that Life is about something else than emotions, and something more than mortal existence, have any serious objections to their minds being comfortably colonised and directed by the linked bureaucracies of employers, the state and the mass media; and there are so few Western religious people; and they are so scattered and mutually mistrustful or hostile, that their resistance to totalitarianism has, so far, been apparently ineffectual.
Why resist totalitarianism? If you have something better to do with your life; and therefore if you wish to avoid self-chosen damnation (which is, ultimately, the only kind of damnation).
But if you deny any real, objective, vital purpose of your life, and if you deny the reality of damnation - then you will surely accept, embrace, joyously join-in with the work of totalitarianism.
George Orwell got us mixed-up about this; because of his emphasis on violent coercion and the assumption that it was the violence which was bad about totalitarianism - and the atheist assumption that the infliction of suffering by violence is the worst possible thing.
The upshot is that when there is no violence - and especially when there is no violent infliction of suffering - modern people cannot perceive totalitarianism: they simply don't notice it, or even deny its presence.
Phrases like 'soft' totalitarianism implicitly suggest that totalitarianism without violence is not really so bad - and nobody fought hard to defend against the triumph of 'soft' totalitarianism, because that didn't sound so bad.
But the badness of totalitarianism is, of course, spiritual - not physical. Totalitarianism is evil because of its effect on our souls - not because of its effect on our bodies.
Totalitarianism aims to control thinking by a system of maximum monitoring - to monitor the people down to a level of detail so fine that the only possible compliance is to think in the approved way.
It is nothing necessarily to do with the infliction of suffering by violence - violence is just one possible means to an end.
Modern Western society is objectively very highly totalitarian - especially in the workplace, compared with fifty years ago - because thought is very highly controlled. Absence, presence, threat of violence has nothing to do with the fact.
But why is totalitarianism bad? - if it isn't violent? Why resist it?
The only reason is if you believe that Life is about something more. The only reason to resist having one's mind controlled is if you believe that there is something very important to do with your mind.
Modern people do not resist totalitarianism because they do not believe they have anything better to do with their lives than to think in the approved way.
Modern people believe that Life is merely about the balance between pleasure and pain (maximising the first, minimising the second) - and altruism merely means wanting the same for other people. If totalitarian thought control can be imposed in a way that does not inflict suffering with violence - modern people are quite happy to accept, indeed embrace, totalitarianism.
Only religious people who believe that Life is about something else than emotions, and something more than mortal existence, have any serious objections to their minds being comfortably colonised and directed by the linked bureaucracies of employers, the state and the mass media; and there are so few Western religious people; and they are so scattered and mutually mistrustful or hostile, that their resistance to totalitarianism has, so far, been apparently ineffectual.
Why resist totalitarianism? If you have something better to do with your life; and therefore if you wish to avoid self-chosen damnation (which is, ultimately, the only kind of damnation).
But if you deny any real, objective, vital purpose of your life, and if you deny the reality of damnation - then you will surely accept, embrace, joyously join-in with the work of totalitarianism.
Monday 6 March 2017
Freedom is good - but freedom can only be Christian (pretty much...)
Real freedom is something that happens - or more often doesn't happen - in thinking; and only in thinking. (What we do is constrained - but how we think may be free.)
Of course, much, most and in some people all thinking is automatic; merely trained or habitual - or a product not of thinking but instead of some causal factor, whether internal or external.
Free thinking is self-caused - and if your metaphysical understanding does not allow for self-causation, then you cannot be free (or, you cannot acknowledge and will deny your own freedom).
Freedom is that thinking which comes from the true self - and the true self is able to be free because it is divine - at least partly.
We are divine because we are children of God - and not fully divine because we are only very immature children of God. It follows that we are not always free - and some people are, apparently, not-at-all free - not least because they deny their freedom (as above).
(Self-caused thinking is a property of the divine; and for an individual person to be free entails that that individual person is individually divine.)
Self-acknowledged freedom is, therefore, pretty much restricted to Christians - and among Christians only to those who really believe that: 1. we are really Children of God; 2. with something of divinity in us (even in mortal earthly life); and 3. (sometimes, potentially) autonomous agents, capable of originating new, uncaused thoughts from an uncorrupted (albeit embryonic) true self.
**
Note added in explanation: By 'restricted to Christians' I mean that Eastern philosophies tend to regard external reality and the self as illusions - as does scientism/ positivism/ materialism; and the pure monotheisms tend to regard the autonomous self as essentially operating in defiance of God - and indeed quite a few Christians have also seemed to adopt this assumption in practice, if not in theory. Only a (relatively) few Christians seem to give free will/ agency/ the autonomous and primarily creative self the full value (both in theory and in practice) which is in line with the fundamental requirements of Gospel teaching.
Of course, much, most and in some people all thinking is automatic; merely trained or habitual - or a product not of thinking but instead of some causal factor, whether internal or external.
Free thinking is self-caused - and if your metaphysical understanding does not allow for self-causation, then you cannot be free (or, you cannot acknowledge and will deny your own freedom).
Freedom is that thinking which comes from the true self - and the true self is able to be free because it is divine - at least partly.
We are divine because we are children of God - and not fully divine because we are only very immature children of God. It follows that we are not always free - and some people are, apparently, not-at-all free - not least because they deny their freedom (as above).
(Self-caused thinking is a property of the divine; and for an individual person to be free entails that that individual person is individually divine.)
Self-acknowledged freedom is, therefore, pretty much restricted to Christians - and among Christians only to those who really believe that: 1. we are really Children of God; 2. with something of divinity in us (even in mortal earthly life); and 3. (sometimes, potentially) autonomous agents, capable of originating new, uncaused thoughts from an uncorrupted (albeit embryonic) true self.
**
Note added in explanation: By 'restricted to Christians' I mean that Eastern philosophies tend to regard external reality and the self as illusions - as does scientism/ positivism/ materialism; and the pure monotheisms tend to regard the autonomous self as essentially operating in defiance of God - and indeed quite a few Christians have also seemed to adopt this assumption in practice, if not in theory. Only a (relatively) few Christians seem to give free will/ agency/ the autonomous and primarily creative self the full value (both in theory and in practice) which is in line with the fundamental requirements of Gospel teaching.
The modern workplace is objectively totalitarian - what are you doing about it?
Well - it is.
Monitoring is extended down to a timescale of minutes; and everyone is enlisted to provide evidence against themselves and each other by the totalitarian systems of 'quality assurance' management.
https://www.hedweb.com/bgcharlton/audit.html
This is not just or primarily a system of physical control - but a strategic system of thought control; designed to entrap people, to enmesh them in lies and compromises from which they see no escape but to beg and crave the indulgence of their superiors.
In the modern workplace; you are in breach of regulations at every moment - the evidence for which is supplied by yourself and your colleagues. It is literally impossible to do your job and comply with the demands for monitoring, and to comply with the overlapping and conflicting requirements for ideology.
Your attitudes are wrong, your attitude are 'evil' - especially when they acknowledge reality. You need your consciousness raising, your understanding transformed, your mind reprogrammed...
You are continually failing - because the situation is one in which success is literally impossible. (Everybody is in breach of regulations at every moment - by action and inaction.) At any time you can be denounced - potentially by you own auditable accounts of yourself. There is no defence - but to beg for mercy (and typically mercy will not be forthcoming - you are to be made an example of.)
The modern worker, 'works' hard, is very 'busy' - but does nothing functional; indeed, the harder he works, the more work he inflicts on himself and his colleagues. The finer the mesh of the steel web of bureacracy he weaves around himself and his colleagues.
Indeed this just IS modern work - a system of creating work and adding more and ever-more systems of monitoring, audit and control.
A waste of time? Yes of course. But that is not the main problem - this is not just a 'waste of time'.
Totalitarian systems are not merely futile - they are actively evil.
Totalitarianism is control with a purpose - and that purpose is the destruction of Good, the denial of God - the inversion of Good, the damnation of souls.
People used to know this naturally without needing it pointed out - people used to feel when they were being corrupted.
But now? They feel a hopeless misery, yes - but they are already so corrupted that they have lost the ability to perceive further corruption. We are all of us - in the workplace - concentration camp guards and bureaucrats - that is, when we are not the prisoners being made to extend and reinforce our gaols.
People do not believe in the instant and infinite power of repentance - so they see no way-out from the state of enmeshed collaboration and their suffocating history of being complicit in tyranny.
But repentance is the answer - and only Christ offers repentance.
(Indeed, without Christ, the concept has no meaning - which is why hardly anybody believes it.)
First repentance to escape the fine steel mesh that traps us - and then? Steps to freedom.
Monitoring is extended down to a timescale of minutes; and everyone is enlisted to provide evidence against themselves and each other by the totalitarian systems of 'quality assurance' management.
https://www.hedweb.com/bgcharlton/audit.html
This is not just or primarily a system of physical control - but a strategic system of thought control; designed to entrap people, to enmesh them in lies and compromises from which they see no escape but to beg and crave the indulgence of their superiors.
In the modern workplace; you are in breach of regulations at every moment - the evidence for which is supplied by yourself and your colleagues. It is literally impossible to do your job and comply with the demands for monitoring, and to comply with the overlapping and conflicting requirements for ideology.
Your attitudes are wrong, your attitude are 'evil' - especially when they acknowledge reality. You need your consciousness raising, your understanding transformed, your mind reprogrammed...
You are continually failing - because the situation is one in which success is literally impossible. (Everybody is in breach of regulations at every moment - by action and inaction.) At any time you can be denounced - potentially by you own auditable accounts of yourself. There is no defence - but to beg for mercy (and typically mercy will not be forthcoming - you are to be made an example of.)
The modern worker, 'works' hard, is very 'busy' - but does nothing functional; indeed, the harder he works, the more work he inflicts on himself and his colleagues. The finer the mesh of the steel web of bureacracy he weaves around himself and his colleagues.
Indeed this just IS modern work - a system of creating work and adding more and ever-more systems of monitoring, audit and control.
A waste of time? Yes of course. But that is not the main problem - this is not just a 'waste of time'.
Totalitarian systems are not merely futile - they are actively evil.
Totalitarianism is control with a purpose - and that purpose is the destruction of Good, the denial of God - the inversion of Good, the damnation of souls.
People used to know this naturally without needing it pointed out - people used to feel when they were being corrupted.
But now? They feel a hopeless misery, yes - but they are already so corrupted that they have lost the ability to perceive further corruption. We are all of us - in the workplace - concentration camp guards and bureaucrats - that is, when we are not the prisoners being made to extend and reinforce our gaols.
People do not believe in the instant and infinite power of repentance - so they see no way-out from the state of enmeshed collaboration and their suffocating history of being complicit in tyranny.
But repentance is the answer - and only Christ offers repentance.
(Indeed, without Christ, the concept has no meaning - which is why hardly anybody believes it.)
First repentance to escape the fine steel mesh that traps us - and then? Steps to freedom.
Sunday 5 March 2017
The Once and Future Charles Williams
My recent essay-review from The Journal of Inklings Studies:
http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/the-once-and-future-charles-williams.html
http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/the-once-and-future-charles-williams.html
Saturday 4 March 2017
Friday 3 March 2017
Why should victims of Political Correctness "never resign, never apologise"?
The advice never to resign, never to apologise is good advice - but the reason for it is misunderstood.
The reason is not because then things will work-out better - that is not knowable, outcomes are not controllable.
Part of the reason is that resigning and apologising is exactly what 'they' want you to do - and that fact, in and of itself, ought to be sufficient evidence that resigning and apologising are a bad idea.
*
However that resignation and apology are what is wanted leads onto the question of exactly 'why' the secular Leftists - i.e. the mainstream socio-political Establishment of all 'parties' - so much want their victims to resign and apologise?
The answer is related to the underlying objective of the Establishment - which is to lead the world (first The West, then everybody else) into self-loathing, despair, implicit suicide, and ultimately chosen damnation.
(Our situation is one of spiritual warfare.)
*
Given that PC witch-hunts are primarily directed against those who tell the truth - resignation and apology means that the victim publicly repents his Good action.
To do something Good, and then to repent it - is actually worse than doing nothing; because it teaches (with the explicit endorsement of the victim) the public lesson that Good is actually evil.
Un-repented evil is, of course, the main weapon of the secular Left (by moral inversion they re-label evil as good, ugliness as beauty, and lies as truth) - but repented-Good is even more powerful a weapon of corruption than un-repented-evil.
*
This is also why most PC witch-hunts are directed against those of 'liberal' views, especially those who broadly favour the sexual revolution - rather than against those who have strong and primary religious convictions.
The witch-hunting Leftists know that other Leftists can be relied-upon swiftly to cave and capitulate.
This is because secular Leftist/ sexual revolutionaries/ 'liberals' (whether or not they term themselves socialist, democrat, conservative, republican, libertarian or alt-right) are all very weakly motivated when it comes to moral principles.
Secular principles are essentially expedient, this-worldly, and orientated towards hedonic goals: the enhancement of pleasure and minimisation of suffering in life. Such people can easily and quickly be pressurised into 'selling-out' - by simply piling-up the threat of disincentives.
*
So - when the chips are down (as opposed to their theoretical boasts or even sincere intentions) the secular/ liberal/ leftist/ sexual revolutionaries among victims of PC witch-hunts have almost all, and rapidly, capitulated - and done exactly what was wanted of them: resigned and apologised.
They may talk tough before the fact, they may say they won't capitulate - but, in fact, they do.
*
It is pretty much only those of strong religious faith who ever stand firm and refuse to apologise or resign; and this is simply because real religious motivations are much, much more powerful than secular motivations.
This is just a fact of human nature - known for centuries (or millennia).
*
And this is why a secular backlash against secular Leftism will not be effective. Any potential leaders will be picked-off sequentially, as and when they threaten to challenge the core agenda.
When things get tough - people who have rejected the divine will not hold the line, and they will capitulate.
Which is why there must be a spiritual awakening, a religious revival: nothing else can work.
**
Of course, real religious faith cannot be had merely because it gives strength of motivation - rather, strength of motivation is - or can be - a consequence of real religious faith. Strong faith is based upon knowledge of truth; and not on any kind of expediency or hoped-for this-world consequence.
The reason is not because then things will work-out better - that is not knowable, outcomes are not controllable.
Part of the reason is that resigning and apologising is exactly what 'they' want you to do - and that fact, in and of itself, ought to be sufficient evidence that resigning and apologising are a bad idea.
*
However that resignation and apology are what is wanted leads onto the question of exactly 'why' the secular Leftists - i.e. the mainstream socio-political Establishment of all 'parties' - so much want their victims to resign and apologise?
The answer is related to the underlying objective of the Establishment - which is to lead the world (first The West, then everybody else) into self-loathing, despair, implicit suicide, and ultimately chosen damnation.
(Our situation is one of spiritual warfare.)
*
Given that PC witch-hunts are primarily directed against those who tell the truth - resignation and apology means that the victim publicly repents his Good action.
To do something Good, and then to repent it - is actually worse than doing nothing; because it teaches (with the explicit endorsement of the victim) the public lesson that Good is actually evil.
Un-repented evil is, of course, the main weapon of the secular Left (by moral inversion they re-label evil as good, ugliness as beauty, and lies as truth) - but repented-Good is even more powerful a weapon of corruption than un-repented-evil.
*
This is also why most PC witch-hunts are directed against those of 'liberal' views, especially those who broadly favour the sexual revolution - rather than against those who have strong and primary religious convictions.
The witch-hunting Leftists know that other Leftists can be relied-upon swiftly to cave and capitulate.
This is because secular Leftist/ sexual revolutionaries/ 'liberals' (whether or not they term themselves socialist, democrat, conservative, republican, libertarian or alt-right) are all very weakly motivated when it comes to moral principles.
Secular principles are essentially expedient, this-worldly, and orientated towards hedonic goals: the enhancement of pleasure and minimisation of suffering in life. Such people can easily and quickly be pressurised into 'selling-out' - by simply piling-up the threat of disincentives.
*
So - when the chips are down (as opposed to their theoretical boasts or even sincere intentions) the secular/ liberal/ leftist/ sexual revolutionaries among victims of PC witch-hunts have almost all, and rapidly, capitulated - and done exactly what was wanted of them: resigned and apologised.
They may talk tough before the fact, they may say they won't capitulate - but, in fact, they do.
*
It is pretty much only those of strong religious faith who ever stand firm and refuse to apologise or resign; and this is simply because real religious motivations are much, much more powerful than secular motivations.
This is just a fact of human nature - known for centuries (or millennia).
*
And this is why a secular backlash against secular Leftism will not be effective. Any potential leaders will be picked-off sequentially, as and when they threaten to challenge the core agenda.
When things get tough - people who have rejected the divine will not hold the line, and they will capitulate.
Which is why there must be a spiritual awakening, a religious revival: nothing else can work.
**
Of course, real religious faith cannot be had merely because it gives strength of motivation - rather, strength of motivation is - or can be - a consequence of real religious faith. Strong faith is based upon knowledge of truth; and not on any kind of expediency or hoped-for this-world consequence.
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