21st CENTURY VISIONS !!!

IN the 20Th century, national sovereignty was generally regarded as something sacred, something that couldn't be interfered with. IN the 21st century, a head of state, a regime or a government can't be left free to do whatever they deem good to their interests or survival.

AS we know today, the world can not stand aside when gross and systematic violations of human rights are taking place ,we also learn that interventions must be based on legitimate and universal principles if it is to enjoy sustained support of the world's community.

WE need to establish a formal body of rules and laws to govern when the UN can authorise an intervention in a sovereign state, including the capability to remove it's leader by force if necessary. WE need to take urgent actions to establish a proposed set of rules to govern our responsibility to protect, our responsibility to react, and our responsibility to free an oppressed people.


20st century modes of dividing the world under major superpower's interests are not acceptable nor justifiable in our 21st century. Veto power in the UN of the said permanent members are not acceptable nor useful to the entirety of world nations. Whether these vetoes come from the U.S. protecting Israel or Russia protecting the Syrian regime, as the two countries and in both cases exercised a very selfish power in blocking and stopping the international body of nations imposing some just and needed actions and solutions.

THIS is a normal inversion of traditional behaviour, which seems necessary for a new era. THE 21st century brings the need for major policy changes on the world scene, with ethics based in deep philosophy. WE have to escape from some of the deeply embedded viewpoints of the 20Th century.

Vested interests will try to discredit such changes in our world legislation, and sometimes in brutal ways, we have again the blatant examples of the Syrian regime or the Israeli right wing government's behaviour and indifference facing international objections to their wrong doings at different instances in their recent history and only protected by superpower's vetoes.

WORLD people and nations need to be sure we understand the journey ahead and need to plan well how to bring about necessary inversions.




Just an honest opinion, thanks for your time.

THE STATE OF THE UNION.......

OF course what I'm referring to here is the union of any two persons, whether in marriage or any form of relationships, including friendship.

THE long time success of a relationship depends far more on avoiding the negative than on seeking the positive. A good estimate that a stable marriage/relationship requires that good interactions outnumber bad interactions by at least 3-4 to 1, some experts even see a 5 to 1 ratio as fair. Every couple should observe themselves.

WE all know that a friendship or a relationship that may take years to develop and mature can be ruined by one single action.

THE prime goal and concerns of a good relationship is that we should survive it.

Because we need to make sure that we are not close to the limits beyond which relationship's total breakage occurs, a discipline that continualy and comprehensively keeps measuring and modeling the mechanisms governing any relationship should reign at all instances.

THE art of living within the boundaries of a relationship, whether it's a couple in marriage or just lovers or a friendship is to make the best of it, not to try to organise everything the way you want.

MY words and few lines contain questions that are addressed personally to the reader, TO YOU. WE are more likely to learn something by finding surprises in our behaviour than by hearing surprising facts about people in general.




Thanks for your time and patience.

WAITING FOR THE CATASTROPHE !!!!

THE possibility of climate change represents a titanic clash of interests between the ability of the planet to support our lifestyle against the profitability of big oil/coal commercial enterprises.

Because there is no apparent certainty, the oil and coal industries can choose to ignore the possibilities and carry on with business as usual. But if we wait until the evidence of catastrophic climate change is conclusive and evident to the eye, it will be too late to stop it. The forces provoking climate change cannot themselves be changed quickly to reverse course.

The study of global warning has become so visible that profit-driven falsification of science constitutes "a clear crime against humanity."

Scientists with their extensive instrumentation have warned us that the Ocean conveyor is beginning to change in all Oceans and more so in the North Atlantic, it might sooner than later be too late to stop it. Once these conveyors start to change, the huge momentum of the forces at work will carry it forward irreversibly.

The U.S. department of defence commissioned a study on the consequences of the Ocean Conveyor's changing their positions and worked out three scenarios in detail. In the worst, Britain and Holland followed by most of central and east Europe have such frigid temperatures that many people leave. Much of Sweden turns to tundra. The Riviera becomes like the main coast of the north. As this is happening and while Western Europe turns icy, central Africa becomes hotter, and rainfall rates decline.

Many parts of the world experience severe droughts. There are mass migrations of people and wars caused by shortages of water and food. Despite this scenario, presented by it's own Department of Defence, the U.S. government took no action.

The true cost of carbon-based fuels includes the costs of pollution, military protection of oil assets and the costs of abnormal storm damage that is related to global warming. The medical expenses for coal-related sickness and emissions of carbon-based gases resulting in enormous lost workdays.

When these costs are included in the accounting, the cost of power from wind generators and solar panels and other green energy resources could be less than the cost of power from coal and oil. If and when that happens, there will be mass production of alternate energy sources, and that by itself will bring down their costs substantially.



thanks for listening, your interest is as usual greatly appreciated, salamat.

THE WAY WE ARE !!!!

The famous psychologist Richard Nisbett conducted an experiment whereby the participants were led to individual booths and invited to speak over the intercom about their personal lives and problems. They were to talk in turn for about 2 minutes. Only one microphone was active at any one time. There were six participants in each group, one of whom was a set stooge. The fake participant spoke first, following a script prepared by the experimenters. He described his problems adjusting to New York and admitted with obvious embarrassment that he was prone to seizures, especially when stressed. All the participants then had a turn. When the microphone was again turned over to the stooge, he became agitated and incoherent, said he felt a seizure coming on, and asked for someone to help him. The last words heard from him were, "C-ould somebody-er--er-help-er-uh-uh-uh [choking sounds]. I... I'm gonna die-er-er-er I'm... gonna die-er-er-I seizure I-er[chokes, then quiet]." At this point the microphone of the next participant automatically became active, and nothing more was heard from the possibly dying individual.

What do you think the participants in the experiment did? so far as the participants knew , one of them was having a seizure and had asked for help. However, there were several other people who could possibly respond, so perhaps one could stay safely in one's booth. These were the results: only four of the fifteen participants responded immediately to the appeal for help. Six never got out of their booths, and five others came out only well after the "seizure victim" apparently choked.

The experiment shows that individuals feel relieved of responsibility when they know that others have heard the same request for help.

Did the results surprise you ?? very probably. Most of us think of ourselves as decent people who would rush to help in such a situation , and we expect other decent people to do the same. The point of the experiment, of course, was to show that this expectation is wrong,, even normal, decent people do not rush to help when they expect others to take on the unpleasantness of dealing with a seizure. And that means all of us and you, too.

When I first came across and read the procedure of the helping experiment I thought I would come to the stranger's help immediately, as I probably would if I found myself alone with a seizure victim. I was probably wrong. If I find myself in a situation in which other people have an opportunity to help, I might not step forward. The presence of others would reduce my sense of personal responsibility more than I initially thought.

Changing one's mind about human nature is hard work, and changing one's mind for the worse about oneself is even harder.



My great thanks to Mr. Daniel K. for finding and discussing the experiment that was conducted a long time ago by R. Nisbett.

THE FUTURE ISN'T WHAT IT USED TO BE..... OR IS IT ???

A new year's first day is a time to recollect and remember, to look back and think. Maybe so... maybe not !!

I've never been a good one to look back. What's the point ? It's over. Been there already, done it all. I'm good at not looking back.

That I spent my life flying and going to places and taking no pictures, none. Friends and family always asked me for photos to look at, and I always said there aren't any, just my memory of it.

My wife and friends though seem to photograph everything. We just had over a hundred photos of our family gathering for this past Xmas period. Pictures of us, our smiles, the tree, gifts under the tree, and always the food at the table.

Face book pages overflow already with dozens of photos , and I mean it could reach the hundreds.

Speaking of Face book, I'm always intrigued by people who reminisce about their breakfast or brunch, or the taste of a prepared dish. It would never occur to me to look back on my brunch or dinner, and for sure not the taste of food, yes it was good, but no need to dwell on it.

That's why I have always been more interested in the year and times ahead, in the future and not the past, what the future might bring, what might happen, the surprise of it all.

I'm now in my sixty-something year of age and still looking forward to getting older, and years to come, I've always looked to older age and ahead times as better in my life.

Maybe the future isn't what it used to be thirty years ago, but it's the all exciting future nonetheless.

Happy new year everyone, let the next adventure begin.



thanks for your time, again happy and happy, salamat.

LIARS AND BULLSHITTERS !!!

I'm referring here to mostly Arab regimes now in conflict with their people ie; the Syrian or Bahrainy regimes to name a few in the Arab world, but by no means the only example of bullshit regimes in the world, North Korea with it's own news and ways, is another very descriptive case of the bullshit regime in our world today. People and leaders are victims of the two categories as well.

Someone who lies and someone who tells the truth are playing on opposite sides, so to speak, in the same game. Each responds to the facts as he understands them.

For most people, the fact that a statement is false constitutes in itself a reason, however weak, not to make the statement.

What a bullshitting regime essentially represent is not the state of affairs to which the regime refers to nor the beliefs of the regime or it's leaders.

The bullshitter regime ignores these demands( whether from it's people or it's own) altogether. It does not reject the authority of the truth, as the liar regime does and oppose himself to it. The bullshitter regime pays no attention to truth at all, nor is such a regime interested in the truth. By virtue of this, bullshit regimes are a far greater enemy of the truth than liars are.

This same unfortunate state of affairs apply today very well to the United States own affairs, I'm of course referring to the electoral mood and arguments of a good number of Americans, republicans and others, voters or leaders, regarding the reelection of the actual President for office in 2012.



Thanks as usual for your time and patience, your comments are always welcome, salamat.

BEGGING THE QUESTION !!

Many hold political, religious or social opinions not because they have any reason to think them true, but just because they like the associations.

We live in mobile and complex societies, there is no need to feel bound to one style of thinking forever.

I must confess that since I started blogging and putting down my opinions and ideas, there has been no deep reform of my character. I still want to write those lines. It's just that what gets me so irritated and sometimes even angered doesn't seem to be of the least interest to the readers of my blog. Nor to my increasingly fewer friends, who yawn and roll their eyes as I explain my concerns.

What bothers me so much ??

Errors in reasoning, misconceptions, faulty or misleading reasoning, unsound arguments, confused or mistaken beliefs, call it what you want, you know the kind of thing I mean.

Why are we protesters so lonely ?? why don't we all complain to whoever else will listen ?

The simple answer is that most people don't notice the problem. When a car for instance, breaks down, anyone can see that it has, even if he or she knows nothing about how cars work. Reasoning is different. Unless you know how reasoning can go wrong, you can't see that it has. Which makes for huge numbers of innocent suckers, unable to resist the fake reasoning of those who want something from them, such as votes or money or devotion.

Covering those errors in reasoning that are commonly encountered, when discussing or debating controversial topics, drawn from politics, theology, business or the social, and wherever people engage in reasoned debate. Is what we ought to aim for.



Thanks for your time , and your understanding, and as usual salamat to all.