An amazing aspect of the internet is that it has democratized information filtration. Whereas in the past information flowed outwards from a few, very powerful, sources, it now flows freely in all directions. Many people have noted this phenomena, even praised it for the miracle that it is, but there is a darker side to the extreme diversity of information filtration, something called ‘comfirmational bias’. This is the tendency we have to look information that already supports a view we currently hold, and it’s not something that’s easy (or even completely possible) to overcome.

This past year I’ve gotten most of my news and information from my facebook and twitter streams, my youtube subscriptions… always feeling as if I was getting ‘the other side’ of the story. I suppose you could call it a mental oversight that, at first, I failed to realize that there is never only two sides to a story. Through the internet I’ve found large groups of loose associations through digital media to people who share similar values to mine, which is great, and has opened my eyes to many new ideas.

However, I tend to agree with more of these ideas than not, and I don’t think this is a good thing. I think a large chunk of the information I expose myself to should be information I disagree with. There are multiple reasons for this, namely:
1. Understanding another’s position is an invaluable tool in conversation, and
2. It’s important to recieve information that has been filtered through an entirely different set of biases than a person is used to. The fact of the matter is that no matter how biased a source for information is, the information is still there, and when we seek a diverse  base of source-biases, we are forced to use our critical thinking capacities as we learn, rather than passively re-inforcing our same old thought-patterns.

What catalyzed perspective shift? I’ve been doing a lot of painting at my day job lately, and was looking for something to listen to on my iPod that might make me feel like I was not wasting my day. I searched iTunes for ‘philosophy’, and on iTunesU I found a lecture series called ‘Modern Philosophy’. I downloaded the batch and started listening.

What I didn’t notice, until I started listening, was that this lecture series was given at RTS (The Reformed Theological Seminary).  I’m about halfway through the series, and now I know why Marx never wrote anything worth thinking about…. because he was a godless statist, of course! But jokes and sillyness like that aside, I really have learned a lot about modern philosophy that I did not know, and I actually appreciated sorting through the perspective that professor Ronald Nash projects onto the philosophies of these great thinkers. People I’d never actually heard of like Kant and Hegel, or those I had like Marx, Nietzsche, or Rousseau (all of whom were near-worthless idiots, according to Nash :D).

Nash is an expert on these people’s philosophies, but the ever-present, transparent Christian bias that goes completely unnoticed by Nash and his students (even as he rails on the logical contradictions in certain philosophies while continuing to fall back on a logically contradictory version of Christianity) is an brain churning example of information filtration that stimulates the neurons to no end. It’s interesting to learn about philosophy from someone I fundamentally disagree with, because as I listen and absorb the real information he’s putting forward, I’m forced to use my critical thinking facilities to understand which statements are based on reality, and which the Christian delusion Nash holds so dear to his heart, as he makes casual reference to the impending Rapture, the unsaved, and joking ‘amen’s’ and ‘halleljia’s’ from his enthusiastic students.

Having never heard a lot of this information before, it was nice to hear it from a bible believing Christian. I can’t wait to hear some more perspectives.

I recently heard about a report that discovered when people listen to someone we percieve as an ‘expert’ in a given field, our critical thinking capacities all but shut down. I have no tests to back this up, but I think if we are listening to experts who have valid insights and information, but also have fundamental disagreements with our own personal philosophies, and therefore constantly arriving at different conclusions than we would, our critical thinking faculties may not be so dormant.

My third contribution to TZM Music Project, now retitled (to my great pleasure) Zeit Tunes!

This is my new year. The middle of the summer is my birthday, and it used to be the divider between grades, so this time of year has always felt that way to me. This has always been my new year.

From tomorrow until next Monday I’ll have barely any cellphone service, definitely no internet access, and probably some chemicals flowing through my system, though I’ll admit, I’m not really the type of person who ‘parties’ very hard. This ‘retreat’ gives me the most of both socialization (there are people everywhere, friends, friends of friends, stranger friends) and contemplation, because inside the solitude of my tent, and even with the distant beat of four or five different stages at nearly 24 hours of the day, my mind is rarely so calm and clear.

Shambhala is a vibrant, and I’ll admit, sometimes overwhelming display of the human spirit. People there are rarely afraid to talk to strangers, they’ll make eye contact, we don’t know what it is, but when we’re there, we all understand it (anyone who’s ever done mushrooms or acid knows that feeling…), even if that understanding is sometimes fleeting, forever striving for it allows each new experience to teach me something. And shambhala is an experience I look forward to every year.

peace. be back on monday :)

and while I’m away don’t be scared to share any of these video’s and posts with your friends.

visit their site: www.invisiblepeople.com to see more interviews.

I’ve never understood the mentality of wanting to resurrect the past, because we as a species are constantly learning. Think of how many things that are possible now that weren’t possible in 1776. Shouldn’t we look towards the future instead of the past?

There is a lot of amazing insight in the US Constitution, and 1776 was a great triumph of freedom over all kinds of unruly controls, but maybe a small part of the reason that the US, Canada, the world, is in this position is because we all rely on these immutable documents, like constitutions, which then become enforced by laws. My point being that one immutable document is NEVER going to be able to lay down the rulebook of a perfect society. By saying we should go back to 1776 is to say that we should go back to what got us into this mess in the first place.

A lot has changed since 1776, when they said “All men are created equal” they meant all white males. We now understand that statement should read “All human people are to have equal rights and freedoms”, or something similar, since even the language “are created” assumes a religious pretense that may not be all inclusive. And if you take the non-religious meaning of creation we know we weren’t all created equally [doggy, missionary,etc]. sorry.). We’ve updated our understandings, and that’s why a constitution, any constitution, will eventually create a failed state.

Here in Canada, until 1913 (which interestingly, but maybe only coincidentally, coincides with the establishment of the US’s Federal Reserve bank) the Federal Government had the authority and the responsibility, to control and issue our money. They were given an unlimited supply of debt-free money with which to operate the country, thus eliminating the need for direct federal income tax. All they had to do was print it. And that’s what they did it for the first 46 years of our country. But, in 1913, our parliament passed an amendment to the Bank Act, without referendum, giving to the banking system the sole right to create money. And they charge interest. Since then our national debt has grown from being 463 million dollars to over 1 trillion dollars in 2009. In this case, our constitutional rights were subverted by underhanded legislation, but that happens all the time, in every country that operates a monetary based democracy the democratic principals will always be undermined by greed. That’s another understanding of ours that has been updated since 1776.

So I’m just asking people to keep in mind that if things get bad enough that there is some sort of armed revolution, like the one of 1776, (and I sincerely hope they don’t, but if they do get that bad… ) an answer isn’t going to be found in old constitutions and old documents. Dogmatic doctrines like constitutions and religious commandments never stand the test of time, this is why society after society fails, because they all think they have the answer. There is no one ANSWER, there is only a constant stream of possibilities from which we can pluck only some, but an ever growing amount, of answers.

Is meditation spiritual? Is it more spiritual than giving a gift to someone you love? Or better yet, someone you don’t even know, or will never know you. Is a monk sitting around in a mosk somewhere helping anybody in any tangible way? They aren’t feeding anyone, they aren’t even exchanging ideas with anyone… they’re achieving inner peace, that’s great for them, but it has no function for society. It helps no one.

I believe true spirituality has a function. I believe true spirituality has a greater purpose in improving the spirits of others. And if our spirit is really nothing more than our psyche, our mental state at a time, then functional spirituality has to do with improving the mental conditions of others, which is directly related to their poverty levels (ie: let’s get our shit together and feed our starving brothers and sisters in Africa), among other things of course.

The notion that our ‘spirit’ somehow exists separately from our mind I’ve come to see as one of the greatest follies of our species evolution of thought. The greatest moments are always those of complete union between body and mind, working together. Your mind responding to all sensory (bodily) input, awareness, those almost transcendant times when I feel whole, complete, unseparated. The complete inegration of body and mind, as one whole being, as it was meant to be.

“Over thinking, over analyzing,
separates the body from the mind.
Withering my intuition, leaving opportunities behind.”

Maybe this is why people have such a history of feeling dispotic and lonely. We’re yearning for this spirit, this nothingness that only leaves you continuing to search, when what we could be doing is forming connections with other people, exchanging ideas, one of the ultimate acts of functional spirituality. Perhaps once we stop searching for the spirit, we can embrace the physical, the reality, the present.

The only true physical reality is the present. The past and future only exist as thoughts in our minds. History and possibilities. The present is the only physical reality. When my mind becomes lost in the past or future, I ignore the present and end up DOING NOTHING… being invisible. Achieving nothing. Serving no spiritual purpose.

In my subjective experience, feeling more present in your body (not feeling like a separate entity that exists somewhere outside or inside of yourself) and more present in the physical world overall creates a more healthy perspective and a more healthy method of thought and of interaction with others.