In Response To An Article Regarding The Disappearance Of Western Civilization In Education

(A part of a conversation regarding the nature and status of the West and it's ideas and ideals)

I've given a lot of thought to this idea/ideal for about the last ten years. I'll get to the heart of my point and converse directly with yours, but first I need to frame the topic in a paragraph or two.

Man cannot create nor grant universal rights. Universal rights are those things which Man possesses equally in society as well as in the presence of no one. I have thus far found only two: Life and Liberty. Being alive I possess my life, and being in Time I possess the prerogative of choosing how to spend it. There's a lot of things that we call rights that are not. Do you think that you, as a human being, have the right to vote? Go to China, see how that works for you. Do you think that you have the right to free speech? Go to Saudi Arabia and try to exercise that right.

When mankind comes into close contact, being of a like nature, we tend to interact. These interactions amount to transactions of a sort that are governed by mutually agreed upon privileges or are transactions of another sort which are used to establish privileges by which to govern future interactions. In our society we have mutually agreed that free speech is a privilege which we consciously extend to each other, hence the conversation we're having now. In our society we have mutually agreed that you and I can hold different cosmological positions and either choose to or choose not to worship in any way we each see fit. That's a privilege that we have agreed to extend to each other.

Mankind, being alive and engaging in activities, is a slave to another universal: his interests. A man's actions are and will be governed by his interests. What informs and shapes his interests? His values! Those things which he holds dear regarding what he believes is the best way to live constitute his values. When that man comes into contact with another whose interests are contrary to his own because that man doesn't hold his same set of values, the resultant transaction is either going to resemble a triumph of one set of values over the other because their was acquiescence on one side or some compromised alloy of the two.

This is what constitutes the differences between world cultures. It's not superficial qualities like skin color or language, it's values. Now we say that there is a spectrum of values that we in the West hold dear: rationalism, self-criticism, the objective search for truth, the separation of church and state, the rule of law and equality thereunder, freedom to think and express ideas individually, human protection from unjust harm, etc. Why. Why are those important? When entering into a transaction with someone who doesn't value these things, can you defend them? Will these things prevail or will you acquiesce to his interests which may contradict directly these values?

Can we expect future generations in the West to continue to defend and advance these values in the face of direct opposition, stated or not, if they are ignorant of how and why these values were discovered, developed, and adopted? Probably not. That's what I'm talking about when I say our culture is in decline. We're like those denizens of the science fiction theme which explores the actions of a people in possession of and dependent upon an advanced technology that their ancestors created that they now have no understanding of how it works. Something breaks the magic machine that they need to live, or it simply breaks down, and they are left in a crisis trying to fix what they don't understand. That's the world that I feel like we've allowed to grow up around us! Our society operates within constructs of ideas that most of the current population, when asked as to their composition, could not give you a coherent answer regarding what that thing means, why it's important. Ask an average college kid why freedom of speech is important as well as when, where, and why it was first realized by mankind. Ask them to cite positive examples of its accomplishments and negative examples of its use and of its censure. They can't do it! Most of them, if they endeavored to answer at all, would be trying to make something up.

The fact is that most of the West, our kids in particular, are completely unprepared to defend the values of our society in the face of contrary opinions. And yes, there are a whole host of contrary opinions, both without and some within our civilization.

Insight From Nov. 3rd

Adrian:

Arguing morality with an atheist; it's like arguing with a blind man that blue is good and yellow is bad.

Doug:

"Christian morality (so called) has all the characters of a reaction; it is, in great part, a protest against Paganism. Its ideal is negative rather than positive; passive rather than action; innocence rather than Nobleness; Abstinence from Evil, rather than energetic Pursuit of Good: in its precepts (as has been well said) "thou shalt not" predominates unduly over "thou shalt.""

-- John Stuart Mill, On Liberty (1859) and advocate of Utilitarianism, perhaps the dominate normative ethical theory.

Adrian:

‎"Thou shalt not" implies that "thou shalt" anything else. To be only permitted to do that which is expressly permitable is an exceedingly restrictive, legalistic approach to life. The alternative frees us to act wither we will. Saying that a man can only walk on the sidewalk begs the question about walking in the grass. To say that man may only NOT walk in the road frees him to wander the forest path of his own volition.

Doug:

Plato would agree. And he predates Christ by about 400 years. Kant advocates for an objective good that has nothing to do with any theological commitments. Both of these are objective goods, that have nothing to do with any theological presuppositions.

Wilson:

As a non-Christian, I have to respectfully disagree with your argument. Obviously when one gets into specifics I have differing opinions, but overall I adhere to the same moral code laid out by Christians. What it all boils down to is being good to other people.

Adrian:

What then is the source of your moral code?

“I believe in Christianity as I believe in the sun has risen, not only because I see it, but by it I see everything else.” -C.S. Lewis

This statement is true for any other belief system. Before you can proclaim anything to be good, you must presuppose that the thing possesses a qualitative nature to begin with, that the nature of those qualities can be identified or equated with goodness, itself a virtue of completely unidentifiable origin; unidentifiable from a deterministic standpoint anyway. What I'm saying is that to believe in good or bad, right or wrong, you're believing in something that is necessarily transcendent to our capacity to understand the world as animal creatures. The breadth of the thoughts we have, the depth and color of the feelings we feel, the pain and ecstasy infused in the passions we hold cannot be adequately explained by any system of understanding that does not include transcendency. Nothing about dominating another human being in a physical contest should make me yearn to roar victorious. Nothing about suffering the agony of the crag should make me want to write a song about the ascent. Nothing about a sunset should make me want to paint a picture. In fact, nothing outside of instinct should make me want anything apart from food, sex, and warmth.

The incorporation of belief into a person's spectrum of understanding is the light Mr. Lewis was referring to that allows us to discern the qualities of reality rather than merely the quantities. One could record tomes describing in precise quantitative measures the exact composition of the world's greatest painting and never produce a sigh; the wavelengths and meter of the world's greatest drama and never produce a tear. Without belief there is a wide swath of human experience that is inaccessible to understanding. To actually suffer from this condition would be to lobotomize your own humanity. However, most folks go on living these experiences without seeking to understand them; yet they are able to have them. They can't help it. They're human.

Really my atheist isn't blind, he just doesn't want to open his eyes.

Doug:

I understand Dr. Lewis to be saying that he sees the world through the eye of Christianity. That is not a bad thing at all, in fact it can be a rather good thing. However, it is not the only good thing. Mill would advocate on behalf of an objective good which all peoples could adhere, that is, the greatest good (measured by well-being) for the greatest number of people. And Kant would say the only good is a good will, which is measured by conformity to the categorical imperative. And Plato would point to his Form of the Good, against which all other good things participate. So to say that Lewis's good is the only good seems short sighted, given the company he has with competing conceptions of good.

Adrian:

An objective good? To that I can only ask for dry water!

I never said that it was the only good, just that to author good is beyond the prerogative of man, and that to perceive its being requires an understanding of that which is beyond the physical. Whatever that is has been left to our own discernment.

Doug:

So you agree that good does not have to be defined in terms of Christianity, as in your first post?

Adrian:

I never said that it did in my first post. You made that assumption.

Doug:

Arguing morality with an atheist; it's like arguing with a blind man that blue is good and yellow is bad. You were not refering to some sort of God, presumably the Christian God, since you then quote Lewis?

Adrian:

Your presumption. I like Lewis' statement. It's very visual and illustrative like the way I think, but its Christian-ness was not why I chose it.

I believe that good is authored by God. I believe that we've been granted the ability to make up our own minds about God. I think that's what He meant by the "...created in His own image..." part. I don't think it's acceptable for me to impune another man for not believing in God or for believing in some other god. He's exercising his "god-ness" in doing so. I can not agree with him, and I can try to convince him otherwise, but I don't have the right to pass judgement on his decision. I believe that this man may perceive goodness by virtue of his humanity, but like I said, I believe that God authored goodness and that certain things don't hold that quality.

Doug:

That sounds like a statement of faith, then, and not a statement of reason. I'm not necessarily denegrating faith, other than as reletively weak evidence for any substantive claim about the nature of the world. Does objective good exist? Some, like Plato, Kant, Moore, and others have said so, and the best support I can give for it is that if it isn't objective, then it must be subjective, and if that is the case, one conception of the good is as good as any other. Therefore, your claim that those denying God have no access to an understanding of morality cannot be true. It is only one of a number of concepts of the good, and most of them make moral claims.

Adrian:

I'm saying precisely that all good is subjective, hence the dry water. However, it is not subject to our own judgment. It's subject to its author's judgement. That certain words appear on the page, unchangeable, for me to read doesn't change the fact that their arrangement was chosen to fit the author's pleasure.

Why is charity good? Nothing in nature informs me that charity is good, yet people perceive that it is. There's no reason why charity should be good or bad. There's no reason we can determine anyway. I don't think it's possible for man to determine the reason for goodness. Many of man's greatest minds, some of whom you've mentioned, have crashed their ship upon that rock, yet the rock remains. Nobody can figure a reason for good yet everybody feels it.

Ultimately, that I lay out my clothes at night is a statement of faith. That we assume the universe will continue to work in the manner which we have always perceived it is a statement of faith. That you, Doug, are an independent being capable of receiving this correspondence rather than just a figment of my imagination is a statement of faith. For us to presume that reason alone will produce understanding is another way of lobotomizing our humanity. You may focus on developing the greatest understanding that reason can provide, but to rely on reason alone is, to me, to admit at the outset that you are satisfied with not knowing.

Doug:

Wait, if good is dependent on the author's judgement, doesn't that realize that good is subjective, since there are so many ideas of the good, and that your original premise is flawed?

Adrian:

I said that good was subjective, and that the author is transcendent. My original premise was that, without belief, there is a quality of reality that is wholly inaccessible; like the concept of color to a blind man. Not only is it inaccessible, it's un-understandable.

Two seeing people may argue the merits of the colors blue and yellow. A whole host of cultural, religious, historical, and philosophical perspectives may be brought to bear by either man to justify his opinion, but...and don't miss this...neither man can deny that blue is blue and yellow is yellow. Not only can they not deny this intrinsic quality, our perception of this quality is dependent upon the light that illuminates it. Its color cannot be seen without the light, and the color which it displays is one part of that greater shining light.

Now a blind man who can sufficiently convince another man that, because of his insightful blindness, the color of the thing matters not to the reality of what that thing really is can begin to make the argument that blue is not blue and yellow is not yellow. For him these qualities are irrelevant. He perceives what is for him the whole of the reality of the thing, and the claims of others to an imperceptible quality are superfluous. For him if blue is blue is no different than if blue is yellow. It doesn't effect his perception of the thing. Yet to those who can perceive, his blue that is yellow is completely incredulous. For him to continue to assert that blue is yellow in the company of sighted people requires that he continually petition on behalf of his assertion against the clear understanding of his fellows, and that his fellows individually cede the point that color does not matter thus diminishing their own perception. If enough cede to this diminished understanding, the color of things, while still present in the eyes of the sighted, becomes irrelevant. The color of things becomes incidental and unimportant. "The blue sky may as well be yellow, it just happens to be blue...whatever." This becomes the corporate reality, and people who adhere to the idea that color is an intrinsic and important quality of things are either mocked or marginalized for their belief in what is clearly, to the masses anyway, a random phenomenon.

So it is with all human activity. All actions have a moral quality: blue or yellow, good or bad, righteous or sinful, karmicly positive or karmicly negative, etc. For men to be convinced that this quality doesn't exist, opens the door for good being bad and bad being good as well as fueling the contempt for and marginalization of those who adhere to the understanding of morality; objective for us, subjective for God.

(I realize now having made that last statement that you and I have been engaging each other in different conversations)

Doug:

The problem I have with your original statement is that you, on a faith premise seem to privilege one understanding of good, and it happens to be the one you adhere to (I think). That seems to privilege your understanding of transcendence, if you want to go that route. Plato would also understand a good based on a transcendent understanding, but quite different from the one advanced by Christians. G.E. Moore advances a transcendent good, but claims that it is roots lie in human relationships. So, again, I wonder what privileges your particular understanding of transcendent, or what amounts to the same question that Wilson asked.

Adrian:

That's what I meant when I said that we're having two different conversations. The difference between the basis for my understanding of transcendence and somebody else's conception of transcendence is not what I'm talking about. That we have a conception of transcendence where other profess not to is what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about the source of the light from which believers see an aspect of reality. I'm talking about the idea that believers SEE at all, where an atheist cannot or will not, and the implications of this blindness.

Doug:

But then you still have the problem with why the atheist's conception of morality is lacking or missing, as your statement implies, because you privilege your perception over theirs.

Adrian:

I'm asserting that morality is inherently a transcendent quality, that its very existence is dependent upon deity just as color is dependent upon a source of light. An object in the absence of light has no color. It may have the potential for color, but until illuminated cannot be said to possess color. It can be touched, tasted, smelled, and even heard, but it cannot be seen. There is a potential quality possessed by the thing that cannot be perceived in the absence of light.

Our atheist would seem to fit the syllogism left unstated: The nature of all morality is fundamentally transcendent; Atheism denies the existence of transcendency, therefore an atheist cannot determine the nature of morality. That an atheist perceives morality is, I think, indicative of his own transcendence, though he chooses to ignore it. So my initial statement would seem to be flawed. The atheist is not a blind man, rather he's a seeing man who is unable to define color, though he sees it. By denying that a source of light defines an object's color, yet being able to see the color, he's left with two possible conclusions: That the color intrinsic to a thing emanates from the thing itself (Animism), or that the color of a thing is a product of his own mind and therefore not intrinsic to the thing and not necessarily of the same color to anybody else (Relativism).

Why Occupy Wall Street Is Bound To Not Succeed

"But since then [The French Revolution] the revolutionary or speculative mind of Europe (and since the 1960's the West in general) has been weakened by shrinking from any proposal because of the limits of that proposal. Liberalism has been degraded into liberality. Men have tried to turn 'revolutionise' (sic) from a transitive to an intransitive verb. The Jacobin (French revolutionary) could tell you not only the system he would rebel against, but what was more important, the system he would not rebel against, the system he would trust. But the new rebel is a sceptic, and will not entirely trust anything. He has no loyalty; therefore he can never be really a revolutionist. And the fact that he doubts everything really gets in his way when he wants to denounce anything. For all denunciation implies a moral doctrine of some kind; and the modern revolutionist doubts not only the institution he denounces, but the doctrine by which he denounces it. Thus...(a)s a politician, he will cry out that war is a waste of life, and then, as a philosopher, that all life is a waste of time. A Russian pessimist (by which he refers to Anton Chekhov, I think) will denounce a policeman for killing a peasant, and then prove by the highest philosophical principles that the peasant ought to have killed himself...A man of this school goes first to a political meeting, where he complains that savages are treated as if they were beasts; then he takes his hat and umbrella and goes to a scientific meeting, where he proves that they practically are beasts (a reference to Darwinism). In short, the modern revolutionist, being an infinite sceptic, is always engaged in undermining his own mines. In his book on politics he attacks men for trampling on morality; in his book on ethics he attacks morality for trampling on men. Therefore the modern man in revolt has become practically useless for the purposes of revolt. By rebelling against everything he has lost the right to rebel against anything."

-Gilbert Keith Chesterton

What I find most remarkable about this passage is that nothing has changed in the 103 years since it was written. For fear of being found offensive to somebody or to provide justification for increasingly immoral behavior, the West has only been in a bigger hurry to rid itself of any guiding moral structure since the turn of the last century. What we are seeing now may be, and hopefully is, the last display of a terminally myopic view of reality. More and more people are coming to understand that in the absence of an ideal, change can only be destructive. But to hold an ideal, to cling to something dear not yet real, one must make a choice not to hold to some other ideal. These protesters who hold nothing dear are merely apparitions and will quickly enough evaporate away in the face of a strongly held conviction based upon a clear ideal. What will not fade so readily will be those hiding among this mass who do hold a clear conviction whose ideal depends upon support from the anarchists. Can these people possibly have in mind the best interests of anybody but themselves?

What Steve Job's Passing Revealed To Me

I'm not a Mac fan, have never really been a technologically inspired person, and am in fact somewhat of a neo-Luddite when it comes to the inclusion of technology in my life. Hey, I grew up near an Amish community; they rub off on you. All this is to say that when he passed, I was only vaguely aware of who Steve Jobs was, and I was certainly never an Apple acolyte.

It started as I drove to work and listened to the reporting of his death and related venerations for his life on the radio. What I felt then is hard to describe. While my first reaction, thankfully, was sorrow over the untimely death of a fellow human being, it was tinged with an aura of negativity. By the time I got to work, a place replete with Apple enthusiasts, that negativity had manifested itself in my heart as a sort of resentment. Why? Why did I resent this man? "This man's no different than the rest of us!", I said to myself. "What makes this guy more special than anybody else?"

There was a sort of jealousy pervading my heart; a strange, not-at-all-covetous sort of jealousy. His wealth didn't make me jealous. His creativity and effusion of creations did not make me jealous. I began to think that the public outpouring of emotion was the cause of my dark heart only to find that it was not, but was closely related to what I did find. Steve Jobs mattered. He mattered in a way that I likely never will. Oh, I'm not talking about the, "you matter to your friends and family" or the, "you matter to God" sort of mattered. He impacted other people's lives; people he never met. Life was made better for some people because of what he did. That realization, in comparison to my own insignificance on that stage, in combination with his drive and motivation were what was coloring my emotion. But that's not what I learned.

This jealousy manifested itself in a way that I now recognize as being fairly typical of my behavior, though to discover that it was so came as an uncomfortable shock. I immediately began to react to each instance reminding me of his death from newspaper articles to FB posts with a sort of personal equivalency. "Yes, yes, he was a great man", I would think to myself, "but I'm probably just as savvy and capable as he was." The unspoken coda to this impulse was, "and I will be if only..." A miraculous series of self-motivated events would have to happen for that ellipsis to be not so, and that's only assuming that I am as capable or savvy a man as he. And there's the lesson! In order for me to compare myself favorably with Steve Jobs I must overlook the distance between his accomplishment and my own. I must devalue his contributions in order to find equivalency amongst the catalogue of my achievements. I must destroy his accomplishments in my own mind to do anything other than look up at him. And my heart doesn't want to look up at him. My heart wants to be looked up to! Pride my friends, pride.

This effect has caused me to look at some of the great pillars of my appreciation: Mozart, St. Timothy, James Madison, Aristotle and Socrates, Vermeer, and the list could go on. My understanding of my own contribution to humanity has literally come crashing down to shatter at my feet this week. While that no doubt develops an image of depression in your mind, as it does my own, I can now look up though the unclouded skylight newly broken. And I see stars!

Why have there been so many earthquakes and volcanic eruptions recently?

(I wrote this article about a year ago, but in light of this month's earthquakes in New Zealand and Japan, I though it appropriate to represent it for people's consideration.)

Watching the news and reading the headlines on the internet would lead one to believe that late 2009 and 2010 thus far has seen an unusual number of geotectonic events. I have often thought, and heard more than a few say, that the perceived increase in seismic activity is due to our contemporary profusion of information sources and that there really hasn’t been an actual increase in geotectonic activity. On the subject of earthquakes, the experts at the USGS agree with this view: http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2439.

See also http://www.enn.com/climate/article/41234.

This recent perceived increase in seismic activity may speak more to mankind’s habitation of more of the Earth’s surface in higher numbers than ever before. Although, like the kernel of truth contained at the core of every myth, I cannot help but think that there may be some truth to the idea that the Earth’s surface is on the move a little more than before. I also wonder if there has been an increase in volcanic activity recently. Although my cursory search hasn’t led to any credible sources supporting or refuting the notion of recently increased volcanic activity, I have found one article from The Guardian (UK) that at least implies that volcanic activity is on the rise: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2007/aug/07/disasters

This article written by Bill McGuire, the director of the Benfield Hazard Research Centre at University College of London, attributes what may be an increase in recent volcanism to a higher volume of near-surface magma caused by the increased surface pressure on the Earth’s crust due to higher sea levels attributable to global warming induced glacier melt. Basically, that more water in the oceans squeezes the Earth, and volcanoes erupt as a result. One crack that I see in this idea is that the scope of the hypothesis is entirely internal to a closed system. The Earth has not received a large deposit of water recently so it’s fair to say that what was here before is still here now. From a material standpoint, the system has not changed. The sea-level connection to increased volcanism requires that the particular distribution of the material in the closed system be the cause of the observed effect. This may be plausible because large amounts of water locked up in glaciers, which are highly localized, causes a very different pressure distribution on the Earth’s crust then the same amount of material spread over a much larger area in the form of water. I am not here to refute the possibility that this idea may be the truth, but I would like to put forth another explanation for the rise in volcanic activity particularly and geotectonic activity in general: The Sun.

Throughout our history, mankind has held an ever-changing view of what his world was like. At one time, the Earth’s geologic features were thought to be the bones of titans laid low by the gods in the starry heavens above. Then we moved to a concept of the Earth as one whole, in the center of all that was, and surrounded by successively more distant spheres of the heavens. Next, we removed the idea of the spheres when we realized that the things not of this Earth were in fact unique objects of their own at some knowable distance away from the Earth. From there we formed the idea of the solar system with the Earth at its center and at the center of all things. Then the sun was at the center, but was still the center of all things. That view was dashed when we found that our star was but one of many which revolved around a common center as part of our galaxy. We essentially find ourselves at this view today. Our prior obsession with the center has carried over into our contemporary consciousness in that even though we understand that our solar system is not at the center of anything, we still think that the Sun is at the center of our solar system. This in fact is not the case. Astronomical scholars know this, but when considering the effects of our Sun’s eccentricity I believe that one certain effect, naturally part of this eccentric system, has been overlooked.

The things in our solar system each have a mass which produces a certain amount of gravity, are arranged in a particular fashion at different points in time, and are moving at certain speeds. All of these properties exist in such a way that dynamic equilibrium within the system is maintained. Dynama-what? Assuming that our solar system is a closed system, meaning that it doesn’t receive any input from forces that originate from outside of the system which is essentially true, this dynamic equilibrium is an equilibrium in which opposite changes occur simultaneously; an equilibrium in which two reversible reactions occur at the same rate. When one planet moves, its change in position with respect to all of the other objects causes the effects of its gravity on all the other objects to change. In response the effects of gravity from all of the other objects on the planet that moved change with respect to that planet in its new position. This is an example of Newton’s 3rd Law of Motion that, “To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction: or the forces of two bodies on each other are always equal and are directed in opposite directions (Actioni contrariam semper et æqualem esse reactionem: sive corporum duorum actiones in se mutuo semper esse æquales et in partes contrarias dirigi).”

An extremely simplistic analogy of the situation described above is that every object in our solar system is connected to every other object in our solar system with a “string”. As the system moves and rotates, these “strings” get longer or shorter as the distance between the objects changes. The force in each of these “strings” is inversely proportional to its length. That is the shorter a “string” is the harder it tries to get shorter. As you may have guessed already, these “strings” in combination with their internal forces as described above represent gravity. The magnitude of the gravity produced by each object is in direct proportion to its mass. Of the mass in our solar system, the Sun accounts for 99.87% of it. The mass of Jupiter accounts for 73.42% of the remaining mass or roughly 0.1% of the total mass of the system. It would seem that the Sun is the 800 lb. gorilla and that the effects of everything else are negligible which is essentially correct except for one effect. If we say that everything other than the Sun and Jupiter are along for the ride then we’re left with two objects connected with one string. Jupiter appears to orbit about the Sun, which cannot be correct because of the assumption that the Sun is stationary and remains stationary. Equilibrium cannot be maintained because as Jupiter rotates, its gravity pulls on the Sun causing it to begin to move. The system has changed and cannot be said to have remained in equilibrium. The reality is that both the Sun and Jupiter are rotating about a common point, and that the mass of Jupiter times its distance to this point is equal to the mass of the Sun times its distance to the point. One very large mass times a very small distance is equal to a very small mass times a very large distance. This point of common rotation is called the barycenter.

Why go to such length to create an analogy to describe the barycenter, and what does the interaction between Jupiter and the Sun have to do with the geotectonics of Earth? The analogy distills the system into something that we can comprehend by testing it with our bodies rather than just our minds. Hold a string that is a couple of feet long and is attached to a small ball. Swing the ball around until it is moving in a circle. Can you continue swinging the ball in a circle at the same speed without swinging your hand in a circle? No, and you will notice that the circle that your hand makes about a common point of rotation with the ball is much smaller than the circle that the ball makes. Your hand is acting like the Sun in this system. Now also notice that the string between your hand and the ball has a tensile force in it. That centripetal force is equal to the ball’s mass times the square of its velocity, divided by its distance to the “barycenter”. What happens when you spin the ball faster? This centripetal force gets larger, and to do this the radius between the “barycenter” and your hand must get smaller as your hand speeds up. Kepler found this relationship when he discovered that the planets move in elliptical orbits.

What does this have to do with the Earth? Well, the weight of the ball at the end of the string is mostly Jupiter. It can be said though that it is also all of the other stuff in the solar system other than the Sun, and the length of the string is the distance between the center of the Sun and the “center of mass” of everything else. When the distance between the Sun and the barycenter gets smaller, the velocity of the sun relative to the barycenter increases, and the centripetal force exerted on the ball gets larger. The converse of this statement is also true that, the distance between the center of planetary mass and the barycenter gets smaller, the velocity of the planetary mass relative to the barycenter increases, and the centripetal force exerted on the Sun gets larger. Thus angular momentum is conserved. So if the force between the planetary mass and the Sun gets larger, and the Earth is part of this mass, then the force exerted between the Sun and the Earth gets larger. The shape of the Earth must change when it is subjected to a higher centripetal force according to the principles of material mechanics. If the Earth is changing shape, even by a few feet, this change must be accounted for by deforming its surface from where it was initially. Hence, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions could result in either increased frequency, magnitude, or both. Conversely, this additional force may act to squeeze everything together resulting in a noticeable decrease in geotectonic activity.

This is all a very neat hypothetical situation that hinges on the premise that the Sun’s distance to the barycenter changes. We must ask ourselves, “Does it change?” A geologist from Australia named Rhodes Fairbridge answered this question. Beginning in 1950, he began to research a unique geological phenomenon along the coast Western Australia and subsequently the coast of the Hudson Bay in Canada as well as other places around the world. His conclusion was that there had been substantial changes in the climate and the sea level over recent geological time that caused these unique phenomena. Furthermore, he put forth the possibility that these environmental factors were highly periodic.

Through a lifetime of research and continual cross-disciplinary coordination, he discovered several things. First, he discovered that the Sun’s characteristic radiation output has varied periodically through time between high activity and relative quiet. In searching for a cause for this observation, he discovered that the Sun’s orbit around the barycenter is not round or even elliptical. Rather, the Sun’s orbit is in the shape of an epitrochoid, which is a circle that contains a tight elliptical loop-the-loop at one point around its circumference, and that these solar variations corresponded to the Sun’s passage through this loop-the-loop. Although Professor Fairbridge focused on the effect that the Sun’s epitrochoidal orbit had on its radiative characteristics, our foregoing discussion reveals that the orbit may also affect the internal inertial forces of the solar system.

Contrary to what I implied above, the Sun approaching the barycenter does not cause the planetary center of mass to approach the barycenter or accelerate. Instead it’s the other way around. When Saturn and Jupiter are in opposition, as they are now in early 2010, the center of planetary mass as well as the Sun’s mass is as close to the barycenter as possible. This positioning of the planetary mass, barycenter, and Solar mass produces the greatest amount of angular velocity as well as centripetal force in the system. Conversely, when Saturn and Jupiter are in conjunction, the system has its least amount of angular momentum and centripetal force as the Sun is at it farthest point from the barycenter.

The potential effects of the Sun’s angular momentum on the solar dynamo and cycles of solar activity are fascinating and could have profound implications on our understanding of the Sun’s impact on our climate. A summary of Professor Fairbridge’s work in this direction of study can be found here: http://www.griffith.edu.au/conference/ics2007/pdf/ICS176.pdf

Additionally, I believe that the centripetal effects on the planets of the solar system produced by this characteristic orbital shape are worth serious consideration as to their possible implications in the study of seismology, volcanology, and geotectonics in general.

Beowulf, Javert, and Modern Morality

I had the opportunity to think about two of my favorite literary characters this morning, Beowulf and Inspector Javert, and something came to mind…

Both of these men did the things they did, one violent the other cruel, out of a fervent conviction that what they were doing was just and necessary. Beowulf was heralded as the penultimate representative of his society’s values, whereas Inspector Javert is used to point out that the zealous pursuit of a call to uphold the moral code set forth by society at large can in some instances actually cause injustice.

The haut monde of our intelligentsia would (if they ever met him) dismiss the actions of the former as barbarism in our modern context, and seem to be consumed by the circumstances of the latter. What I mean is that the general assembly of people out there who pursue morality, either individually or corporately, are disparaged because of and constantly made to be presented in the light of those who prove to be less than perfect among their ranks. In short, do-gooders are all bad because a few do-gooders are bad. This sentiment seems to me an outgrowth of the Modernist reexamination of what constituted the idea of right and wrong, and has manifested itself in the present day as a total rejection of the idea that right and wrong exist at all!

It’s as if they’re using Beowulf’s potential for barbarism and channeling it through the anomaly of Inspector Javert to justify their position that the pursuit of morality can have disastrous consequences so we should therefore not engage in the pursuit of morality. Although what it feels more like to me is an excuse not to have to put forth the effort required to improve oneself. Basically, in the face of the possibility that they may fail to rise to a higher standard, they choose not to attempt the climb and satisfy themselves by ridiculing, from the bottom, those defeated by the climb not having achieved the summit.

The Euthyphro Dilemma and Holiness: Part 1

“Is holiness an intrinsic quality of certain actions, or are certain actions made holy by virtue of their being pleasing to God?”

What constitutes an action as being holy? The definition of holy then is:

holy adj. 1 Dedicated to religious use; belonging to or coming from God; consecrated; sacred 2 spiritually perfect or pure; untainted by evil or sin; sinless; saintly 3 regarded with or deserving deep respect, awe, reverence, or adoration 4 [slang] very much of a: a generalized intensive. Often used in interjectional compounds to express astonishment, emphasis, etc.

We must necessarily restrict our understanding of the premise to refer only to actions rather than to include objects. I am compelled to make this distinction because every object in the universe is composed of matter. Matter being an intrinsic property of all things, if one thing were to be also intrinsically holy, then any other thing could likewise be considered holy and thus the entirety of the physical universe be holy. To say otherwise, that one thing being of matter and intrinsically holy and another thing being of matter and intrinsically not necessarily introduces an external qualification for holiness; the object’s arrangement, the date of its creation, its status in the eyes of God, something. Can objects engage in an action then that could be considered holy? A rock of its own accord cannot do anything. Matter without thought cannot decide to do anything. Any apparent behavior displayed by any object is merely the observed effect of the physical laws of the universe acting upon it.

It would seem then that the second definition of holiness is the one from which we may most readily explore the holiness of Man’s actions either with or without an external standard. The first definition, being in terms of an action’s status of having come from or belonging to God, can only apply to one half of the premise, and therefore cannot be of use in making a distinction. The third definition is subjective to Man’s perception of an action. The status of an action’s holiness being different from person to person necessarily disqualifies its intrinsic holiness lest such holiness exist apart from Man’s base perception and only be acknowledged more or less clearly by each person; an interesting distinction to the premise. The fourth definition is wholly irrelevant.

Under the second definition, “…spiritually perfect…” implies a standard against which an action may be deemed imperfect as does “sinless”. Sin is that which is an offense against God. That an action be “pure” does not necessitate the use of a standard. A thing can be said to be pure by observing that it is wholly unto itself; untainted or unmixed. But can an action be pure?

purity n. the quality or condition of being pure; specif. a) freedom from adulterating matter b) cleanness or clearness c) freedom from evil or sin; innocence; chastity d) freedom from corrupting elements e) freedom from mixture with white; color saturation

A pure action then could be said to mean any action that is free from adulterating matter, evil or sin, or corrupting elements. Again imbedded in parts of this deeper meaning are implications of a standard which is external to the action itself. The word adulterate means, in part, to make inferior. Since nothing can be said to be either inferior or superior with regard to only itself, to be free from adulterating matter requires that the action be judged against something else. To be free from evil or sin requires that a standard exist by which a distinction may be made between good and evil, sin and obedience to God.

From this preceding discussion, the only independent understanding of holy actions are those which are pure by virtue of their freedom from corrupting elements. Further parsing this meaning around the meaning of corruptness:

corrupt adj. 1 changed from a sound condition to an unsound one; spoiled; contaminated; rotten

we find then that holiness is an intrinsic property of those actions which are pure by virtue of their being composed of no parts which would change its soundness to unsoundness. Here I have to wonder if this line of reasoning doesn’t end with, “that which is holy is holy because it is not unholy.” However it does seem to introduce the idea of the holiness of the uncorrupted action; breathing for instance. Uncorrupted by speech or toxic inhalants, could breathing be a holy act?

My Cloister

This is my first post in my latest attempt to create some type of narrative record of my thoughts and what I think is important. For those who may find yourself here, Welcome! This place represents the cloister of my spiritual building; that place protected inside the abbey walls, exposed to the sun where my mind may lie upon the grass and ruminate on all subjects.

As of this date there are a great many things on my mind that I hope to find the time to hash out in this place. There are also studies that I wish to chronicle. If it please you to return and follow my thoughts, consider adding your insight as well. Conversations held in solitude, I've found, generally don't lead to answers.