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Let Us Never Forget the True Heroes of Society
Let us never forget that the true heroes of society quietly get the job done, and do so with incredible dedication, perseverance, and dignity in an environment of steadily diminishing resources. When the 2002 World soccer championships were held jointly in Japan and South Korea, Hugo Enciso, a Los Angeles marketing executive, decided to take his son to Tokyo. Mr. Enciso, Mexican by birth, American by education and lifestyle, worked for La Opinion, the biggest Spanish-language daily in the United States of America. In Japan they met members of the tiny community of Latin Americans who lived there and were introduced to Japanese food, manners and its mania for sports. For Mr. Enciso it was an experience he would long remember. Hundreds of thousands of other foreigners, from all parts of the globe, poured into Korea and Japan to attend the games. We later met Mr. Enciso in California at the wedding of two young software executive—he born in Pakistan, she in India. His family was Muslim, hers Hindu. When the speaker system blared Pashtun music, Mr. Enciso joined the crowd of frenetic, happy dancers, most of whom had never heard a note of Pashtun before that night. Among them where WASP executives, Asian students, American Jewish people, and many with still other ethnic, religious or geographical backgrounds. It was not merely a mixed marriage but a mixed celebration. And it was truly symbolic. We are not only still shifting the center of World economic gravity toward Asia, including South Asia, where the married couple have their ancestral roots. We are not only altering the criteria that will determine where tomorrow’s jobs will be found, where new factories, offices and homes will be built, and where revolutionary wealth will be created. We are expanding something we might call our personal “spatial reach.” Twenty-four hundred years ago in ancient China, where the less affluent were rooted to the soil, the Chinese philosopher Chuang-tzu declared that people who travel are apt to be “troublesome, false, restless, and engaged in secret plots.” #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
Today an estimated 8 percent of the human race—roughly 640 million people—travel across some national boundary in the course of the year. This number is larger than the entire population of the Earth in the year 1700, which was 603 million, right after the dawn of the industrial age. Troublesome or not, engaging in secret plots or not, searching for a job or just flying to Milwaukee to visit a customer, we are a species on the move. Americans on average drive fifteen thousand miles per year. However, most car trips are back and forth to one’s workplace—an average round-trip journey of twenty-three miles, or to destinations closer to home, like the supermarket or the bank. Vacation travel may take the family father. We could easily track our car travel on a map. A business traveler can also pinpoint the cities to which one has journeyed in the course of the year and the trips within those places. The results would be a map showing one’s “travel reach.” However, we could also show on the map all the locations to and from which we have sent or received e-mail, post office mail, phone calls, text messages, faxes, plus the physical addressed of all the people in our electronic Rolodex and sites visited online. With considerably more difficulty, we could even track the geographical origin of the products we buy and the destinations of the waste matter and pollution we create. Even these do not exhaust all the geographical locations with which we have, or wish to have, some relationship. However, they would give us a rich image of our spatial reach—a continually changing map of our personal geography. Compare our individual spatial reach today with that of the average less affluent European in, say, the twelfth century, who in the course of an entire lifetime was unlikely to ever have traveled more than fifteen miles from one’s village. Except, perhaps, for religious ideas that came over the centuries all the way from Rome, fifteen miles largely bounded in one’s life. That was the less affluent personal footprint on the planet. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
If we apply this kind of mapping to companies, industries or nations, we promptly discover that the spatial reach of each varies and continually changes. Similarly, different segments of each economy require a different “reach.” A country may need to import raw materials or components from many countries in order to sell exports to only a few. Or vice versa. Hollywood uses equipment from Japan and acting talent from Britain, but its films are exported all over the World. However, that is just a simple example. Your personal digital assistant (PDA) or camera phone may include a processor from America, a circuit board from China, chips designed in Taiwan, Austria, Ireland, or India, a color display from South Korea and a lens from Germany. It is the combination of these spatial relationships that together define each company’s spatial reach. The Japanese, for example, have had a decades-long debate over whether to focus their economy on ties with Asia or spread them around globally. During Japan’s momentary triumphalism in 1980s and ‘90s, flag-waving politicians like former governor Shintaro Ishihara, urged Japan to replace the United States of America as the dominant power in Asia. That, however, was before Japan’s economic slowdown and China’s simultaneous rocketlike rise, not to mention its big military buildup and recent explosions of anti-Japanese sentiment. However, Mr. Ishihara new Japan had new vulnerabilities in the region, and called for stronger relations with the United States of America. Today, Japan is one of the World’s most successful democracies and largest economies. The U.S.-Japan Alliance is the cornerstone of the United States of America’s security interests in Asia and is fundamental to regional stability and prosperity. The Alliance is based on shared vital interests and values, including: the maintenance of stability in the Indo-Pacific region: the preservation and promotion of political and economic freedoms; support for human rights and democratic institutions; and, the expansion of prosperity for the people of both countries and the international community as a whole. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
In fact, 2020 marked the 60th anniversary of the signing of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty. Both countries need each other, and they collaborate closely on international diplomatic initiatives. The countries are also cooperating on a broad range of global issues, including development assistance, global health, environmental and resource protection, and women’s empowerment. Other common goals are also the promotion integrity in Information and Communications Technology supply chains and to ensure a secure transition to 5G networks. There are also common objectives in the fields of science and technology in such areas as brain science, gaining, infectious disease, personalized medicine, and international space exploration. Japan and America are also working towards intensively expanding already strong people-to-people ties in education, science, and other areas. However, the real question has to do with the spatial reach of Japan’s economy. Is Japan a regional or a global player? What is its economic and cultural foot-print on the World? At a time of rising populism and authoritarianism around the World, Japan stands out as a relative island of social and economic stability. And though it owes its current situation to unique economic and geopolitical circumstances, it might still have something to teach other developed countries. By and large, Japan feels relatively stable and peaceful when compared to other advanced economies. Moreover, the Japanese government has been publicizing its efforts to attract certain foreign-born workers having recognized that immigration will be necessary for future growth. Japan is also the third largest source of foreign direct investment (FDI) into the United States of America, behind the United Kingdom, and Canada, with a total stock of FDI in 2020 at $647.72 billion U.S dollars (the total foreign direct investments in the United States of America were valued at approximately 4.63 trillion U.S. dollars in that year). Japan’s FDI positions in the United States on a historical cost basis has grown every year for the past several years from $238 billion in 2009. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
Japan’s influence on culture—the Japanese influence on America culture has expanded beyond Sushi, Bento Boxes, and Japanese cars. The Japanese have fully integrated in American culture and are actually starting to leave a lot of their traditional culture behind and are embracing American ways and lifestyles. Although they may still embrace customs inside of the home such as a clean minimal design layout, no shoes in the house, and family dinners, outside of the home, Japanese have started buying American and Germany cars, have desegregated their housing choices, are opening up technology businesses, and working in traditional corporations, and are even marrying other Americans who may not be of the same ethnic background. They have moved outside of the niche as being see as “exotic,” and have become red blooded Americans. They like the American flag, take their kids to baseball games, basketball games, and football games. With American being such a huge melting pot, it is hard to find any traditional cultures still around. Every culture is some blend of American culture and that is generally accepted. Many people love the diversity. America has become like one big international city. And while Japanese are expanding their horizons in fashion and automobiles, many Americans have fallen in love with Japanese cars, food, and clothing. So, that little island has had a tremendous impact on America and the globe. Japan is flourishing as a regional economic power. Its output of cars, SUVs, Sony Play Stations, flat-panel TVs, and computers are marketed around the World. Japanese companies operate plants on virtually every continent. Whether anyone likes it or not, Japan needs resources, markets opportunities, energy, ideas and information from all over the globe, not just from its nearby neighbors. Japan’s global influence is real. The spatial reach or footprint of every person, company and country is undergoing major change. And it is not just people and products that are on the move. Money, too, has spatial reach. And that, too, is changing rapidly, with deep implications for the global economy. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
It is common knowledge that trillions of dollars are continually zapping across electronic channels at phenomenal speeds, from nation to nation, bank to bank, and person to person, in a grand unending monetary tango. Most people also know—or should by now know—that international currency trading is a global casino. What most people do not know, however, is that the dollar is not just an American currency. It is popularly believed that Americans use dollars, Germans use euros, Japanese use yen, and Argentineans use pesos. In fact, according to economist Benjamin J. Cohen of the University of California/Santa Barbara, “nothing could be further from the truth.” This idea had become “an outmoded and misleading caricature” because competition has “greatly altered the spatial organization of monetary relations,” and more people are switching to Crypto currencies. Put differently, each currency, like each person, has its own, continually changing spatial reach. At present the dollar, despite its recent plunge, has the longest reach, some countries actually forgoing a currency of their own in favor of “dollarization.” They make the U.S. dollar legal tender, and it becomes their own official currency. In other countries, the dollar unofficially supplants local money for many purposes. The American dollar was introduced as the official currency of the United States of America in 1785 and is used as official currency in 16 countries ranging from Panama and Ecuador to East Timor. In addition, there are numerous countries where the U.S. dollar is readily accepted even in regular retail transactions. Internationally, it has established itself as a reserve currency and is the most traded currency in the World. In fact, according to the Federal Reserve, more U.S. dollars are held by foreigners than by Americans—somewhere between 55 and 70 percent, mostly in hundred-dollar bills. The dollar is not the only currency that has supplemented or supplanted another. For all practical purposes, before the introduction of the euro, one could use the German mark in the Balkans, the French franc in parts of Africa, the Swiss franc in Liechtenstein, the Indian rupee in Bhutan, the Danish krone in Greenland. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
In all, a study by the International Monetary Fund found eighteen countries in which foreign currency makes up more than 30 percent of the money supply and another thirty-four in which it averages 16.4 percent or more. According to Dr. Cohen, currencies “increasingly are employed outside their country of origin, penetrating other national monetary spaces. The rapid acceleration of cross-border currency competition has transformed the spatial organization of global monetary relations. National currency domains are more interpenetrated today than at any time since the dawn of the era of territorial money.” In short, money had been unleashed from its former spatial limits. This shift carries important power consequences. An “invading” currency (our term) does not always benefit the nation from which it comes. Many factors play a role, and it can sometimes prove costly. The “invaded” country’s government usually loses a degree of control over its domestic monetary policy and is weakened in the eyes of its citizens. It loses a part of what economists call “seigniorage”—the money it makes for its own money, that is, printing and issuing it. And if it ranks low in the World pecking order of currencies, it can, as a rule, be more easily whipsawed by the action of other economies. The much bigger change, however, according to Dr. Cohen, is not in the relationship of nations to one another but in the relationship between governments and markets. Thus the use of more than one currency in a country opens more options for companies and financial institutions doing business there. It may offer choices with respect to currency risk, taxes, regulations, accounting rules, transaction and conversion costs, financial instruments and the like. Conversely, it reduces the local government’s influence or control. Finally, it also makes the “invaded” country more sensitive to, and potentially responsive to, World financial markets. Which is why the first stop of many a new president or prime minister is a de rigueur visit to Wall Street to perform a reassurance ritual promising financial prudence during the ensuing term of office. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
What we have seen so far—the great wealth shift toward Asian, the creation of cyberspace, the change in criteria by which locations are appraised, the expansion of global reach, and the geographical spread of the currently shaky dollar—are only some of the changes taking place in our relationship to the deep fundamental space. The public spokesman asks for new inspiration to give us a “more meaningful existence.” However, other public spokesmen say that the juvenile delinquents get that way because they do not attend the churches we have. One explanation of this contradiction, of course, is that we are human and have new problems, but the boys are hardly human and ought to be better socialized to the appropriate institutions. This is not serious. What is the actual religious plight of a young man growing up in our society? Let us discuss it theologically, though I am aware that this vocabulary is at present puzzling. If a person asks “How am I justified? What is the meaning of my life?” he will surely find no rational answer. The bother is that the question has arisen and begun to plague one. If the question arises, as an important question, something is wrong; he will feel unworthy and damned, and wasted. Historically, appeal has then been had to psychological techniques of revivalism or physical techniques of sacramental magic. (Dr. Douglass’ intellectual approach cannot work.) However, if the question, as that question, never gets to be asked—if the matter is mentioned, if at all, as a moment of reflection in an ongoing process of life, it is possible to avoid the imputation of being damned. This non-asking can happen in two ways. First, if certain life behavior is necessary, no questions are asked. (We shall return to this first alternative.) However, secondly, if a man’s developing needs and purposes do indeed keep meeting with real opportunities and duties, no “final” questions are asked. You do not need to finish the task, and neither are you free to leave it off. The opportunities need not be such as to satisfy a human and make one happy—tht would be paradise; the duties must not be such that he must succeed in performing them—that would be hell; if he is earnest, if there are simply possible ways for his activity and achievement, so that he knows the World is a World for him, it is sufficient. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
This condition of meeting the World is called being in a state of grace. In such a case the questions that are really asked are practical and specific to the task in hand. The question, “How am I justified? what is the meaning of my life?” is answered by naming the enterprise that one is engaged in, and by the fact that it is going on. As Kafka said, “The fact of our living is in itself inexhaustible in its proof of faith.” (By analogy, if a young couple has had a good dinner without external or internal interruptions, they do not feel guilty for indulging and are fortified against criticism. The behavior justifies itself. However, if the dinner had worked out badly, they are disappointed, resentful of one another, and vulnerable to being made guilty by others for eating such rich food.) The sense that life is going on and the confidence that the World will continue to support the next step of it, is called Faith. It is hard to grow up without Faith. For then one is subject to these nagging unanswerable questions: Am I worthless? How can I prove myself? What chance is there for me? Did I ever have a chance? (These will be recognized as “questions of a juvenile delinquent to his soul.”) Children, if we observe then, seem normally to be abounding in simple faith. They rush headlong and there is ground underfoot. They ask for information and are told. They cry for something and get it or are refused, but they are not disregarded. They go exploring and see something interesting. It is the evil genius of our society to blight, more or less disastrously, this faith of its young as they grow up; for our society does not, for most, continue to provide enough worth-while opportunities and relevant duties, and soon it ceases to take them seriously as existing. Desperately, then, people may try to fill the void of worthlessness-and-abandonment by seeking money or status, or by busy work, or by self-proving exploits, both to silence critics and to silence own doubts. They substitute role playing, conforming, and belonging for the grace of meeting objective opportunity. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
However, there is no justification in such “works,” for they are not really the man’s own works, nor God’s providence for him. As the theologians have said, Real works are the natural products of faith taking its next step. Or alternately, people may spurn the false roles that are available and try for formless mystical experiences. This seems to be the aim of the Beat Generation, which is a kind of brotherhood of Quietism plus stimulants. Or alternatively, again, where the despair of abandonment is acute, as with many juveniles, they rush fatalistically to punishment, to have it over with and be received back. Finding a new ethics or esthetics, as Dr. Douglass asks, will not put us in a state of grace. Existence is not given meaning by importing into it a revelation from outside. The meaning is there, in more closely contacting the actual situation, the only situation that there is, whatever it is. As our situation is, closely contacting it would surely result in plenty of trouble and perhaps in terrible social conflicts, terrible opportunities and duties, during which we might learn something and at the end of which we might know something, even a new ethics; for it is in such conflicts that new ethics are discovered. However, it is just these conflicts that we do not observe happening. Everybody talks nice. At most there is some unruliness and dumb protest, and some withdrawal. So urging the juveniles to go to church is not serious, for how will the church give them faith? What opportunity will it open? Often, celibacy is an unbidden state, imposed by circumstances—a lack of available partners, for instance, as in modern China with its skewed gender ratio, or in apartheid-bound South African, where rigid work and travel permits could confine one marriage partner to the white city, the other to a black township. The American Civil War, which killed a generation of young men, also doomed their sisters to spinsterhood as maiden aunts burdensome family charges, and underpaid schoolmarms. #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
In societies with strict social and moral standards, financial constraints may also necessitate celibacy. In Victorian England, middle-class spinsters were expected to abstain from pleasures of the flesh until marriage, and most brides sashayed chastely up the aisle. However, they often took an inordinately long time to do so because before the final vows were exchanged, the bridegroom was supposed to accumulate enough money to buy a proper house in an approved neighborhood: “Virtue is good, but a house in Belgravia is better,” as the aphorism went. As the young men waited out their long courtships and engagements, they practiced frugality but not always celibacy; thanks to the license the double standard permitted English males, the percentage of women of the evening in England was higher than in anywhere else in Europe. In the twentieth century, the Great Depression squeezed more than pockets and stomachs as it pushed millions into unemployment and underemployment. This relentless poverty forced the postponement of thousands of marriages, and it convinced the unmarries to remain celibate or face the unmentionable—another mouth to feed when their own were flapping with unsated hunger. Country folks who lacked access to reliable birth control or who had religious or moral concerns about it simply waited it out. Social values may produce the same effect. In Asian societies that bar young women from marrying before their older sisters are suitably disposed of, unwelcome premarital celibacy may be extended indefinitely by the impossibility of marrying off a homely, disabled, or disagreeable sibling. In India, even if they were widowed as children and were forced into lifelong celibacy, Hindu widows could not remarry. Even today, this has changed only slightly. In some societies, lack of dowries has also doomed women to celibacy, and as we have seen, medieval convents expanded their numbers and their coffers by accepting dowries far too modest for a mortal husband. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
Other times, celibacy is directly coerced. A man or a woman is tossed into prison, where pleasures of the flesh is forbidden Until this century, European domestic servitude entailed celibacy for life. In England, some male servants could marry, but women could not because employers refused to inconveniences themselves by dealing with the pregnancies and babies their domestics’ marriages would produce. The countries of Carlisle aggressively monitored her female servants, instructing her head housemaid to tattle on any underlings not regularly washing their monthly-napkins which proved they were not having a baby. Many women lived out their lives in chaste service, fending off advances of their domineering employers. Bachelorhood or celibacy was also mandated for certain trades and professions. Apprentices could not marry even when they became journeymen, but had to wait for years until they were masters. Often their delayed marriages followed either resentful chastity or cheap solicitation. In the Middle Ages, male serfs were often lifetime bachelors. Educators on all levels faced a traditional ban on marriage—celibacy or your job was a common choice. Quite unlike brahmacharya, the orthodox learning tool for Indian students and scholars, celibacy was often inflicted on reluctant Western academics. Until 1882, when the requirement was relaxed, Oxford and Cambridge dons accepted their positions on condition of celibate bachelorhood. Some observed it cynically, in the breach, keeping mistresses or frequenting women of the evening, but many dons were conscientious men who lived in scholarly celibacy in the comfortable, well-catered, and companionable digs of their ivory towers. Until the twentieth century, throughout Europe and North America, female teachers faced the same stricture from rigid, misogynist, educational bureaucracies that cringed at the thought of women with child being active in pleasures of the flesh while forming tender young minds. Instances of coerced or de facto celibacy are legion, and those mentioned above represent a tiny sampling. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
Nonetheless, any kind of celibacy unwillingly embraced is substantively different from committed celibacy. The hormonal young women pledged to chastity because it will guarantee her a suitable marriage or the athlete striving for greatness in the next competition is motivated in ways the coerced or happenstance celibate is not. A look at five cases of such unwilling celibacy confirms this. A special conference was held in November, 1831, at Hiram, Ohio. At this time it was decided to print the revelations which the church had received through the prophet Joseph Smith. Up to this time the revelations of Joseph had received from the Lord had been written on paper by hand. The priesthood in preaching could quote them only from memory. Now that W.W. Phelps had a printing shop in Independence, it was thought the revelation could now be printed so all could read them. Joseph met with a group of elders to get the material ready for the new book of revelations, which Oliver Cowdery was to take to Independence for printing. The preface to the Doctrine and Covenants was given at this time, and it was placed in the beginning of the book and numbered, “One.” In this preface, given November 1, 1831, the Lord said: “Hearken, O ye people of my church….Hearken ye people from afar, and ye that are upon the islands of the sea, listen together. The voice of the Lord is unto all humans, and there is none to escape, and the voice of warning shall be unto all people, by the mouths of my disciples, whom I have chosen in these last days, for I the Lord have commanded them. Wherefore I the Lord, knowing the calamity which should come upon the inhabitants of the Earth, called upon my servant Joseph Smith, Jr., and spake unto him from Heaven, and gave him commandments, and also gave commandments to others, that they should proclaim these things unto the World; and all this that it might be fulfilled, which was written by the prophets; that faith also might increase in the Earth; that mine everlasting covenant might be established; that the fullness of my gospel might be proclaimed unto the ends of the World, and before kings and rulers.” #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
The Lord proclaimed that He had given Joseph Smith, Jr., the power to translate the Book of Mormon, and had given his latter-day disciples power to lay the foundation of this church—“To bring it forth out of obscurity, and out of darkness, the only true living church upon the face of the whole Earth, with which I the Lord am well pleased, speaking unto the church collectively and not individually. For I the Lord can not look upon sin with the least degree of allowance; nevertheless, one that repents and does the commandments of the Lord shall be forgiven. And one that repents not, from one shall be taken even the light which one has received, for my Spirit shall not always strive with humans, saith the Lord of Hosts. O inhabitants of the Earth, I, the Lord, am willing to make these things known unto all flesh, for I am not respecter of persons, and will that all humans shall know that the day speedily cometh when peace shall be taken from the Earth, and the Devil shall have power over his own dominion. And also the Lord shall have power over his saints, and shall reign in their midst. Search these commandments, for they are true and faithful, and the prophecies and promises which are in them shall all be fulfilled. And though the Heavens and the Earth pass away, my word shall not pass away. For behold, and lo, the Lord is God, and the Spirit beareth record, and the record is true, and the truth abideth for ever and ever. Amen.” As the elders were preparing the revelations for publication, some of them objected to the language of some of the revelations and wanted Joseph to change them. Because of this the Lord gave a revelation in which he said: “I, the Lord, give unto you a testimony of the truth of these commandments.” Then the Lord suggested that they choose the wisest man among them to try to write one which would compare with any of the revelations which had been given through Joseph. William E. McLellin made an effort to imitate one of the revelations, and all the elders realized that the best he could write was far inferior to the revelations. This renewed the faith of these man in truth of the revelations the Lord had given to his church through his prophet, Joseph Smith. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
Another revelation given at this time contained instructions for parents concerning their children. The Lord, Jesus Christ, said: “Inasmuch as parents have children in Zion, or in any of her stakes which are organized, that teach them not to understand the doctrine of repentance; faith in Christ the Son of the Living God; and of baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of the hands when eight years old, the sin be upon the head of the parents. For this shall be a law…and their children shall be baptized for the remission of their sins when eight years old, and receive the laying on the hands. And they shall also teach their children to pray, and to walk uprightly before the Lord.” One Angel enlightens another. To make this clear, we must observe that intellectual light is nothing else than a manifestation of truth. All that is made manifest is light. Hence, to enlighten means nothing else but to communicate to others the manifestation of the known truth. “To me the least of all the saints is given this grace to enlighten all humans, that they may see what is the dispensation of the mystery which hath been hidden from eternity in God,” reports Ephesians 3.8. Therefore one Angel is said to enlightened another by manifesting the truth which one knows oneself. Theologians plainly show that the orders of the Heavenly beings are taught Divine science by the higher minds. Now since two things concur in the intellectual operation, as we have said, namely, the intellectual power, and the likeness of the thing understood; in both of these one Angel can notify to another the known truth to another. First, by strengthening one’s intellectual power; for just as the power of an imperfect body is strengthened by the neighbourhood in corporeal things. Secondly, one angel manifests the truth to another as regards the likeness of the thing understood. For the superior Angel receives the knowledge of truth by a kind of universal conception, to receive which the inferior Angel’s intellect is not sufficiently powerful, for it is natural to one to receive truth in a more particular manner. Therefore the superior Angel distinguishes, in a way, the truth which one conceives universally, so that it can be gasped by the inferior Angel; and thus one proposes it to one’s knowledge. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
Thus it is with us that the teacher, in order to adapt oneself to others, divides into many points the knowledge which one possesses in the universal. Every intellectual substance with provident power divides and multiples the uniform knowledge bestowed on it by one nearer to God, so as to lead its inferiors upwards by analogy. All Angels see the Essence of God immediately, and in this respect one does not teach another. It Is of this truth that the prophet speaks; wherefor one adds: “They shall teach no more every man his brother, saying: ‘Know the Lord’: for all shall know Me, from the least of them even to the greatest.” However, all the types of the Divine works, which are known in God as their cause, God knows in Himself, because he comprehends Himself; but of others who see God, each one knows the more types, the more perfectly one sees God. Hence a superior Angel knows more about the types of the Divine works than an inferior Angel, and concerning these the former enlightens the latter; and as to this, the Angels are enlightened by the types of existing things. An Angel does not enlighten another by giving one the light of nature, grace, or glory; but by strengthening one’s natural light, and by manifesting to one the truth concerning the state of nature, of grace, and of glory, as explained above. The rational mind is formed immediately by God, either as the image from the exemplar, forasmuch as it is made to the image of God alone; or as the subject by the ultimate perfecting form: for the created mind is always considered to be uniform, except it adhere to the first disposition to this ultimate form. Within the circles of our lives, we dance the circles of the year and undergo a moderate discipline for this purpose. This is a time for the more advanced quester who seek to attain the highest possible standard and who is willing to pay in self-denial and self-training the corresponding price. Prayer teaches us what to aspire for. So often we do now know what to cling to. Prayer implants in us the ideals we ought to cherish. Prayer is no panacea, no substitute for action. It is, rather, like a beam thrown from a flashlight before us into the darkness. It is in this light that we who grope, stumble and climb, discover where we stand, what surrounds us, and the course which we should choose. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
Cresleigh Homes
Cresleigh Homes features living spaces with an open airy design which keeps the whole home filled with sunlight.
Cresleigh Homes feature chef’s dream kitchens, which come complete with quartz or granite countertops, stainless appliances, a gas cooktop, upgraded cabinets with door hardware, and tile backsplash.
The casual dining area is adjacent to the kitchen, some homes also come with formal dining rooms or a dedicated dining, which provides for a convenient and intimate setting.
The great room with a sliding glass door is the perfect setting for relaxation and enjoying your private yard.
The Primary Suite is complete with a luxurious bath, featuring a spacious walk-in closet, and dual vanities.
Enjoy the serenity and seclusion offered by a Cresleigh Home.
She Had Better Stop and Take a Good Look at Herself
With all the changes and challenges you face each day, there has never been a greater need to take the time to determine your priorities. The art of being wise is to know what to overlook. In 1993 Mexico signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with the United States of America and Canada. Within seven years, 3,500 maquiladora plants manufacturing everything from furniture to apparel to TV sets had sprung up along Mexico’s U.S. border, creating 1.4 million new, mainly assembly-line jobs for workers drawn from all parts of Mexico, and they important more than $51 billion in supplies into Mexico. However, in the late 1990s, with Guangdong and, indeed, all of China now competing in the cheap-labor derby, and estimated 250,000 to 300,000 of those Mexican jobs followed the great circle route across the Pacific. That put Alejandro Bustamante in a spot. When his employer, Plantronics, a leading manufacturer of telephone accessories, received an order, it called Mr. Bustamante. Although he ran the firm’s three factories in Tijuana, Mexico, he was told he must compete for each contract just like anyone else. However, Mr. Bustamante paid his workers an average of $2.20 an hour (including benefits) and had to bid against a Chinese manufacturer whose employees average only about 60 cents, which was nearly four times less than the Mr. Bustamante’s employees earned. There is nothing unique or new about that. Many maquiladora operators in norther Mexico face Chinese competition. However, what especially irked Mr. Bustamante was that the Chinese rival he faced was, in fact, itself also owned by Plantronics. This may be a case of serial outsourcing—sending jobs to China that had already been outsourced to Mexico. Outsourcing, while involving a small percentage of all jobs, has aroused fierce condemnation and prompted so much media coverage that there is no reason here to recap the familiar arguments, beyond recognizing that it is part of a much larger pattern of change in the spatial distribution of wealth and wealth creation. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18
Outsourcing enrages the critics of re-globalization who insist that it creates an unstoppable, brutalizing “race to the bottom.” They typically contend that companies go where labor costs are lowest and are ready to pick up and spatially relocate at a moment’s notice. If this were true, it would be easy to forecast where wealth is heading. It would be good news for African, which can offer a big pool of available labor at the lowest wages on Earth. (Africans should cheer each time workers in Asia join unions and drive wages up.) If labor cost were the sole consideration, why have not all those factories now in China wound up in Africa instead? The fact is that even for low-tech work, labor is cost, if ever, the exclusive basis for a company’s decision to relocate. Africa’s endless violence and war, inadequate infrastructure, stratospheric levels of violence, ravaging illnesses, and shameful regimes may rule out significant investment no matter what wage level. However, China has maintained its position as the largest investor in Africa over the last ten years by the number of new jobs created (18,562 on average), with a gradual substantial increase of newly created jobs on a yearly basis. China has spent 27 percent of its investments in Africa. Furthermore, since 2000, China’s foreign direct investment (FDI) flows to Africa have grown at an average annual rate of 40 percent, overtaking U.S. FDI in 2012. In 2019, FDI flows reached $2.7 billion, with the top destinations being the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Angola, two mineral-rich nations. China is also making space along a 30-mile coastline, in Africa, North of Dar Es Salaam, to make space for a $10 billion Chinese-built mega-port and a special economic zone backed by an Omani sovereign wealth fund. It seems Africa has more than just diamonds, gold, other precious minerals, people and animals that World wants to exploit. There are unspoiled beaches and bays; and lush vegetation. If the project goes ahead as planned, Bagamoyo will be transformed into the largest port in Africa. There is even talk of an international airport. #RandolphHarris 2 of 18
Many villagers have already accepted compensation for the loss of their homes. This portion in African is supposed to be as prosperous as Shenzhen, China. Shenzhen, in southeastern China, is a modern metropolis that links Hong Kong to China’s mainland. Over the past 40 years, the establishment of the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone (SEZ), has been a transformation of Shenzhen from a fishing village to a metropolis of innovation. The total investment has been $28 billion USD. Shenzhen has also nurtured some World leading technology firms including Huawei, DJI, and Tencent. The sector has emerged as the pillar industry of the city. As a matter of fact, a total of $4.27 billion USD, was invested in research and development, putting it on the top list of the country. In addition to this, the city has seen 17,500 international patents filed, accounting for one third of the national total. So this is what could be done in Africa, and it is important to keep an eye on the moves of China because they could become the World leader by investing in and colonizing foreign markets, with the large population. Another thing, with China colonizing Africa, it will also become a melting pot and the standard of beauty will change from the traditional European standard and shift to value other features. The race-to-the-bottom theory, moreover, presupposes that workers are essentially interchangeable—which may largely be true in repetitive, assembly-line operations. The higher up the skill ladder one goes in a knowledge-based economy, however, the less valid it becomes. As the knowledge components of wealth creation—marketing, finance, research, management, communication, I.T., vendor and distributor relations, regulatory compliance, legal affairs and other nontangibles—all grow in complexity and importance, workers, like the work itself, become less interchangeable and the required skill sets more temporary. If they extrapolate tomorrow’s economy from existing or projected wage levels alone, attempts to forecast which cities, regions or, for that matter, countries will become the next Guangdong will be inaccurate and the speculations are doomed to fail. #RandolphHarris 3 of 18
Any such simplistic analysis becomes even more questionable because, where economies are transitioning from smokestacks and assembly lines to knowledge-based production, we are already radically changing the very criteria by which a location, city, region or country becomes a high-value-added place. What we are about to see is less racing to the bottom and more of a race to the top. To anticipate tomorrow’s surprising geography—including the location of high-pay jobs, prime real estate, business opportunities, wealth and power—another key point needs to be understood: We are changing not merely the where of wealth but they why—the criteria by which we value places. And that further changes the where. Seeking to woo industry in 1955, the state government of Indiana placed an advertisement in Fortune listing its economic advantages. These, it claimed, included low-cost coal, limestone, white clay, aluminum, gypsum, rock asphalt, dolomite, fluorspar, water, sand, gravel, wood, corn, soybeans and easy access to the Ohio River. In addition, it promised an “enviable strike and lockout record”—that is, a weak or dormant labor movement. That was then. Today Indiana’s development council boasts of breaking away from “over-reliance on traditional industries.” No limestone here. Inc. tells American small-business leaders that the “best” place to “start or grow a company” is Phoenix, Arizona, because of its growing high-tech workforce, sunny climate, renovated art museum and “four major sports franchises.” A group called the Small Business Survival Committee concludes that the place to invest is South Dakota because it imposes the fewest costs on business in the form of taxes, minimum-wage laws, number of state employees and the like. Still another rating system bases its conclusions about the future on the age and growth rate of companies in any given location. A contributor to Microsoft’s bCentral.com then confects a hybrid index out of these last two methods and concludes that Nevada is the place to pull out your wallet. #RandolphHarris 4 of 18
Citing the 1955 Indiana ad in 2002 study called the “State New Economy Index,” Robert D. Atkinson and Rick Coduri of the Progressive Policy Institute write: “In an economy in which fewer than 20 percent of economic activity consists of creating, processing, or moving physical goods, access to raw materials, transportation and markets means less. As an increasing share of economic inputs and outputs are in the form of electronic bits, the old locational factors diminish in importance.” Take, for example, nearness—proximity. Some economists today believe that because Mexico is so close to American markets, it can beat Chinese competitors in the long run. They assume that distance still plays the same role it did before the knowledge economy arrived. However, thanks to information intensive technologies, products are becoming smaller and lighter every day. To rely on proximity means, to the degree that transportation costs matter, that Mexico’s advantage would apply to the older, bigger, bulkier, heavier physical products—precisely those now being replaced. And it means still less to high-value-added intangible services whose transportation costs have little or nothing to do with distance—finance, software, satellite TV, airline reservations, music and the like. Continuing to count on proximity will set Mexico even farther behind—and keep it there. Today, in their race to the top, competing states boast less about limestone and coal than about their great universities, low communication costs, advanced technology, frequent airline service, low crime, good climate and superior quality of life. The economy has been transformed along with workers’ values and way of life. The very categories with which we describe spatial units and relationships change as new economic networks emerge. We are seeing, for example, the rise of an entire ecology of airports linked to one another more strongly than with their local and national governments. Each airport is increasingly surrounded by its own ring of shopping malls, conference centers, 24/7 gyms, chapels, post offices, dentists and doctors, rooftop pools and luxury hotels. #RandolphHarris 5 of 18
The result has been a sprint—no longer just in the United States of America—to create what might be called higher-value-added places tht will attract the brightest, most creative workforce capable of producing knowledge-intensive, higher-value-added products and drawing businesses from around the World. The historical shift toward Asia, the digitalization of many economic functions, the emergence of cross-national regions and the change in the criteria by which we value place or location are all parts of a larger transformation in our relations with the deep fundamental of space. They merely form the background against which even bigger changes loom. One’s stumblings and one’s falling may depress one’s heart and reduce one’s aspiration. They may deter one’s will from further endeavour. For those monsters of hate and cruelty, either utterly materialistic and God-denying or fanatic and taking the name of God in vain, there is no shelter where they can hide once they are forced across the barrier of death. The qualities of determination, intelligence, and persistence—so useful in philosophy—can be used for good or evil. They can make a more successful criminal as well as a better philosopher. The upsurge of well-thought-out, daring, resourceful, and highly ambitious crime in modern times is a sign of misapplied powers, while its violence is a sign of merciless egocentricity. The end for such persons is commensurate. Then many come a crippling deformation future birth, or a sudden and radical awakening to the grave peril toward which they are heading—and a change of course to a better life. The unfortunate experiences which sometimes befall an individual’s Worldly life are, or may be, partly indued by one’s own psychic practices of the period immediately preceding them. One may have been drawn into a vortex of psychic evil which has harmed one’s spiritual life and brought suffering into one’s Worldly existence. What are the inner causes which can produce these dismal outer effects? Here are come of them: shock, worry, fear, resentment, anger, excessive, criticism, condemnation of others. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18
The English woman novelist named Ouida, who wrote during the earlier part of this century, was so successful that she became the highest-paid fiction writer of her time. Yet when she died she was alone, penniless, half-blind, and dwelling in a back alley of Viareggio, Italy. Why? She was brilliant, fluent, and vibrant in her style, but most of her written work was scathing, bitter, highly critical, filled with prejudices and even hates. To what extent did a mind and heart holding so many negatives contribute to these unpleasant results? Yet she was unquestionably a lady in manners, breeding, dress, and way of life. She wrote her letters and even her manuscripts on the finest quality paper. She was highly independent and refused an offer to write her own life story, even though a substantial amount of money was the prize. Her reply was that it would be lowering herself to feed her own egotism and vanity to do so! It is quite true and utterly obvious that bad physical conditions make their contribution also, but it I even more true that bad inner conditions are the fundamental causes which turn outward remedies to disappointments in the end. Blind selfishness brings mutilated lives and ugly minds. Pessimism is practical defeatism and psychological suicide. It is the child of despair and the parent of dissolution. If we make room in our minds for negative, bitter thoughts of complaint, outrage, or injury against those who mistreat us, we shall not be free and will remain unable to find peace. Beware of giving birth to thoughts of hate, envy, malice, or wrath and sending them to another person. For they will reach one, yes, but will then return like a boomerang to their source. Wicked humans may gain the fruits of their aggressions and desires, may win victories over others, but at the end they are destroyed at the roots. The coldly calculated torture of animals in the name of scientific progress must be paid for in different degrees by those who allow it as well as by those who perpetrate it. The practice of vivisection is a sinful one. The humans who do it will have to pay the penalty one day, quite often by being born into a maimed and hurt body. Some among them, who gradually lose every vestige of pity from their character, become heartless monsters. #RandolphHarris 7 of 18
Through violent aggression whereby impassioned men seek to destroy others, they work their own destruction—at first moral, in the end, physical. These undesirable thoughts and feelings are bad for others as well as oneself, besides wasting so much of one’s own energies. An evil human’s mistakes sometimes strike back at one later when one least expects them, and can least afford them. Is it prudent to heed all this talk of coming calamity? Is it a mistake to read material speculating on its likelihood or imagining its horrors? Each person must answer such a question for oneself, but the philosophic person approaches it in a different manner. On general principles one dislikes negative thoughts and repels them. One seeks a clear recognition of what is happening in the World around one, but one trains oneself—disciplines one’s mind and detaches one’s emotions—to do so without picking up the accompaniments of panic or depression. One practices living with complete calm in the face of provocations and irritations, keeping one’s head, when others all around are losing theirs. When these disaffected find one another and form a subculture, they tend to see their choice, fraught with crisis, as a religious movement. One of the favorite spokesmen of the Hipster Generation announces: For the crucifix I speak out, for the Star of Israel I speak out, for the divinest man who ever lived who was a person I speak out, for sweet Mohammed I speak out, for Buddha I speak out, for Lao-tse and Chuang-tse I speak out, for D.T Suzuki I speak out. This is typical speaking; like an address by Eisenhower it includes all voting creeds and betrays a similar lack of acquaintance. (The bother is that the speaker is in his late thirties and out to know better.) However, as we shall see, this formless ultimate experience is not irrelevant to the plight of being resigned, for there is no available World to give experience a form. #RandolphHarris 8 of 18
However, let me at once give a similar strain of rhetoric of a seasoned public spokesman in the organized system itself. I quote from an address to the National Recreation Congress of 1957 by Dr. Paul Douglass. He is concerned with the terrifying Problem of Leisure, namely that with a shorter work week and automation many millions of adults might simply goof off and get into mischief. “The assimilation of leisure into the folkway tomorrow makes essential the reconstruction of the goals and values of life, the evolution of a new ethics, and the definition of an esthetic suitable for the upreaching taste, the deeper comprehension and enjoyment of beauty in its many forms, and a more meaningful existence. Of course this is not serious. A “new ethics” would, presumably, be the work of an Isaiah or Ezekiel or at least Socrates. If someone’s lips were touched with fire and one got oneself rejected by us and swept our children wake, it would solve other problems than out leisure time for it would be convenient for us. –The Hipster spokesman, surprisingly, seemed to be satisfied with the ethics that we have inherited. (As an artist I find this kind of public speech vaguely insulting. Do we need an esthetic? I cannot cope with the artistic tradition that we have, especially its modern triumphs, so that my own work is both unclassical and dated according to standards right on my bookshelf. Does Dr. Douglass mean a popular esthetic? Is it news to him that the popular taste is systematically debauched by Hollywood, Broadway, Madison Avenue? that by the unanimity of publishers, producers, and broadcasters, assisted by the censorship, it is almost impossible to get an honest or vivid word to the public? and that if something slips by it is swamped by trash and singled out for neglect by ignorant critics?) Dr. Douglass cannot mean what he says, yet he does mean something. Under what conditions do public spokesmen use this kind of language, asking for new ethics and a meaning for existence, when there are concrete tasks glaring in the face? #RandolphHarris 9 of 18
The conditions are disappointment in oneself according to a lofty ethics, and resignation about doing anything. Not early resignation, but after the profound disappointment of experience. Spoken as if miracles were for the asking, the buoyant abstractions ward off pain and uneasy conscience when one is no longer going to try to do anything practical. (The crisis will occur “tomorrow.”) The tone, if not the content, fits the American style, optimistic about expedients. And the disappointment is more profound because the American promise was so bright. Achieving most of what we set out to get, we are surprised to find that it is useless, and worse. For after the century of progress, the folk who are wealth and pretty healthy are not only not happy or wise, but they are uneasy. Their own writers hold them in contempt. Foreigners keep saying that the atom bombs were dropped for no good reason. The beautiful American classlessness is freezing into statuses. People ask for a stop to immigration. In the modern World, we Americans are the old inhabitants. We first had political freedom, high industrial production, an economy of abundance. Naturally we are the first to be disappointed. Europeans, when they ape and deny envy us, are like children. Disappointed and resigned, adults do not see a future for their own children, for they do not know the Way themselves. Immigrants of the first generation wanted their children to make good and have careers; it the third generation they just “want their children to be happy.” And perhaps children being happy is exactly why America is in such a mess today. People should have wanted their children to work hard, honor their family name and practice chastity. Then maybe they would be more respectful and more industrious instead of having a sense of entitlement. We are not saying you should not help your children, by every means you should, but help them so they can focus on their education. If you can afford it, there is nothing wrong with buying a child a brand-new car when they are in high school, paying for insurance and gasoline, and giving them a monthly allowance. #RandolphHarris 10 of 18
By treating your child some luxuries, you will ensure they do not have to work and can spend more time preparing for college, and that they will have time for high school clubs and sports. Do not thrust your child off to work while they are still a child. Let them enjoy being young. When their brain power has increased and they reach college, perhaps by sophomore, when they are acclimated to college education and know how much time to spend getting back and forth to class, then talk to them about seeing if they are ready to be more mature and get a job to help pay for their education. Of course, if you can that is a great idea. Not everyone is lucky to have affluent parents have to work in high school and it makes life more difficult. So if you can help your child financially to become more successful, it is only your family name and image you are helping to become a success. Now, in tropical Africa, what anthropologists call terminal abstinence is a widespread phenomenon. What it refers to is the deliberate—and often deliberated—decision to terminate conjugal relations involving pleasures of the flesh. For example, Yoruba women—but not men—know that permanent celibacy awaits them down the road. Sometimes husbands impose celibacy on their wives because they wish to take or concentrate on a younger wife, but twice as often the woman themselves decide to adopt it. Most commonly, this happens when a woman becomes a grandmother. Throughout Africa, and in Yorba society in particular, child-rearing is predicated upon extensive grandmother participation. The transition from mother to grandmother is complex. Each has different rights and obligations, and sometimes the simplest or only way to navigate between their conflicting demands is to renounce childbearing altogether. Renouncing pleasures of the flesh relations is no hardship for these grandmothers. Usually, a woman’s greatest emotional satisfaction comes from her children and family, not from an intense love affair with her husband. #RandolphHarris 11 of 18
A woman may also declare terminal celibacy as a protest against a new wife or because she has proven her fertility and can now rest. It is not a rejection of her husband so much as a redeployment of energies. For women whose marries represent dynastic bonds and courtyards full of children rather than romantic attachments to their husbands, and for the millions of women who have operations to protect their celibacy, terminal celibacy can be a release rather than a loss. Indeed, it is often no loss at all. In North America, many aging women (who have had operations) also retire from pleasures of the flesh service without the slightest regret. Some consider pleasures of the flesh as purely for reproduction, while others say that, at their age, it is no longer necessary, proper, or dignified. Many older men and women claim they must abstain from pleasures of the flesh activities because of illness, though the medical reality is that their arthritis, heart disease, or hypertension does not require it. In fact, their newly adopted celibacy may disguise or excuse an antipathy to pleasures of the flesh. In the late 1870s, when pregnancy was an interesting condition, underwear one of many of life’s unmentionables, and death a delicate passing away, feminists cleverly softened their demands for an instrument to control when and how often they gave birth by referring to it as Voluntary Motherhood. After all, birth control had ugly connotations, namely, freedom from the consequences of, well, a coming together, as it were, a very intimate sort of carnal knowledge. From one perspective, feminists shared the common fear that contraceptives would lead directly and inevitably to wanton pleasures of the flesh. The various “washes, teas, tonics, and various sorts of appliances [were a] standing reproach upon, and a permanent indictment against, American women,” declared one feminist, articulating the disgust shared by many antifeminist men. So pronounced was their alarm that legislation actually prohibited the distribution of information about birth control. #RandolphHarris 12 of 18
Form a different optic, birth control was criticized for being unromantic and removing the spontaneity from pleasures of the flesh. Women’s greatest fear, however, was that widespread contraception would work against them. They would no longer be able to keep their husbands at arm’s length by invoking the argument that pleasures of the flesh might lead to conception. These devices also smacked of “looseness” and abandon of pleasures of the flesh and seemed unsuited to respectable people living respectable lives. Contraceptives might also send husbands galloping off to bed with “fallen women” they no longer needed to worry about producing a child with. Jealousy was only a partial factor. Horror of the illnesses that unfaithful husbands quite frequently passed on to their wives was a more urgent issue. For all these reasons, many women, including Voluntary Motherhood feminists, accepted birth control in only one form: continence in pleasures of the flesh, the World’s oldest and most widely practiced method of contraception. Voluntary Motherhood supporters were concerned above all with a woman’s right to control her body and, by extension, her fertility. They saw celibacy as the only moral way to achieve this and condemned artificial devices as instruments of immorality that permitted consequence-free indulgence of pleasures of the flesh. In an era where women had few legal and social rights, demanding control of their relations in pleasures of the flesh with their husbands was considered extremely radical. Their endorsement of celibacy softened its impact, but only slightly. Under the aegis of Voluntary Motherhood, married celibacy could take two forms: the couple’s mutual or the woman’s unilateral decision. Usually, the wife’s unilateral declaration of celibacy was at the core of Voluntary Mothers. On the difficult battleground of her home, each determinedly celibate woman defined not only her husband and her society’s norms but even the law, which required her to submit both body and will to her husband. #RandolphHarris 13 of 18
In these circumstances, she needed immense courage to dictate her availability for pleasures of the and to withhold it except when she was prepared to conceive a child. “Our religion, laws, customs, are all founded on the belief that woman was made for man,” remarked feminist Elizabeth Cady Stanton. “Womanhood is the primal fact, wifehood and motherhood its incidents…Must the heyday of her existence be wholly devoted to the one animal function of bearing children? Shall there be no limit to this but woman’s capacity to endure the fearful strain on her life?” Like a great many other nineteenth-century women, Mrs. Stanton had no romantic notions about intercourse involving pleasures of the flesh. It led to an endless series of being with child, and when desperate mothers sought advice on how to avoid conception, they were given false information. Medical “expert” Dr. Ezra Heywood, for example, told them that if they abstained from pleasures of the flesh until ten to twelve days after starting their cycle, conception could be avoided. This woefully wrong interpretation of the fertility cycle misled women, who ended up with child yet again. No wonder, then, that pleasures of the flesh soon lost is magic. Too often, it exhausted, impoverished, disabled, and ended their lives. A woman grieving for a miscarried child was a typical victim: “I am nearly wrecked and ruined by…nightly pleasures of the flesh, which is often repeated in the morning. It is almost nonconsensual because I am trying to produce a child to please my husband. This and nothing else was the cause of my miscarriage…he went to work like a man a-mowing, and instead of a pleasure as it might have been, it was most intense torture.” To end these all-too-frequent personal tragedies, the Voluntary Motherhood movement preached that woman had the right to practice celibacy. Any other form of contraception was not only morally questionable, but would deprive her of the ability to control when she had pleasures of the flesh. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18
The Voluntary Motherhood movement was both inherently radical and relatively conservative in its stance. In an era when the notion that a man could have nonconsensual pleasures of the flesh with his wife was seen as ludicrous because marriage gave him unlimited access to her temple, wives who resisted on ideological grounds were social rebels. Their commitment to Voluntary Motherhood, and to celibacy except for protection, was their means of empowering themselves vis-à-vis their husbands, and in a large sense, within the families they wished to space out and control, and even withing the society whose laws they so quietly and privately defied. In this contact, they justified their celibacy as an instrument or a weapon they needed to fight for the very noblest of causes. People with histrionic personality disorder, once called hysterical personality disorder, are extremely emotion—they are typically described as “emotionally charged”—and continually seek to be the center of attention. Their exaggerated, rapidly changing moods can complicate life considerably, as we see in the case of Suzanne: Suzanne, an attractive and vivacious woman, sought therapy in hope that she might prevent the disintegration of her third marriage. The problem she faced was a recurrent one, her tendency to become “bored” with her husband and increasingly interested in going out with other men She was on the brink of “another affair” and decided that before “giving way to her impulses again” she had “better stop and take a good look” at herself…Suzanne was quite popular during her adolescent years. Rather than going to college, Suzanne attended art school where she met and married a fellow student—a “handsome, wealthy, ne’er-do-well.” Both she and her husband began “sleeping around” by the end of the first year, and she “was not certain” that her husband was the father of the daughter. A divorce took place several months after the birth of this child. #RandolphHarris 15 of 18
Soon thereafter she met and married a man in his forties who gave both Suzanne and her daughter a “comfortable home, and scads of attention and love.” It was a “good life” for the four years that the marriage lasted. In the third year of this marriage she became attracted to a young man, a fellow dancing student. The affair was brief, but was flowed by a quick succession of several others. Her husband learned of her exploits, but accepted her regrets and assurances that they would not continue. They did continue, and the marriage was terminated after a stormy court settlement. Suzanne “knocked about” on her own for the next two years until she met her present husband, a talented writer who “knew the scoop” about her past…She had no inclination to venture afield for the next three years. She enjoyed the titillation of “playing games” with other men, but she remained loyal to her husband, even though he was away on reportorial assignments for periods of one or two months. The last trip, however, brought forth the “old urge” to start an affair. It was at this point that she sought therapy. People with historic personality disorder are always “on stage,” using theatrical gestures and mannerisms and the most grandiose language to describe ordinary everyday events. Like a chameleon, they keep changing themselves to attract and impress an audience, and in their pursuit they change not only their surface characteristics—according to the latest fads—but also their opinions and beliefs. In fact, their speech is actually scanty in detail and substance, and they seem to lack a sense of who they really are. Approval and praise are the life’s blood of these individuals; they must have others present to witness their exaggerated emotional states. Vain, self-centered, demanding, and unable to delay gratification for long, they overreact to any minor event that gets in the way of their quest for attention. Some make suicide attempts, often to manipulate others. People with this disorder may draw attention to themselves by exaggerating their physical illnesses or fatigues. They may also behave very provocatively and try to achieve their goals through seductions involving pleasures of the flesh. Most obsess over how they look and how others will perceive them, often wearing bright, eye-catching clothes. They exaggerate the depth of their relationships, considering themselves to be the intimate friends of people who see them as no more than casual acquaintance. Often, they become involved with romantic partners who may be exciting but who do not treat them well. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18
This disorder was once believed to be more common in women than in men, and clinicians long described the “hysterical wife.” Research, however, has revealed gender bias in past diagnoses. When evaluating case studies of people with a mixture of histrionic and antisocial traits, clinicians in several studies have a diagnosis of the histrionic personality disorder to women more than men. The latest statistics suggest that around 2 percent of adults have this personality disorder, with males and females equally affected. They psychodynamic perspective was originally developed to help explain cases of hysteria, so it is no surprise that these theorists continue to have a strong interest in histrionic personality disorder today. Most psychodynamic theorists believe that children, people with this disorder experienced unhealthy relationships in which cold and controlling parents left them feeling unloved and afraid of abandonment. To defend against deep-seated fears of loss, the individuals learned to behave dramatically, inventing crises that would require other people to act protectively. Some psychodynamic theories focus exclusively on female patients. They suggest that an early lack of maternal nurturance causes some daughters to develop an intense need for their father’s attention to seek it through displays of affection and dependence that go far beyond the usual behavior of young girls toward their fathers. These highly flirtations and dramatic displays of emotion established a histrionic pattern that extends to later relationships in their lives. Such individuals enter adulthood as “unhappy little girls,” looking at men as idealized fathers and always trying to manipulate them. Cognitive explanations look instead at the lack of substance and extreme suggestibility found in people with historic personality disorder. These theories see the individuals as becoming less and less interested in knowing about the World at large because they are so self-focused and emotional. With no detailed memories of what they never learned, they must rely on hunches or on other people to provide them with direction in life. Some cognitive theorist also propose that people with this disorder hold a general assumption that they are helpless to care for themselves, and so they constantly seek out others who will meet their needs. #RandolphHarris 17 of 18
Additionally, sociocultural theorists believe that histrionic personality disorder is produced in part by society’s norms and expectations. Until recently, our society encouraged girls to hold on to childhood and dependency as they grew up. The vain, dramatic, and selfish behavior of the histrionic person may actually be an exaggeration of femininity as our culture once defined it. Unlike people with most other personality disorders, those with histrionic personality disorder often seek out treatment on their own. Working with them can be very difficult, however, because of the demands, tantrums, and seductiveness they are likely to deploy. Another problem is that these individuals may pretend to have important insight or to experience change during treatment, merely to please the therapist. To head off such problems, therapists must remain objective and maintain strict professional boundaries. Cognitive therapists have tried to help people with this disorder to change their belief that they are helpless and also to develop better, more deliberate ways of thinking and solving problems. Psychodynamic therapy and group therapy have also been applied. In all these approaches, therapist ultimately aim to help the clients recognize their excessive dependency, find inner satisfaction, and become more self-reliant. Clinical case reports suggest that each of the approaches can be useful. Drug therapy is less successful, however, except as a means of relieving the depressive symptoms experienced by some patients. Now, the seed now begins its time of gestation in the rich dark Earth. It is the great cold of night: not the negative images of darkness, but the dark richness of that unknow, fertile, deep part in each of us where our intuitive creative forces abide. The Christ energy enters the Earth at this season. The yule log is lighted. The nights grow shorter, the light returns, and we experience rebirth. Again, again we come and go, changed, changing. Hands join, union in love and fear, grief and joy. The circles turn, each giving into each, into all. Prayer takes the mind out of the narrowness of self-interest, and enables us to see the World in the mirror of the holy. We do not step out of the World when we pray; we merely see the World in a different setting. Prayer is a way to master what is inferior in us, to discern between the signal and the trivial, between the vital and the futile, by taking counsel with what we know about the will of God, by seeing out fate in proportion to God. #RandolphHarris 18 of 18
Cresleigh Homes
What is it like living a community in that feels like a resort? Pretty totally great! This open concept design welcomes you into a window-filled great room.
There is also an open kitchen with prep island and plenty of counter space, and the beautiful dining room that you see below, which can be repurposed, as there is also a breakfast nook in the kitchen.
Since we moved in a Cresleigh Home, we’ve taken a dip in that sparkling pool every time we get the chance.
From the conveniences your heart desires and the finest features and finishes, a Cresleigh Home is what you are looking for. https://cresleigh.com/havenwood/
There is Something Attractive in the Forbidden
To be better at life is to be better at work. The great secret to success is to go through life as a person who never gets used up. Because the New World has been so economically dominant for so long, it is often overlooked that five centuries ago China, not Europe, had the most advanced technology, and it was Asia that led the World, turning out fully 65 percent of the globe’s measurable economic output. It is largely forgotten, at least in America, that in 1405 a fleet of 317 ships manned by some 27,000 sailors and warriors set out on the first of seven extraordinary voyages of exploration. The fleet was commanded by Admiral Zheng He, a Chinese Muslim eunuch and one of the most remarkable men ever to put to sea. It explored the coasts of African and the Gulf of Aden in the Middle East, reaching as far west as Jiddah and Dhofar, and laying the navel basis for Chinese trade all across the Indian Ocean. It was not until another two and a half centuries passed that the Enlightenment and the early industrial revolution launched the great Second Wave transition that gradually shifted the locus of economic, political and military power to Europe. It did not, however, stay there. By the end of the nineteenth century the center of the World wealth creation had begun to move on—pushing farther westward to the United States of American. Two World wars put an end to what was left of Europe’s economic dominance. By 1941, just before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor drew the United States of American into World War II, one knew inherently that the twentieth century was already “the American Century.” The United States of America, was supposed to be the Good Samaritan of the entire World, feed all the people of the World, who, as a result of this Worldwide collapse of civilization are hungry and destitute. Indeed, since this time, and especially since the mid-1950s, when the Third Wave and the transition to a knowledge-based economy began, the American economy has been dominant. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18
Technology is arguably at the center of the changing relationship between China and the World. Tthe wealth shift toward Asia, starting with a trickle toward Japan and later the so-called newly industrialized countries (NICs) such as South Korea, gathered strength throughout the subsequent decades. The floodgates really began to open when, in the 1980s, Chia explicitly legitimized and encouraged the not-very-communist pursuit of wealth. They swung fully open in the 1990s, and foreign direct investment (FDI) poured in. China was the second largest recipient of FDI inflows Worldwide in 2020 and has been an attractive destination for foreign investment since it opened-up four decades ago. Annual FDI inflows increased rapidly from around 40 billion U.S. dollars in 2000 to 124 billion in 2011. In 2021, the value of foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows to China reached approximately 179 billion U.S. dollars. This was an increase of around 20 percent compared to the previous year. The Xinhua news service called the torrent of FDI “nothing less than miraculous.” The United States of America took the leadership position as the largest recipient of FDI in 2019 and, consolidated that position in 2020, mainly driven by higher direct investments from Japan, Germany, and the Netherlands. Together, these three economies accounted for most of the increase in foreign direct investment in the United States of America over the last three years. However, there is a very important reason to keep taxes low. Low-tax jurisdictions such as the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Hong Kong SAR, Singapore, and Ireland remained among the top direct investors and investee economics. They continued to be attractive destinations for different types of investments, including those channeled through special purpose entities (subsidiaries created by parent companies in the countries convenience). Nonetheless, China’s remarkable rise is a tribute to the hard work, brains, and innovation of its people, once freed from the severe constraints of communism. However, and here the story of Henry Luce resumes, it could not have happened without the assistance of the United States of America. #RandolphHarris 2 of 18
Mr. luce was the son of a Missionary in China and was himself a committed Christian and anti-communist who never lost his interest in China. And if he were alive to look back at the last few decades, he might take astonished satisfaction in the powerful support given by the United States of America to China’s rapid economic rise, though the suspicion flickers that altruism had little to do with it. By 2003, Americans had poured $44 billion in investments into China. The United States of America also provided a gigantic market for Chinese goods, importing more than $150 billion in 2003. By then China’s World exports had hit $436.1 billion, and its GDP reached $6.5 trillion. That year marked an Asian watershed. China, along with Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan, had an aggregate GDP nearly equal to the combined total of Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Spain—the five biggest economics in Europe. And that calculation did not even include Japan. Or India. If Japan and India are added, the six Asian nations have a combined GDP $3 trillion greater than the entire twenty-five-member European Union—or the United States of America. What we have been witnessing, therefore, has been a monumental transfer of wealth and wealth creation across the World map. It can be seen as nothing less than the continuation of the movement begun when economic power first shifted from China to Wester Europe and then to the United States of America—the completion of a great historical circle, retuning economic dominance to Asia it left centuries ago. Ponder the World of 2050, an Asia with more than half the World’s population; perhaps 40 percent of the global economy; more than half the World’s information technology industry; and World class high-tech military capabilities. It seems that important goods, FDI in other countries, and high taxes has been a Trojan Horse of the United States of America. No wonder why so many people want “Made in America” produce, beef, fruits and vegetables. So is this really the great circle closing? Will today’s changes continue in linear—or should we say circular—fashion? #RandolphHarris 3 of 18
The United States of America should prepare for a triumphant or ascending People’s Republic of China (PRC)—scenarios that not only align with current PRC national development trends but also represent the most challenging future scenarios for the U.S military being a country who is proud of having an unprotected boarder. In contrast, Beijing’s intense preoccupation with internal security and deep suspicions regarding the United States of America toward China may frustrate attempts by Washington to improve bilateral relations and encourage more liberal domestic policies. Researchers studied trends in the management of politics and society and analyzed the specific national-level strategies and plans that China’s Communist Partyer rulers have put in place to further their vision of a China that is well governed, socially stable, economically prosperous, technologically advanced, and military powerful by 2049, the centenary of the founding PRC. China, as other nations, could already be sneaking spies and military across the southern border. It seems a country would have learned from the past and want to secure it border for national security reasons. If China proves ascendent, the United States of America’s military should anticipate increased risk to already threatened forward-based forces in Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines, as well as a loss of the ability to operate routinely in the air and sea space above and in the Western Pacific. The United States of American should optimize its abilities to deter hostilities, get troops and equipment to hotspots quickly, operate from forward bases, and work with allied forces. The United States of American could field more robust cyber and network attack capabilities and other means to counter China’s unmanned aircraft systems. The capacity to respond quickly and effectively to China’s burgeoning reconnaissance-strike system will play an important role in determining the extent to which China’s leadership remains risk averse when considering military options to resolve regional disputes. #RandolphHarris 4 of 18
China’s $14 trillion economy is second only to the United States of America. On the basis of purchasing power, China will take the number one slot as early as 2023. Even in nominal terms—depending on how you analyze the data—the Chinese economy is expected to surpass the United States of America at some point in the 2030s. China is also the World’s largest trading nation in goods, and Chinese and Taiwanese companies account for more than a fifth of this year’s Global Fortune 500. Not only does China rank in the World’s top two countries for receiving and giving foreign direct investment, it is also the second biggest spender on research and development at some $3 billion last year. China is also represented in international institutions. Its citizens sit at the top of global bodies like the International Telecommunications Union and –until Meng Hongwei was detained for reportedly confessing in a Chinese court to taking bribes—Interpol. China now rivals the United States of America in technology, speaking a new arms race in areas such as artificial intelligence and fifth-generation telecoms networks. While China needs access to foreign markets to support teach development, it also wants to increase the market share for local technology players. And while the United States of America believes in it breaking strides for having weak borders and amnesty, and historical and first this and that, and what seems to other nations as a country that is confused about gender identity and sexuality or what bathroom certain genders should use, other countries are paying close attention to whether China break from global trade to focus on its domestic market. China’s rise and modus operandi have created waves across the globe, threating foreign relations and imperiling trade, technology, and capital flows. We will return to the future of China and Asia later. For now, we need to look at some of the other surprising spatial changes that come with revolutionary wealth. Now, imagine a nowhere in which we all live and in which we all live and in which all the riches of the World are made. Exactly such a fantasy took wing during the Internet explosion of the late 1990s. #RandolphHarris 5 of 18
The growth of the Internet was so dramatic that it began to call into question the very meaning of space and spatial relations. Many digerati and Internet enthusiasts spoke glowingly of “placelessness.” Think, what is location become irrelevant? Imagine a World where you could close your eyes and appear in Bombay or Paris as if you had been assisted by a Star Trek transporter. Picture the ability to have parties with someone while he or she is in another part of town or in another city. Think of being in two or three spots at once…Such is a World without place. The Placeless Society…does not exist. Not yet. However, convergent technologies are moving us in precisely this direction. Others described cyberspace as a territory that has no place in the physical World and even as the first instance of a parallel World. For them, the virtual World occupies what might better be called “unspace.” Despite the poetry and hyperbole, however, even electronic bits are stored somewhere, in some actual location, and they move through space, not unspace, as they are transmitted. Digitization, in short, does not dematerialize space. It does not substitute “virtual space” for reality. However, it does speed up and facilitate the shift of wealth and wealth creation everywhere, not just on the scale of a “great circle” but right down to the local level. Back here on the ground, the wealth maps of the World are being redrawn as waves of changes roll across the Earth, fast-forwarding some cities and regions into future and sending others into economic oblivion. Around the World tomorrow’s higher-value-added places are even now taking form. Cleveland, Ohio, was once an important center of hard-core industry, with its steel mills, foundries and auto plants. Today Cleveland claims one of the nation’s top science and engineering universities, Case Western Reserve, and has a huge medical sector led by the Cleveland Clinic. However, its housefronts and stores are still blackened by decades of smog and smoke, and Cleveland is listed as the poorest big city in America, a victim of its past industrial success and its failure to move on even as the Third Wave carried other parts of America toward the future. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18
Cleveland, moreover, is only the most obvious example. Much the same fate has met the other great smokestack cities around the World—yesterday’s engines of industrial wealth. It is not just cities, however. Whole regions are declining in economic significance as new ones rise to take their place. Take Guangdong in southeaster China. A couple of decades ago it was noted for being a place where water buffalo pulled plows across paddy fields. However, Guangdong is now known as China’s economic powerhouse. Not only does it have the largest and fastest-growing economy in terms of GDP among the 31 provinces and municipalities in Chinese mainland, and is also home to the Pearl River Delta (PDR) Economic Zone and the Shantou, Shenzhen and Zhuhai Special Economic Zones, but it also has rows of factories and high rises producing computer chips, radios, mobile phones, toy, clothed and green technology. Big-name investors with production bases there include Procter & Gamble, Nestle, Coca-Cola, and Mitsubishi. Millions of people have flowed into the area. Millions of jobs have been created, and Guangdong’s per capita GDP has quadrupled in the last decade. Today Guangdong and the Pearl River Delta of which it is a part, along with Hong Kong and Macao, form one of the most powerful manufacturing centers in the World. They have made the transition from agrarian economies to industrial centers, taking over much of the manufacturing earlier done in the West’s smokestack cities. However, that is not all they have accomplished. For instead of setting its sights on a Second Wave future, Guangdong has one eye fixed on what happens after the inexpensive-labor factory jobs run out. It is grabbing all the low-tech work it can get, but it is already going after Third Wave, knowledge-intensive, higher-value added production. Thus the China Development Institute notes that Guangdong’s growing high-tech sector now includes companies in fields like information technology, new materials, new energy, biotechnology and laser-machine-electronic integrated systems manufacturing. Apart from research at Case Western Reverse, relatively few of these are found in Cleveland—or in its rust-belt sister cities. All of which need new strategies for survival. And new wealth maps. #RandolphHarris 7 of 18
With so much going on the World, the people are going to need to learn to be more social. Research suggests that 4 percent of the people in the United States of America are affected with anti-social disorder. Explanations of antisocial personality disorder come from the psychodynamic, behavioral, cognitive, and biological models. As with many other personality disorders, psychodynamic theorists propose that this one, too, begins with an absence of parental love during infancy, leading to a lack of basic trust. In this view, some children—the ones who develop antisocial personality disorder—respond to the early inadequacies by becoming emotionally distant, and they bond with others through the use of power and destructiveness. In support of the psychodynamic explanation, researchers have found that people with this disorder are more likely than others to have had significant stress in their childhoods, particularly in such forms as family poverty, family violence, and parental conflict or divorce. Many behavioral theorists have suggested that antisocial symptoms may be learned through modeling, or imitation. As evidence, they point to the higher rate of antisocial personality disorder found among the parents of people with this disorder. Other behaviorists have suggested that some parents unintentionally teach antisocial behavior by regularly reinforcing a child’s aggressive behavior. When the child misbehaves or becomes violent in reaction to the parents’ requests or orders for example, the parents may give in to restore peace. Without meaning to, they may be teaching the child to be stubborn and perhaps even violent. The cognitive view says that people with antisocial personality disorder hold attitudes that trivialize the importance of other people’s needs. Such a philosophy of life, some theorists suggest, may be far more common in our society than people recognize. Cognitive theorists further propose that people with this disorder have genuine difficulty recognizing a point of view other than their own. #RandolphHarris 8 of 18
Finally, a number of studies suggest that biological factors may play an important role in antisocial personality disorder. Research reveals that people with this disorder often experience less anxiety than other people, and so may lack a key ingredient for learning. This may help explain why they have so much trouble learning from negative life experiences or tuning in to the emotional cues of others. Several studies have found that subjects with antisocial personality disorder are less able than control subjects to learn laboratory tasks, such as finding their way out of a maze, when the key reinforcements are punishments such as shock or loss of money. When experimenters make the punishments very apparent of force subjects to pay attention to them, learning improves; left to their own devices, however, subjects with this disorder are not influenced much by punishments. Perhaps they simply do not react as anxiously as other people to negative events. Why should people with antisocial personality disorder experience less anxiety than other people? The answer may lie in the biological realm. Subjects with the disorder often respond to warnings or expectations of stress with low brain and bodily arousal, such as slow autonomic arousal and slow EEG waves. Perhaps because of the low arousal, the individuals easily tune out threatening or emotional situations, and so are unaffected by them. It could also be argued that because of their physical underarousal, people with antisocial personality disorder will be more likely than other people to take risks and seek thrills. That is, they may be drawn to antisocial activity precisely because it meets an underlying biological need for more excitement and arousal. In support of this idea, as we observed earlier, antisocial personality disorder often goes hand in hand with sensation-seeking behaviour. Approximately 25 percent of all people with antisocial personality disorder receive treatment for it, yet treatment is typically ineffective. A major obstacle is the individuals’ lack of conscience or desire to change. #RandolphHarris 9 of 18
Most of those in therapy have been forced to participate by an employer, their school, or the law, or else they come to the attention of therapists when they also develop another psychological disorder. Not surprisingly, one study found that 70 percent of these patients left treatment prematurely. Some cognitive therapists try to guide clients with antisocial personality disorder to think about moral issues and about the needs of other person. In a similar vein, a number of hospitals and prisons have tried to create a therapeutic community for people with this disorder, a structured environment that teaches responsibility toward others. Still another popular approach uses physically challenging wilderness programs to build self-confidence, self-esteem, and commitment to others in a group. Some patients seem to profit from such programs. Generally, however, most of today’s treatment approaches have little or no impact on people with antisocial personality disorder. Now, special mention must be given to male homosexuality, which preoccupies adolescents and young men of every class from bottom to top. The preoccupation appears either as gnawing doubts that oneself might be a “latent homosexual,” or as reactive contempt and ridicule, or hostility even paranoia. Among young people every kind of nonconformism in a contemporary tends to be thought of as homosexual, whether it be a passion for music or a passion for social justice. Inevitably in the stimulating and hectic biological atmosphere, including overtly expressed homosexuality, repressed homosexual thoughts also begin to break through. Remnants of unfinished normal homosexual situations reappear, and one is sharply aware of new temptations in the culture. The shared narcissism of dandy-contact of buddies is obsessionally inhibited or immediately commented on and “interpreted”; and one sees homosexuals everywhere. The question must be asked why the breakthrough into awareness seems to balk and circle at just this point on just this issue? why, in the present, just the homosexual temptations and threats loom so large? #RandolphHarris 10 of 18
Well, the fellows are interrupted in growing up as men; their homosexuality threatens them as immaturity. They are afraid of going backward to boyhood status, admiring the model male organs and powers of their seniors and adults. Or they regress further to a safe narcissism and would want their own male organs and bodies to be loved as their personal worth, but this reversion to infantilism is fiercely resisted. In the difficulty of growing up, the young man psychologically regresses to an earlier stage because it is easier, he cannot take on the responsibilities of heterosexual love and masculine conflict. However, then, doubling his potency and to avoid ridicule and danger, he becomes obsessionally heterosexual and competitive; or alternatively, he may become apathetic and sexually not there. Other “animal” expressions, besides the sexual, are also problematic. Let us sum them up by some more philosophical considerations. As our organized systems perfects itself, there is less “open” environment. It is hard for a social animal to grow when there is not an open margin to grow in: some open space, some open economy, some open mores, some activity free from regulation and cartes d’identite. I am referring not to a war between the “individual” and society, or to a wild animal that has to be acculturated—for there is no such individual or animal—but to a deepening sociological flaw in the modern system itself. A society cannot have decided all possibilities beforehand and have structured them. If society becomes too tightly integrated and pre-empts all the available space, materials and methods, then it is failing to provide for just the margin of formlessness, real risk, novelty, spontaneity, that makes growth possible. This is almost formal cause importantly drives young people out of the organized system altogether and makes creative adults loath to co-operate with it. When time, clothes, opinions, and goals become so regulated that people feel they cannot be “themselves” or create something new, they bolt and look for fringes and margins, loopholes, holes in the wall, or they just run. #RandolphHarris 11 of 18
Our society pre-empts literally too much of the space. For instance, it is impossible in the Eastern United States of America to pitch a tent and camp for the night without registering with the National Parks and its list of regulations. You cannot go off somewhere for a bout of pleasures of the flesh without paying rent. Almost any stone that a kid picks up and any target that he throws it at, is property. People hygienically adopt a permissive attitude toward the boisterousness and hyperkinesis of children, and meantime we design efficient minimum housing. Under modern urban conditions, it is impossible for woman who is a senior citizen to be a harmless lunatic, as was commonplace in country places; she would hurt herself, get lost among strangers, disrupt traffic, stop the subway. She must be institutionalized. If you roam the street late at night doing nothing, and looking for something to do, the police who is protecting you and everybody else does not want you to be going nowhere and to have nothing to do; and you ask him, Does he have any suggestions? We have all heard, and probably joked, about chastity belts. We know, vaguely, that they were used in the olden days. If pressed, we might even cobble together a description. Were not they gruesome contraptions, bolted around helpless woman’s loins like enormous, saw-toothed, mini prisons? Did not jealous husbands use them before setting out on long voyages Were not some of these husbands holy Crusaders, leaving civilized Europe to Christianize the heathen? Or was it the opposite, that Crusaders returning from foreign conquests carried with them as booty these exotic monstrosities? If fact, chastity belts were exceedingly rare. They were not unicorns—they did really exist—but they are far more common in literature and in the popular imagination than as actual hardware, and in Europe, only the cruelest most obsessive men forced their women into one. Those unlucky women, however, numbered at least in the hundreds. The discomfort, inconvenience, humiliation, and often agonizing chafing they suffered was the terrible price exacted from them to guarantee exclusive access to their body. #RandolphHarris 12 of 18
Most authenticated chastity belts, which were primarily to protect maidenly virginity, are from the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Several court cases resulted from the injuries they caused their wearers. One involved a jealous Danish husband who bolted his wife into a chastity belt. For months she endured the pain it caused her, until her friends intervened and insisted she have it removed. Her predicament became public and an outcry ensued. Her husband was summoned to court, which banished him for his cruel treatment of his wife. However, as late as 1892, a Frenchman named Hufferte seduced a young girl, then became so ragingly jealous that he put her into a chastity belt. What happened afterward is uncertain, but newspapers of the period reportedly sometime carried advertisements for these items. The British Museum, for instance, has a copy of a Heinrich Aldegreyer engraving portraying a love-struck young couple, in their birthday suits except for her chastity belt. In one had she grips a key, evidently to the other garment she wears, and stares uncertainly into he pleading eyes. Dare she or daren’t she? That is the unanswered question. First of all, surviving belts are all slightly different, but their essential design is the same. They have hip bands formed of anywhere from four to ten iron-jointed strips. The portion that passes between the legs is also jointed so it bends back up again, behind that woman’s posterior. Some attention was given to decoration and the wearer’s comfort. Designs are etched into the surface, and the insides are padded with velvet or silk. There is a slit in the front for bathroom business, and often a large heart-shaped area in the rear for bathroom business. These openings are surrounded by saw-edged teeth that would quickly lacerate or mince any male organ inserted into them. An obvious problem was that the metal dug or bit into the flesh and, at the very least chafed it. Unless the woman could take care of bathroom business with unusual precision, the interior of the belt must soon have been fetid, soiled and caked with errant bathroom business. #RandolphHarris 13 of 18
Sleeping with a chastity belt must have been nightmarishly difficult, as the belt pressed down on the flesh. Washing the enclosed areas was impossible, for the sharp metal teeth at each womanly aperture would be as lethal to fingers holding a cloth as anything else trying to enter where it does not belong. They chastity belt tortured real women, but as a metaphor in literature and popular culture, it has titillated millions. Britney Spears often preforms with one made of silk. She has a matching outfit, one red, one black. Paris Hilton is also often photographed in a red, silk chastity belt outfit. I guess it is called chastity belt lingerie? As private area shield, it kept the individual woman chaste. As a symbol, it has been a powerful reminder to millions of how important chastity is and to what stupendous lengths men have gone to ensure their women observe it. The belts, of course, have nothing to do with the optimistic aspects of chastity and everything to do with the double standard and the outmoded concepts of male dominance over woman’s bodies that are associated with it. In some North American societies, such as with the Cheyenne people, they also invented a chastity belt. If a young man had so much as touched a woman’s private areas, the Cheyenne view of premarital chastity was so grim that a young woman had no hope of a respectable marriage. Cheyenne virginity was a deadly serious business. It is always good to get some background information on one’s culture and how people were raised to understand the people. History often tends to slander cultures and so them what has become of them after their culture has been ravaged and destroyed. Some people like Dr. Freud believe that the oppression of pleasures of the flesh leads to violence, but there is already so much violence dealing with non-consensual pleasures of the flesh one hundred years after his revolution started. It seems now people think they have a right anyone’s body they want. And it probably would be a good idea for Americans to be more concerned about chastity to desexualize society and make it safer for people to walk the streets or be at home alone or go out to a nightclub. American values of what is a right and what is important need to change. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18
So anyway, the Cheyenne regarded the belt as perfect protection. If he attempted to undo it, each mand knew that his victim’s male relatives would probably end his life and the female relatives would destroy his family’s property. Males respected the chastity belt and the penalties for tampering with it were draconian enough to enforce the respect. As a result, Cheyenne women were famed for their chastity, and those few who willingly surrendered it were disgraced for life. However, sometimes chaste wives and virgins who were forced to married were “put on the prairie” and it was known that it was okay to have your way with them. Sometimes as many as thirty men would be waiting to. Nonetheless, Cheyenne society was considered unusual in that male chastity was also highly regarded. Obviously a society with virtually no available women must develop an ethos of chastity for all its members, in contrast to the double standard, which can operate only with women of the evening as an integral element. Seen in this light, the Cheyenne chastity belt was as much symbol as it was physical obstacle to pleasures of the flesh. What made it so successful was the community’s commitment to chastity as the only acceptable way of life. There is something attractive in the forbidden. On the usual psychological theory, to do the forbidden is to attack the forbidding authority, ultimately the oedipal father. This explains the obvious fear of punishment, and also the stronger, often quite irrational, fear of transgressing the due order of things. (Exempli gratia, “Are we allowed to climb up the ladder?” “Naw! of course not!” “Then we’d better not”—even though there is nobody to catch them at it. But they then climb up anyway.) On this theory, what would the attraction be? The forbidden by the oedipal authority; and secondly, more subtly, a teasing of the authority, to win his personal attention, for he is so impersonal. I think there is a good deal to this second point, for it has somewhat the feel of the attraction of the forbidden. (Exempli gratia, “Will the watchman wake up?”—hoping that he will thrillingly wake up, even if he bites.) #RandolphHarris 15 of 18
However, there is still a third fundamental attraction in doing the forbidden: the animal need to transgress the limit in order to finish the situation. Consider. People are continually stimulated and set in motion, but they come up against limits and cannot fully go or let go. Typically, because of inhibitions and circumstances, the full expression is not total and not altogether without “self-consciousness.” The spontaneous acceleration toward an unlimited goal seems evident in the way one forbidden achievement emboldens the next, until the process comes to a natural end, rather than an impose limit. The freedom that beckons in the forbidden attraction is not, negatively, merely a freedom from constraint, but a relief of internal pressure as one arrives and finishes the experience. If there is not much satisfaction in the forbidden object achieved (exempli gratia, there is nothing up on the roof and the kids soon climb down and go home), there is a quiet satisfaction. However, there is no disappointment, because the action has reached its natural end: you have climbed to the top of the mountain and that is the furthest you want to go. This spontaneous acceleration to the goal is not the same as “raising the ante” characteristic in purely delinquent behavior. Raising the ante has a fragmented and desperate tone that comes from finding that each daring act has not paid off, and therefore the next time one must stab more wildly. The end of raising the ante is clearly self-destruction, to be “extreme”; it is not to finish a process. Doing the forbidden is a normal function of growth; raising the ante is a sign that a person is not in contact with his real needs. The same twelve-year-olds I have been describing returned to the same building the next week—a pleasant spot overlooking the Hudson where they came to smoke forbidden cigarettes. They directly climbed onto the roof for it was now the established routine, and they came down. However, there was a new boy with them whose behavior was different. He promptly dared the others to jump off the roof—a ten-foot drop to a concrete pavement, guaranteed to break his ankles. He himself climbed over the ledge and hung by his hands and said he was going to drop. He would have let go, too, except that we men intervened, shouting. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18
The other kids were indignant and disgusted at his senselessness; they did not seem challenged. One of the men said to him. “That wasn’t smart.” He, grinning: “Aw, I thought youse’d think it was smart.”!! Had he been playing, after all, for our attention? He got it. Millions of people seem to carry on their lives quite comfortably and form their opinions quite easily without the necessity of troubling themselves about the place in one for the spiritual laws and in the other for spiritual truths It is as if such things simply did not exist. Some people are very shallow and it is because they are pressured to be sometimes that is because of behaviors other force on them. Things like chastity, which is very important, or you may not every hear them say it and that thought may shock them when they listen to their thoughts, but they may think like Marcia Brady, that the World is about having nice shinny hair, and “being skinny and pretty is the most important thing” because that is engrained in their head and they have nothing else in their life to life for. You know, they have not done anything important to be satisfied in life that their physical appears is what is most important because they are hallow inside. The realm of spiritual truths has become like a foreign country to them, the spiritual life like a queer eccentricity. It is not that they are incapable of understanding truths, for many of them have fair intelligence, or that they are too distant from the life, for many of them are good in heart and conduct. However, when so many people are so unaware of, or so indifferent to, the higher purpose of life it requires no special foresight to forecast what gloomy changes will take place in their future course. Those who interest in life begins and ends in their little egos, who cannot believe in and immediately reject the need of putting a higher purpose into all their activities, naturally fall into unavoidable error and experience avoidable sufferings. Both the protagonists in our contemporary international scene have really fallen into the same soul-sickness; the chief difference is only in the way and the extent to which they fell into it. Both have sold their spiritual birthrights for a mess of materialistic pottage, the one through temptation and freedom and other through blindness and compulsion. #RandolphHarris 17 of 18
The goals of both civilizations are similar, only their methods and atmosphere differ, and widely. Both seek the mechanistic and materialistic life, but only partially, the other wholly. Hence the real struggle is between two varieties of materialism. The only correct conclusion is that this is not so much a conflict of clashing ideologies as of two different variants of the same ideology—a good variant and an evil one. This leads to a confused rather than a clear issues. The clean-cut difference in ethical values, aims, and ideals which made the war against the precious incarnation of the aggressive spirit a defensive struggle against obvious evil is still present today, but the metaphysical issues are somewhat chaotically distributed on both sides. However, how far is it enough from the point of view of higher culture? Will they learn to appreciate the values of truth, goodness, and beauty or despise and trample on them? For the juncture of social justice with mechanical development could provide them for the firs time with more freedom every day. What use will they make of this enlarged or even new freedom? We may not let such questions hinder us from creating the opportunity to think about higher matters. What use or abuse will be made of its history’s concern. With the summer solstice we feel the maximum power of the sun as it gives it fullest offering to our part of the Earth. The time of rigorous outward manifestation is here. Everywhere are the energies of doing. The garden image of summer applies to whatever we undertake; if we continue to give them our energies—sun, water, care, love—our dreams will grow and prosper. If we do not continue to nourish our dreams, they may wilt and perish. Faith does not detach humans from thinking, it does not suspend reason. It is opposed not to knowledge but to indifferent aloofness to the essence of living. Faith means to hold small things great, to take light matters seriously, to distinguish the common and the passing from the aspect of the lasting. Faith is an awareness of divine mutuality and companionship, a form of communion between God and man. To regard all that happens as workings of Providence is to deny humans responsibility. We must not idolize history. #RandolphHarris 18 of 18
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Nature’s Stillness or Environmental Quietness Chooses Dusk, Dawn or Midnight
Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing. The last of the human freedoms is to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances. Study a small lake or pond and you are likely to find many intertwined lifeforms, including host and parasite species, some reproducing quickly, other slowly, all changing at different speeds as they interact with one another in a kind of ecological ballet. Inside of every business, too—and every hospital, school, government agency or city hall—there is what might be called an “ecology of time,” with different subunits and processes all interacting and running at different speeds. Though truly perfect synchronization is never attainable, under ordinary conditions the lack of synchrony may be maintained at a tolerable degree. However, conditions today are far from ordinary. The gurus’ advice was unrealistic, but the acceleration they sought to address was—and is—very real. Never have the pressures been greater for companies—and other organizations as well—to speed up their operations. Cascading technology innovations and consumer or client demands for instant gratification, added to the competition, all conspire to drive up the pace of change. If one department or division falls behind, multiplier effects ricochet throughout the entire organization. One often-overlooked cost reflects the diversion of energy and attention from other needed tasks as time becomes increasingly politicized. Often, organization leaders find themselves clashing bitterly over conflicting schedules and time horizons, and I.T. departments become battle zones. The time needed for software development or for a major system overhaul is notoriously difficult to estimate. It can even be hard to estimate how long it will take to make the estimate. However, that is what I.T. executives are often compelled to do. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18
Software managers who insist they need a long time to complete a project catch flak from bosses and from department chieftains whose work might be slowed or disrupted. On the other hand, I.T. managers who promise quick results are frequently fired when subsequent glitches impede progress. As various business units are de-synchronized and schedules need revision, budgets, power and egos come into play and a lot of emotional artillery is called up. Time itself, in the form of deliberate delays or imposed deadlines, may be used as an internecine weapon. Battles over timing are even more common in connection with research and development. Pressed by investors demanding faster returns, CEOs often feel compelled to slash spending on R&D. Or they shift funding away from research to development and reallocate whatever is left from basic to applied research. The result slows major innovation when it is most needed. Time battles inside a fast-changing firm take many other forms as well. They can kill important deals and, ironically, can actually waste so much management attention and energy that they slow down the firm’s overall capacity to adapt to change. Things become even more complicated when they involve two or more companies, each with its own internal ecology of time. Fights over synchronization greatly complicate partnerships, joint ventures and other alliances and are particularly stressful before and after mergers. If your company is undergoing a merger or acquisition, you are likely to feel anxious. Roughly 30 percent of employees are deemed redundant when firms in the industry merge. For individual managers and employees, this corporate strategy may be disruptive and traumatic. Postmerger integration is typically a period of tension, uncertainty, and chaos. Workloads ramp up, as to pressure and stress. Even when the main hurdles are overcome, trying to sync up the internal rhythms of two firms after their marriage takes time, costs money, sucks attention from other matters and upsets already upset people. #RandolphHarris 2 of 18
Though little is written about it, many partnerships and mergers founder precisely because synchronization turns out to be so painful. In such situations, most people tend to fixate on what they cannot control: decisions about who is let go, promoted, reassigned, or relocated. However, researchers indicate that individuals faced with organizational upheaval have much more power over what happens to them than they realize. If your company is involved in in one of the tens of thousands of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) deals struck annually around the World, you can respond in a few ways. The first option is to remain humble, focus on the tasks at hand, and hope that every thing turns out well. A second takes is to polish your resume, reconnect to your outside peer network, and start looking for alternative employment. One can also embrace the dynamic, intense integration process and use it as an opportunity for introspect and growth. It is estimated that nearly 50,000 mergers took place in 2019, ranging from huge multinational arrangements to smaller regional deals. Some of these companies were Verizon and Vodafone, Heinz and Kraft, Pfizer and Warner-Lamber, AT&T and Time Warner, and many others. AT&T spent $85 billion on Time Warner, and it wants the money back because AT&T is primarily focused on its phone services, and Timer Warner is primarily in to making films and TV shows, but competing with Netflix is really difficult because they are the biggest player in digital streaming. Netflix is going to spend $17 billion this year on programing, and Disney is not far behind. The technological issues are not necessarily the most difficult. Within any firm, de-synchronization can occur among divisions, functions, hierarchical levels, regional offices and in other dimensions as well. Often it is culture that is the breaking point. #RandolphHarris 3 of 18
When a new CEO took over Siemens Nixdorf some years back, he seemed, according to the Financial Times, “more worried about units of time” than dollars. Siemens, the German electronics giant, had acquired Nixdorf, a PC firm, to supplement its mainframe-computer business. The CEO knew that part of the firm needed to “have a major technical feature change every six months.” The parent firm, however, was older, more hierarchical and slower to react. Changing a product is one thing. However, as he complained at a press conference, “changing a corporation’s mentality usually takes three to five years, and we don’t have it.” The CEO is no longer at Siemens—and neither is Nixdorf. Scaling up from companies, we find even bigger examples of costly desynchronization at the level of whole industries. Some, indeed, are infamous for being out of sync. Ask any American who has ever hired a contractor to build or remodel a house. Chances are the estimated completion date is a fairy tale. Delays may run to months. Needed parts—everything from flush toilets and bidets and drawer pulls and windows—rarely seem to arrive on schedule. They only experience even more frustrating is dealing with the municipal zoning and building bureaucrats who must issue various permits or variances along the way. We asked a prominent California developer to look closely at the issues of construction delays in his project to build hundreds of homes in a high-tech center. “I was shocked,” the not-easily-shockable contractor told us on the promise of anonymity. Including land, our houses cost between $358,000 to $600,000 to build. They should take 120 days to complete. However, we have had houses take as much as 180 days. That means 60 days of extra interest on a $150,000 to $300,000 loan. So that is going to be an extra $1,190 to $2,381 per house—more, of course, if interest rates go up. And that is just in actual construction—it does not begin to include costs of delays in permitting, environmental approvals, failure of the utilities to install the electrical, gas and water lines on schedule. #RandolphHarris 4 of 18
Subcontractors do not show up on time. Sinks arrive that are defective—they have to go back and we wait for replacements. If the subs are delayed, they want more money on the next contract to build in protection against lost time. Add up all the other expenses. How about property taxes? How about management fees? I pay a management firm to oversee the project. Their bill runs up. What if buyers cancel because of the delays? I had my accountant quantify the known cost of construction time glitches. I run an extremely tight ship. And yet, at least on this project, they add up to almost 4 percent of the cost of a house. Bigger firms might be able to cut that somewhat. But if I were just a private person, building one house, for myself, delays are even more expensive percentagewise. All that lost time adds up to a penalty—a kind of time tax on every project. From 2019 to 2022, despite the impact of COVID-19, new residential construction in the United States of America is expected to have increased by 33 percent, which is equivalent to 182 billion U.S. dollars. This increase mostly stems from single-family housing, as well as home improvements—additions, alternations and major replacements. Single-family houses being built also increased, but not as much. The value of new residential construction in the United States of American is expected to increase to $729.89 billion in 2023, $757.83 billion in 2024, and $798.14 billion in 2025, a 3 to 5 percent “time tax”—the overall cost of wasteful, never-on-time, de-synchronized operations—would run into the $23-$38 billion range annually. At say, $216,000 a unit, that is roughly what it might cost to provide more than 1.4 million homes or apartments for low-income Americans every decade. That could make a dent in the problem of homelessness. However, a more cost-effective system would be a federal voucher program which allows them to rent and buy in the private market, would reduce the amount of money spent to maintain and staff these properties. #RandolphHarris 5 of 18
However, that is only the amount for the residential end of the housing industry. Its erratic, costly performance in turn reflects (or causes) desynchronization among its supplier industries and labour pool as well. Shortages of drywall, insulation, skilled carpenters and the like are common. Track this all the way down the chain, and the cost must swell significantly. If housing is a skinhole of unsynchronized operations, what needs to be said about a very different example—America’s giant defense industry? Here are major firms making everything from the highest of high-tech communications gear, satellites and weapons systems to relatively simple products like shirts and boots. It is an industry perennially attacked by Congress for cost overruns, waste and inefficiency. Its seven-hundred-dollar hammer or toilet seat—whether apocryphal or not—has become a national symbol of scandalous waste. However, it is worth noticing that de-synchronization in an industry may sometimes be partially imposed on it from outside. And that is the case here. Thus, to prevent corruption and maximize efficiency, the U.S. Defense Department’s procurement processes, many of them mandated by Congress, are so byzantine, so complex, and aggravating, that many sensible firms refuse even to bid for a Pentagon contract. Worse yet, those firms that do undertake defense work often find themselves caught in a steel cage largely constructed by Congress itself. An editor of Armed Forces Journal International once summed it up in a single, hard-to-forget sentence: “Faced with a twenty-year threat,” he wrote, “government responds with a fifteen-year program in a five-year defense plan, managed by three-year personnel funded with single-year appropriations.” We have seen the de-synchronization effect within individual firms, groups of firms and whole industries. However, de-synchronization occurs on an even larger scale when two related industries develop at different speeds. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18
The rise of the personal computer (PC) from the 1970s on was marked by a kind of technological pas de deux as Microsoft launched bigger and more powerful versions of its Windows software for PC, and Intel successively developed the faster and more powerful chips needed to support them. For years, the two symbiotic companies were referred to in the media as though they were a single firm called “Wintel.” The synchronization, imperfect as it was at times, powered the phenomenal spread of the PC Worldwide. In sharp contrast, however, the closely linked computer and communications industries have more then once found themselves without a dance partner. No ballet here. In the United States of America, the rise of the computer industry throughout the last half century has been wild, wooly, and unregulated. Computer makers were frequently frustrated by far slower rates of change in the tightly and confusingly overregulated telecom industry. As the basic technologies of these two industries converged, their rates of change diverged. According to many analysts, advances in chips, computers, and related fields could have come even faster but for this discrepancy. Similarly—and more interestingly—in recent years the development of networks trailed far behind increases in the speed of computer chips. By 2005, however, this de-synchronization went into reverse. We simply do not know the aggregate costs of the de-synchronization effect at the level of firms and industries, but we can only imagine how much greater the effects are when we look at de-synchronization in whole sectors of an economy in the age of revolutionary wealth. Now, when Minoru Naito, a small-business owner, decided to celebrate his daughter’s birthday at a posh sushi restaurant in Tokyo, it was on a Saturday. He went to a nearby Automated Teller Machines (ATM and also still called the “Versatell” by some) to withdraw some cash. However, it was 6.00 p.m. and the machine had shutdown at 5.00. Hence, no sushi that evening. #RandolphHarris 7 of 18
The fact that banks used to close their ATMs so early was, in the words of Nihon Keizai Shimbu, Japan’s Wall Street Journal, “particularly striking because more retail stores in Japan are operating around the clock.” In short, the banking sector was out of sync with developments in the retail sector of Japan’s economy. Faced with competition from foreign banks and securities firms that did offer twenty-four-hour services, the relatively small Tokyo Sowa Bank eventually opened the first “twenty-four-hour” ATMs at a Japanese bank (never mind that they initially closed down at 10.00 p.m.). It was not until 2003 that one of Japan’s major banks, UFJ, followed suit. Closing the gap between shopping hours and banking hours requires new I.T. systems. That normally means ditching or upgrading older, so-called legacy I.T., piece by piece, program by program. And that cannot be done without altering the timing of data flows, accounting procedures, work schedules, reports and other matters, spending some work units up but necessarily leaving others to lag temporarily. Every new computer, software operating system, application or change in a network inescapably changes the tempo, rhythms and synchronization levels in the organization. In Japan, too, one man’s synchronization is another’s de-synchronization. Moreover, it can legitimately be argued that disparities in rates of change open countless opportunities for entrepreneurial synchronizers who, by synchronizing some functions or organizations, create new disparities elsewhere. The problems of synchrony are becoming more, not less, difficult because, as during the industrial revolution, we are once more transforming the way humans work, play and think in the time dimension. We are profoundly altering the way we deal with the deep fundamental of time. Until we understand time’s relationships to wealth creation, we will never free ourselves of today’s crushing time pressures—or huge unneeded costs. #RandolphHarris 8 of 18
Let us next talk about marriage and so-called “animal” functions of the social animal. Everyone agrees that an important condition for the troubles of growing up is the troubles between the parents at home, brutal quarrels and drunkenness, coldness, one or the other or both parents getting away as often as possible and being withdrawn while present, and marriages breaking up. The most common popular, and mayoral, prescription for delinquency is “more parental supervision.” In the usual circumstances this would likely increase the tension and the trouble, but be that as it may: the question remains, how? how to have reasonable supervision when the marriages do not have the problem children. (The frequent recommendation to fine or jail the parents is a lulu.) I do not think the public spokesmen are serious. For powerful and well-known modern reasons, some of them inevitable, the institution of marriage itself, as we have known it for several hundred years, cannot work simply any longer, and is very often the direct cause of intense suffering. Urbanism, the economic independence of women, contraception, relaxing the inhibitions against unmarried and extramarital sexuality, these are inevitable. A dispassionate observer of modern marriage might sensibly propose. Forget it; think up some other form of mating and child care. The pastor of a large church in an ordinary Midwestern town told me that, in his observation, not one marriage in twenty was worthwhile; many were positively damaging to the children. If very many marriages could simply let themselves dissolve after a few years, the partners would suddenly become brighter, rosier, and younger. However, of course, in this field there are no dispassionate observers. We are all in the toils of jealousy of our own complexes, and few f us can tolerate loneliness and the feeling of being abandoned. Nor do we have any other formula for a secure intimacy, companionship, and brining up children. This is not a newsy story. It is kept in mind by the Mayor of New York whose canned voice says every night on the radio that parents who are not affectionately supervising the children are failing in responsibility? #RandolphHarris 9 of 18
Has the Mayor not seen an harassed mother hysterically and unmercifully whacking a three-year-old in the sand pile? Does he think it is some different parent he is now appealing to? (I heard one mother scream, “I ask you only one simple thing, to obey me!”) “Most of the children we see [in King’s County Domestic Relations Court] have been so seriously damaged by their environment that they need 24-hour-a-day corrective treatment. I will say unequivocally that most of the children we see should be separated from their parents for their own health and welfare.” (Dr. J.M. Fries.) Outraged women demand chaste men to lessen the double standard. Legions of Victorian men accepted and honored the code of premarital celibacy, but many spoiled and randy young blades saw no need to repress their intimate longings. When women of their own class refused to succumb, they found a vulnerable and cooperative woman elsewhere. She was, perhaps, a domestic servant that a higher-ranked young man could force himself on, or the shop girl he paid or flattered for a few minutes of extracurricular pleasure. At one time or another in his life, she was likely the “public stew,” the lady of the evening whom that compromised servant or shop girl might eventually be forced to become. To desperate, reckless, or ruined women, the calling of the streets was irresistible. It supplemented that pittance they earned elsewhere at their day jobs. Henry Mayhew, an investigative journalist and author whose expose of London’s seething, suffering labouring class in the mid-nineteenth century continues to shock, discovered, for instance, that a seamstress who stitched together moleskin trouser could earn five shillings and sixpence a week, scarcely enough to survive, if she worked sixteen hours daily. When work was slack, she could either starve or “go a bad way” and sell her most valuable possession. Because so many women were struggling to survive by needlework, lacemaking, and other trades, with occasional forays into become women of the evening, the competition was ferocious. #RandolphHarris 10 of 18
As a result, incomes remained law, arrests and imprisonment common, and their unhealthy bodies were susceptible to illnesses. Some managed to support themselves through pleasures of the flesh alone, and a few lucky and clever ones did better—they parlayed their amorous skills into marriage. “Why shouldn’t we?” inquired one confident woman of the evening. “We are pretty, dress well, we can talk and insinuate ourselves into the hearts of men by appealing to their passions and their senses.” However, in the last half of the nineteenth century, illnesses double standard became the concern of reformers of every ilk. In earlier centuries, and despite alarm, only inconsequential numbers of deaths were attributed to the so-called French pox, as syphilis was called in England. In London, according to the Bills of Mortality, it struck down eleven victims in 1813, eighty-six in 1817, and only nineteen and fourteen in 1818 and 1819. Women of the evening and their clients, and those secondarily infected, endured nasty and debilitating symptoms, but doctors could provide effective treatment and restore most patients to health. For centuries, illnesses related to pleasures of the flesh were seen as a disturbing problem rather than a critical one. In 1864, a drastic change occurred, after horrified medical officers reported that some of these illnesses affected up to 30 percent of the troops in British garrison towns, including many ports. The military capacity of the nation was called into question. In panicky attempts to stamp out or at least control these illnesses among soldiers and sailors, Parliament passes a serious of Contagious Diseases Acts between 1864 and 1869. These Acts authorized police in towns with substantial military installations to seize any suspected women of the evening and force them to submit to a gynecological exam every two weeks. Infected women (but not men) could be confined to a hospital for up to nine months. #RandolphHarris 11 of 18
The object was to diminish infections related to pleasures of the flesh by controlling women of the evening, but the real effect was a witch hunt, to persecute thousands of women, active in pleasures of the flesh or not. Any woman out alone in public without a reasonable excuse was a target. Girls without homes were routinely hauled off and painfully examined, and one widow afterward committed suicide. Women plucky enough to resist were charged in police court, where it was their word against that of a plainclothes government spy. Furthermore, women of the evening not their clients were charged in criminal court. “What think you of sending a wench to Bridewell [prison], and doing nothing to the fellow that debauched her, tho’ sometimes the first is single, and the other married?” demanded one opponent of the double standard. Until the passage of the Contagious Diseases Act, being a woman of the evening and its underlying moral duplicity had had mainly muted challengers. The Acts, embodying the worst features of the double standard, provoked sustained and widespread protest. One group of critics proposed a novel solution, that men stop being unchaste. Chastity in men? How preposterous, given their naturally lecherous natures and irrepressible intimate impulses! (This would have a surprised the ancient Aztecs, Chinese, Greeks, and a few million other people who “knew” that women were the culprits when it came to intimate desires.) And yet, if men couple only get a grip on themselves (but absolutely not with int masturbator handshake tht so distressed the Male Purity contingent) and just tell themselves, “No!” This at least was the thinking of the Church of England Purity Society, as well as thousands of feminist activities in late-Victorian England. The Purity Society was formed at the instigation of Jane Ellice Hopkins, a lifelong celibate dedicated to ending the degradation of women through being a woman of the evening by the novel expedient of reforming men’s bad behaviour. #RandolphHarris 12 of 18
Hopkins also worked with young women at risk for becoming women of the evening, providing counseling, clothes, lodging, and a job registry with real jobs rather than fake come-on ads that duped gullible, desperate, and unemployed girls into servitude as harlots. Men’s chastity leagues, Hopkins declared, should be developed to deal with the “real cause” of rampant solicitation and moral decay—that pesky double standard. “What I crave,” she wrote, is to instill in wayward men “a good, strong passionate sense of the pitifulness of degrading women, inflicting a curse which they do not share with so much as their little finger.” These men indulge, then return to their “jolly” lives and friends, their “pleasant” homes and their careers, their “power of marrying” intact. Behind them, in the debris of the flings in intimate passions, are their female victims, destined to lives as social outcasts, barred forever from the safety and comforts of marriage and motherhood. The women might be infected with a “hideous” disease and could expect only “a degraded life and [then to] die a Godless, Christless, hopeless death.” After Hopkins exposed the Anglican Church’s complacency and tacit complicity in upholding the double standard, the Church was shamed into creating its Purity Society. Its pledge cards, signed by hundreds of men and strikingly reminiscent of today’s Promise Keepers, listed five obligations: to respect all women and defend them from wrong; to reject indecent language and jokes; to maintain purity and chastity equally for men and women; to proselytize these principles; and to maintain personal purity. Hopkins hated solicitation and blamed men for driving women, consumed by “disease, degradation, curses, drink, despair,” into it. “Ay, I know that it is often the woman who tempts; these poor creatures must tempt or starve. However that does not touch the broad issues, that it is men who endow the degradation of women; it is men, who make the demand, create the supply.” And thunderingly, “Is it fair for you men, who can compel a fair wage for your work, to sit in judgment on her, and say it is her fault?” #RandolphHarris 13 of 18
Hopkins’s dream for starving out (rather than institutionalizing) solicitation consisted of three kinds of coexisting municipal societies: male purity leagues to inspire men to learn self-control; vigilante committees to see that they did and to prosecute those who failed; and women’s associations to work directly with at-risk girls. Hopkins’s was as radical a proposal as others. Each individual man provoked into feeling his guilt could be induced to take responsibility for his actions and stop sinning. Another group to which Hopkins belonged, the Moral Reform Union, founded in 1881, rejected the double standard and accepted as a principle that men and would should abide by the same morality. They were convinced that both could be chaste and denounced as a blasphemous fiction the age-old endorsement premise that solicitation was essential for a few to ensure moral purity in the majority. What the Union members wanted was quite simply virtue and rectitude in men. The Contagious Diseases Acts were, the Union said, inequitable laws based on the double standard and its outrageous hypothesis that a group of bought women was necessary to the smooth functioning of a society. Decades of sustained outrage against this monstrous assumption and their Acts themselves produced their suspension in 1883 and their repeal three years later. Feminist purists rejoiced, but their rapture was modified by the reality that solicitation continued to thrive as a nightmarish degradation of womanhood. If she was with child, the seduced maid was still kicked out onto the street. The women of the evening caught solicitating was still locked up in jail. The battle against The Contagious Disease Acts had been won, but not the greater ward against solicitation and the double standard. The moral purists attacked the issue from several angles. One was to stamp out the notion that men’s intimate desires were too urgent to curb. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18
For centuries, ever since women crazed with intentions of pleasures of the flesh had been erased from the moral lexicon and replaced by men crazed with intentions of pleasures of the flesh, this unstoppable male urge had justified women of the evening and other intimate abuses. If it could be exposed for what it was—an unscientific fabrication—then self-control would take on new possibilities as men (and women) learned to regard male intimate passions as a normal physical trait, akin to any other hunger. A man who overpowered a vulnerable woman by subterfuge or muscles would be judged as reprobate as one who stuffed food into his mouth before the grace or snatched cutlets from other people’s plates. As one suffragette put it, “The man or woman who is incapable of self-control (in pleasures of the flesh) should be walking about on four legs, and not on two, because lack of self-control is incompatible with human nature.” The other myth to be combated was that celibacy weakened the male physiology, for ironically, while millions of men worried about the loss of even one drop of vital force, others anxiously observed their caste private area for signs of atrophy. The medical establishment was also coming around, and some physicians admitted publicly that modern scientific thought ran counter to a persistent superstition that chastity was physical harmful to men. (Even today the old heresy limps on, as some men and some women weight celibacy against the mantra, “If you do not use it, you will lose it.”) The moral purity movement holds for its members that chastity in vulnerable young women was a right that self-indulgent men imperiled. Chastity in men, on the other hand, was a proud, moral measures of self-control and constituted the best possible protection against male sexual abuse against women. Conscious of danger in its depth around the World, truth is accompanied by great power. It cannot be separated from its sayer. The truth is like electricity, which is so useful a servant of man but so dangerous when not rightly treated, which may save life or destroy it altogether. When humans become insensitive to the sacredness within oneself, one is lost. #RandolphHarris 15 of 18
It is a sin to deny the Power from which one’s body draws its life, one’s mind its consciousness and intelligence, one’s soul its very existence. It invites punishment, which comes through being left alone with the opposing force in Nature, with its physical, intellectual, psychical and subtle forces, unguided by the intuitive and unprotected by the divine. Humans then try to live by their own light alone. One fails, stumbles, falls, and suffers. This is one’s position today and that is why there is a World-crisis of stupendous proportions. This is one’s hour of real need. This is when one must turn, as in Christian Biblical history, to one’s true Deliverer. Every other way out except this one is closing for one. There is no doubt that effective community programs can help people with schizophrenia recover. However, fewer than half of all the people who need them receive appropriate community mental health services. What are the consequences of inadequate community treatment? What happens to person with schizophrenia whose communities do not provide the services they need and whose families cannot afford private treatment at all; many other spend short time in a state hospital or semihospital and then are discharged prematurely, often without adequate follow up treatment. Many of the people with schizophrenia return to their family and receive medication and perhaps emotion and financial support, but little else in this way of treatment. Around 8 percent enter an alternative institution such as a nursing home or rest home, where they receive only custodial care and medication. As many as 18 percent are placed in privately run residences where supervision is provided by untrained individuals—foster homes (small or large), boardinghouses, congregate care homes, and similar facilities. These residences vary greatly in quality. Some of them are legitimate “bed care” facilities, providing three meals a day, medication reminders, and at least a small degree of staff supervision. However, many fail to offer these minimal services. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18
Another 31 percent of people with schizophrenia live in totally unsupervised settings. Some of these individuals are equal to the challenge of living alone, support themselves effectively, and maintain nicely furnished apartments. However, many cannot really function independently and wind up in a rundown single-room occupancy hotel (SROs) or rooming houses, often located in inner-city neighbourhoods. They may live in conditions that are substandard and unsafe. The following newspaper account from the mid-1980s describes the kinds of conditions that continue in many locations today: Hundreds of mentally ill patients throughout Sacramento County are being packed into aging hotels and homes that are little better than slums, according to health officials, who say that appalling living conditions virtually ensure patients will skin deeper into insanity. Many of the buildings contain the stuff of nightmares. Piles of trash and cockroaches, feces, urine and vomit litter the floors. Half-naked men wander purposelessly through hallways, and doors swing open into hot and fetid rooms where other, gazing vacantly at the ceiling, lie neglected on dirt cots. Men and women gamble, drink, use drugs, play amplified music daily and make the community members feel sacred and threatened. In one instance, [the state Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services] released patients to a building run by a landlord who three years earlier lost his state license to operate public housing because of its life-threatening conditions. The landlord did not apply for a license for his latest building. He bought a home and used plywood sheets to divine the coral rock house into 12-foot by 14-foot boxes and then told HRS worker he would take in the mentally ill. Each of the boxes, strung along trash-strewn passagesways in the two-story house, contains a narrow bed, a fan and a chest of drawers. Hot meal containers and plastic forks fill waste bins. Most of the boxes also contained people whose bed sores attest to hours spend in bed, staring at a paint-chipped wall a foot from his pillow. #RandolphHarris 17 of 18
Most of the residents in poorly supervised or unsupervised settings survive on government disability payments, and many spend their days wandering through neighbourhood streets. Thus it is sometimes said that people with schizophrenia are now “dumped” in the community, just as they were once “warehoused” in institutions. Finally, a great number of people with schizophrenia have become homeless. There are nearly 600,000 homeless people in the United States of America, and approximately 33 percent have a severe mental disorder, commonly schizophrenia. Many such persons have been released from hospitals. Others are young adults who were never hospitalized in the first place. Another 235,000 or more people with severe mental disorders end up in prisons because their disorders have led them to break the law. Certainly deinstitutionalization and the community mental health movement have failed these individuals. And if they are able to return to hospital life, many report actually feeling relieved. Let us pray for everyone in our community and Worldwide that they will feel the love of God and be freed from all affliction and suffering and be welcomed into a loving home where they feel safe and loved and can experience a life of abundance and gain promotion on the job. To pray is to try to experience the reality of God, to feel the purity and exaltation that comes from being near Him, and to give to our souls that serenity and peace which neither Worldly success nor Worldly failure, which neither the love of life, nor the fear of death, can disturb. O Lord, I have set Thee always before me, indeed Thou art at my right hand; I shall not stumble. Thou art my Lord, I have no good but in Thee. Thou makest me to know the path of life; in Thy presence is fullness of joy. Whom have I in Heaven but Thee? And on Earth I desire none else. When my heart and my flesh fail, Thou art my strength and my portion forever. Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter—birth, growth, fading, death—the cycles of life turn, and we turn with them. Ideas are born, projects are consummated, plans prove impractical and pass away. We fall in love, we suffer loss; we give birth, we grow old. We are renewed, we are reborn, even as we decay and die. Our psychic energies are renewed in their deepest sources by this participation in the cycles of change within the natural World. #RandolphHarris 18 of 18
Our Meadows Residence 1 home has an outdoor space that’s equal to our indoor space! Entertaining is effortless, and our guests never fail to be impressed.
We’re so glad we chose the #PlumasRanch community!
No More Cold Eggs–Societies for the Reformation of Morals
How simple it is to see that all the worry in the World cannot control the future. Leaders set aside a portion of each day (even if it is only a matter of minutes) for quiet time devoted to prayer, meditation, imaging, or just daydreaming. Learn to value your time alone—when you value something you are keener to protect it. Humans who are wholly selfish, cunning, combative, ambitious, and unscrupulous represent the dark principle and become dangerous to society. Sentimentality is not spirituality. It is true we give our goodwill to all humankind, and so we give it to those who are the instruments of dark forces. However, that does not mean weakness or foolishness in our dealings with them. Life will teach them. Leave them alone. Brotherhood? No, be the thought far from me. They are Adam’s children—alas, yes, I well remember that, and never shall forget it; this rage and sorrow. However, they have gone over the dragons; they have quitted the Father’s house, and set up with the Old Serpent; till they return, how can they be brothers? They are enemies, deadly to themselves and to me and to you, till then; till then, while hope yet lasts I will treat them as brothers fallen insane. Those who have scientifically engaged in psychical research know that a psychological belt wherein a host of evil Earth-bound spirits are congregated surrounds this planet. Physical researchers are aware too that such obsessing entities become most active at night, as anyone may discover by watching the conduct of a possessed person. A human being can be infested astrally with psychic vermin as one can be with physical vermin. The wise human refuses to accept removable evils and avoidable sufferings. If one finds oneself brought by circumstances into the society of evil-minded people, the first step to self-protection should be to switch the mind instantly into remembrance of the witness-self and to keep it there throughout the period of contact. To turn inwards persistently when in the presence of such discordant persons is to nullify any harmful or disturbing effect they might otherwise have on our thoughts. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
This instant and unhesitating turning inward is also an effective method of insulating oneself against the currents of fear, despair, and weakness which misfortune often generates. If the student feels evil forces have attacked one from time to time, let one pray earnestly every day for self-purification and make the sign of the cross whenever one becomes aware of their presence, at the same time invoking the help of whatever power or personage one feels inspires one most. In times of terrible danger, one should stick to one’s faith in the divine power as a protective talisman. Whenever one is in difficulty, one should drop all fear and trouble temporarily from one’s mind and imagine oneself handing them over to one’s higher Self, thereby surrendering oneself to its will, help, and protection. When there is evidence of being obsessed by a spirit-entity, the only radical cure is exorcism. Unless one has the guidance of an actualized Christian, the following is suggested: First, one should try sleeping with a green-coloured night light burning throughout the night. It should be placed not more than eighteen inches from the bed. If this fails, then an ordinary non-coloured bulb may be substituted, thus giving a stronger light. The inconvenience of trying to sleep with the bedroom illuminated will only exist for a few days or a few weeks and will vanish as the eyes become accustomed to the new habit. It may even be averted by covering the eyes with a black silk bandage. In addition to this, one must pray, and combine this with creative meditation, wherein one actually pictures the freed condition desired during the night. One should also pray and meditate prior to retiring. One must learn to control one’s thoughts—deliberately driving out the memory of undesirable psychic experiences or of any individual possessing “evil powers.” One should take the protective words, “Jesus Christ, I am with You always” and repeat them to oneself, trying to realize their truth and meaning. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
The student who has got involved with sorcery or black magic must cut off every possible connection and communication with the source of evil. Then, one must destroy or get rid of any articles or writings in one’s possession coming from it. One must express repentance for one’s errors of judgment and pray for guidance in the future. One needs for such psychic encounters the faith, the courage, and the knowledge which may come with time and growth. One needs such an attitude as George Fox had when, thrust into a cell haunted by the ghost of men’s murderers, he exclaimed, “I told them if all the spirits and devils in hades were there, I was over them in the power of God, and feared no such thing.” One who is confronted with a choice of evils must call in the help of the higher power. Even trouble can be turned to self-educative uses, and some kind of benefit gained out of the experience. However, this can happen more easily and more quickly only if the willingness to learn is there, and only if a corresponding surrender of self is present. It is then that so-called evil is converted to so-called good. What Jesus Christ taught over two thousand years ago is still true—even more true, if that could be, for it has the proofs afforded by all history during that time: hatred cannot end by being returned, nothing will dissolve it save a generous and patient goodwill. A friend who has turned against you and become an enemy can be met in a better way. Instead of getting angry or resentful for one’s unkind words or actions, try to turn one over benevolently to the higher power. If you succeed in entering the Stillness for a period with your last thought being such a wish for one, this will be, in the end, more effective. It will make it possible for one’s attitude to be modified and for one’s own hurt feelings to calm down. The more you forget one in the Stillness, the better the result will be for both of you. Some religions associate grief with the evil principle, and therefore shun it. Summon the strength to refuse to receive other people’s negative opinions. Say plainly that they are certainly entitled to their views, but you would rather not discuss them and would prefer some other subject—providing it is optimistic. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
Instead of hating your enemy, and meeting punches with punches, one’s sin with your sin, try another way, Christ’s way. This involves real risk, moral courage, and mental flexibility. It requires willingness to endure and suffer for what is right, a trust in spiritual principle rather than in brute power. One is competent to deal with life who equips oneself to deal with its darker sides as well as with its brighter ones, with its difficulties and sufferings no less than with its joys and successes. We cannot ignore the spirit of our times without inviting failure, and we cannot despise it without inviting danger. We must need to face its reality. Throw out negative feelings, expel resentments against other persons, and one will be better and happier person. Every negative thought about others cut it out at once by a smile to yourself, looking at your higher Self dealing with it. At the heart of every atom of every Universe there is Spirit, divine and deathless. It is for this reason that any human society based upon its denial has no future and cannot survive. As long as humans exists, one will need to satisfy inner hunger, to find spiritual comfort, to receive holy communion, and to hear words of eternal truth. The sight of evil humans rising to power over stupid or stupefied masses has brought good human to despair. However, the Universe has room for both. It is a school for all and the outcome of its instruction is yet to be seen. It may well be that those who have banished the religious faith of childhood from their hearts and replaced it by the scientific scepticism of adulthood, followed by the political cynicism of maturity, will end by banishing hope, too. The perversity of humankind, the hypocrisy of its leaders, and the presence of materialistic society may well seem to justify it. Through ignorance of destiny’s laws and through weaknesses in one’s psychological being, humans create the conditions which must finally express themselves in violent conflict with one’s fellows. Most people have failed to recognize that the forces of destiny are back of these events. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
Even the powerful impact of such stirring events as history has recorded in our times has not been enough to bring about this recognition. Yet they sense their own helplessness, although they do not understand that it is the very inevitability of their retribution from misusing the Universal Law which has made them feel this helplessness. Some humans radiate animosity as others radiate goodwill. The unfortunate members of the first class are victims of their own negative thinking. Those of us who have been born and brought up in democratic countries like England and the United States of America rightly resent the idea of living under oppressive dictatorship. Yet we tend to overlook the fact that even in such countries the State is itself becoming more and more formidably dictatorial as it becomes more and more centralized. Those of us who value individuality and freedom are coming into inner conflict with it—some of us even into outer conflict. Humans who are scarcely sane, who are either pathological cases or in need of psychological treatment, become heroes and leaders among the young. Confronted in actual firsthand experience by the terrors and errors, the tragedies and sufferings of these decades, the serious mind could lose its balance enough to declare life an unmitigated evil. The disciples of Materialism say that the execution of 3000-odd persons in the French Revolution was a small price to pay for the beneficial reforms which it brought about. However, only the philosopher can trace the line of connection between its hatred and violence and the Napoleonic wars which soon followed it, taking a half million French lives and hundreds of thousands wounded, mutilated, or crippled French bodies; these too must be added to the cost of hatred, the price of violence. Cunning criminals and brutal plotters have found whole nations willing to follow them. These sinister figures seek, and often get, key positions in politics, organized groups, etcetera, and from there manipulate the mass and use them as blind unwitting tools. If we are to report faithfully at all, when we examine the forces which are active in the heart of sick humanity today, we must report little hope for the patient’s future. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Spiritual faith is stronger in a few individuals but weaker in the great masses. The future is bright for better machines yet dark for better morals. A moral awakening and religious renewal was hoped for. That, unfortunately, is not the situation which has actually developed. Humanity has suffered but has not been prepared enough by its sufferings to let the new spirit have entry into its heart. Nothing is gained by blinking at these facts. The end of the war did not bring that new spirit amongst humankind which is the prerequisite to a better era. The social, political, and economic structures now being erected will not succeed without it. It is a waste of time to enter any public activity which is foredoomed to defeat. This disadvantage of attempting to avoid sufficient consideration of these truths and of shutting one’s eyes to their consequences, is that the pleasanter time thereby gained is much more than offset by the immense worsening of the climax when it does come. Too many find their work boring, their careers futile, and their lives aimless. The result is spiritual torpor. In other times what they sought from drink or pleasures of the flesh, ambition or adventure, was happiness. However, in these times what they seek from them is—short of ending their lives (which is NOT recommended)—refuge from unbearable hopelessness and fatiguing uselessness. They must be uneasy whose hearts are spiritually empty but whose World is full of menace. The past has become a grave of buried hopes, the present a dulled waiting for better times, and the future a bitter blankness which will not bear contemplation. Just as the introduction of poisons into the human body harms it, so the introduction of unsuitable materials and forces into the Earth’s body will harm it too. Nature brings its own retribution to its dwellers for what they do to the planet. This applies just as much to the introduction of mental and psychical pollutions into the invisible atmosphere or aura. The magnetic relationship between the two Earth poles has been disturbed by the excessive amounts of radiation poured lately into space, with great weather disturbance as a result. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
A despondent outlook can be an effective obstacle to hearing the Overself’s voice. History, both ancient and modern, shows that there is much evil in humankind, that its stupefying effects leads not only to an unwillingness to listen to truth and an unreadiness to understand it, but also to a hostile malignity against it expressed through vituperation and opposition. Resistance to the spiritual forces and rejection of their message must lead in the end to the destructive penalties of which war, pestilence, and flood are instances. We have tried broadly to paint some of the background conditions that discourage patriotism: the lack of bona fides about our liberties, the dishonourable politics in the Universities, the irresponsible press, the disillusioning handling of the adventure in space, the inferior and place-seeking high officers of the State, the shameful neglect of our landscape and the disregard of community; later we shall speak of our trivial leisure which has no community meaning. However, besides these not usually mentioned background conditions, there are of course the persistent immediate uglinesses that everybody talks about and every child sees: the cases of graft, social injustice, stupid law, and injustice to persons. Yet in an important sense, these scandals do not discourage patriotism, so long as there is the feeling of a persistent effort against them. My guess is that more pride of country is engendered by one good decision, or even a good powerful dissenting opinion, of the at least traditional Supreme Court, than by billions of repetitions of the pledge of allegiance. Racial segregation and prejudice destroy community by definition, and we need not discuss them. Here again the revolution commenced in Jefferson’s time and recommenced by the abolitionists, went unfinished; and we have inherited the consequences. However, it is perhaps useful to point out again that, when there is prejudice, the community of the dominant class is equally destroyed. Some people, for instance, talk a blatant patriotism and a specious regionalism grounded in nothing but keep some groups of people marginalized. The result is that flag and cross have become contemptible in their own eyes. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
Real regionalism, that finds its culture and satisfaction in its own geography and economy and can withstand the temptations of the national cash-nexus, has long ago succumbed to Madison Avenue, Hollywood, and Wall Street. Now that law and religion side against them, the groups who like to discriminate are manic with wounded conceit and intimate fear; their behaviour or integration should be referred not to the Attorney General but to the Public Health Service. All this has come banging down on the children as the battleground. Yet, paradoxically, among all young people it is perhaps just the young people are the ones who find life worth living these days, because something real is happening in the first quarter of the twenty-first century. (In some cities and towns, also, the children are thrown into a central position in the community crisis of exclusion and prejudice, but sometimes as peacemakers. Here is an interesting architectural example. It has become common to use the new centralized school building as the community building for meetings and recreation. One reason is economy. However, another reason that is given is that the school is the one community function that brings together the otherwise discordant elements in the neighbourhood, so maybe the adults can get together in the school. It is a curious situation when the grownups have to rely on the children to make sense for them and when the school building is the chief community building. However, it is better than nothing.) Deep in the organized system itself there has been an important new effort toward community. The postwar boom in young marriages and the sensational rise in the urban birth rate that for the first time promises to surpass the rural birth rate, have been accompanied by the moving of affluent workmen to suburban projects and of the middle status to ranch houses. These new settlements devote time and energy to common interest. Do they do anything for local patriotism? They are communities for small children, one to five, and for women as the mothers of small children. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
These are the groups in society unequivocally benefited by high production, full employment, and the high standard of living. They thrive on animal security. Labour-saving devices make the World of the infants much pleasanter. Morally and vocationally, there is no question that having and caring for the children is justified work for the mothers, necessary, honoured, and using good human capacities. Women have real jobs, and men are likely to be certified public accountants or politicians. Today, when so many work in the Rat Race, few would deny that this is correct. So now men too try earnestly to devote themselves to the small ones as a secondary but real career. This is called the New Fatherhood. The child World, in the suburbs and surrounding country, and somewhat less in the city, is the best that small children have had in modern times. The new psychology of belonging is feeble stud, but the new psychology of infant care has been radical: no toilet training, permissive thumb sucking and so forth, free crying and movement, exposure to the grownups’ bare skin, honest answers to questions. The new medicine gets them quickly over the usual diseases (though there is debate about the later consequences). The school system as a whole is poor, but the nursery schools are often first-rate, progressive, and have intelligent and dedicated young teachers. It is said that children’s toys and games are excellent, practical and imaginative, up to the age of six, when the commercial criteria of the eleven-billion-dollar market begin to operate. For the adults, the improvement of this child’s World results in genuine community participation, committee meetings and lectures on psychology, concern for traffic and zoning, and even extension courses in cultural subjects to create the proper atmosphere for growing up. It seems astonishing, given so much active participation, that these community activities have not much developed into other important political and social action. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
However, courage gives out at the political issues relevant to age six. The sponsorship and control of the organized system are everywhere apparent. (For instance, in a recent agitation that has prevented some marginalized groups from moving into Deerfield, a suburb of Chicago—average income per person $93,026.91-$103, 363.24—an “attractive young married couple” explained that most of their friends had most of their money tied up in their houses: “We do not expect to live in them very long. Some of the junior execs expect to become seniors and move to the real North Shore, and a lot of us will be transferred all over the United States of America. When this happens, we want to be sure our houses have resale value.” The spiritedness of this speaks for itself.) Unfortunately, when the adults devote themselves thus to the child’s World, there is not much World for the child to grow up into in the next stage. For Father to guide his growing son, it is necessary for him to have a community of his own and be more of a man. In the circumstances this is difficult. However, if there is no big environment, there are no grounds for patriotism. The corporations, however, have now entered into this arena too, to organize the next stage of growing up. This is the meaning, surely of the publicity that has been trumped up for the Little League, the baseball teams of subteen-agers sponsored and underwritten by various business firms. What value the Little League has as play, I do not know, I have not watched games. The high-pressure advertising has been violently denounced by the older sports writers as giving kids an unsportsmanlike taste for publicity. As a school of rulemaking, responsibility, and impersonality, the Little League certainly cannot compare with the free games of the street, but we saw that these have been passing away. Economically, however, the function of the Little League is clear-cut: it is child labour, analogous to ten-year-olds picking hemp in the factory one hundred and sixty years ago: it keeps idle hands out of mischief; it is not profitable as production, but it provides valuable training in attitude and work habits. Viewed so, the suburban and exurban trends are the formation of a new proletariat, producers of offspring. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
Naturally the Public Relations have been unable to restrain themselves from invading the public schools. The classes are flooded with pamphlets and documentary films on electronics and the introduction of cows into New Zealand (Oh, and in America, we are do thankful to the Europeans because so many of us love red meat and it is not native to America.), put out by Consolidated Edison, Ford, Shell, Westinghouse, the National Dairy Council, Union Carbide, Bell, etcetera, and even Merrill Lynch. These proclaim their sponsorship with more or less discreet plugs. In the ninth grade, however, at a New York City school I know well, they have spent class time with an item called The Educational ABC’s of Industry, a collection of advertisements interlarded with reading matter; and the class was actually required, by a teacher distracted by overwork, to copy out jingles in which C stands for Orange-Crush, “taste it and see,” and F for the Ford Motor Company, “where the first car grew.” I would gladly share this literature with the reader, but is publisher has not given me permission. Also, why not allow corporations to advertise in schools. Like for example when teaching the ABC. A could stand for Audi, B for BMW, C for Cadillac, instead of charging a Mello-Roos. We need to find ways for government institutions to make money besides through taxes and consumer spending. Allow, for instance, NASA to build private airplanes that car fly to space and manufacture cars. Imagine how good they would be with the technology they have. Now, when we consider some of uncontrolled debaucher in society, there are some consequences for this. There were countries that proposed to protect a great many virgins by legalizing a limited number of people who were allowed to solicitate intimate passions. The rationale for this moral triage—for every three virgins, there would be one person who was allowed compensation for indulging in pleasures of the flesh. However, solicitation became so widespread that Societies for the Reformation of Morals, moral vigilantes who hunted down and prosecuted sinners, had sprung up everywhere. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
The gravest consequences of solicitation were illnesses, which, in two Centuries, made such incredible Havock all over the World. The Innocents had to suffer by it as well as the Guilty: Men gave it to their Wives, Women to the Husbands, or perhaps their Children…so that no Age, Gender, or Condition could be entirely safe from the Infection. Other terrible consequences were that children without a father to claim them were terminated after birth, lascivious young men refrained from marrying because they prefer to indulge in pleasures of the flesh with hired help, and marriages were destroyed by errant husbands. Seduced young maidens are were ruined when a “slip of this nature was discovered” because afterward, they have no chance of marrying and were often forced into becoming women of the evening. However, at the bottom of it all, the blame is with human nature. Because pleasures of the flesh are taught to be something everyone should enjoy. To counterbalance their innate sensuality, social pressures were employed. All young woman were to have strong notions of honour carefully inoculated into them from their infancy. Young girls were taught to hate solicitors, because they knew what the “word” is implying in these circumstances; and when they grow up, they find their Worldly interest entirely depending upon the reputation of their chastity; and it is upon this compound of natural and artificial chastity, that every woman’s real actual chastity depends. This shrewd analyses of seduction and courting rituals, painfully reminiscent though cleverer by far than the offerings in many modern women’s magazines, explained how women calculate their dream guy will continue to love them as they have struggled to maintain their chastity and surrendered it only after being “stormed” or seduced. Wrong, wrong, wrong, of course—but by then, chastity is a thing of the past, but many would like to revive it. Especially because many people dislike the double standards between genders. At the heart of the matter, they only way to preserve female chastity, is to prevent the men from laying siege to it. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
Legislation against impropriety, of course, will not work well because cities and states cannot claim they own human bodies, as slavery was already outlawed. However, a campaign to advocate abstinence and celibacy is an excellent idea because it will advise people of the risks involved in being unchaste and make it clear that the male and the female are both responsible from preserving their own bodies and health. Yet many critics say that is the job of the church and the parents. Also, a system of carefully regulated “solicitation” is not a solution. The double standard would remain in full force, laundered and made tolerable by decriminalizing “solicitation.” All women suffer a hangover from our long understanding of the relationship between wives, nuns, and virgins. Virtually every woman who was not an aristocrat had to uphold an ideology of respectability and chastity that is distinguishes her from an unchaste person. Of course, there are some other things people were outraged about involving this double standard, which we will discuss tomorrow. Now, people recovering from schizophrenia need medication, psychotherapy, help in handling daily pressures and responsibilities, guidance in making decisions, training in social skills, residential supervision, and vocational counseling—a combination of services sometimes assertive community treatment. Those whose communities help them meet these needs make greater progress than people living in other communities. Some of the key features of effective community care programs are coordination of patient services, short-term hospitalization, partial hepatization, supervised residencies, and occupational training. When the Community Mental Health Act was first passed, it was expected that community care would be provided by a community mental health center, a treatment facility that would supply medication, psychotherapy, and inpatient emergency care to people with severe disturbances, as well as coordinate the services offered by other community agencies. Each center was expected to serve a geographic area with a population of 50,000 to 200,000 people. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
When community mental health centers are available and do in fact provide these services, patients with schizophrenia often make significant progress. They are better integrated into the community and function more effectively than patients who receive only standard outpatient care. Coordination of services is particularly important for the so-called mentally ill chemical abusers (MICAs), patients with schizophrenia as well as a substance-related disorder. When people develop symptoms of schizophrenia, today’s clinicians first try to treat them on an outpatient basis, usually with a combination of antipsychotic mediation and psychotherapy. If this approach fails, short-term hospitalization—in a mental hospital or a general hospital’s psychiatric unit—that lasts a few weeks (rather than months or years) may be tried. Soon after the patients improve, they are released for aftercare, a general term for follow-up care and treatment in the community. Short-term hospitalization usually leads to greater improvement and a lower rehospitalization rate than extended institutionalization. Countries throughout the World now favour this policy. People’s need may fall between full hospitalization and outpatient therapy, and so some communities offer day centers or day hospitals, all-day programs in which patients return to their homes for the night. Such programs actually originated in Moscow in 1933, when a shortage of hospital beds necessitated the premature release of many patients. Today’s day center provides patients with daily supervised activities, therapy, and programs to improve social skills. People recovering from schizophrenia in day centers often do better than those who spend extended periods in a hospital or in traditional outpatient therapy. Another kind of institution that has become a popular setting for the treatment of people with schizophrenia is the semihospital, or residential crisis center. Semihospitals are houses or other structure in the community that provide 24-hour nursing care for people with mental disorders. Many individuals who would otherwise be cared for in state hospital are being transferred to these virtual hospitals. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
Many people do not require hospitalization but, at the same time, are unable to live alone or with their families. Halfway houses, also known as crisis houses or group homes, often serve individuals well. Such residences may shelter between one and two dozen people. The live-in staff usually are paraprofessionals—lay people who receive training and ongoing supervision from outside mental health professionals. Those houses are usually run with a milieu therapy philosophy that emphasizes mutual support, resident responsibility, and self-government. Research indicates that halfway houses help many people recovering from schizophrenia adjust to community life and avoid rehospitalization. Here is how one woman described living in a halfway house after 10 hospitalizations in 12 years: “The halfway house changed my life. First of all, I discovered that some of the staff members had once been clients in the program! That one single fact offered me hope. For the first time, I saw proof that a program could help someone, that it was possible to regain control over one’s life and become independent. The house was democratically run; all residents had one vote and the staff members, outnumbered 5 to 22, could not make rules or even discharge a client from the program without majority sentiment. There was a house bill of right that was strictly observed by all. We helped one another and gave support. When residents were in a crisis, no staff member hustled them off or increased their medication to calm them down. Residents could cry, be comforted and hugged until a solution could be found, or until they accepted that it was okay to feel bad. Even anger was an acceptable feeling that did not have to be feared, but could be expressed and turned into constructive energy. If you disliked some aspects of the program or the bahviour of a staff member, you could change things rather than passively accept what was happening. Choices were real, and failure and successes were accepted equally. Bit by bit, my distrust faltered and the fears lessened. I slept better and made friends. Other residents and staff members who had hallucinated for years now were able to control their hallucinations shared with me some of the techniques that had worked for them. Things like diet…and interpersonal relationships became a few of my tools.” #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
Paid employment provides income, independence, self-respect, and the stimulation of working with others. It also brings companionship and order to one’s daily life. For these reason, occupational training and placement are important services for people with schizophrenia. Many people recovering from this disorder receive occupational training in sheltered workshop—a supervised workplace for employees who are not ready for competitive or complicated jobs. The workshop replicates a typical work environment: products such as toys or simple appliances are manufactured and sold, workers are paid according to performance, and all are expected to be at work regularly and on time. For some, the sheltered workshop becomes a permanent workplace. For others, it is an important step toward better-paying and more demanding employment or a return to a previous job. In the United States of America, occupational training is not consistently available to people with severe mental disorders. Some studies find that fewer than 15 percent of such people are completive employed. The way the World works, is not always perfect, but many people try hard. In a perfect timed World, friends would never show up late, breakfast eggs would never be cold and kids would always come home on schedule. Better yet, inventories would be reduced to zero, eliminating their various costs, including storage, maintenance, management and warehousing. Best of all, meeting would always begin and end on time. However, what kind of economy would result? In economics, the term balanced growth has been loosely used to mean many things. For some, it suggests that environmental factors are taken into account. For others, it signifies the inclusion of transportation or take your pick of other factors in the definition of “growth.” It can mean growth that occurs when capital and labour inputs (adjusted for productivity) increase at the same rate. Alternatively, it can imply an equal emphasis on agriculture and industry in development policy. In the 1960s, and ‘70s, a school of “balanced growth” economists argued that the best way for an economy to develop was for all sectors to grow at the same rate, with the relations of all inputs and outputs held steady. This was, in fact, a call for perfectly synchronized development—a belief that the path to ever-growing wealth was through ever-greater synchrony. However, things are not that simple. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
These theorists brushed aside something important. Perfect synchronization, holding key variables in fixed relationships, makes any system inflexible, inert and slow to innovate. It creates an all-or-nothing game in which you have to change everything at once or change nothing at all. And changing everything at once, still less proportionally, is extremely difficult. By contrast, as economist Joseph Schumpeter showed, economic development also requires “gales of creative destruction”—winds of change that annihilate old, backward technologies and industries to make way for the new and disruptive ones. And the first thing creative destruction tears up is yesterday’s timetable. Every firm, every financial system, every national economy needs, therefore, both synchronization and some degree of de-synchronization. Unfortunately, at present we lack both the data and the metrics that would help us know when we are about to crash the limits of either. What might be called “chronomics”—the study of timing in the economy—is still primitive at best. What is clear, however, is that time adjustment is now so complex and important that a big, booming synchronization industry has grown up around it. This industry experienced three “great leaps forward” between the mid-1980s and the first quarter of the new century. Today it is a gain. Tomorrow it will be even bigger. In 1985, when the Institute of Industrial Engineers published a book called Innovations in Management: The Japanese Corporation, the term Kanban—what the West came to call the “just-in-time” principle or JIT—hardly rated mention. Manufacturing in the United States of America was still dominated by something called material requirements planning or MRP, a mainframe-based system for scheduling factory resource requirements. MPR’s purpose was to produce parts and products according to a present schedule. The JIT system, by contrast, first developed by Toyota, allowed the customers’ changing needs to set the schedule. It made flexible timing practical. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
By 1990, when the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences in the United States of America published its Competing in World-Class Manufacturing report, JIT had already become a buzzword in America and was spreading throughout manufacturing. Soon management consultants jumped on board the JIT express and sped its implementation. IBM, Motorola, Harley-Davidson and scored of other leading firms adopted it. A study of 291 diverse manufacturing facilities in the United States of America and in 128 in thirty other countries found that, as the NCMA summarized it, “of the many potential means of improving productivity, only JIT-related ones were statistically shown to be consistently effective. What JIT did, however, was shave time tolerances even more closely. And that required far more sophisticated synchronization than ever before. Another burst of change in business began when consultants Jim Champy and Michael Hammer, in their best-selling book Reengineering the Corporation, told managers to “reengineer” their firms when “leading competitors achieve significantly shorter cycles,” when the organization responds a single supplier and required the restructuring of entire long supply chains in the 1990s and early 2000s. Not only did first-tier markers of components have to deliver them as needed, but second-tier suppliers did as well, in order to accelerate through-put and reduce inventories. The goal was tighter synchronization at every level. Huge companies such as Oracle, SAP, PeopleSoft and scores of others offering enterprise resource planning (ERP) and related software owe their very existence, in substantial measure, to the mounting demand for smarter and closer timing in business. Hundreds of consulting firms by now were heavily into the synchronization business. SAP or Oracle, say, would sell the software. Then I.T. consultants would be called in to implement it. Anderson Consulting (now Accenture), one of the largest consulting firms in the World, owed much of its remarkable growth to the new synchronization systems. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
The greater the synchronization, the greater the value added to the entire supply chain’s performance. No wonder some UPS delivery trucks bear the slogan: “Synchronizing the World of Commerce.” The synchronization industry still has a long way to go—and grow. First, many small firms that have not yet restructured their supply and/or value chains will increasingly be compelled to do so. Second, synchronizing supply and distribution chains is only one step toward tomorrow’s deeper and more comprehensive temporal integration. Now the synchronizers want to do more than sell just the initial software. They also want to service their direct customers and tier after tier of downstream customers stretching all the way to the end user. Indeed, it may even extend beyond that someday because more and more products may be returned to the manufacturer for recycling, as is already the case with autos in European and printer ink cartridges in the United States of America. All these changes multiply layer after layer of suppliers, distributors, servicers and users needing synchronization. Last, the synchronization industry will expand because rising competition requires innovation after innovation, each of which, in turn, changes timing requirements and requires resynchronization. However, the hidden paradox of the law of de-synchronization is that the more you synchronize at one level in a system, the more you de-synchronize at another. If price decisions are taken neither continuously nor in perfect synchronization, the process of adjustment of all prices to a new nominal level will imply temporary movements in relative prices. It might then well be that, to avoid these movements in relative prices, each price setter will want to move one’s own price slowly compared to others. The result will be a slow movement of all prices to their new nominal level, and substantial inertia of the price level. Even small departures from perfect synchronization can generate substantial price level inertia. If price decisions are desynchronized, even anticipated movements in money will usually have an effect on economic activity. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
It is however possible to find paths of money deceleration which reduce inflation at no cost in output. Price desynchronization has implicated for relative price movements as well as for the price level. Goods early in the chain of production have more price and profit variability than good further down the chain. Price inertia, if it is due to price desynchronization, may be difficult to remove. It may well be that, given the timing decisions of others, no agent has an incentive to change one’s own timing decision: the time structure of prince desynchronization may be stable. Until recently, a mindless cult of acceleration led by numerous business “gurus” in the United States of America urged companies to “Be first! Be agile! Shoot now, aim later!” This simplistic advice led to the launch of many low-quality, poorly tested products; angry customers; unhappy investors; a loss of strategic focus; and a high turnover of CEOs. It ignored the problems of synchronization and de-synchronization. It was a superficial way of dealing with the deep fundamental of time. Mismatched timing can damage—even kill—individual companies. However, this is not just a problem of particular enterprises. It can upset relations among multiple firms. Moreover, anecdotal evidence at least suggests that it can impact the whole industries, entire sectors of a country’s economy, and even the global economy. Now, time to close in prayer. Little by little roads eat away the hearts of mountains. Fires burn through, come back in huckleberries, trails close in August, too many bears. Too many bears, now following avalanche chutes, glacier lily, early spring. Caribou in old growth spruce, lichen, banks of snow and fog. Bear tracks in the mud. Treat each bear as the last bear. Each wolf as the last, each caribou. Each track the last, gone spoor. Gone scat. There are no more deertrials, no more flyways. Treat each animal as sacred, each minute our last. Ghost hooves. Ghost skulls. Death rattles and dry bones. Each bear walking alone in warm night air. To pray is to mediate on events of the past which testify to God’s guiding spirit in the affairs of humans, and which give us courage to fight for justice and freedom, and to look confidently and hopefully to the future. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
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No one has yet fully realized the wealth of sympathy, kindness, and generosity hidden in the soul by God. The human mind is fascinating. A young officer working on a ship wrote that he would awaken during the night and discover himself under an undesirable physical and mental condition. He seemed to be clearly in a mesmerized condition, caused by someone or something giving the powerful posthypnotic suggestion to wake up and obey. The remedy is to use the same technique in reverse. That is, practise auto-hypnosis, give the self-suggestion that on waking up there will be full conscious and full rejection of the negative idea. If one must hate something, let one hate hatred itself. The storms of violent passion are to be resisted as the smoothness of inner peace is to be invited. To keep one’s temper in a single provocative situation may be easy, but to keep it consistently equable is a real feat. Life is a conflict. One must not let these negative feelings take up lodgement within in one longer than a single moment. All humankind must awake from its materialistic apathy and cast out something of its selfishness. It is called upon to renounce its violence and meannesses, its intolerance, unkindnesses, and injustices. It must either emerge from its animal brutality or else suffer itself to be extinguished by it. It must come out from the shadows of ignorance, selfishness, and materialism. Only then will it find the sunshine of a larger life that awaits it. It is not always one oneself who acts in a particular way at a particular time. Impulses from lower sources or outside contacts may be strong intuitions from higher levels or outside sources may influence one to wise choices which bless one’s future. We must not hate those who are born of the same divine essence as ourselves but we may hate the sins they perpetrate and the evil they radiate. The seeker has to contend not only with limiting environments but also with internal enemies. Apathy delays one, depression obstructs one, and loneliness frustrates one. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18
The more one becomes sensitive, intuitive, responsive to the spirit, the more one is unfolding exceptional passivity. However, this puts one in peril, for one feels the negative presence too. Hence the more one must restrict one’s contacts until one’s strength is above them. It is prudent to escape from a situation where there is much pressure to commit a foolish action or to make a foolish decision leading to calamitous results—and not continue to stay in it until the danger materializes. One whose presence is felt to be odious, whose personality is regarded as distasteful, is better left alone. One should never allow the actions or words of ignorant human to arouse in one reactions of anger, envy, or resentment. The years are too few and there is too much to be done—both on oneself and for oneself—to waste them in negative, resentful thought and decaying, neurotic emotion. When one comes to understand its importance, one will begin to exercise some vigilance over one’s thoughts. Resist beginnings—that is the most practical way to deal with negatives. The destructive thoughts of fear and self-doubt which whine at your door, whine at the door of every human. However, you can make them powerless to hurt you. For—there is n chance, no destiny, no fate can circumvent, can hinder or control the firm resolve of a determined soul! If the negative thought persists then one has to wrench oneself away from it with the assent and use of all one’s being—feeling, reason, intuition. One’s own attitude towards events holds the power to make them good or bad, whatever their nature of itself may be. Those who are unable to think correctly about this tragic World situation must be pardoned, but those who refuse to think correctly about it do not deserve pardon. The counsel of Jesus to “resist not evil” does not apply to other men’s acts but to our own thoughts. We are to turn aside from a negative thought-habit by the simple method of substituting the opposite and the beneficial one. We need not to spend our strength resisting the thought of misery, for example. We are to substitute hope for misery, whenever the latter appears. #RandolphHarris 2 of 18
Wrong-doing will be avoided not because it is punished by the law of recompose even when it is not punished by the law of society, but because of the strong inner conviction that right-doing is its own reward, its own satisfaction. The beautiful is allied to the good. If we cultivate beautiful feelings, evil ones begin to get dissolved. One will not risk rebuffs by expressing one’s views and describing one’s experienced to the uncomprehending of the unsympathetic. It I cowardice to refuse to face the fact that one has made a mistake and to continue following the same course because it is to stop it and return to the right road. The easier way is too often the worse way, leading to trouble for one’s self and others. There is a limit to the extent of concessions to prejudice; we must not beyond it. Beware of those whose mind is vindictive and whose speech is venomous. If they are born of emotional prejudice or passionate bias, it is of little use to meet irrational arguments with rational statements. The ancient saying that where goodwill exists agreement will not be hard to find, still remains true. The crowds which delighted in the gladiator shows of ancient Rome and, to a lesser extent, those which delighted in the bullfights of modern Spain, do not see to understand how bestial they allow themselves to become at such times. If one is to be distinguished from a member of the savage species, the true human being, the fully evolved human, must have the quality of pity in oneself. Do not attempt to fight evil with evil. Overcome it by calling on a higher power to bring out the good in you wherewith to meet it. In this way you obey Jesus’ counsel, “Resist not evil.” Synesis (fourth century): “This would be the most extreme of ills—not to be conscious of the presence of evil. For this is the condition of those who no longer try to rise…for this reason repentance is elevating means…[but] both deeds and words [must] lend a helping hand.” A philosopher may not ignore the negative side of one’s or another’s life: one has to deal with it because circumstances force one, like everyone else to do so. #RandolphHarris 3 of 18
However, one’s way will be different, because one will use all one’s faculties and capacities: intellectual, practical, and intuitive. One will keep calm and not let passion or negative emotion carry one away. However, all that done, one hands over the results to the higher power (which includes destiny). One’s mind must stay in That which transcends negativity, sin, evil, even if one must grapple with them. Philosophy will not disregard the bad in others, and the sin in ourselves, but having seen them clearly it does not react negatively in useless condemnation. Instead, it reacts constructively in trying to realize the meaning of evil, the consequence of sin, and then proceeds to cultivate the opposite quality, the good of that particular evil—as honesty where there is dishonesty and so on. If practical dealings are involved, we may regret the existence of these faults in others, but we may not refuse to recognize them. Amid all the pessimistic reflections which the state of the World so easily induces in the thinking human, one may yet be buoyed up by the hope which the eternal verities must again and again give one, that is, the hope that the end of it will be immeasurably better. The existentialist view—so popular with so many young people today—that we begin with oblivion and end with annihilation, that what comes between is either meaningless or mysterious, with no solutions to problems, no answers to questions, is a view which the tragedy and evil and catastrophe of our times tempt us to accept. However, religion and philosophy release us from this despair. In such critical times as these even some faith in the existence of a higher power, and some aspiration towards serving it, has protective value. Trust, not tension: trust in the higher power producing serenity rather than tension; because of the pressures of life this is a great need today. However dark or desperate World history may seem at times, we must always remember no one can disrupt the divine World-Idea, or spoil its manifestation, or prevent its glorious outcome. #RandolphHarris 4 of 18
Fear of the power and cunning of these evil opponents causes them to rely on obvious but ordinary human forces and weapons for protection. They forget the divine forces they could, and should in this crisis, call on—and neglect the superhuman and extraordinary. To express a half-amused contempt for the intelligence of our time is not at all the same thing as to make a jaundiced indictment of it. To witness the magnificent parade of a civilization of almost unredeemed triviality is less likely to arouse bitterness in the soul and more likely to give it a good half-hour’s amusement. On the one hand, carried away by the idealistic enthusiasm and millennial promises of merely emotionalist cults, some believe that a spiritual teaching has only to be propagated and it will spread triumphantly everywhere. On the other hand, confronted by the formidable spectacle of a whole World plunged in ignorance, conscious that the ordinary individual can do so little to uplift it, others drift into bewildered defeatism and actually do nothing at all. However, this second attitude, although much more sensible and much more justifiable than its opposite one, is not quite philosophical. According to the old classical fable, we had to look for truth in the bottom of a well; today we have to look for it in the bottom of a bitter disillusionment. In the dismal World conditions of today it is a paramount necessity to obtain some glimpse, however meagre, of the divine plan which is working out for all our lives. Only in this way can we co-operate with it understandingly and adequately. Instead of relying on flight into the unknow and uncertain, it is better to rely on God. In the first case one may be making a false escape and duping oneself, but in the second case one opens the way for true guidance in the matter. With peace in the mind and harmony in the feelings, both completed by knowledge of the universal presence of divinity—who could harbour evil thoughts, hatreds, or destructive plans? #RandolphHarris 5 of 18
Every evil person who crosses our path provides an opportunity, in the injury one attempts to do us, to keep ourselves from being provoked into retaliation, anger, or resentment. If we succeed in overcoming our own feelings, we mount upward a step. In a negative situation, where negative criticism and negative emotions are rampant, other persons may try to involve one in it, or at least get one to support their attitude and endorse their criticism. However, a feeling may come over one preventing one from doing so. If so, one should obey and remain silent. With time the rightness of this course will be confirmed. One the injunction to return good for evil, the question arises, with what then will you return go? Return good for good, but justice for evil. Is this not wiser counsel? Does not the other punish goodness to an extremist position, rendering it almost ridiculous by condoning bad conduct? Inner and outer difficulties are often related. What appears to be an ugly state of affairs may well be a definite attack of certain evil forces using interested human instruments. In such a situation, the individual should never practise nonresistence in any way, but, on the contrary, should fight them off as hard a one can. At the same time, one must remember that weakness in self-control can give these evil forces an opening which they might not have had otherwise. If one wishes to emerge victorious in the struggle, one must be on one’s guard. If one does not throw off this condition, one, oneself, unwittingly erects a barrier though which the divine help sent one finds it difficult to penetrate. Although the temptation to seek release as such a time through, for example, the easy way of drink is understandable, one must nevertheless remember the duty one owes to one’s spiritual life, to one’s personal interest on the relative plane, and to others. Although the student must forgive those who mistreat one, one need not think tht forgiveness implies one has to associate with such people thereafter. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18
Whenever the thought of them, or their abuse, comes into one’s mind one must exert one’s willpower to drive it out, and immediately direct one’s thoughts toward God, or toward any inspired individual in whom one had faith. Only the actualized Christian is entitled to dismiss evil and to deny its existence: all others must look it in the face, understand it, and overcome it by slow gradations. It is better to keep out of the way of evil humans, especially when they are in power, until or unless we are driven by the necessity of circumstance of the inward voice of duty to oppose ourselves to them. It is always a certainty that the practice of active goodwill directed toward those who regard one harshly will benefit one’s own development, while it is always a possibility that this practice may dissolve the harsh feeling against one. It is all gain and no loss. This is one part of the case for Jesus’ advice to return good for evil. It is a technique of this evil power to paralyse its intended victims by frightening them. If we give way to fear, we give assistance to its effort. It cannot be beaten without open defiance and ready valour. One must remember that one will meet with those individuals who are themselves the bearers of antagonistic forces, instruments of darkness—sometimes consciously, most unconsciously, people used by evil forces. So far as possible one must avoid such people. Certainly never enter into intimate associations with them, whether the relation be business or personal. If one does one will find that sooner or later some of their unfortunate behaviour will be returned by Universal Law and tumble on one and one with have to suffer with the afflicted individual. These people make talk as believers in spiritual things—indeed, they often belong to some cult or other. However, they do not understand truth or live it. They cannot help one and one is not strong enough to carry them. So leave them alone. And that is not always easy, because often they are people of a kind that force themselves into one’s life. #RandolphHarris 7 of 18
Sometimes one can know them by this hallmark, by this aggressive way which they try to entangle another individual. It may even be necessary at times to deal with such people with a firm hand, even mercilessly and relentlessly. If so, do not hesitate, but do it without any personal feeling of any kind. The American landscape has been badly corrupted. European writers no longer even notice the natural wonder of it, they are so put off by the ugliness and conformity of the towns. However, worse than the ugliness and conformity is the neglect that baffles pride of place. Our poets try to move themselves by nostalgically repeating the names of towns: “Biloxi and Natchez, Pascagoula and Opelousas”—but beware of paying a visit. The Americans disesteem public goods, and improving the landscape is a big expense. Historically, the neglect of appearance and plan of our scores of thousands of villages and small towns, especially in the Middle West and South—the diner, the Woolworth’s, and two filling stations—can be analogized to the neglect of the present-day less affluent. In the tide of expansion, appearance was disregarded as not essential; later, the matter would be mopped up. However, the neglect rigidifies, it is a hard core not easy to change. Instead, the present tendency is to impose on the countryside a new corporation style altogether, in the form of shopping centers (=national chain supermarkets) on the highway. This works out disastrously for the communities, for these “centers” are not centers of villages, and there cease to be villages at all, simply scattered family houses. This is the end of a long process of disruption, for in any case the industry is gone, then men work in plants thirty miles away. It is possible to travel many miles even in New England and not see a single activity a man could make a living at, except automobile agencies and filling stations; not even a food store. #RandolphHarris 8 of 18
The schools too are large and centralized. The families tend to move away frequently, but even while they are put, they are driving around. This does not make much community to grow up in. In more primitive societies, a chief community activity is working together, thatching a roof, net fishing. However, with us, precisely this co-operative labour, for instance the work in a factory, is removed from its community setting ad emptied, by the relations of production, of any community spirit. Places that have no shape have no face-to-face functioning, for the shape is the functioning community. The loveliness of so many hamlets in Europe is that they have shape and are built of local materials by local craft. Perhaps the people had to cluster to attend early masses. In Ireland, where they farm out the back door, the rows of thatched houses line both sides of a little street. In France, where men go off to their farms, there may be a square. In our own early New England villages, where congregational and political spirit was strong, there was a common green with public buildings, though the families lived scattered on the farms they worked. There was the shape of a community, with its economy, its crafts, and its ideas. The advantage of growing up in such a community in one’s early years is evident. It is not family supervision, on which the physicians of juvenile delinquency are now laying such stress; quite the contrary! it is that the family does not have to bear the burden of teaching the culture. In a community, everybody knows the child face to face. There is an easy grading of overlapping ages, right up to the adults who are going about their business in a going concern, and not paying too much attention to children. A good city neighbourhood works in the same way. From this point of view, the swarm of kids in a city housing project form a better community than present-day country boys or the kids on Park Avenue. Therefore they have more local patriotism. #RandolphHarris 9 of 18
The bother with this community chain, however, is that it terminates abruptly before it reaches the adults, who belong to a different World; so the kids are a gang and the local community spirit turns into loyalty to a Code; it does not eventuate in anything socially cohesive and culturally worthwhile. And such a gang in prone to be delinquent because, as we shall see, in such conditions it is the forbidden tht best cements loyalty. Politically, a delinquent gang is not lawless and not in the state of nature. Balked in its growth, the local loyalty turns on itself and simple reinvents the feud-code of Alfred the Great, marking out safe territories and making provision for special classes of revenge. On this view, if one teenage gang, pursuing its vendetta, falls on another and murders a kid, it would not be our business to interfere in the law of that differently constituted society. Also, like Danes or Vikings of Alfred’s time, they regard our larger society merely as a field of sports and plunder; they have not yet reinvented International Law. However, we, of course, cannot view it so, for we live in an advanced state of politics and law: they are members of our community. We are not children but more experienced and somewhat wiser, and therefore responsible, so we cannot simply annihilate them like pirates (they are small in size, few in numbers, and armed with primitive weapons); and we cannot let them hurt themselves. (I think it is wise sometimes to regard disaffected groups as if there were plausibly these two viewpoints, rival patriotisms. It is better humanity and it might make better law. The advantage is that it takes the disaffected seriously as disaffected, rather than merely pathological; it keeps in the foreground the question of allegiance. We must deserve allegiance.) However, they are children. Let us consider rather the peculiar patriotic problem of an older disaffected group, the Hipster young men, for then we can see that it is a patriotic problem. #RandolphHarris 10 of 18
Here too, I think, there has often been a strong community influence of growing up together. For instance, fellows who went to Black Mountain College, which was oriented to community and creative arts—a powerful, and powerfully disaffecting, combination—are pillars of Hipster society. Other fellows were buddies in the armed services. However, it was, as Hispters their community spirit is strong. They barge in to sleep, they share property, they share a culture. Now think of this community, disaffected from America, as engaged in a pathetic quest for some other big patriotism, an adult peer group. We saw how, appointing themselves outcast, they affirm the accidental symbol of other marginalized groups: African American, Puerto Rican, the less affluent, and others. However, this is pretty thin gruel for intellectual young men, many of whom have been to college. On the other hand, they are unable to make the jump to the great international humanists community because, simply, they do not know anything, neither literature nor politics. (I once taught at Black Mountain College, and to my astonishment I found that the students had never read the Christian Bible, Milton, Dryden, Gibbon, etcetera, etcetera, nor did they feel—as a lack—that such things existed. However, they knew odd facts about Mayan hieroglyphics which their teacher had been interested in.) What then? Since it is necessary for grown fellow to have some major allegiance or other, they have latched on to the late Japanese masters of Zen Buddhism. (This is a late effect of the early-century discovery of Japan by Fenollosa, Frank Lloyd Wright, the Misses Lowell and Ayscough, and Ezra Pound, suddenly reinforced by the postwar occupation under General MacArthur.) Now, as we shall see, Zen is not irrelevant to those young men’s needs, for it is a theology and style of immediate experience. #RandolphHarris 11 of 18
However, the pathos is that Zen was the flower of an intensely loyal feudal system that fed, protected, and honoured its masters, and to which the Zen masters in turn had fealty. For example, it is said that the haiku was invented by a poet as a public service when one was suicidally despondent because one’s Emperor had died. However, Zen without farmers and servants is an airy business; and the young men, as we have seen, are betrayed into dubious devices to keep body and soul together, nor do they have a flag to salute. Community approaches have worked to resolve many problems. In looking at mental health, the broadest approach for the treatment of schizophrenia is the community approach. In 1963, partly in response to the terrible conditions in public mental institutions, the U.S. government ordered that patients be released and treated in the community. Congress passed the Community Mental Health Act, which stipulated that patients with psychological disorders were to receive a range of mental health services—outpatient therapy, inpatient treatment, emergency care, preventative care, and aftercare—in their communities rather than being transported to institutions far from home. The act was aimed at a variety of psychological disorders, but patients with schizophrenia, especially those who had been institutionalized for years, were affected most. Other countries around the World put similar sociocultural treatment programs into action shortly thereafter. Thus began four decades of deinstitutionalization, an exodus of hundred of thousands of patients with schizophrenia and other long-term mental disorders from state institutions into the community. On a given day in 1955 close to 600,000 patients were living in state institutions; today only around 60,000 patients reside in those setting. The unfortunate result is that mental health lost most of its funding and a lot of people with mental illnesses have to where to go, but jail or to live on the street. #RandolphHarris 12 of 18
Clinicians have learned that patients recovering from schizophrenia can profit greatly from community programs. However, the actual quality of community care for many of these people has been inadequate through the United States of America. The result is a “revolving door” syndrome: the few patients, who are lucky enough to be treated, have been released to the community, readmitted to an institution within mothers, released a second time, admitted yet again, and so on, over and over. A lot of people who want mental health care are not able to access this precious resource. In fact, 10.3 percent (over 4.7 million) of adults with a mental illness remain uninsured. And, 56 percent of patients want access to a mental health care facility. As COVID-19 continues to rage, Americans are experiencing anxiety and depression. More than 42 percent of U.S. adults reported symptoms, up 11 percent in the previous years. Nearly 1 in 5 Americans has some type of mental health condition. Spending on mental health treatment and social services has reached over $250 billion, which is up approximately 60 percent since 2009. This cost includes spending on things like therapy and prescription medications as well as stays in psychiatric or substance abuse rehabilitation facilities. However, it does not take into account indirect costs, such as lower workforce participation rates and decreased productivity. In fact, depression alone is estimated to account for $44 billion in loses to workplace productivity. And access to care can be prohibitively expensive—even more so than physical health costs. An hour-long traditional therapy session can range from $65 to $250 for those without insurance. A patient with major depression can spend an average of $10,836 a year on health costs. Meanwhile, a person with diabetes taking insulin can spend $48,000 to manage their condition. On a national level, research shows that the United States of America is likely to continue to experience a shortage of mental health professional through 2025. If you are looking for excellent health and wellness coverage, consider becoming a Kaiser Permanente member. You do not need a referral for mental health and addiction care services. #RandolphHarris 13 of 18
Other ways to help keep health and wellness in check is celibacy. However, there is the double standard that is a Worldwide phenomenon that has many layers of meaning. The first is that one and one is not always two, because the woman or man of the evening is a criminal but their client is a “john,” an also because women are expected to be virginal at marriage and chaste afterward, and some men are expected to be chaste before a relationship and after, and during the marriage and relationship, but one’s husband is not bound by the same constraints. The double standard implies, in other words, that chastity is primarily and woman’s and small percent of men’s domain. Nonetheless, only women are typically judged more harshly than all men whose conduct is identical. Even today, the discrimination is thunderously obvious, preached from pulpits and parliaments and specifically mandated in the law. The double standard is nefarious not only because it embodies egregious gender inequality but because it condoned solicitation as an acceptable outlet for unchaste men. Though it condemns people of “the evening” as social scum and consigns them to lives of degradation and danger and disease, it sanctions their profession. The reason is obvious: without solicitation, lascivious people might seduce rather than marry the virgins of their own social class. It is particularly chilling that the members of many churches and other organizations in positions of authority support the double standard and, albeit reluctantly, swallows the equation that no men or women of the evening equals no chastity. Laws essentially force women to abide by a higher standard of regard in the matters of chastity than men. They also denounce solicitation but at the same time partially exonerate it as the safety valve that kept virgins pure. It is unsurprising, then, that the double standard matured as a code of conduct in pleasures of the flesh that demand female chastity and at the same time approve, or at least tolerate, the dominant group of mostly men, and their carnality expressed in the use of other humans as toys, though this meant sacrificing certain women and sometimes other to unchaste, unrestrained men and a small fraction of women. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18
Furthermore, not all men honour their obligations to marry their child’s mother. And when men who came from a higher social echelon seduced a working-class girl, they almost never honoured that class’s code. Domestics and shop girls in particular were the pray of privileged men, but being with child destitute these women rather than pushing them into marriage with the baby’s father. However, often times, after these men who have money start to become older and nearing retirement, they will then leave their wives for young women of other ethnic backgrounds and of lower social standings because these women tend to be considered more exotic and attractive. The women will marry for older man for security and to escape labour. However, in a few cases, it is real love. In society, another problem is many people seem to scarcely be able to comprehend what chastity means, or to regard it as a virtue. Among the middle and upper classes, chastity’s double standard wreaked havoc on social decency. Some of these moral puritanical, which even frown on premarital male activities involving pleasures of the flesh, young women are coached to trap husbands without surrendering beforehand even a taste of the delights to come. Men are, in some cases, are frustrated at this implacable wall of chastity and take it as a challenge. They play games. In large numbers, they form unholy crusades to seduce young virgins. This upper-class deviance was depicted on shows like the original on Gossip Girl. “Resist, resist!” the virgins’ elders urge them. “Just say a resounding ‘No’ to your pleading, inveigling, deceiving young suitors.” After all, as the old adage went, “Who would keep a cow of their own that can have a quart of milk for a penny?” However, at the same time, ladies, and a small percentage of men, forgive them for trying to ruin you. This double standard of conduct involving pleasures of the flesh is necessary, because unlike you, the dominant class of men and a small percentage of dominant women, by nature have an urgent, irrepressible need. Brothels used to be officially licensed. Unchaste people play a crucial role in upholding their societies’ notions about chastity. #RandolphHarris 15 of 18
Now, nowhere is a failure to achieve perfect synchronization more lamented than in the bedroom—unless it is when the U.S. Federal Reserve or the Bank of Japan rises or lowers interest rates and get the timing wrong. Timing, as any comedian can tell us, is everything. However, we are, for the most part unwittingly, changing our links to time, and that is no joke. As interested as investors and economists may be about exact timing in finance, they re remarkably uniformed about the role of synchronization—and, even more so de-synchronization—in the creation of wealth and poverty. Yet understanding these can give us a wholly new way of thinking about wealth creation. Some degree of synchronization has been needed ever since hunters and gatherers began working in groups. Historian William McNeill argues that mass rhythmic activities have been used throughout history to promote synchrony, which in turn improved economic productivity. Tribal dancing, he suggests, strengthened teamwork and made hunting more efficient. For thousands of years fishermen have chanted in unison as they hauled in their nets, the musical beats indicating when to pull and when to breathe. Agrarian economies also reflected seasonal change. According to anthropologist John Omohundro, writing about the Philippine island of Panay, “Through the dry season…and into the rainy season…businessmen are in their slowest season. All aspects of the distribution system slow down. By September or October the rice crop begins to arrive in town…Because the wealth of the province is regulated by agrarian cycles, city business activity rises and falls the these cycles.” Economic anthropologist Willem Wolters adds: “Purely local banks have never been viable in the semi-arid tropics because of the seasonality and synchronic timing.” Early industrial economics operated under completely different temporal conditions. Assembly-line work required a different rhythm. Thus, the factory whistle and the time clock were invented to coordinate work schedules. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18
By contrast, today, as we will see, business activities are speeding toward real time. In addition, the uses of time are becoming increasingly personalized and irregular, if not erratic. More different tasks need to be integrated, and the acceleration effect truncates the time available for each task. All this makes synchronization harder to achieve. And that is only the beginning. If we look deeper, we find that every economy throbs and vibrates with unnoticed rhythms. We may buy a newspaper daily, pick up soap or milk at the supermarket weekly, gas up the car every ten days or so, cash a paycheck every two weeks and pay credit card bills monthly. We might call a broker sporadically according to what is happening in the stock market, buy a movie ticket or a book on a whim a few times a year, pay taxes quarterly or annually, go to the dentist when a toothache strikes and purchase a gift for a relative who is getting married in June. These and countless other transactions create rhythms that flow through banks, markets and lives. With the very first slap on our infant behind, every one of us becomes part of this ongoing economic music. Even our biorhythms are affected (and in turn influence) the marvelously complex, orchestrated process that pulse around us as people work—making things, providing services, managing others, caring for one another, financing companies or processing data and information into knowledge. At every moment, some tempos speed up, others slow down. New melodies and harmonies are introduced, then fade out. There are choruses, counterpoints and crescendos. Beyond these, throughout the entire society and economy, there is a generalized pulse of life that is itself the average, as it were, of all its subordinate tempos. The “economic music” never stops. The result is not patternless chaos because, within every wealth system, various components or subsystems are continually adapting their speeds, phases and periodicities to one another. In biology this process is called “entertainment.” #RandolphHarris 17 of 18
Neurons, it turns out, do not work alone. They form temporary teams—much as businesses increasingly do today. In the words of Science magazine, “Neurons frequently fall into step with one another, forming ensembles that play the same tune, as it were, firing in relative synchrony for brief periods, before some neurons drop out of synch, perhaps to join another ensemble.” Firing in sync, moreover, apparently predisposes the neurons to “joint processing” at high levels of the system. Today’s breakup of monolithic corporations into congeries of short-lived project team, alliances, partnerships and joint ventures parallels these ephemeral “ensembles” in the neural system. One way the World could survive in joy is if the whole World worships God. We hear you, fellow-creatures. We know we are wrecking the World and we are afraid. What we have unleased has such momentum now, we do not know how to turn it around. Do not leave us alone, we need your help. You need us too for your own survival. Are there power there you can share with us? In the Service of the Heart, nothing is further from the truth than the widespread notion that to pray is synonymous with to beg, to request, or to supplicate. To be sure, to pray means to call upon God to help us. However, we need Him not only when we are physically in danger. We need Him also when we are spiritually in danger. To pray means to seek God’s help, “to keep our tongue from evil,” “to purify our hearts,” “to put into our hearts to understand, to learn and to fulfill in love, the words of the Christian Bible,” and thus to keep us unswervingly loyal to truth, goodness, and beauty. To pray is to feel and to give expression to a deep sense of gratitude. No intelligent, healthy, normal human being should take for granted, or accept without conscious, grateful acknowledgement the innumerable blessings which God in His infinite love bestows upon one daily—blessings of parents and loved one, of friends and country, of health and understanding. To pray is to express renewed allegiance to the moral and ethical principles which we accept as the guides of our personal lives, and which we recognize as the indispensable foundation stones for a decent human society. #RandolphHarris 18 of 18
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Why is there Never Any Happy News?
Evolution has been able to create the advanced structure and metabolism of modern organisms. Biological evolution is the change in inherited traits over successive generations in populations of organisms. Adaptation is a key evolutionary process in which variation in the fitness of traits and species are adjusted by natural selection to become better suited for survival in specific ecological habitats. The environment acts to promote evolution through changes in development. Therefore, determining how developmental changes are mediated is critical for understanding the mechanisms of evolution. In our early speculation about the primitive coacervates, before the nucleic acid mechanism appeared upon the scene, we pictured the development of a number of cell-like characteristic. The external membrane, which made an individual out of a modern cell, was such a characteristic. Another consisted of solid inclusions such as microsomes, on the surface of which certain kinds of chemical reactions might take place more rapidly. And we had no difficulty, in terms of the primitive mechanisms alone, in accounting for the existence of fluid-containing regions within the coacervates shielded by their own membranes from the chemical influence of the surrounding material. To the space-varying chemistry permitted by such complex structures, we were even able to add time-varying chemistry by postulating suitable combinations of membrane selectivity and reactions time lags. We have seen how the appearance of nucleic acid provided a powerful new line of evolutionary development. In the past, we have devised an imaginary course of natural history capable of refining the first fumbling architectural inclinations of nucleic acid into the remarkable precise and effective control properties of the modern nucleic acid/enzyme apparatus. In this way, our discussion has bridged the gap between primitive coacervates and modern cells with respect to the basic metabolic mechanisms underlying the control of growth and reproduction. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18
However, we should not allow our recent preoccupation with development of the genetic mechanisms to blind us to the fact that other refinements of the primitive mechanisms were also necessary if modern cells were to evolve from the coacervates. Let us consider two or three examples of these less spectacular, but nonetheless important, refinements that characterize living cells today. First, consider the properties of membranes. The physical laws that had to be obeyed by large-molecular-weight material in water would sometimes result in the formation of a semipermeable membrane enclosing the coacervate. In the ensuing treatment extensive use was made of the selectivity of such membrane—their confining effect on large molecules but relative permeability to small ones, for example. In general, the ability of an enclosing membrane to sustain substantially different chemical reactions in contiguous regions and to permit the interpenetration of selected products of these reactions is fundamental to the life process. Therefore, it might be imagined that the economic of natural selection would have caused today’s membranes to have much more highly developed properties than those of the primitive progenitors of cellular life. And indeed this is true, although it is true in a somewhat curious way. Apparently, just as in the case of the nucleic acid/enzyme apparatus, the processes of natural selection have discovered one basic structure that is superior to all others; for electron microscope observations have revealed that all cell membranes have essentially the same two-dimensional arrangement of protein and lipid material. However, this does not mean that the permeability properties are the same for all cells. The important differences needed to meet the metabolic requirements of different cell species are the same for all cells. The important differences needed to meet the metabolic requirements of different cell species are produced by means of enzymes of special class called permeases. #RandolphHarris 2 of 18
Different varieties of permease can cause the standard membrane to pass or block the passage of different kinds of molecules. The combination of a suitable permease and the membrane also frequently results in one-way permeability, in which molecules of a certain kind will pass through the membrane in one direction but not in the other, even though they have to oppose a strong concentration gradient in their migration. It is easy to see how valuable this property can be in permitting a cell to extract selected ingredients from the surrounding fluids and concentrate them internally. Another example of a detail of cell structure that must certainly have undergone extensive evolutionary refinement consists of the solid inclusions in the cytoplasm—the microsomes—that we have seen play such an important role in the nucleic acid control of protein formation. By a combination of electron microscope and chemical techniques, it is clear that “working parts” of the microsomes consist of a myriad of very small subparticles, or ribosomes, that are densely distributed over the surface of the much larger microsomal particles. Each ribosome is of about the right size to support a single molecule of messenger RNA while it engages in its process of multiple marriage with the amino-acid-conveying transfer RNA molecules. In addition, these ribosomes have been found to possess a special chemical composition that presumably contributes to their mission. They themselves contain RNA, mixed in about equal proportions with protein. Apparently, this ribosomal RNA does not perform any control function of the kind that we have come to expect of nucleic acid. Instead, its binding with protein appears only to provide a surface with properties favourable to the attachment of the messenger RNA molecules that do participate in the control activities. Incidentally, studies of the ribosomal processes have led to the conclusion that the lie of the messenger RNA molecule is frequently a short one after it has stretched out on the ribosomal surface. In bacteria, at least, it last for only two or three minutes before it breaks up and its fragments float away. (However, some messenger RNA, especially in cells of higher organisms, persist for much longer periods.) #RandolphHarris 3 of 18
Experiments employing radioactive tracer elements, by means of which determinations can be made of the time intervals involved in the capture of amino acid segments by transfer RNA and these subsequent assembly of the segments into protein molecules under the guidance of messenger RNA, have shown that in two or three minutes only a few protein molecules can be constructed Thus, the formation of enzymes under the guidance of the nucleic acid mechanisms can be a very active process, with messenger RNA continually being manufactured by the DNA molecules and the ribosomes continually receiving newly arriving messenger molecules and then recleansing their surfaces after a small amount of protein-construction activity. It is only because every cell contains hundreds of microsomal particles each covered with thousands of ribosomes that this seemingly inefficient process can produce adequate numbers of protein molecules to sustain life. Modern cells contain a number of different types of inclusions in addition to ribosomes. Some possess such complexity of structure and function that they are called organelles, or “small organs.” Organelles are specialized structures that perform various jobs inside cells. In the same way organs, such as the heart, liver, stomach, and kidneys, serve specific functions to keep an organism alive, organelles serve specific functions to keep a cell alive. The mitochondria constitute an important kind of organelle. They are rod-shaped and about one three-thousandths of an inch long. There are perhaps 2,000 of them distributed throughout an average cell. Each tiny mitochondrion is a complete processing plant that takes in a standardized raw material—the sugar glucose—and puts out, in addition to by-products, and energy-rich chemical—adensoine triphosphate (ATP). More than a dozen separate chemical reactions are involved in this transformation, and each reaction is catalyzed by a different enzyme. The mitochondrion must store all these enzymes as well as the intermediate products in a structure that permits the continuous assembly-line manufacture of its end product ATP. #RandolphHarris 4 of 18
ATP, sometimes called a coenzyme, differs from the nucleotide adenylic acid only in its possession of three phosphate groups instead of one. It is by all odds the most important source of chemical energy in present-day organisms. No modern cell could survive without it. And the origin of this vital ingredient is the complex chain of reactions, many of the steps of which are identical for man and dandelion, that continuously take pace in the mitochondria. One of the most conspicuous structural features of modern organisms is the cell nucleus. In terms of our previous discussion, it is easy to regard the nuclear structure as a straightforward example of the kind of “drop within a drop” development that we postulated for the later stages of coacervate evolution. Nevertheless, it seems likely that the kind of nucleus we now know, with its clear-cut membrane separating certain internal structures and organelles from others of quite different kinds in the surrounding cytoplasmic fluid, is a relatively late development. For bacteria and a few other primitive organisms do not have well-developed nuclear membranes, although they frequently exhibit other inclusions and organelles of a considerable degree of sophistication. In short, modern cells differ from primitive coacervates not just in their possession of the power genetic mechanisms but also in their incorporation of other features of a degree of sophistication and refinement unheard of in bygone days. There is no reason for this to be surprising, in view of the inevitable ubiquity of the evolutionary effects on which all biological progress is based. However, it seemed worthwhile to call explicit attention to these other developments before proceeding to a consideration of what must be some fairly late evolutionary development related, once again, to the genetic mechanisms. Four our treatment of the modern cell, cursory though it is intended to be, would yet be unjustifiably incomplete if it failed to describe some of the techniques employed today to hold together and protect the all-important book of instructions contained in the DNA molecules for directing the chemical activities in the organism. Specifically, we must examine the properties of modern cells that minimize the effects of chance on the architectural activities of the nucleic acid control mechanisms. #RandolphHarris 5 of 18
The problem we must consider is not fundamentally different from one which we encountered in connection with the reproduction of the early coacervates. When one of our primitive bags of chemicals broke up, we saw that the ability of any one of the resulting smaller droplets to support a chain of chemical reactions similar to that which had been responsible for the growth of the parent depended on whether chance provided that smaller droplet with an adequately representative inventory of ingredients. If so, the new individua could survive and grow; if not, death ensured. The development of the genetic mechanisms would have modified the problem of viable heredity, but would not have eliminated it. In particular, as DNA molecules assumed control of the chemistry of the cell by means of the powerful enzymes they generated, the survivability of an offspring of an adult individual would have become less dependent on the chance incorporation in the offspring of many of the ingredients normally found in the parent; the strong directing influence of the enzymes would have quickly made up for any initial imbalance in the proportions of most of the vital juices. However, nothing could have made up for the absence of an important enzyme resulting from the accidental failure of one of the generating DNA molecules to be captured by the offspring when the adult broke up into smaller pieces. This discussion so far has demonstrated how DNA is perhaps the most famous biological molecule; it is present in all forms of life on Earth. virtually every cell in your body contains DNA of the genetic code that makes you. DNA carries the instructions for the development, growth, reproduction, and functioning of life. Differences in the genetic code are the reason why one person has brown eyes rather than green, why some people are susceptible to certain diseases, why birds only have two wings, and why giraffes have long necks. However, we will continue more of this interesting topic in future reports. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18
When it comes to the past, it is not wrong to look back if we understand the purpose for doing so. The Lord wants us to learn from our mistakes. However, we can learn from them only by keeping them in perspective and not dwelling on them. We fall into a deep pit of discouragement if we continually dwell on past mistakes. This is particularly true of sins. We can also become discouraged by blaming ourselves for sins we did not commit. For example, victims of abuse often feel responsible somehow for the abuse they received. They sometimes even feel guilty for having survived the abuse. In the same way, those who have been victimized by the sins of others continue to be victims if they blame themselves and dwell on the past. Healing comes when they seek the Lord’s help to rise above the sorrow and turn their pain into a blessing. Sometimes the fear of the consequence of confessing a sin keeps people living in the past. Some people even spend a lifetime trying to recreate the past. This relates to a most confusing psychological phenomenon called “repetition compulsion.” In repetition compulsion, a person repeats a traumatic event or its circumstances over and over again. This includes reenacting the event or putting oneself in situations where the event seems likely to happen again. Many people who are stuck in the past, regardless of if it was a trauma or their “heyday,” expose themselves to people or places they are stuck on, so they can create reminiscent scenes of the original situation. These behavioural reenactments are rarely consciously understood to be related to earlier life experiences. Humans seek comfort in what is familiar and predictable—even if this means repeatedly harassing and stalking people who want nothing to do with them, nor the past. Through these behaviours, individuals believe they are recreating history and changing the outcome, thereby gaining mastery over what they could not control in the past. When one re-enacts scenarios from the past, it involves the hope that this time they will get it right. #RandolphHarris 7 of 18
Consciously or unconsciously, some believe they are omnipotent in other individual’s lives and they have the power to satisfy them, by trying to make the past the present. Compulsive repetition of the past, especially if the person you are focusing on had a bad experience with you, or has not talked to you in decades, may not be the best idea. Social media is there and it is virtually easy to contact anyone you want. Sometimes it is best to let others reaching out to you, especially if you are fixated on the past. Their lives may have changed, they may not be interested in the past, or they may be in a situation where they are not willing to reconnect with the past or even may not want new friends. Compulsive repetition of fantasies may provide a temporary sense of mastery or even pleasure (but ultimately leads to chronic feelings of helplessness and a sense of being bad and out of control). Change, even when healthy, feels foreign and scary. When we consider that all patterns of behaviour contain ulterior gains, we can better understand the cycle of repetition. It is important to note that the motivation to not change is not necessarily an action that brings happiness, relief or other beneficial emotions. Sometimes people revert back to familiarity because the outcome is predictable. To venture into uncharted waters is to invite intolerable anxiety. Tragically, some people remain so preoccupied with the past that they are not able to develop meaningful life experiences. This fixation often results in difficulties with assimilating subsequent experiences, almost as if their emotional development has stopped at a certain point. Perhaps some people may benefit more from therapy than obsessively trying to recreate the past. Often times, people even forget who they are and make believe they are the person they traumatized. To recover rationality after being irrational, to recover normal life, is a great thing. A variety of insight therapies, from cognitive to psychodynamic, may be used in cases of schizophrenia. Such approaches may be offered in individual or group formats. Studies suggest that the particular orientations of insight therapists are often less important than their levels of experience with schizophrenia. In addition, the therapist who are most successful tend to be those who take an active role, setting limits, expressing opinions, challenging patients’ statements, providing guidance, displaying empathy, and gaining trust. #RandolphHarris 8 of 18
The area of patriotism is intermediate between childhood and adulthood. We must understand it carefully or we play into the hands of fools and rogues who have done our country plenty of damage. To what can we correctly attach the adjective “American”? Well, America is supposed to be a “slice of Heaven,” where everyone has a beautiful house, fancy cars, a high paying job, and two kids. Being American meant to have security, safety, material wealth, excellent health, religion, be proud of your country, well educated and innovative, and a successful career. American was supposed to mean all the good God made and none of the bad stuff. During the 1950s, the economy boomed, and many Americans enjoyed material comfort. The American Dream because a reality. By 1956, the majority of Americans no longer held blue-collar, or industrial, jobs. Instead more people worked in higher-paid, white-collar positions—clerical, managerial, or professional occupations. Unlike blue-collar workers, who manufactured goods for sale, white-collar workers tended to perform services in fields like sales, advertising, insurance, and communications. Though achieving job security did take a psychological toll on some Americans who resented having to repress their own personalities, it also enabled people to provide their families with the so-called good things in life. Most Americans worked in cities, but fewer and fewer of them lived there. New highways and the availability of affordable automobiles and gasoline made commuting possible. By the early 1960s, every large city in the United States of America was surrounded by suburbs. Of the 13 million new homes built in the 1950s, 85 percent were built in the suburbs. For many people, the suburbs embodied the American Dream of an affordable single-family house, good schools, a safe, healthy environment for children, and congenial neighbours just like themselves. #RandolphHarris 9 of 18
In between, there is an American landscape, as American primary and secondary education, an American classlessness, and American Constitution, and Anglo-American language, and American kind of enterprising. That is, just where a child ventures from home and grows up through adolescence, the great environment becomes one’s scene, and this is American, a characteristic geography and history, place and community. It is just in growing up that a patriotic opportunity is essential. It is just this opportunity that, for ingenuous youth, is corrupted. And so it is hard to grow up. Let us be quite clear what this American landscape and community is. 95 percent of U.S. teens have their own mobile device, nearly 64 percent of teens have televisions, 93 percent of teens go online, 69 percent of teens have their own computer, 63 percent of teen Internet users go online every day. The average teen in American spends $2,150 per year. That is 42 million teens in America spending their money on a variety of products. And the average American dad spends $9,486 annually per kid, while the typical American mom spends just $8,789. So, annually, teens are spending $90.3 billion of their own money. That is just a little bit less than the $90.4 billion quarterly net income of TFC Financial, or more than the $76 billon net income of Alphabet Inc. On the high end, parents spend $752 billion on their teens, which is slightly less than the $800 billion Microsoft is worth. The teenage market is tremendously powerful. Perhaps that is why advertisers spend more than $12 billion per year to razzle-dazzle promotional stunts (right) to reach the youth market. If parents have any idea of organized revolt, it is already too late. Teenage spending is so important that such action would send quivers through the entire national economy. This is a description of the landscape. There are just a few examples of fundamental that lie beneath the “fundamentals.” And they are even more important than they may seem because they form a system. Thus, changes in the deep fundamental interact with one another. Moreover, the limited examples cited so far are just that—limited. A fuller list would surely include others—energy, the environment and family structure, for example—all changing at high speed, all shaking the ground under the more superficial, everyday fundamentals. #RandolphHarris 10 of 18
Many of the deep fundamentals have received scrutiny from time to time. For example, in 2020, the relationship between the biosphere and wealth creation once again became the center of global concern and controversy. By contrast, several of the deep fundamentals most relevant to revolutionary wealthy have, in fact, received scant attention. That, therefore takes us on a journey to strange, largely unknown territory to probe three of the fastest-changing, most powerful and most fascinating of all the deep and fundamentals today—three will that without question shape the future of wealth. The countries with the key economics in today’s World—the United States of America, Japan, China and the European Union—are all heading for a crisis that none of them wants, that few political leaders are ready for and that will set limits on future economic advance. This looming crisis is a direct result of the “de-synchronization effect,” an example of how we mindlessly deal with one of the deepest of all the deep fundamentals: Time. Nations all over the World today are struggling at different rates of speed to build advance economies. What most business, political and civil leader have not yet clearly understood is a simple fact: An advanced economy needs an advanced society, for every economy is a product of the society in which it is embedded and is dependent on its key institutions. If a country manages to speed up its economic advance but leaves its key institutions behind, it will eventually limit its potential to create wealth. Call it the Law of Congruence. Feudal institutions everywhere obstructed industrial advance. In the same way, today’s industrial-age bureaucracies are slowing the move toward a more advanced, knowledge-based system for creating wealth. This is true of Japan’s Okurasho (its Ministry of Finance) and other government bureaucracies. It is true of China’s state-owned enterprises and of France’s ingrown, elitist ministries and universities. It is also true of the United States of America. In all these countries, key public institutions are out of step with the whirlwind of change that surrounds them. #RandolphHarris 11 of 18
Nowhere has this been more evident than in the inability of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to cope with the skyrocketing speed and complexity of the private-sector financial institutions it is supposed to regulate. In the great Enron scandal, in the illegal mutual-fund machinations that directly involved time and timing, and in case after case of overcreative accounting, regulators were left in the dust by the accelerated manipulations of less than honourable companies. This was matched elsewhere by the striking failure of U.S. intelligence agencies to shift quickly enough from a focus on Cold-War targets to anti-terrorism capabilities—leaving the door open to the horror of 9/11. More recently, the impact of de-synchronization was dramatized by the embarrassing, tragic ineptitude of governmental responses to COVID-19 in 2022, when the president Biden admitted he had “no national plan,” and while prices are rising substantially, he refuses to help those who truly need help. Everywhere, as we will see later, attempts to change or replace an industrial-era agency spark resistance from its traditional beneficiaries and their allies. This resistance creates, or at least contributes to, drastically uneven rates of change. Which helps explain why so many of our primary institutions are dysfunctional—out of sync with the accelerative pace that a knowledge-based economy demands. Today’s governments, in brief, have a severe problem with time itself. Nonetheless, many think there is too much criticism abroad today, too little affirmation. Millions of humans think and live largely on negatives. It is because all humanity is approaching the threshold of a new era, a better era, that all the devils of the old era put forth their fiercest efforts, whilst there is yet a little time, to degrade human character, to drag it down into the hades of the worst forces and emotions—hate, envy, aggressiveness, and brutality. If there is physical pollution in the atmosphere, the water, and the Earth, there is another kind in humans, a moral depravity and mental baseness not less repellent. If there is so much friction, violence, and tension in the World, it is only because so many individual persons themselves are inwardly experiencing these things. #RandolphHarris 12 of 18
People fill the World’s aura with bad thought which, if sustained, prolonged, and strong enough, break out on the physical level into undesirable or evil happenings. If there is so little real peace in the World, it is only because there is so little real peace in the individuals who live in the World. Their thinking, their emotions, and their passions have affected the mental atmosphere of the World. The most violent selfish passions and the most aggressive of emotional urges abound in this decade only because they have been brought up to the surface the better to attack and curb them. Just as association with a master throws the disciple’s virtues and vices to the surface, so contact with the higher forces being released in the World brings both great evil and great spirituality to the surface. The evil, in disciple’s as in humanity’s case, must manifest itself so that it may not lurk untouched but may be got at, grappled with, and eventually destroyed. Let us not misunderstand appearances, therefore. Since last century, things have been getting worse only to get better. Today most people feel frustrated, restless, and discontented. They search for happiness here and there, in this thing of that thing, through one person or another, or by moving from excitement to sensation. All this is their unconscious reaction to the new spiritual forces arising in their midst and destined to be vigorously active in a couple of hundred years. Today humanity has already largely lost faith in itself, doubts its goodness, worries about its future, and is bewildered about its present. Compulsive fears and corrosive anxieties, enfeebling doubts and neurotic complexes trouble the minds of so many millions in our age, as thwarted hopes and enchaining environments depress their hearts. Idealism presses them to become servants of Good; passion distorted into destructive violence deceives them into becoming servants of Evil. The thoughts which have gestated unspoken in humans’ minds and the feelings which have fermented unexpressed in their hearts have been and are being thrown up to the surface through the upheavals of our times, externalized, as it were, in their events. #RandolphHarris 13 of 18
Humanity did not come into its present grievous situation by chance. The whole picture of thoughts and their consequences, passions and their evils, acts and their effects, must be seen under the light of immutable Universal Law. The policy of fear and suspicion has not brought peace nearer; but, on the contrary, pushed it father away. We live in a World which, today, is populated with too many insane humans, too many unbalanced maladjusted persons. However, because they re not actually raving and jumping so as easily to be identified for what they are, this seldom is understood. This leaves many to wonder, when and where was the concept of celibacy first articulated? Did it originate as an actualized Christian instrument later adopted by ambitious hunters and warriors? Or was it fries imposed on people to guarantee their purity for those they would later breed with? The story of celibacy, in the guise of virginity and chastity, is shrouded in the mists of eons past. Though the hunger to know too urgent to dismiss, we can only suckle it on pap distilled from prehistoric gleanings, glimpses, and guesses and hope that some true nourishment seeps in Myriad pieces of data confirm the near-universal subordination of woman from the earliest times. Despite consoling myths about great matriarchies, it is a rare society where women are equal to men. One study of over eight hundred societies reveals how overwhelming males dominate leadership positions, including their kinship groups. Enormous China, with the World’s largest population, typifies humankind’s perspective. China has traditionally stifled women, and even today in its rural areas, woman have a 40 percent higher suicide rate than men because, they, too, undervalue their lives. The mechanics of this process of universal submission can only be guessed at. What is certain is that, unlike hunter/gatherers and horticulturists, most stable agricultural societies base social continuity and internal stability largely of female celibacy—virginity in girls, chastity and fidelity in wives—the best guarantee for successful genetic transfer. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18
This rule’s rare exceptions underlie its universality. The male virgins of Papua New Guinea’s tiny Enga culture are prime examples of the infrequency of the phenomenon of compulsory male virginity. Conversely, a few cultures value fertility so gratefully that their men refuse to waste themselves on women who have not provided themselves by bearing a child. As we shall, see, these, too, are anomalies. Less rare is the societal standards that accepts or even expects premarital pleasures of the flesh with the intended spouse, with pregnancy followed swiftly by marriage. A European example is eighteenth-century Georgian England, where in rural perishes—the overwhelming majority—illegitimate births not followed by marriage were a mere 1.5 percent of births in the early seventeenth century, 3 percent in 1750, and still only 6 percent in 1810. However, births within seven months of marriage—though conception was prior to it—were 10.2 percent of first births from 1650 to 1699, 25.5 percent a century later, and by the nineteenth century, over 30 percent. Clearly, in most cases, premarital pleasures of the flesh were acceptable with the intended mate and pregnancy precipitated the actual marriage ceremony. However, many societies that tolerate a lack of chastity among lower-ranking women demand premarital virginity of women of higher status. This class element is complex. It operates partly to reinforce more stringent moral standards on members of its female elite, thereby emphasizing their superior moral worth. Paradoxically, the opposite is often true for its males, who are permitted or even encouraged to indulge in experimentation with pleasures of the flesh. A second major reason for valuing chastity is moral or religious. As humankind evolved, so did belief systems, and we have already seen how spiritual values deal with pleasures of the flesh and govern its expression. Celibacy, one such manifestation, has its advocates and practitioners such as widows and shamans, or priests. Except in isolated communities, it is only selectively practiced; after all, wholesale enforcement would be collective genetic suicide. Virginity in brides, however, is the religious ideal of the great majority of societies. #RandolphHarris 15 of 18
The third and perhaps the driving force behind this policy is economic. In many societies, a wealthy man’s daughter used to be his chattel and, as such, a vehicle for distributing his land and other holdings through a dowry or for acquiring property through a bride price. Chastity, as evidence of the pure and pristine nature of the goods, was at the forefront of qualities necessary in the bride-as-merchandise. Here is a brief breakdown of the most important consideration underlying this fixation on virginity. First, the bride’s chaste maidenhood carries several important guarantees for her Husband: that the child she conceives—least the first one—will be his; that she is not to dishonour him by allowing another man to take her maidenhead and have intimate knowledge of her body; that by refraining from pleasures of the flesh, she has demonstrated the likelihood of marital fidelity; tht by obeying the dictates of her relatives, her culture, and/or her religion, she has proved she is dutiful and likely to submit as well to her husbands authority; and that by coming to her husband unburdened by a child, her dowry and future labour will be devoted exclusively to the new family he and she have just founded. The bride’s family and in-laws also benefit, because her virginity enables her family to negotiate favourable marriage terms; she has shamed neither her own nor her husband’s family by acquiring a bad reputation; and she has not violated her religion’s strictures against premarital pleasures of the flesh, bringing down on her family’s head the wrath of offended deities. For a combination of these reasons, defloration has developed an almost mystical significance. Its imperatives override the urgent stirrings of awakening young bodies and impose chastity. This despite the fact that chastity runs counter to the human female’s evolution as a creature unique in her capacity for seasonless, round-the-clock copulation. This is why, of course, most societies that insists on maidenly virginity tacitly acknowledge that it is unnatural. They do this variously. They devise stringent methods to enforce it—foot-binding and female genital mutilation are examples. They inculcate the principle of virginity into their youth or preach it as a religious tent. They punish the unchaste, often severely. They marry girls off when they are still too young to be lustful. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18
Lastly, they reward virgins and/or their families. Young women who sacrifice immediate, intimate pleasure may gain considerable economic payback: husbands who will support them, who may even pay—to their families—a hefty bride price for the virtuous young bride. This trade-off has its ironic dimensions. The indefatigable intimate passions that virgins must suppress was part of an evolutionary strategy to attract the strongest, most productive males. Now women must achieve the same goal by repressing their intimate passions, tantalizing prospective mates to purchase it for the price of a marriage vow. (As late as 1981, when the British royal family calculatingly selected an appropriate consort for the heir to the throne, they let the World know that the teenage Diana Spencer’s vaunted virginity was one of her most important qualifications.) This social construct places an enormous responsibility on a woman’s shoulders. If, in a single weak or willful moment, she surrenders to her physical nature, she can destroy her future or shame her family. We are now living in a historical period, characterized by a radical and revolutionary transformation of one historical era into another. Nobody can doubt this fact seriously, and nobody who has even a minimum of historical understanding would do so after what has occurred during recent years. We are in the midst of a World revolution affecting every section of human existence, forcing upon us a new interpretation of life and the World. What about ethics in this connection? Does it represent a realm above change? It is superhistorical in its foundation, its values, and its commands? Or does it follow the stream of historical becoming, and will it be transformed as rapidly as the other realms of life are transformed in our days? If the latter be true, what authority, what power of shaping human life remains in it? Can the unconditional claim with which every moral demand imposes itself on human conscience be maintained if the contents of the demand are different in every period of history? However, if the former be the case—if ethics constitutes a real above history, immovable and unconcerned by historical change—how can it influence man, living in history and transformed by history? Would it not remain a strange body within the context of human experience, separated from it in untouchable remoteness, perhaps worthy of awe but without actual influence on the life-process? #RandolphHarris 17 of 18
Truth twisted into service of the lower purposes or even the evil forces must be carefully inspected, analyzed, and lastly corrected or rejected. The kings of the Earth did not believe, nor did any of the inhabitants of the Earth, that the oppressor and enemy could enter the gates of America. [But this happened] because the sins of her [false] prophets and the iniquities of her priests, who shed the blood of the just and righteous in the midst of her. [The false prophets and priests] wandered [staggering] in the streets as if blind; they had so polluted themselves with blood it was not [lawful] for men to touch their garments. We must preserve nature and the human soul. You are the last whale, washed up on a far beach. The waves are pushing against you. Your brothers and sisters are gone. You cannot breathe. Small children are throwing rocks and laughing, climb onto your body. You die alone, your ears full of wid. You are the last buffalo. The sun is setting over the plains. You stand alone, enormous, heavy with fur, lovely. You are tired of running, tired of running. All of your friends have gone. It seems even the Earth has turned against you. There is not one to say goodbye. You rest, listening to the wind. When the time is right, the spirit of the wolf returns. The pastures of the wilderness overflow, and the hills are girded with joy and transmuted into spiritual force to start a new current of creative power. Several feel the benefits too. Spirits are revived and cures depression. There is a stimulation and awakening influencing the whole person. The meadows are clothed with flocks; the valleys also are covered over with corn; they shout for joy, yea, they sing. Our garners are filled to overflowing with all manner of store; our flocks increase by thousands in our fields. There is no attack and no enslavement, and no cry of distress in the broad places. Blessed be the Lord for the precious gifts of Heaven; for the precious gifts of the Earth, and the fullness thereof; praise the Lord. May the Lord give us of His abundance, and establish the work of our hands. #RandolphHarris 18 of 18
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And there is More Evidence—He Bills Me from His Firm at 2 A.M. for Overtime
Education is not just teaching students to memorizes things, and filling their brains with information, but teachings others, very abstractly, how to think and become successful. One does not want to teach them what to think, but show them the architecture of how to critically think and form ideas that are rational. Teaching them to have informed opinions so they do not just repeat things they heard on the evening news. You want a student to be able to explain their opinion. For example, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, was more of a democrat then republican. Looking at his policies and how he balanced how he balanced the budget, made it clear that he was not a true republican. A few things about him that were characteristic of a democrat, were his bipartisan agreement to reduce California’s greenhouse gas emission through legislation in 2006, but then he is also the same person who made the Hummer, a gas guzzling vehicle street legal. So, one can see he was clearly conflicted, but like a democrat, they never have a clear idea of what they are doing. Hence President Joe Biden, “There is no national plan for COVID.” Furthermore, the way Schwarzenegger balanced the budget when California was facing a $20 billion shortage by selling 11 state properties, including the Elihu M. Harris building in downtown Oakland, California and the Ronald Reagan building in Los Angeles, California and also several others seemed to be a move a republican would make. Yet, he leased them back from the new owners, which seemed not to be cost effective, more of a political move, and also a decision that actually would cost taxpayers more money because these nationally important, historically buildings would appreciate over the years. That move seemed to be more democratic. Furthermore, Schwarzenegger also gave away historic paintings from the Hearst Castle, which were purchased by its owner William Randolph Harris. These moves of giving away assets, and the wasteful spending, and the energy bill made Schwarzenegger are more characteristic of a democrat than a republican. Maybe we need a republic and not a democracy to balance America? #RandolphHarris 1 of 19
Republicans tend to like to use fossil fuels because they want to keep these historical companies alive, not lay off workers, and make use of technology we have already perfected. They are also more businesses minded and like to first, make money, reduce regulations, and then make improvements to their polices when there is money in the bank to avoid a shock to the system. Therefore, if you want to get a republican in the governor’s office in California, try buying a Cultural hero to win the election and pass you policies. Otherwise, we are likely to have another democrat in office because they are importing voters for they do not think they can win without rigging elections. When presenting an argument and coming from a defensive stance, where you threaten people who ask questions and make statements about things that seem illegal or irrational, you will fail every time you start an argument with “They said.” First of all who are “they” and why to they have authority to say anything? Generally, those are the types of speeches that people who have not gone to college make. Now back to the topic at hand, we have not made a convincing case for the hypothesis that the genetic mechanisms are truly universal. More evidence is needed. And there is more evidence. It came, between 1961 and 1963, out of the Laboratories of the National Institutes of Health and the California Institute of Technology. In that interval Marshall W. Nirenberg and J. Heinrich Matthaei, government research scientists at Bethesda, Maryland, and James Bonner and coworkers, at Pasadena, California, made some remarkable discoveries. Their findings are directly pertinent to our quest for evidence of the universality of the genetic mechanisms. Both groups of investigators employed the lowliest of instruments in their important work—the Escherichia coli (E. coli) bacillus, a form of bacteria that thrives in the intestines of humans and other vertebrates. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19
Most E. coli are harmless and actually are a part of a healthy human intestinal tract. However, some E. coli are pathogenic, meaning they can cause illness, either diarrhea or illness outside of the intestinal tract. The type of E. coli that can cause diarrhea can be transmitted through contaminated water or food, or through contact with animals or persons. Bovine food products and fresh produce contaminated with bovine waste are the most common sources for disease outbreaks in the United States of America. E. coli is a Gram-negative, rod-shaped, facultative anaerobic bacterium. This microorganism was first described by Theodor Escherich in 1885. As stated above, most E. coli strains harmlessly colonize the gastrointestinal tract of humans and animals as a normal flora. However, there are some strains that have evolved into pathogenic E. coli by acquiring virulence factors through plasmids, transposons, bacteriophages, and/or pathogenicity islands. This pathogenic E. coli can be categorized based on serogroups, pathogenicity mechanisms, clinical symptoms, or virulence factors. Among them, enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) is defined as pathogenic E. coli strains that produce Shiga toxins (Stxs) and cause hemorrhagic colitis (HC) and the life-threatening sequelae hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) in humans. (HUS is pretty serious. It is considered a syndrome because it may have different causes. HUS occurs after a severe bowel infection with certain toxic strains of the bacteria E. coli. It may also occur in response to certain medicines, but this is even more rare. HUS results in the destruction of blood platelets (cell involved in clotting. A low red blood cell count (anemia). Kidney failure due to damage to the tiny blood vessels of the kidneys. Other organs, such as the brain or heart, may also be affected by damage to very small blood vessels). Several serotypes in EHEC are frequently associated with human diseases such as O26:H11, O91:H21, O111:H8, O157:NM, and O157:H7. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19
E.coli O157:H7 is the most frequently isolated serotype of EHEC from ill persons in the United States of America, Japan, and the United Kingdom. EHEC serotype O157:H7 was first recognized in 1982 as a human pathogen associated with outbreaks of bloody diarrhea in Oregon and Michigan, U.S.A. and is also linked to sporadic cases of HUS in 1983. Since then, many outbreaks associated with EHEC have been reported in the United States of America and E. coli O157:H7 has become one of the most important foodborne pathogens. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has estimated that E.coli O157:H7 infections cause 73,000 illnesses, 2,200 hospitalizations, and 60 deaths annually in the United States of America. The outbreak surveillance data from CDC reports the E. coli O157:H7 infections are decreasing after the peak in 1999. However, large outbreaks and sporadic cases continue to occur. The annual cost of illness due to E.coli O157:H7 infection was $405 million U.S.D., including lost productivity, medical care, and premature deaths. The high cost of illness requires additional efforts to control this pathogen. That is also why doctors say, “Stay away from the colon!” Researchers studied extracts from E. coli bacilli that contained microsomes, transfer RNA, energy-supplying phosphates, amino acids, and enzymes. When supplied with E. coli messenger RNA, such cell-free mixtures of essential ingredients were known to be capable of manufacturing proteins through the operation of the nucleic acid/enzyme mechanisms that we have been considering for the past several reports. Nirenberg and Matthaei discovered, however, that the addition of big-molecular RNA from a number of other species, including viruses, could also cause protein to be synthesized. The evidence that RNA molecules from one species could successfully act as messenger RNA in the protein-manufacturing mechanisms of an entirely unrelated species certainly added strength to the developing case for the universality of the genetic mechanisms. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19
However, it also raised questions. For example, what kind of protein is produced when the big-molecular RNA from an exotic species is added to the E. coli system of components? Could it be protein characteristic of the species from which the big-molecular RNA is derived? A number of experiments were performed in search of an answer to this question. In some the results were indeterminate, but in 1963 a definite, and affirmative, answer was obtained by the Caltech group. They combined purified DNA from the nuclei of pea cells with systems of E. coli components similar to those employed by Nirenberg and Matthaei and found that a kind of protein was produced that was specific to the particular type of pea cell from which the DNA had been extracted. Their results, in fact, went somewhat beyond the point of establishing that messenger RNA from pea cells could operate the nucleic acid mechanisms of E. coli bacilli to produce pea-cell protein. In addition, their work showed that pea-cell DNA could be induced to manufacture messenger RNA by the action of the enzyme RNA-polymerase derived from bacteria. Here, finally, was an argument for the universality of the genetic mechanism that was completely convincing. For no one could suggest that there was any special evolutionary kindship between the pea plant and the Escherichia coli bacillus that might cast doubt on the significance of the results. Nevertheless, pea-cell DNA had been found capable of operating the molecular mechanisms of E. coli not just to manufacture protein molecules, but to manufacture the precise type of protein molecules normally fabricated in the cells of pea plants. The experiment had demonstrated the existence in the pea plant and in the E. coli bacillus not only of grossly similar mechanisms but of mechanisms employing an identical “genetic code”—that is, an identical set of relationships connecting the sequence of bases along the backbone of the molecule of DNA and its messenger RNA, the particular kind of transfer RNA molecule attracted to each position along that backbone, and the particular kind of amino acid carried by each kind of transfer molecule. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19
This was not just evidence for the existence in all cells of generally similar nucleic acid/enzyme control mechanisms; it was evidence for the existence of an impressive degree of detailed identity among the mechanisms of different organisms. It would be misleading to leave the impression that serious consideration of the possibility of a single genetic code applicable to all cells originated with this work. From the discovery that protein manufacture is controlled by the messenger RNA/transfer RNA mechanisms there was much speculation about the kinds of code that might relate the sequence of bases along the messenger RNA molecule with the various kinds of transfer RNA in order to array the amino acid segments properly. Because it was the simplest assumption, the idea of only one such code for all cells was from the importance of the Nirenberg-Matthaei and Bonner discoveries, however, for theirs was the first convincing evidence that nature, as well as the biologists, had decided to make such a simplification. However, still another question was suggested to Nirenberg and Matthaei by their line of investigation: “If the addition of RNA from another organism to the nucleic acid/enzyme apparatus of the E. coli bacillus could stimulate the manufacture of protein products, what would happen if a synthetic RNA was added instead?” To be sure, the techniques available to Nirenberg and Matthaei caused their man-made product to fall far short of natural RNA in complexity of structure—they could not put nucleic acid molecules together with precisely known structure unless they contained, say, only one of the four bases. However, they reasoned, such simplicity might actually be an advantage in early attempts to study the details of the metabolic control processes. Therefore, they devised an experiment using the simplest possible kind of man-made RNA: polyuridylic acid, and RN with the monotonous base sequence UUUUUUUUUUUU…#RandolphHarris 6 of 19
The experiment worked: the addition of synthetic RNA to the E. coli extracts resulted in the appearance of protein! A significant question, again, was: “What kind of protein?” There was a considerable logical appeal in the answer, when it was finally provided by chemical analysis of the end product. For the protein—a chain composed of a single amino acid, monotonously repeated. The particular kind of amino acid that was pulled out of the solution (which contained abundant supplies of all 20 amino acids) and incorporated into the protein under the direction of the polyuridylic acid type of RNA turned out to be the amino acid phenylalanine. Here was indeed an exciting discovery, for it constituted nothing less than a start toward the actual deciphering of the genetic code. Evidently the base sequence UUUUUUUUUUUU…in the messenger RNA was translated by the genetic mechanisms into the amino acid sequence phenylalanine, phenylalanine, phenylalanine…in the resulting protein molecule. It the past, it was already mentioned that, by a combination of experiment and theory, workers in the field had concluded it to be likely that each molecule of transfer RN attaches to the messenger RNA by the conjugation of three pairs of bases. In terms of this hypothesis, and the known affinity of the U and A bases, the Nirenberg-Matthaei discovery was interpreted as implying that the particular kind of transfer RNA that carries the amino acid phenylalnine is characterized by a sequence of three unconjugated A bases at its hairpin bend. The Nirenberg-Matthaei technique was quickly extended. For example, messenger RNA composed solely of cytidylic acid was found to cause the manufacture of protein molecules consisting entirely of the amino acid proline. More sophisticated experiments were also devised that employed synthetic RNA molecules containing a small amount of one of the other nucleotides in addition to uridylic acid. (Techniques of synthesis permitted combining known proportions of the four nucleotides to form RNA, although the precise sequence of the nucleotides in the molecule remained unknow.) #RandolphHarris 7 of 19
Such messenger RNA in the E. coli extracts resulted in the production of protein products including not only phenylalanine but also occasional “instructions” of other amino acids. By relating the frequency of occurrence of such other amino acids to the probabilities of occurrence in the RNA molecule of triplet combinations other than UUU, it was found possible to develop shrewd guesses as to many probable correspondences between specific messenger RNA triplet base sequences and specific resulting amino acids in the protein structure. And recently H. G. Khorana, of the University of Wisconsin, announced a technique whereby synthetic RNA molecules can be tailored to consist of a successive repetition along backbone of known triads—UAU UAU UAU UAU UAU, for example. By the use of such molecules of messenger RNA in combination with the usual E. coli extracts, work is being speeded on the development of a dictionary connecting the various possible base triplets in messenger RNA with the particular amino acids that they are responsible for in the finally assembled protein molecules. We will consider more of this exciting information on the next report. For now, it is time to move on to another subject. Milieu therapy and token economy programs helped to improve the gloomy outlook for patients with schizophrenia, but it was the discover of antipsychotic drugs in the 1950s that truly revolutionized treatment for this disorder. These drugs eliminate many of its symptoms and today are almost always a part of treatment. What is more, they have influenced the way clinicians now view schizophrenia. In the effectiveness of antipsychotic drugs, an early influential study found that after six weeks of treatment, 75 percent of patients with schizophrenia who had been given antipsychotic drugs were much improved, compared to only 25 percent of patients given placebos. In fact, close to half on those placebos worsened. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19
The discovery of antipsychotic medications dates back to the 1940s, when researchers developed the first antihistamine drugs to combat allergies. Although antihistamines also produced considerable tiredness and drowsiness, they quickly became popular, and many such drugs were developed. The French surgeon Henri Laborit soon discovered that one group of antihistamines, phenothiazines, could also be used to help clam patients about to undergo surgery. After experimenting with several phenothiazine antihistamines and becoming most impressed with one called chlorpromazine, Laborit reported, “It provokes not any loss of consciousness, not any change in the patient’s mentality but a slight tendency to sleep and above all ‘disinterest’ for all that goes on around him.” Dr. Laborit suspected that chlorpromazine might also have a calming effect on persons with severe psychological disorders. The psychiatrists Jean Delay and Pierre Deniker (1952) therefore tested the drug on six patients with psychotic symptoms and did indeed observe a sharp reduction in their symptoms. In 1954, chlorpromazine was approved for sale in the United States of America as an antipsychotic drug under the trade name Thorazine. Since the discovery of the phenothiazines, other kinds of antipsychotic drugs have been developed. The ones developed throughout the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s are now referred to as “conventional” antipsychotic drugs in order to distinguish them from the “atypical” antipsychotics that have been developed in recent years. The conventional drugs are also known as neuroleptic drugs because they often produce undesired movements effects similar to the symptoms of neurological diseases. Among the best known conventional drugs are thioridazine (Mellaril), fluphenazine (Prolixin), trifluoperazine (Stelazine), and haloperidol (Haldol). Antipsychotic drugs reduce the symptoms of schizophrenia at least in part by blocking excessive activity of the neurotransmitter dopamine, particularly at the brain’s dopamine D-2 receptors. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19
We have in America a mystique of “production” and a man engaged in “production” is highly esteemed. This attitude is entirely specious. Of five ways in which production can be increased: Expect in wartime we do not try to increase the labour supply; we do not try to encourage new enterprises; in most industries, we do not try for technological innovation. All the stress is laid on full employment, and efficient use of present capital. However, another factor of productivity that concerns us here: to increase the aptitude and skill of each lad. Indeed, as we have tried to show, rather than encouraged it is systematically retarded. It would not today be said, as it used to be, that Americans are born mechanics. Among the model heroes of the young we do not think of Edison, Burbank, Ford, Steinmetz, and so forth. It is anachronistic to mention their names. The juvenile literary and pictorial image of the inventor and scientist has correspondingly changed. Two generations ago it was a kindly bumbling old fool, unkempt but stubborn and brave, and with a light of divine truth in his eyes. A generation ago science began to be altogether strange and the scientist began to be a surgeon with rubber gloves or a cold manic with diabolic power in his eyes. However, this stereotype is forbidden today, for strategic reasons, and the scientist is now a young, neatly dressed, co-operative Organization Man holding up some apparatus that proves his role, but nothing in his eyes at all, at all. However, he is having fun. The claim of the organized system is that research and invention are in their nature increasingly corporative and anonymous, and this produces great results. That is debatable. I doubt that very much is corporatively invented which is not pretty directly dictated by managerial need and policy, whereas the essence of invention is to be hitherto-unthought-of—though, of course, there occurs the rich comedy of administrators anxiously waiting for mathematicians to turn up with something “useful,” and never knowing what goes on behind those spectacles. (I have a mathematician friend who bills his firm for overtime because he tends to think of things in bed about 2 A.M. and his attitude is that they can take it or leave it.) #RandolphHarris 10 of 19
Certainly the following example is not untypical: A gifted food chemist puts in six months developing a formula; he is successful and the product is going to be pushed with a million-dollar campaign; it is, in his opinion, identical with———-Mayonnaise, the popular brand. (In this case the scientist suddenly decided to quit and to set himself up as an independent consultant, hoping that people would come in with real problems.) Proof on this kind of issue is difficult. On the one side, the corporations, having pre-empted much of the talent, point proudly to inventions made under their auspices, as if they might not have been made anyway. On the other side, their opponents argue from inventions-that-have-not-been-made, a peculiar metaphysical category, exempli gratia, “If all the capital and research had not gone into internal combustion engines, by now we should have much superior steam or electric cars.” It may be said definitely that research entailing million-dollar equipment and vast samplings of the populace cannot be carried on without corporative or state sponsorship; yet many would deny that this style of research, and expense of social wealth, is so fruitful as the old American shoestring operator of the seventeenth-century gentleman-philosopher with his dumb-bunny apparatus and towering intellect. We certainly have at present the dismal situation that the most imaginative men are directed by a group, the top managers, who are among the least, hard-working thought they may be. Also, inventions made outside the organization are notoriously bought up and withheld or otherwise sabotaged by the organization. (To my conscience, this practice, of keeping basic new ideas in limbo until it is profitable to exploit them, is immoral and disruptive of the community of humankind far more than rigged quiz shows, but it comes from the same box, whose label is Intellect Bought.) #RandolphHarris 11 of 19
So we return to the President of Merck and Company, who hauled before a Senate investigation of charges that Merck and its semimonopolistic “competitors” were criminally overpricing drugs, warned the Senators that they might “upset the delicate balance we have been able to develop over the years between the quest for scientific knowledge on the other.”!! Quo usque tandem. The situation of a young fellow is ironical. If he has reached college age and has technical aptitude, the most desperate attempts are made to get him for this or that firm. They pay for his schooling and guarantee him a job. Meantime, the systematic behaviour of those firms has been to baffle aptitude in the young and to limit it where it has survived. It is in this context that we must listen to Dr. Conant’s recommendations for the high school: the selection of academically talented, the top 15 percent, to major in a program of mathematics and sciences. No effect is made to increase the pool of ability; and the public schools are, effectually, to be used as apprentice training grounds for the monopolies and the armed forces. Across the planet today, we find three markedly different wealth-making systems, crudely symbolized by the plow, the assembly line and the computer. The first thing we need to know is that much of what today passes for “fundamental” is not present in all of them. For example, while “a strong manufacturing sector” virtually defines the industrial wealth system, it was a vestigial in pre-industrial less affluent economies—and still is in many parts of the World. Again, while the Federal Reserve and central banks in general have played a key role throughout the industrial age, they did not exist as such in preindustrial societies, and they may not in the future. No less a worthy than the governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, has suggested that they may disappear, since many of their functions will no longer be needed or will be carried out automatically by the electronic infrastructure. Among the many so-called fundamentals, in short, some are relevant only for societies at one stage of development and not another. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19
By contrast, some fundamentals are so vital to wealth creation that they matter in all economies, at all stages of development, in all cultures and every civilization, past, or present. These are the deep fundamentals. “Wanted,” the noticed might have read, “Spiritual community for determinedly single, rebellious, and politically astute professional women.” The time and place: late-nineteenth-century England. The plays: the “silent strikers” described above, educated young women who opted for celibacy in protest against the double standard that clawed at them in every aspect of life—the law, the workplace, politics, overall society. In the 1880s, a generation of these woman matured to adulthood and set out on their personal journeys. One lively and ambitious group included writer/activist Beatrice Potter and novelists Margaret Harkness, Amy Levy, and Olive Schreiner. They choose to move out from under their fathers’ (overly patriarchal) roofs, but not into communal, single-sex residences such as those set up by an earlier wave of female teachers, nurses, and social workers. These young women were more adventurous and went off instead to live in their own lodgings. Compared to their comfortable childhood homes and neighbourhoods, these residences were extremely modest and deliberately chosen to be agreeably distant from those of their families. Central London was especially appealing, far away from prying, critical relatives. It permitted an ease and anonymity of movement. Best of all, so many like-minded women lived there that they formed, within the heart of the bustling metropolis, a community of kindred spirits whose mutual support was a continual reminder of what they wanted to achieve. None of this, however, made their lives easy. Independent or not, decent women did not wander about alone or eat alone. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19
Parts of London, as Virginia Woolf wrote in The Pargiters, were “as impassable, save with their mother, as any swamp alive with crocodiles.” And “to be seen alone in Piccadilly…was equivalent to walking up [residential] Abercorn Terrance in a dressing down carrying a sponge.” Despite these constraints, the determined young women set themselves up downtown and prepared to lead self-directed, satisfying, worthy, and celibate lives. These women differed from millions of others chaste working women supporting and discovering themselves in their own digs because their celibacy was a purely political stance. It has nothing to do with perceptions of morality, fear of pregnancy, or keeping pure until Prince Charming materialized with a proposal of marriage. Sometimes even the women were astonished that they had rejected bourgeois marriage and motherhood and had hammered out a notch for themselves in the real World of gritty, grimy London. As social worker Beatrice rhapsodized in her journal: “Who would have thought it,” [Maggie and I]…said constantly to one another, “when we two as schoolgirls stood on the moorland near Bournemouth…discussed our religious difficulties and gave vent to all out World-sorrow, and ended by prophesying we should in tend years be talking of cooks and baby linen…who would have thought of our real future?” Strengthen and deeply influenced by each other’s ideas and experiences, including Beatrice’s many stories about her needy clients, the woman produces an impressive body of work. All wrote about London’s less affluent, and all rejected the patronizing attitude of charitable middle-class women. Instead, they portrayed their subjects with empathic clarity. In her novel Out of Work, Maggie Harkness scarcely disguised her own tenements and melodramatically depicted the life of casual labourers down at the docks. #RandolphHarris 14 of 19
The proud celibate of women during these days sustained. They were too busy experiencing and working and enjoying life. This included romance—Beatrice, for example, dallied with (chastely, of course), then declined to marry, Radical politicians Joseph Chamberlain. No, their collective commitment to celibacy simply shored up their confidence and guarded them against succumbing to male dominance. Beatrice, who was intensely attracted to the much older, powerful, and prosperous Chamberlain, is an excellent case in point. Despite her feelings, she was frightened off because she recognized he was a dominant personality: “If the fates should unite us (against my will) all joy and lightheartedness will go from me. I shall be absorbed into the life of a man whose aims are not my aims; who will refuse me all freedom of thought in my intercourse with him; to whose career I shall have to subordinate all my life, mental and physical.” Yet despite its success, this spiritual community of celibate women was as vulnerable as other communes. The problem was not celibacy, its original glue, but ongoing life itself: money problems and professional achievement, emigration, and in the case of Amy Levy, profound, incurable melancholy. After nearly a decade, the women, parted ways, shutting the doors forever on their once tremendously productive celibate community. The community did not fail so much as wither away, a shriveled vine impervious to pollinating bees or restoring rainfall. In earlier times, it has borne profusely. Its luscious grapes had fermented into heady wines. They banished shyness and inspired ideas that, in their turn, gave birth to the prose and poetry that had been the community’s raison d’etre, tangible evidence that independent women could, in celibate community, create and succeed. Its heroines, however, faithful reflections of their now-dispersed authors, lived on in their fictional celibate communities, touching other women, moving some to stake their futures. #RandolphHarris 15 of 19
Everyone has a conscience, however there is much debate as to what it is. In his doctrine of conscience, Max Scheler opposes the popular conception of conscience as the “voice of God.” He calls this, as well as the quest for “freedom of conscience,” a principle of chaos. Instead of freedom of conscience, he demands subjection to authority as the only way of experiencing the intuitive evidence for moral principles. It is impossible to reach such evidence without personal experience, and it is impossible to have such an experience without acting under the guidance of an authority that is based on former experience. In this respect, ethical (we could say “existential”) experience is different from theoretical (id east, “detached”) experience. Although this completely fits the situation of the Catholic, it is not meant as the establishment of external authority. “All authority is concerned only with the good which is universally evident, never with that which is individually evident.” Ethical authority is based on general ethical evidence. However, does such general ethical evidence exist? Or is philosophical ethics bound to be either general and abstract or to be concrete and dependent on changing historical conditions? And if this is the alternative, can the problem of conscience be answered at all in terms of moral conscience? A conscience may be called “transmoral” if it judges not in obedience to a moral law, but according to its participation in a reality that transcends the sphere of moral commands. A transmoral conscience does not deny the moral realm, but is driven beyond it by the unbearable tensions of the sphere of law. It was Luther who derived a new concept of conscience from the experience of justification through faith; neither Paul nor Augustine did so. Luther’s experience grew out of the monastic scrutiny of conscience and the treat of the ultimate judgment, which he felt in its full depth and horror. Experience like these he called Anfechtungen, that is, “tempting attacks,” stemming from Satan as the tool of the divine wrath. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19
These attacks are the most terrible thing a human being can experience. They create an incredible Angst (“dread”), a feeling of being enclosed in a narrow place from which there is no escape. (Angst, he rightly pointed out, is derived from angustiae, “narrows.”) “Thou drivest me from the surface of the Earth,” he cries to God in despair, even in hate. Luther describes this situation in many different ways. He compared the horrified conscience that tries to flee and cannot escape, with a goose that, pursued by the wolf, does not use its wings, as ordinarily, but its feet, and is caught. Or he tells us how the moving of dry leaves frightens him as the expression of the wrath of God. His conscience confirms the divine wrath and judgment. God say to him, “Thou canst not judge differently about thyself.” Such experiences are not dependent on special sins. The self, as such, is sinful before any act; it is separated from God, unwilling to love Him. If in this way bad conscience is deepened into a state of absolute despair, it can be conquered only by the acceptance of God’s self-sacrificing love as visible in the picture of Jesus Christ as the Christ. God, so to speak, subjects Himself to the consequences of His wrath, taking them upon himself, thus reestablishing unity with us. The sinner is accepted as just in spite of his sinfulness. The wrath of God does not frighten us any longer; a joyful conscience arises as much above the moral realm as the desperate conscience was below the moral realm as the moral realm. “Justification by grace,” in Luther’s sense, means the creation of a “transmoral” conscience. While God is the accuser in the Anfechtung and our heart tries to excuse itself, in the “justification” our heart accuses us and God defends us against ourselves. In psychological terms this means: insofar as we look at ourselves, we must experience a desperate conscience; insofar as we look at the power of a new creation beyond ourselves, we can attain a joyful conscience. Not because of our moral perfection, but in spite of our moral imperfection, we are fighting and triumphing on the side of God. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19
As in Durer’s famous painting, “Knight, Death and the Devil,” the knight goes through the narrows in the attitude of victorious defiance of dread and temptation. There is not much that an individual can do in time of great general catastrophe, such as the mass horror of war. However, even then, the hope and faith of an existence higher than the present one is not without its value. At such times one must lean back, draw a deep breath, and remark as Abraham Lincoln did during the most morbid hours of the U.S Civil War: “This too will pass.” The coming of war brings its own anxieties. This is when one has to draw upon one’s spiritual knowledge to get the strength and courage to endure bravely special trials and tribulations. It is only at such times of crisis that all higher interest gets the chance to prove their solid worth, for without their inner support and some kind of understanding of what it all means, life becomes most inhumanly alarming. One may have found glimpses of inner peace from time to time and now one has to insert these into his external life and try to stretch them out through constant remembrance of the Real. Such frequent communion and intelligent remembrance can give one the strength to go on, the peace to put up with frustrations, doubts, and fears, and faith in what is still beyond one’s conscious knowledge, the satisfaction that the years are not being wasted. All other duties become better fulfilled when one fulfils this supreme duty of realizing the ever-present reality within the heart. Indeed they cannot be separated from it for through them Reality can express itself. It is not palatable to hold the thought that humanity is so bad, or else its rulers so misguided, that little or nothing can be done to save it. Yet if it happens to be a true thought, we ought to be so strong enough to accept it and acknowledge that there are times when such a defeatist outlook is justified and necessary. It does not usually pay to be pessimistic but that need not prevent our facing unpalatable facts. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19
The evil one has no opportunity to fight in the larger World outside, one has every opportunity to fight in the smaller World inside one’s own person. With destruction awaiting modern civilization, it is useless to look for a safer refuge than in finding the peace and strength of the Overself. For if we do that, we shall also be led by it to do what may be physically needful too. If the greater knowledge brings greater power, it also brings greater responsibility. The more one receives from the Overself’s grace, the more should one give to humanity’s need. Let others pray for the passenger pigeon, the dodo, the whooping crane, the Inuit: everyone must specialize. I will confine myself to a meditation upon the giant tortoises, withering finally on a remote island. I concentrate in subway stations, in parks, I cannot quite see them, they move to the peripheries of my eyes, but on the last day they will be there; already the event, like a wave travelling shapes vision: on the road where I stand they will materialize, plodding past me in a straggling line awkward without water, their small heads pondering from side to side, their useless armour sadder than thanks and history, in their closed gaze ocean and sunlight paralysed, lumbering up the steps, under the archways toward the square glass altars where the brittle gods are kept, the relics of what we have destroyed, our holy and obsolete symbols. “If My people, who are called by My name, shall humble themselves, pray, seek, crave, and require of necessity My face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from Heaven, forgive their sin, and heal this land,” reports II Chronicles 8.14. Beware lest you forget the Lord your God, and forsake His commandments. When you have eaten and are satisfied, and have built goodly houses, and dwelt therein, when your herds and your flocks increased, and your silver and gold is multiplied, and all you have is multiped, beware lest your heart be lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God, and you say in your heart: “My own power, and the might of my hand has gotten me this wealth.” You shall remember the Lord you God, for it is He that hath given you the power to get wealth. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19
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Don’t Go Out Like Whitney Huston–Can I Leave A Million at Your House and You Won’t Touch it?
Great changes require administrative support and necessary and necessary resources. A ship in port is safe, but that is not what ships are built for. The World changes faster than the people in it. We must now try to imagine what the nucleic acid molecules, in the late coacervate/early cellular era, could have done besides reproduce their own kind. For definiteness, let us consider a coacervate or cell containing large numbers of nucleic acid molecules of different compositions and lengths. Let us assume, moreover, that much of the nucleic acid is in its single-stranded form at the time we commence our observations. This could be because not enough time has yet elapsed for the growth of the Siamese-twin configurations since the cyclically changing chemistry of the cell last produced the conditions that split the double molecules into single ones. In any event, let us follow the adventures of a single nucleic acid molecule as it floats around in the cellular fluid. We know, of course, that the floating around of such a molecule would not be a completely passive performance. We have already dealt with the tendency, arising from the electric fields associated with atoms and molecules, for some of the small organic and inorganic molecular fragments that inhabit the cellular fluid to attach themselves to local regions of the nucleic acid molecules. In the past, we concentrated on one type of such attachment process—that which cases a single molecule of nucleic acid to grow into a double one by conjugation of its bases. At that time, we did not concern ourselves greatly with competition from other kinds of attaching molecular fragments, although we knew that such other attachments were bound to occur from time to time. Our lack of concern for such competition was based on our awareness that most of these other attachments would be tenuous and quickly broken, since the randomly encountered molecular fragments would usually not “mate” very well with the nearby parts of the nucleic acid. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
Our discussion implied that, upon the approach of a free nucleotide to a suitable region of a molecule of nucleic acid, the strong binging forces that would come into play would result in the displacement of any lightly held “impurity” in favour of the attachment of the arriving nucleotide. Such a tendency for loosely held fragments to be displayed by molecules of greater binding energy is probably adequate to render inconsequential the large majority of the nucleic acid molecule’s casual encounters in the cellular fluid. Nevertheless, there would appear to be possibilities for attachments of kinds that would not necessarily yield to such displacement forces. For example, two different nucleic acid molecules would occasionally bump together. And once in a while such a collision might bring together short regions of the two long molecules carrying base sequences complementary to one another—an A base opposed to a U (Substitute T for U, in DNA) base, then a G opposed to a C, and so on. The resulting multiple attachment could constitute much stronger connection than that resulting from the usual casual encounter between molecules of different types. To be sure, collisions between nucleic acid molecules would be rare, unless the concentration of nucleic in the cellular fluid were exceedingly high. There is a related kind of encounter, however, that would occur much more frequently—the collision of one part of a long nucleic acid molecule with another part of the same molecule. For the nucleic acid backbone is supple; it can turn back upon itself like a rope. Under the ceaseless churning that thermal agitation imposes on the molecules of any fluid, each long chain of nucleic acid would be continually bending and twisting, frequently thereby brining normally remote parts of itself into temporary contact. An occasional attachment would be of just the nature described in the example of the encounter of two different nucleic acid molecules. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
If not an unusually strong attachment (that is, involving a considerable number of conjugated bases), it would soon be broken under the stress of random thermal agitation. However, if a special way of folding the long molecule back upon itself could result in a binding together of the two halves strong enough to survive, it would eventually be “found”; the random processes would ultimately make nearly the right kind of fold, the resulting attractive forces would do the rest, and the long molecule would lock together in a characteristic folded configuration. Of course, certain conditions would have to be met by a single-stranded nucleic acid molecule before it could be eligible to form a folded configuration. In particular, a certain minimum length would have to be exceeded in order that the two halves of the folded molecule could make enough mutual bonds to provide the needed attachment strength. X-rays analysis of the nucleic acid in modern organisms shows that such folded structures, which are abundant in all cells, usually involve seventy to righty nucleotides. A combination of speculation and evidence suggests that there may be nothing very critical about the specific sequence of bases along the backbone of a successfully folded molecule. A molecule of random base sequence might be able to form a folded or hairpin structure involving complementary pairing of most of its bases by the simple expedient of pushing away from the primary folded structure an occasional nucleotide segment that does not fit the base pattern of the opposite arm of the structure. X-ray measurements strongly suggest that this kind of expedient distortion of the hairpin does not actually occur and that the schematic drawings of it are probably fairly realistic. Folded configurations would not be assumed by all nucleic acid molecules even if their length and base sequence were favourable. For the reproduction process would sometimes prevent the formation of folded molecules; to the extent to which the projecting bases had already been mated with conjugate nucleotides from the surrounding fluid, there would be a decrease in the probability that the different parts of the flailing molecule would stick together. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
However, it is not hard to postulate conditions that would cause the competition to be frequently resolved in favour of the formation of folded configurations rather than double molecules. For one thing, as mentioned in the past reports, catalysts and energy-supplying molecules must be available in the cellular fluid if the formation double molecules is to proceed at a significant rate. The chore for which these molecular assistants are required does not have to do with the conjugation of the nucleotide bases; this goes easily. Rather, the additional energy and catalytic assist are needed to connect the sugar phosphate ends of the nucleotides. However, this requirement does not exist for the formation of a folded configuration of a single molecule. Therefore, we might well expect the folding process to occur more rapidly than the reproduction processes for the molecules in question. This would be particularly true if, as we can easily postulate, the supply of catalysts and energy-contributing molecules were low in the vicinity of some of the single-stranded nucleic acid. Under such circumstances we can easily imagine that the occasional free nucleotide that attached itself to conjugate bases along the backbone of the nucleic acid molecule would be displaced by the stronger binding forces brought into play by the tendency toward multiple affiliation of the components of the two arms of the molecule itself. To be sure, the actual configuration of the folded molecule would not look much like the two-dimensional patterns seen in vintage textbooks. The same electric forces that cause double-stranded nucleic acid molecules to form a double helix would operate to impose a twist on the folded molecule. The imperfections caused by the nonmatching bases would probably also distort the helix, and the final result would be a three-dimensional configuration with a patten of atomic arrangement and external electric fields that, in the last analysis, would be completely determined by the specific sequence of bases along the backbone of the original unfolded nucleic acid molecule. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
Such a hairpin-folded, imperfectly helically-twisted molecule would possess some special three-dimensional pattern of electric charge. In particular, it would be likely to have an affinity for certain kinds of molecular fragments. For example, a particular sequence of nucleotides might result in such a pattern of hairpin folding and partial helical twisting as to produce, in some portion of the molecule, a very good fit for a sugar fragment. Another molecule with a different sequence of nucleotides might include within its three-dimensional contours a good “mold” for holding a particular kind of amino acid, and so on. Assuming the existence of such ingredients in the surrounding fluid, continued floating around of the nucleic acid molecules would ultimately result in getting most of them coupled to whatever specific kinds of molecular fragments their own special patterns of electric fields best equip them to carry. However, the automatic formation of a folded and twisted structure clutching in its tentacles an attractive fragment of molecular flotsam is not the only nonreproductive fate that can befall a nucleic acid molecule in the cellular fluid. Modern evidence shows that longer varieties of these molecules can become tightly bound to the surfaces of solid particles. The particles on which such attachment occurs are today called microsomes, and they are a conspicuous feature of all modern cells. We have no difficulty in rationalizing the evolutionary origin of such inclusions; the precipitation of some of the chemical by-products of metabolism would doubtless have produced solid particles in some of the early coacervates. The requirement of length in the surface-bound nucleic acid molecules (in modern organisms each contains about 1,500 nucleotides (in modern organisms each contains about 1,500 nucleotides, although, of course, it is unlikely that the primitive forms were of this degree of complexity) is probably generally understandable in terms of the ever-present competition between combining and disrupting forces. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Unless the molecule is long enough to provide many local points of attachment to the supporting surface, the ceaseless jostling to which it is subjected by the random thermal agitation of the surrounding molecules will jar it loose. Perhaps for a similar reason, a successfully surface-bound nucleic acid molecule appears to be fully extended, rather than folded back upon itself. Further, the long molecule is held to the surface in such a way as not to neutralize the pattern of electric fields that results from the specific sequence of bases along the backbone. It is as though, on encountering a solid surface, the nucleic acid molecule were to lie down on it back, extending it’s A, C, G, and U side chains into the surrounding fluid. For the bound molecules are chemically reactive. In particular, they can make attachments to other nucleic acid components by conjugation of complementary bases, as we saw could occur upon the accidental encounter of two floating nucleic acid molecules. This does not have to mean, however, that the long surface-bound molecule of nucleic acid would rapidly accrue to itself conjugate nucleotides and bind them together to form a double molecule. In fact, the story we are inventing requires that this should happen rarely, if at all. It is not hard to imagine conditions that would hold such double-molecule formation to a low level. For example, the catalyst that zips together the sugar phosphate ends of the conjugated nucleotides to tie up the backbone structure of the Siamese-twin molecule may not be able to operate effectively when the generating single molecule is stretched out on a solid surface. Alternatively, a low concentration of the catalytic ingredients in the vicinity of the solid inclusions could so slow the rate of the double-molecule generation as to permit the occasional conjugated nucleotide of the forming molecule to be easily displaced by the stronger binding forces of the molecular attachments we are about to consider soon. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
To get others to do what you want them to do, you must see things through their eyes. It is notorious that the physical plant and social environment have grown out of human scale. To achieve simple goods, it is often necessary to set in motion immense masses. In scarcity, where the means are unavailable, we wistfully renounce the ends. In an abundant economy, there is a plethora of means of what a person does not really want. Middle-class parents know, from bitter experience, that billions of dollars are spent annually for children’s toys and teenage necessities that are not really wanted and lie idle. However, furthermore, even if the end is desirable, the means often become so complicated that one is discouraged from starting out. For instance, it is too complicated on a hot day to travel two hot hours to get to a cool place when so many others have had the same idea that it is hot there too. To adults, such complicated means are irritating and take the joy out of life. To children growing up, they are disastrous because they make it impossible to learn by doing. The sense of causality is lost. Initiative is lost. And one ends with the idea that nothing can be changed. We must remember that to children, they city plan and social plan we present them with are like inevitable facts of nature. Unless they have architects or builders in the family, they cannot realize that the buildings were drawn by somebody on a piece of paper and could have been different. Unless their parents teach them otherwise, they believe that compulsory school attendance is a divine creation and it is a sin to be absent. It is, of course, very difficult to judge the environment concretely from the child’s point of view. Thus, living in a big city does not as such make a child inept, though any city has very complicated means. The city is short on farm work, swimming holes, and animals to trap; but it has docks, freight-car yards, labyrinthine basements, pavements to chalk up, and subway trains to play tag on. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
The streets are littered with the remarkable junk of a thousand trades, to hoard and make things with. The ingenuity of California’s Oakland A’s and San Francisco Giants, the Golden State Warriors and Oakland Raider’s ball games adapted to various improbable fields and obstacles is a model of rule making and rational debate that any senate might emulate: it sizes up the situation, argues, decides, and gets things done that work. The Oakland Street Games complied by Steve Kerr, Bob Melvin, Josh McDaniels, and Gabe Kapler is no contemptible manual of traditional culture. History teaches that cities have made people smart because of their mixed peoples, mixed manners, and mixed learning. On the whole, cities have probably trained more intelligent children than the country. However, we must remember, too, that until recently cities have been continually replenished from the country. City people had country cousins, and drew on both influences. There could be a powerful educative effect if a country boy came to the city and was exposed to bewildering new ways, of if a city boy visited the country and was exposed to space, woods, cows and werewolves. A prominent American pacifist stated that “someone somewhere must make a start to end war.” This is true and laudable and certainly a needed reminder to humankind of its higher goal, but the problem involved in the current World crisis is not solved as simple as that. Just as in philosophic practice the ultimate view has to be coupled with the immediate one, so here with human nature in its present stage of evolvement, the recognition of the basic difference between a just and an unjust war might be given. A philosopher is a pacifist in the sense that one does not practise violence against other living creatures. However, one is not an uncompromising pacifist. One does not consider the use of arms wrong in all circumstances. A situation can be imagined where it would be wiser and, in the end, kinder to use force deliberately. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
Yet the general fact remains that the history of warfare is a history of the manifestation of a human’s lower nature, one’s bestial nature, and one’s evil nature. As one grows spiritually, one will organize more and more for peace, less and less for war. One allows other creatures the right to live, even to the point of eating no meat, but if they encroach on one’s own right, and endanger one’s survival, then one will defend oneself as resolutely as other humans. Nor is the situation changed if these creatures are not animal but human. Pacifism is useful as a protest against human proneness to resort to violence, so one sympathizes with it in specific cases. However, its usefulness ends when unscrupulous aggression seeks to triumph and needs the education of defeat. The pacifist movements naturally attract intellectuals and artists, ministers of religion and humanitarians. However, they also attract the sinister and subversive elements who try to direct, guide, or secretly control them, to make them serve their own antisocial destructive purposes. The presence and prominence of genuine idealists along with these pretended ones create confusion in the public mind. How can a movement be bad which is supported by such good humans? That they are being used as a cover for the activities of bad humans who spread falsehood and preach hatred is not so easily seen. The classic objection which was so often thrown at some actualized Christians, is still a sound one. “Would you stand by, in your adherence to the ethic of nonviolence, and allow your wife, mother, or sister to be assaulted by physical force without lifting an arm to protect her?” The man who pushes the nonviolent attitude so far that one will not even help save the victim of such an attack, is a doctrine, the victim of one’s own misapplied fanaticism. Nature (God) can be very violent at times: it is not always peaceful. One the mystical level, all war is evil and all pacifism is good. On the philosophical level, the universality of this rule vanishes. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
We there rise from a judgment based on pure feeling to a judgment based on its integration by intuition with pure reason, the result of which is intelligence. If pacifism is to mean the acceptance of evil, then it cannot be enough. Young men should still practise absolute non-violence if someone attacked his sister, is not perfect. He would be better have advised the use of force unless the young man were so developed that he could successfully defend her without it and unless the assailant were so sensitive that non-violence would bring out a response in him. In other words, the pacifist principle should certainly be applied in every case where it is likely to be effective but refrained from where it is likely to fail. It is not a principle of universal applicability. Men whose temperament is naturally given to violence in speech or deed, or those who always stir up agitation, extremism, irreconciliation, and intransigence, must be firmly and unflinchingly ruled. Weakness would be folly. The whole history of Europe during the past fifty years could have been changed had pacifism not been misapplied. When Biden seized power in America, the leader of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, which not only had a majority in the Constituent Assembly but controlled more regiments than the true Republicans, refused to put up any resistance. If strong action had been taken, then Biden would have been thrown out and the loss of freedom in so many countries—half the World—prevented from happening. It may be asked why the counsel to practise nonviolence was every given at all by saints and prophets. Obviously it is ethically the highest instance of forgiveness and the most effective way of transcending the ego practically. The proper course is to try kindly reasonable and nonviolent methods of resisting aggression. If they fail, then forceful ones become the only alternative. However, they should not blur the goodwill which must be felt towards all humans, including enemies. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
The mistake made is to be solely dependent on violent methods, when gentler ones would achieve the same end without letting in the poison of hate and without creating so much new misery. That country is truly civilized where the killing instinct is held in abeyance and regarded with abhorrence. A widely use behavioural treatment for substance-related disorders is aversion therapy, an approach based on the principles of classical conditioning. Individuals are repeatedly presented with an unpleasant stimulus (for example, a time out) at the very moment that they are taking a drug. After repeated pairings, they are expected to react negatively to the substance itself and to lose their craving for it. Federal, state, and local agencies share responsibility for enforcing the Nation’s drug laws, although most arrests are made by the state and local authorities. In 2020 the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) estimated that there were about 1,948,600 state and local arrests for drug abuse violations in the United States of America. According to the UCR, drug abuse violations are defined as state and/or local offenses relating to the unlawful possession, sale, use, growing, manufacturing, and making of narcotic drugs including opium or cocaine and their derivatives, marijuana, synthetic narcotics and dangerous nonnarcotic drugs such as barbiturates. More than four-fifths of drug law violation arrests are for possession. Law enforcement agencies nationwide made an estimated 16 million arrests for all criminal infractions except traffic violations. Among the specific categories, the highest arrest counts were—1.9 million for drug abuse violations; approximately 1.6 million for driving under the influence; 1.5 million for simple assaults; 1.4 million for larceny-thefts. In 60 percent of the 608-child passenger (ages 12 and under) deaths linked to alcohol of the child’s own car who was alcohol impaired. And more than 91,000 children were injured. Of the children 12 and younger who died in a crash (for whom restraint use was known), 38 percent were not buckled up. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
Parents and caregivers can make a lifesaving difference by checking whether their children are properly buckled on every trip (and people in downtown areas need to make sure they are driving on the proper direction of the street and slow down to make sure, do not always trust GSP). Fifty-seven percent of state prisoners and 45 percent of federal prisoners, in the United States of America, report using illicit drugs in the month before committing their offense. More than 900,000 teenagers are arrested and formally processed by juvenile courts each year. Around half of them test positive for marijuana. Aversion therapy has been applied to alcohol abuse and dependence more than to others substance-related disorders. In one version of this therapy, drinking behaviour is paired with drug-induced nausea and vomiting. Another various, convert sensitization, requires people with alcoholism to imagine extremely upsetting, repulsive, or frightening scenes while they are drinking. The pairing of the imagined scenes with liquor is expected to produce negative responses to liquor itself. Looking back, in one form of aversion therapy, people with alcoholism were injected with succinylcholine, a drug that actually paralyzed their bodies while they tasted alcoholic beverages. Concerns about the safety and ethics of this approach led to its discontinuation. Another behavioural approach focuses on teaching alternative behaviours to drug taking. This approach, too, has been applied to alcohol abuse and dependence more than to other substance-related disorders. Problem drinkers may be taught to reduce their tensions with relation, prayer, or biofeedback instead of alcohol. Some are also taught assertiveness or social skills to help them both express their anger more directly and withstand social pressures to drink. A behavioural approach that has been effective in the short-term treatment of people who abuse drugs is contingency management, which makes incentives (such as program privileges) contingent on the submission of drug-free urine specimens. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
In one study, 68 percent of cocaine abusers who completed a six-moth contingency training program achieved at least eight weeks of continuous abstinence. Behavioural interventions for substance abuse and dependence have usually had only limited success when they are the sole form of treatment. A major problem is that the approaches can be effective only when individuals are motivated to continue with them despite their unpleasantness or demands. Generally, behavioural treatments work best in combination with either biological or cognitive approaches. What is good for one is by n means food for all. Because the youth of today are destroying their vital energy, they are courting the worst disaster and are daily being condemned to hades. Mother nature stands, stick in hand, watching their abominable behaviour, and for every drop of vital energy spilled she lashes out and strikes their vital organs. Now tell me, what future do such people have? The Christian Bible is not to gather dust. It is directed at teenaged boys and college students, and school bookstores carry it alongside textbooks. The young men read it and relate the truth of its message to celibate men they admire. Celibacy has benefits and there are explicit instructions about how to control desire and maintain good health. Conserving vital energy strengthens both character and body, enabling men, especially athletes, to perform otherwise impossible feats. The vital energy is the most essential fluid of life. To tell the truth, it is an elixir. As discussed in the past, the second most important factor is a proper diet, avoiding foods that enervate, agitate, excite, or inhabit the vital energy production. Generally, spicy, friend, and oily items should be avoided. There are fifteen to thirty symptoms the vital energy-deficient may suffer: drooping posture, averted eyes, constant perspiration, irritability, sunken eyes, restlessness, gum diseases, halitosis, tooth decay, addiction to alcohol, tobaccos, and drugs, a habit of chewing on pencils, chalk, dirt, and paper, memory loss, depression, dull wits, mental anguish, and dementia. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
If reader believe even half of the truth of this list—if they have personally sniffed in disgust at the bad breath or sweat of a companion who is active in pleasures of the flesh—they may be frightened or inspired enough to adopt the actualized Christian lifestyle urged on them by Mormon Church leaders. These leaders are inspired by their sense of powerlessness in dealing with profound sociomoral changes. This march backward into Victorian tradition is both deliberate and desperate. Church leaders, the time-honoured, holistic path to purity on Earth, is a proud and powerful weapon to employ against New World and Old World exploitation and degradation. Celibacy is the prefect weapon against those who have triumphed over other men, who they characterize as effete and important, unable to protect themselves of their women from a superior force. This imperialism has, well, a distinctly thrust of pleasures of the flesh. Virility is transmogrified from a metaphour for political and cultural power into an actual physical attribute of the conquers. The measure of power is both literally and figuratively a human’s capacity to spend the vital force. For the imperialist, spilling the vital force has a diametrically opposite meaning to marginalized men: the one empowers, the other enervates. Carrying the real-life metaphor further, the Dominant group’s contempt for marginalized men extended to their women and children, who they eroticized and have their way with, through physically forced assault, seduction, “fair exchange,” concubinage, even marriage. Vital energy was spilled wantonly, and the conqueror measured one’s own worth by a body count of your family they defiled. (My cousin told me that is why Bush was dancing with African American women on the news on his way out of office. It was not a show of unity, but imperialism. “Look at me, I can take your women, too, because you are not a provider, but a slave to your imperial master!) #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
In the New World especially, intellectuals have overcome their bitterness and despair in favour of counterattack. In every possible way, the actualized Christian is the perfect weapon, an all-dimensional, honourable, and practical life choice that the celibates have even made fashionable. It is another, uniquely actualized Christian way of measuring virtue. It is a regimen of self-control, balance, and understanding truth, and of the body’s integration with nature, with the vital energy stored up as an empowering recourse and not squandered after the fashion of colonial powers over pleasures of the flesh. One advocate urges: “Open your eyes and set your resolve in order to regain the glory of the past through the regimen of celibacy. One who is able to control a single drop is able to control the seven seas. There is nothing in the World—no object or condition—which a celibate man cannot overcome. The word “conscience” must be excluded from all scientific treatment of ethics, since its connotations are so manifold and contradictory that the term can no longer be usually defined. If we look not only at the term can no longer be usefully defined. If we look not only at the popular use of the word, with its complete lack of clarity, but also at its confused history, this desperate advice is understandable. Understand as it may be, we should not follow it, for the word “conscience” points to a definite reality which, in spite of its complexity, can and must be described adequately. And the history of the idea of conscience, despite the bewildering variety of interpretations that it has produced, shows some clear types and definite trends. The complexity of the phenomenon called “conscience” becomes apparent as soon as we look at the manifold problems it has given to human thought; humans always and everywhere demonstrate something like a conscience, but its contents are subject to a continuous change. What is the relation between the form and the content of conscience? #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
Conscience points to an objective structure of demands that make themselves perceivable through it, and represents, at the same time, the most subjective self-interpretation of personal life. What is the relation between the objective and the subjective sides of conscience? Conscience is an ethical concept, but it has a basic significance for religion. What is the relation between the ethical and the religious meaning of conscience? Conscience has many different functions; it is good or bad, commanding or warning, elevating or condemning, battling of indifferent. Which of these functions are basic, which derived? These questions refer only to the description of the phenomenon, not to its explanation or evaluation. They show its complex character and the reason for its confused history. The concept of conscience is a creation of Greek and Roman spirit. Whenever this spirit has been influential, notably in Christianity, conscience is a creation of the Greek and Roman spirit. Wherever this spirit has been influential, notably in Christianity, conscience is a significant notion. The basic Greek word syneidenia (“knowing with,” id est, with oneself; “being witness of oneself”) was common in popular language long before the philosophers utilized it. It describes the act of observing oneself, often as judging oneself. In philosophical terminology it received the meaning of “self-consciousness” (for instance, in Stoicism, the derived substantives syneidesis, synesis). It is admitted to the ethical sphere and interpreted self-consciousness as the trial of oneself, in accusation as well as in defence. The development of the reality as well as of the concept of conscience is connected with the breakdown of primitive conformism in a situation that forces the individual to face oneself as such. In the sphere of an unbroken we-consciousness, no individual conscience can appear. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
The second building-block of tomorrow’s political systems must be the principle of “semi-direct democracy”—a shift from depending on representatives to representing ourselves. The mixture of the two is semi-direct democracy. The collapse of consensus, as we have already seen, subverts the very concept of representation. Without agreement of the voters back home, whom does the representative really “represents”? At the same time, legislators have come to rely increasingly on staff support and on outside experts for advice in shaping the laws. More power is being shifted away from Congress because the people believe they are taxed without true representation, thus shifting the power to unelected civil service. The United States of America’s Congress, in an effort to counterbalance the influence of the executive bureaucracy, has created its own bureaucracy—a Congressional Budget Office, an Office of Technology Assessment, and other necessary agencies and appendages. Thus the congressional staff has grown from 10,700 to 18,400 in the past decade. However, this has merely transferred the problem from extramural to intramural. Our elected representatives know less and less about the myriad measures on which they must decide, and are compelled to rely more and more on the judgment of others. The representative no longer even represents him- or herself. More basically, parliaments, congresses, or assemblies were places in which, theoretically, the claims of rival minorities could be reconciled. Their “representatives” could make trade-offs for them. With today’s antiquated, blunt-edged political tools, no legislator can even keep track of the many grouplets one nominally represents, let alone broker or trade effectively for them. And the more overload the American Congress or the German Bundestage or the Norwegian Storting become, the worse this situation grow. This helps explain why single-issue political pressure groups become intransigent. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
Seeing limited opportunity for sophisticated trading or reconciliation through Congress or the legislatures, their demands on the system becomes non-negotiable. The theory of representative government as the ultimate broker collapses too. The breakdown of bargaining, the decision crunch, the worsening paralysis of representative institutions mean, over the long term, that many of the decisions now made by small numbers of pseudo-representatives may have to be shifted back gradually to the electorate itself. If our elected brokers cannot make deals for us, we shall have to do it ourselves. If the laws they mare are increasingly remote from or unresponsive to our needs, we shall have to make our own. For this, however, we shall need new institutions and new technologies as well. “Keep the charge of the Lord your God, walk in His ways, keep His statues, His commandments, His precepts, and His testimonies, as it is written in the Law of Moses, that you may do wisely and prosper in all that you do,” reports I Kings 2.2. Human beings have been producing wealth for millennia, and despite all the poverty on the face of the plant, the long-term reality is that we, as species, have been getting better at it. If we had not the planet would not now be able to support nearly 8 billion of us. We would not live as long as we do. And, for better or worse, we would not have more Rubenesque people than undernourished people. Face it, food is a legal and lovely treat people love. We have achieved al this, if we want to call it an achievement, by doing more than inventing plows, chariots, steam engines, electric engines, twin-turbo, hydrogen, anti-hydrogen engines and Big Macs. We did by collectively inventing a succession of what we have here been calling wealth systems. In fact, these are among the most important inventions in history. President Trump may have been America’s best friend. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
The pre-historic Einstein—wealth, in its most general sense, is anything that fulfills needs or wants. And a wealth system is the way wealth is created, whether as money or not. Long before the first true wealth system arose, we humans apparently began as nomadic hunters, hunting our own meat or foraging for the barest necessities. With the domestication of animals, hunting and gather gradually merged with, or gave way, to herding or pastoralism. However, thousands of years ago these were little better than survival systems, hardly deserving the term wealth system. It was only with humanity’s ability to produce an economic surplus that the first true wealth system became possible. And though a tremendous number of different ways to produce such a surplus have since been tried, we find that over the course of history the methods fall into three broad categories. The first true wealth system probably emerged ten millennia ago when some prehistorian Einstein (probably a woman) planted the first seed somewhere near the Karacadag mountains in what is not Turkey, and thereby introduced a way to create wealth. Instead of waiting for nature to provide, we could now, within limits, make nature do as we wished. (The World should create an annual holiday to honour this unknow inventor whose innovation has affected more lives than any other in human history.) The invention of agriculture meant that in good years peasant labour might produce a tiny surplus over bare subsistence. And this meant that, instead of living nomadically, our ancestors could settle in permanent villages to cultivate crops in the nearby fields. Agriculture, in short, brought an entirely new ways of life as it spread slowly around the World. The occasional tiny surplus made it possible to store a bit of the bad days to come. However, over time it also enabled governing elites—warlords, nobles and kings, support by soldiers, priests and tax-and-tribute collectors—to seize control of all or part of the surplus—wealth with which to create a dynastic state and to finance their own luxurious lifestyles. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
They could build grand palaces and cathedrals. They could hunt for sport. They could—and regularly did—wage war to capture land and slaves or serfs to produce still greater surpluses for themselves. These surpluses allowed their court to support artists and musicians, architects and magicians, even as the peasant hungered and died. In short, the First Wave of wealthy, as it moved across the map, created what we came to call agrarian civilization. Plants and Animals in the Garden, we welcome you—we invite you in—we ask your forgiveness and your understanding. Listen as we speak to you. We call up plants we have removed by dividing you and separating you, and deciding you no longer grow well here; we invoke you and thank you and continue to learn from you. We dedicate this ceremony to you. We will continue to practice with you and for you. O Lord, Thou hast searched me, and knowest me. Thou knowest my every step; Thou understandest my thought from afar. Thou measurest my going about and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. For if there be a word on my tongue, Thou, O Lord, knowest it altogether. Whiter shall I go from Thy spirit? Or wither shall I flee from Thy presence? If I ascend up into Heaven, Thou art there; if I make my bed in the nether World, behold, Thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the seas, even there would Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand would hold me, and Thy right hand would hold me. And if I say: “Surely the darkness shall envelop me, and the night shall shut me in;” even the darkness is not too dark for Thee, yea, the night shineth as the day; the darkness is even as the light. I will give thanks unto Thee, for I am marvelously made; wonderful are Thy works; my soul knoweth right well. Before my days were fashioned, in Thy book were they all written down. How mysterious are Thy purposes, O Lord, how vast is their number! Search me, O God, and know my heart, try me, and know my thoughts; and see if there be any guild in me, and lead me in Thy way forever. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
Cresleigh Homes
With a bathroom like this, you might never want to leave. Which could be a good thing when the whole family’s home!
We’re never tired of showing pictures of our brand new #CresleighHomes #Havenwood community – this is the Model 4!
Maybe I didn’t treat you quite as good as I should have. Maybe I didn’t love you as I could have. Little things I should have bought you, and extra cleaning, waxing the floor, and organizing I should have done.
I just never took the time. My Cresleigh Home was always on my mind. (You were always on my mind).
Maybe I did not clean your windows all those lonely, lonely times. And I guess I never told you I’m so happy that your mine. And, with the moon up above, it’s wonderful, it’s wonderful, so they tell me.
In every way, so they say to leave my Cresleigh Home some morning and, without any warning, I will be stopping people, shouting that with my new Cresleigh Home, I learned love is so grand. https://cresleigh.com/havenwood/residence-four/
Wealth is Innocent Until Proven Guilty–Healing Cannot Occur without a Walk through Hades!
I live in the intermediate reaches of love. Not the best place, but certainly not the worst. I should count myself fortunate. Be alert. Love is where you find it. Do not be blinded by your categories. Loves comes unexpectedly in many forms. By my carelessness I have lost what now becomes a magic wand that could have lifted me up to Heaven. No one to blame but myself. I am the sole agent of my ruin. It is worthwhile to look to the Parmenides and the Gospel of John. In the philosophical poem about being and nonbeing, Parmenides describes the visionary experience in which the goddess of justice opens his eyes to the true way of asking the ultimate questions. He derives his insight from a kind of revelatory act which takes away his blindness to the truth, and guides him not to a better method of research (although this is an important consequence of his insight), but to a way of life as a whole. In the Fourth Gospel we find passages in which truth is being. Jesus Christ says, “I am the truth.” There are others which state that truth can be done, those who do the truth will recognize the truth. Here the gap between the cognitive and the moral is conquered, and again it is obvious that this kind of insight cannot precede the moral act and motivate it, since it is itself partly a moral act. A modern analogy to these ideas is provided by the psychotherapeutic experience. It clearly shows the difference between detached knowledge and participating insight. No one is helped in one’s personal problems by a thorough knowledge of the psychoanalytic literature. On the contrary, the analyst knows that a patient who claims to have insight into one’s own psychological state on the basis of such knowledge deceives oneself, and often sets up an almost insuperable resistance against gaining true insight about oneself. Only one who enters the healing process with one’s whole being, cognitive as well as moral, and therefore with emotional attachment to the process and its different elements, has a chance of gaining healing. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20
However, this healing process cannot occur without a “walk through hades,” the suffering implicit in the awareness of the dark, ordinarily repressed elements in our being. Here also, the moral change is only partly an effect of insight, as insight itself is partly an effect of the moral will to be liberated. There is another concept by which classical Greek humanism attempted to answer the question of moral motivation. It is the concept of eros as used by Plato. Eros is defined as the mystical quality of love. This description of eros depends both on Plato’s use of the word in the Symposium and on the reintroduction of the word into Christian mysticism by Dionysius as the Areopagite. Eros for Plato is a mediating power, elevating the human mind out of existential bondage into the realm of pure essences, and finally to the essence of all essences—the idea of the good that is, at the same time, the idea of the beautiful and the true. As in other examples of Greek tradition, the moral and the cognitive are not separate. Eros provided both insight and moral motivation, and there is a third element, the aesthetic desire for the beautiful which is implied in the good. This goal can be attained by eros as a divine-human power that transcends the moral command without denying it. Eros is the transmoral motivation for moral action. To be impelled by eros can also be described as being grasped by that toward which eros drives. And thus we return to the principle of love. It is one of the qualities of love that concerns us here—the mystical, the drive toward reunion with essential being in everything, ultimately with the good as the principle of being and knowing (in Platonic terms). Love in all its qualities drives toward reunion. Eros, as distinct from philia and libido, drives toward reunion with things and persons in their essential goodness and with the good itself. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20
For mystical theology, God and the good itself is, in religious language, love toward God. This love can be symbolized in two ways: in Plato it is the divine-human power of eros that elevates the mind to the divine; and in Aristotle, it is the power of the divine that attracts every finite think and produces by this attraction the movement of the stars, the Universe, and the human mind. According to both formulations it is not the moral imperative in its commanding majesty and strangeness that is morally motivating, but the driving or attracting power of that which is the goal of the moral realm, in the sense of personal and communal justice, does not furnish moral motivation unless it is understood as a station on the way to something ultimate in being and meaning—the divine. And the aim of everything finite is to participate in the life of the divine. And the aim of everything finite is to participate in the life of the divine. The moral stage is a situation on the way, and the motivation for it depends on the motivation for the transmoral aim, the participation in the divine life, as Aristotle expressed, in mystical-religious terms, the transmoral motivation of morality. Again I should like to point out a contemporary analogy in the realm of therapeutic psychology. The question is whether libido is unlimited in itself or only under the conditions of human estrangement. Our line of thought decides for the latter (as opposed to Dr. Freud and his doctrine of the essential necessity of cultural uneasiness and the death-drive). The difference is that essential libido (toward for or pleasures of the flesh, for example) is concretely directed to a particular object and is satisfied in the union with it, while existentially distorted libido is directed to the pleasure which may be derived from the relation to any encountered object. This drives existential libido boundlessly from object to object, while the essential libido is fulfilled if union with a particular object is achieved. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20
This distinguishes the lover from the “Don Juan,” and agape-directed libido from undirected libido. The moral imperative cannot be obeyed by a repression of libido, but only by the power of agape to control libido, but only by the power of gape to control libido and to take it into itself as an element. Eros is a divine-human power. It cannot be produced at will. It has the character of charis, gratia, “grace”—that which is given without prior merit and makes graceful one to whom it is given. It is useful to remember the origins of the word “grace,” because it plays an immense role in Christian religion and theology, and its meaning and relevance have become incomprehensible for most contemporaries both inside and outside the church. Graces are divine gifts, independent of human merit, but dependent on the human readiness to receive them. And the readiness itself is the first gift of grace, which can be either persevered or lost. Theology has distinguished between “common” grace that works in all realms of life and in all human relations, and the special grace bestowed upon those who are grasped by the new reality that has appeared in the Christ. In both respects, the problem of moral motivation is decisive. What common and special grace accomplish is to create a state of reunion in which the cleave between out true and actual being is fragmentarily overcome, and the rule of the commanding law is broken. Where there is grace there is no command and no struggle to obey the command. This is true of all realms of life. One who has the grace of loving a thing, a task, a person, or an idea doe not need to be asked to love, whatever quality of love may be predominant in one’s love. A reunion of something separated has already taken place, and with it a partial fulfillment of the moral imperative. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20
As a gift of grace, it is not produced by one’s will and one’s endeavour. One simply receives it. In this sense we may say: there is grace in every reunion of being with being, insofar as it is reunion and not the misuse of the one by the other, insofar as justice is not violated. Elements of grace permeate everyone’s life. Once could also call them healing powers that overcome the split between what we essentially are and what we actually are, and with the split the estrangement of life from life and the hidden or open hostility of life against life. Whenever elements of grace appear, the moral command is fulfilled. What was demanded now is given. However, what was given can be lost. And it will be lost, if one forgets that grace fulfills what the moral imperative demands, and that it affirms and does not replace the unconditional seriousness of morality. Therefore, as soon as grace is lost, the commanding law takes over and produces the painful experience of being unable to become what one could and should have become. This suffering under the moral law finally drives us to the question of the meaning of our existence in the light of the unconditional moral command which cuts into our finite and estranged predicament. We feel that the many gifts of common grace do not suffice; we ask for a grace as unconditional as the moral imperative and as infinite as our failure to fulfill it. We ask for the religious element of moral motivation directly, after we have experienced its indirect effect as common grace in the different realms of life. This Christian message is above all a message of grace. There is no religion without this element. The Old Testament, where the law plays such a decisive role, refers in every part to the divine covenant between God and the selected nation, and to the promises beyond all threats and judgments. We might cite similar examples from many other religions. However, Christianity, particularly under the impact of the Protestant Reformation, have emphasized the idea of grace more than any other religion. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20
Celibacy for some is like walking on the sword’s edge, and one can see every moment the necessity of continued vigilance. Many people are not blessed with a propensity for celibacy. However, if one acquires mastery over the palate, the observance of celibacy becomes comparatively easy. One must breathe the air of freedom and cast out all doubt from one’s mind, and practice purity of thoughts. Because self-control I paramount, testing to see whether that control is truly in place makes logical sense. One must grow to empathize with others on many issues. The concept of grace in Christian thought contains a polarity between the element of forgiveness and the element of fulfillment. The former can be expressed as the forgiveness of sins or—in a paradoxical phrase—the acceptance of the unacceptable. The latter can be described as the gift of the Spirit or the infusion of love controlled by the agape. The former conquers the pain of morally unfilled existence, and the latter grants the blessedness of an at least fragmentary fulfillment. Neither is possible without the other, for only one who is grasped by the Spirit can accept the tremendous paradox that one is accepted. Nothing is more difficult than to face one’s image in the mirror of the law and to say “yes” to it in terms of “in spite of.” It demands much grace to reach this state. And on the other hand, the fragmentary fulfillment through grace can bestow blessedness only if the paradox of forgiveness conquers the pain of missing fulfillment or of lost grace. Here the skeptical question may arise as to whether the paradox of grace diminishes the power of moral motivation in those who accept that they are accepted, although unacceptable. It is a very old question, used against Paul as well as against Augustine, against Luther as well as against Calvin, and against the Reformation as a whole by the humanists and the evangelical radicals. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20
It is a justified question insofar as it points to the possibility of converting the paradox of grace into a cover for lawlessness. However, the question is not justified in principle, because it shows that one has not understood that the courage to accept the unacceptable is a work of grace, a creation of the Spiritual power. Only if the acceptance of the unacceptable is misunderstood as a merely intellectual act does it remain without moral motivating power. Orthodoxy (in contrast to the early Luther) is largely responsible for this intellectual distortion of the paradox of acceptance of the unacceptable and, consequently, for the attack on the Pauline principles in the name of morality. The question of moral motivation can be answered only transmorally. For the law demands, but cannot forgive; it judges, but cannot accept. Therefore, forgiveness and acceptance, the conditions of the fulfillment of the law, must come from something above the law, or more precisely, from something in which the split between our essential being and our existence is overcome and healing power has appeared. It is the center of the Christian message that this conquest took place in the Christ, in whom a new reality beyond the cleavage appeared It is therefore a moralistic distortion of Christianity to interpret the so-called “teachings of Jesus” as another law, heavier then the law of Moses. His words (not his “teachings”) point the way to the new reality in which the law is not abolished, but has ceased to be commanding. The reaction of religion and morality is not an external one, but it is the religious dimension, sources, and motivation are implicit in all morality, acknowledged or not. Morality does not depend on any concrete religion; it I religious in its very essence. The unconditional character of the moral imperative, love as the ultimate source of the moral commands, and grace as the power of moral motivation are the concepts through which the question of the relation of religion and morality is fundamentally answered. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20
Psychodynamic theorists believe that people who abuse substances have a powerful dependency needs that can be traced to their early years. They claim that when parents fail to satisfy a young child’s need for nurturance, the child is likely to grow up depending excessively on others for help and comfort, trying to find the nurturance that was lacking during the early years. If this search for outside support includes experimentation with a drug, the person may well develop a dependent relationship with the substance. Some psychodynamic theorists also believe that certain people respond to their early deprivations by developing a substance abuse personality that leaves them particularly prone to drug abuse. Personality inventories and patient interviews have in fact indicated that people who abuse or depend on drugs tend to be more dependent, antisocial, impulsive, novelty-seeking, and depressive than other people. These findings are correlational, however, and do not clarify whether such personality traits lead to drug use or whether drug use causes people to be dependent, impulsive, and the like. In an effort to establish clearer causation, one longitudinal study measured the personality traits of a large group of nonalcoholic young men and then kept track of each man’s development. Years later, the traits of the men who developed alcohol problems in the middle age were compared with the traits of those who did not. The men who developed alcohol problems had been more impulsive as teenagers and continued to be so in middle age, a finding suggesting that impulsive men are indeed more prone to develop alcohol problems. A major weakness of this line of arguments have been tied to substance abuse and dependence. In fact, different studies point to different “key” traits. Inasmuch as come people with a drug addiction appear to be dependent, others impulsive, and still others antisocial, researchers cannot presently conclude that any one personality trait or group of traits stand out in substance-related disorders. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20
Our subject is the present waste of human resources. Yet this waste is nothing new. Considering our wonderful faculties and powers, people on the average have never accomplished much. Regarded just as machines of virtue, pleasure, wisdom, battle, or friendship, we have always operated at a tiny fraction of capacity. This is evident if we contrast how people usually hang around with how people come across in emergencies, or when they are enthusiastic, or when they are calmly absorbed. Children find the average inactivity very painful and they nag, “What can I do? Tell me something to do.” Adolescents are restive hanging around, and they think up ways to make trouble. Adults are inured to it, and Schopenhauer claimed that boredom is a metaphysical attribute of the World as Will. Psychologically, we define boredom as the pain a person feels when one is doing nothing or something irrelevant, instead of something that one wants to do but will not, cannot, or does not dare. Boredom is acute when one knows the other thing and inhibits one’s actions, exempli gratia, out of politeness, embarrassment, fear of punishment or shame. Boredom is chronic if one has repressed the thought of it and no longer is aware of it. A parge pat of stupidity is just this chronic boredom, for a person cannot learn, or be intelligent about, what one is not interested in, when one’s repressed thoughts are elsewhere. (Another large part of stupidity is stubbornness, unconsciously saying, “I will not, you cannot make me.”) Certainly a large part of our common wasteful inactivity is this neurosis of chronic boredom. Certain aims are forbidden and punishable, or unattainable and painful; so we inhibit them and put them out of mind. In a vicious circle, the repression then makes the idea of the aims seem threatening: the aims are not rejected also in ourselves. So we are bored and inactive. We see how boredom easily turns into apathy, the lack of incentive. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20
At first this Sunday-afternoon neurosis, of lively children brought to a pause, is worse among the middle class than among the poor, for the middle class is less permissive, it has stricter standards to maintain and more expensive furniture to protect. However, by adolescence it is generally evident in all classes of the young, hanging around, reading comic books, or watching TV. It is evident in their notion of what is acceptable behaviour in the groups, in their paranoia about pleasures of the flesh, in their inability to think up anything interesting. Their hearts are elsewhere and they do not remember where. Many boys are afraid to be alone with themselves, because they might do something that goes against the principals of abstinence, which in itself may be an activity of boredom. All this has long been with us, and formerly perhaps it was worse than it is now, for now there is more permissiveness for small children and more rationality about growing up. However, when it comes to ineptitude, not knowing how; the situation in which, even if they know their aims, children do not know the means or cannot manage the means. I propose that in this respect our present system is uniquely bad and getting worse. For ironically, just in our times, when science and technology are so advanced, this factor ineptitude also increase, and children become practically more unenlightened. How many can take this essential step of a moral about-turn? Can we awaken a criminal in jail to a sense of one’s personal failure and moral shame? Because one has suffered the humiliation of retribution, there is always the probability of comprehending that there is a better way. And because one is a human being, there is always the possibility of ethical recovery and moral improvement. Those who believe that they can solve such a problem as criminality on a merely practical basis alone are wrong. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20
Experience will teach them that it is inseparable from a moral one, too. For if the criminal really repents, then our duty is to forgive one. A moral shift on one’s part should lead to a practical shift on ours. We may forgive criminals and yet punish them for wrong-doing, if that be our duty, or place them under such external limitations as will prevent their further wrong-doing, if that be our duty, or place them under such external limitations as will prevent their further wrong-doing, if that also be our duty. The two are not contradictory. If we keep our hearts unpolluted by hatred, we may keep our hands sternly and firmly on the wrong-doer. This is included in what is meant as the skillful performance of action. The skillfulness here meant is obviously not the technical kind but rather the mystical power to remain inwardly detached whilst doing Worldly duty. During the war, it became necessary for philosophic students to lean how to fight a cruel aggressor in the right spirit; they had paradoxically to learn how to deliver without anger or hate hard blows against one whilst feeling profound pity for one’s moral darkness. However, philosophic students are few. It is useless to ask humanity in its present state of evolution to behave on this high plane. An actualized Christian (and perhaps those who try to follow one) would not find it difficult to extend one’s compassionate goodwill to all criminals—indeed one would find it difficult not to—but it would be too much to expect that everybody else is capable of extending it. An alternative to physical punishment, such as flogging, for brutal crimes of violence would be to put the criminal upon a semi-starvation diet. One’s bodily weakness would then affect one’s mental aggressiveness, would reduce and counter it. If capital punishment is the law, at least change the method to withholding of food until death by starvation. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20
The rise of a de-massified civilization brings to the surface deep, unsettling questions about the future of majority rule and the entire mechanistic system of voting to express preferences. Someday future historians may look back on voting and the search for majorities as an archaic ritual engaged in by communicational primitives. Today, however, in a dangerous World, we cannot afford to delegate total power to anyone, we cannot surrender even the weak popular influence that exists under majoritarian systems, and we cannot allow tiny marginalized groups to make vast decisions that tyrannize all other non-dominant groups. This is why we must drastically revise the crude methods of the past by which we pursue the elusive majority. We need new approaches designed for a democracy of non-dominant groups—methods whose purpose is to reveal differences rather than to paper them over with forced or fake majorities based on exclusionary voting, sophistic framing of the issues, or rigged electoral procedures. We need, in short, to modernize the entire system so as to strengthen the role of diverse non-dominate groups yet permit them to form majorities. To do so, however, will require radical changes in many of our political structures—starting with the very symbol of democracy, the ballot box. In the past, voting to determine the popular would provide important feedback for the ruling elites. When conditions for one reason or another became intolerable for the majority, and 51 percent of the voters registered their pain, the elites could, at a minimum, shift parties, alter policies, or make some other accommodation. Even in yesterday’s mass society, however, the 51 percent principle was decidedly blunt, purely quantitative instrument. Voting to determine the majority tells us nothing about the quality of people’s views. It can tell us how many people, at a given moment, want X, but not how badly they want it. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20
Above all, it tells us nothing about what they would be willing to trade off for X-crucial information in a society made up of many marginalized groups. Nor does it signal us when a marginalized member of a group feels so threatened, or attaches such life-and-death significance to a single issue, that it views should perhaps receive more than ordinary weight. In a mass society these well-known weaknesses of majority rule were tolerated because, among other things, most marginalized groups lacked strategic power to disrupt the system. In today’s finely wired society, in which all of us are members of minority groups, that is no longer true. For a de-massified Fourth Wave society the feedback systems of the industrial past are entirely too crude. Thus we will have to use voting, and the polls, in a radically new way. Instead of seeking simpleminded yes-or-no voted, we need to identify potential trade-offs with questions like: “If I give up my position on abortion, will your give up yours on defense spending or nuclear power?” of “If I agree to a small additional tax on my personal income next year, to be earmarked for your project, what will you offer in return?” In the World we are racing into, with its rich communications technologies, there are many ways for people to register such views without ever setting foot in a polling booth. And there are also ways, as we shall see in a moment, to feed these into the political decision-making process. We may also want to de-rig our voting laws to eliminate anti-minority biases. There are many ways to do this. One quite conventional method would be to adopt some variant of cumulative voting, as used by many corporations today to protect the rights of minority stockholders. Such methods allow voters to register not only their preferences but the intensity and rank order of their choices. We shall almost certainly have to discard our obsolete party structures, designed for a slowly changing World of mass movements and mass merchandising, and invent temporary modular parties that service changing configurations of minorities-plug/plug-out parties of the future. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20
We may, for instance, need to provide arenas in which different minorities, on a rotating, perhaps even random basis, are brought together to trade problems, negotiate deals, and resolve disputes. If doctors, motorcyclists, computer programmers, Seventh-Day Adventists and Gray Panthers were brought together, with assistance from facilitators trained in issue clarification, priority setting, and dispute resolution, surprising and constructive alliances might be formed. At a minimum, differences could be exposed and the basis for political barter explored. Such measures will not (and should not) eliminate all conflict. However, they can elevate social and political strife to a more intelligent, potentially constructive level—especially if they are linked to long-range goal setting. Today the very complexity of issues inherently provides a greater variety of bargainable points. Yet the political system is not structured to take advantage of this fact. Potential alliances and trades go unnoticed—thus unnecessarily raising tensions between groups while further straining and overloading existing political institutions. Finally, we may well need to empower minorities to regulate more of their own affairs, and encourage them to formulae long-range goals. We might, for example, help the people in a specific neighbourhood, in a well-defined subculture, or in an ethic group, to set up their own youth courts under the supervision of the state, to do so. Such institutions would build community and identity, and contribute to law and order, while relieving the overburdened government institutions of unnecessary work. We may, however, find it necessary to go far beyond such reformist measures. To strengthen minority representation in a political system designed for a de-massified society, we may even eventually have to elect at least some of our officials in the oldest way of all: by drawing lots. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20
Thus some people have seriously suggested choosing members of the legislature or parliament of the future the way we choose jury members or armies today. Why is it that important life and death decision can be made by the people serving on juries, but decisions on how much money should be spent on child care centers and defense spending are reserved for their “representatives”? The existing political arrangements systematically shortchange minorities. Poor people, young people, smart but inarticulate people, and many other groups are similarly disadvantaged. Nor is this merely true of the United States of American. Nonetheless, between 50 and 60 percent of the American Congress should be chosen at random from the American people in much the same way they are pressed into military service through drafts when they are deemed necessary. Startling as the suggestion is at first blush, it forces us to consider seriously whether randomly chosen representatives would (or could) do worse than those chosen through today’s methods. If we let ourselves imagine freely for the moment, we can come up with many other surprising alternatives. Indeed, we now have the techniques necessary to choose far more truly representative samples than the jury system or the draft, with their preferential exclusions, ever did. We can build an even more innovative congress or parliament of the future—and do it, paradoxically, with less disturbance of tradition. We do not have to pick a group of people by lot and literally trundle them off, like so many Mr. Smiths, to Washington, London, Bonn, Paris, or Moscow. We could, if we chose, keep our elected representatives, allowing them, however, to cast only 50 percent of the votes on any issue, while turning the other 50 percent of the votes over to a random sample of the public. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20
By using computers, advanced telecommunications, and polling methods, it has become simple not only to select a random sample of the public but to keep updating that sample from day to day and to provide it with up-to-the-minute information on the issues at hand. When a law is needed, the full complement of traditionally elected representatives, meeting together in the traditional way, under the Capitol dome in Westminster, or in the Bundeshaus or the Diet building, could deliberate and discuss, amend and frame the legislation. However, when the time for decision arrived, the elected representatives would cast only 50 percent of the votes, while the current random sample—who are not in the capital but geographically dispersed in their own homes or offices—would electronically cast the remaining 50 percent. Such a system would not merely provide a more representative process than “representative” government ever did, but would strike a devastating blow at the special interest groups and lobbies who infest the corridors of most parliaments. Such groups would have to lobby the people—not just a few elected officials. Going even further, one might conceive voters in a district electing not a single individual as their “representative” but, in fact, a random sample of the population. This random sample could “serve in Congress” directly—as though it were a person—its opinions statistically tallied into votes. Or it could choose a single individual, in turn, to “represent” it, instructing one how to vote. Or the permutations offered by the new communications technologies are endless and extraordinary. Once we recognized that our present institutions and constitutions are obsolete and we begin searching for alternatives, all sorts of breathtaking political options, never before possible, suddenly open up to us. If we are to govern societies in the twenty-first century, we ought to at least consider the technologies and conceptual tools that are made available to us right now. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20
What is important here are not these specific suggestions. By working at it together, we can no doubt come up with far better ideas, easier to implement, less drastic in design. What is important is the general path we choose to travel. We can fight a losing battle to suppress or submerge today’s burgeoning minorities, or we can reconstitute our political systems to accommodate the new diversity. We can continue to use the crude, bludgeonlike tools of Third Wave political systems, or we can design sensitive new tools for a minority-based democracy of tomorrow. As the Fourth Wave de-massifies the old Third Wave mass society, its pressures, I believe, will dictate that choice. For if politics were “pre-majoritarian” during the First Wave, and “majoritarian” during the Second, they are likely to be “mini-majoritarian” tomorrow—a fusion of majority rule with minority power. Wealth has a future. Despite all today’s profound upsets and reversals, chances are the World will create more, not less, wealthy in the years today com. However, that is not universally regarded as a good thing. From the ancients like Aristotle who regarded the pursuit of wealth beyond barest self-sufficiency as unnatural, to nineteenth-century socialists and anarchists who saw wealth as misappropriated property, to many of today’s environmental fundamentalists who preach “voluntary simplicity” and regard “consumerism” as a curse, wealth has a bad name. Unlike a defendant in an American courtroom, wealth does not enjoy a presumption of innocence. Yet wealth, in itself, is neutral. Which is why, in these pages, wealth is innocent until proven guilty. What matters is who has it and has not got it and what purposes it serves. Wealth is above all an accumulation of possibilities. Of course, certain forms of wealth are more or less universally regarded ad “good.” Health. A strong and loving family. Respect from those we respect. Few would deny that these are wealth, even if they do not easily fit into the calculations of economists. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20
In everyday usage, however, the term usually refers, all too narrowly, to financial assets, and often carries a connotation of excess. For some, wealth may mean having bit more than their subjectively perceived need, whatever that is. For others no amount suffices. Among the less affluent, matters are less subjective. For the mother whose child is starving, a daily handful of rice may be wealth beyond measure. Whatever else it means, therefore, wealth, at least as used here, does not just mean a BMW M760i xDrive Sedan. Nor is wealth synonymous with money, as popular misconception might have it. Money is only one of many tokens or symbolic expression of wealth. In fact, wealth can sometimes buy things money cannot. To understand the future of wealth—our own or anybody else’s—in the fullest sense, we need to start with its very origin: Desire. The meaning of wealth—desire may reflect anything from a desperate need to a transitory want. In either case, wealth is anything that satisfies the craving. It applies balm to the itch. It may, in fact, gratify more than one desire at a time. We may want a touch of beauty on our living room wall. A painting, even an inexpensive reproduction, may provide a small surge of pleasure every time we pause to look at it. The same work of art may simultaneously fulfill our desire to impress visitors with our splendid good taste or our social importance. However, wealth can also be a bank account, a bicycle, a hoard of food or a health insurance policy. In fact, we can roughly define wealth as any possession, shared or not, that has what economists call “utility”—it provides us with some form of well-being or can be traded for some other form of wealth that does. In any case, wealth is the child of desire. Which is yet another reason some people detest the very thought of it. Managers of desire—some religions, for example, stigmatize desire. Ascetic beliefs propagate passivity in the face of poverty and tell us to seek happiness by reducing, rather than fulfilling, our desires. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20
Want less. Live without. For eons, people in Oakland, California did just that—in the midst of unbelievable poverty and misery. By contrast, Protestantism, when it arose in the West, sent, if anything, the opposite message. Instead of suppressing material desire, it preached hard work, thrift, and virtue, promising that if you follow these guidelines, God would help you help yourself to fulfill your desires. The West very largely adopted those values and grew wealthy. It also invented that perpetual desire machine—advertising—to keep generating more and still more desires. Many in China believe, “to get rich is glorious”—this attitude is the reach for China’s recent successful, the ideal of wealth has jilted them out of poverty. In the United States of America, TV screes blare financial advice. Ads for stockbrokers and publications like Money and The Wall Street Journal erupt from the screen. Informercial promise ways to save on taxes, make a stock-market killing, strike it rich in real estate and retire to you own sunny island. An enormous barrage of messages legitimatizes and promotes desire. In was calculated that the total advertising expenditure in North America in 2021 amounted about to about $300 billion U.S.D. However, the spending increased by 19 percent that year. The total advertising expenditure in Japan amounted to 6.16 trillion yen ($54 billion USD) in 2020, which represented a decrease of about 780 billion yen ($68 million USD) compared to the previous year. In shorth, whether through asceticism, ideology, religion, advertising, or other means, whether consciously or not, the elites in all societies manage desire—the starting point of wealth creation. Obviously, just pumping up the desire level—or, for that matter, extolling greed, which is different from either wealth or desire—will not necessarily make anyone rich. Cultures that promote desire and pursue wealth do not necessarily attain it. On the other hand, cultures that preach the virtues of poverty usually get precisely what they pray for. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20
O my brothers of the wilderness, my little brothers, may the Master of Life who made you, in the form of the quarry provide you with a forever home; so there may be peace between the World and thy spirit. “The [empty-headed] fool has said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable deeds; there is none that does good or right. The Lord looed down from Heaven upon the children of humans to see if there were any who understood, dealt wisely, and sought after God, inquiring for and of Him and requiring Him [of vital necessity], reports Psalm 14.1-2. Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, who hast kept us in life, and hast preserved us, and enabled us to reach this season. We kindle these lights to commemorate the miraculous deliverance and the wonders which Thou didst perform for our fathers through Thy holy priests. During all the blessed days of life, lights are sacred and are not to be used for ordinary purposes; we are only to behold them. We kindle these lights to offer thanks and praise to Thy name for Thy miracles, Thy deliverances and Thy wonders. I will lift up mine eyes unto the mountains; from whence shall my help come? My help cometh from the Lord, who made Heaven and Earth. He will not suffer thy foot to be moved, he that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold, He that keepeth America doth neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is thy keeper; the Lord is thy shade upon they right hand. The Sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the Moon by night. The Lord shall keep thee from all evil; He shall keep thy soul. The Lord shall guard thy going out and thy coming in, from this time forth and forever. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want; He maketh me lie down in green pastures; He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul; He guideth me in straight paths for His name’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies; Thou hast anointed my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life’ and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20
Cresleigh Homes
Two things to note about this wonderful photo from our Meadows Residence 2 model…
✨ 2022 will see the rise of green as a neutral!
✨ Statement walls will always be one of our favorite ways to decorate. They say you found someone new, but that won’t stop my loving you.
Guess I could find another home, too. But I don’t want no one but you. How could I leave without regret?
A Cresleigh Home is not easy to forget. I long to know the feeling of you sweet embrace, but when we are face to face I just look at you. https://cresleigh.com/cresleigh-meadows-at-plumas-ranch/residence-2/
Ready to see what you do when you move into your #CresleighHome at #PlumasRanch!
Randolph Harris II International 