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By the Terrible Torment of Demons
Here haunts eternally the curse of the Winchester fortune; here lives the mysteries of the fruit orchards, harbinger of spirits; many voices may echo, among the Queen Anne Victorian mansion, but perhaps none more curious than the mischievous demons. No region in the West is richer in legend than my home. The tales of The Winchester Mansion range in subject-matter from buried treasure to black arts, secret passageways and portals to other Worlds. An opening into a mysterious passageway may be seen behind one of the 47 fireplaces. However, where the tunnel leads in its subterranean wanderings none can say, for its walls have caved in not far from the entrance and its secret is buried. I had this tunnel as an emergency entrance and to my mansion. I kept my horses there shod backward to deceive the foeman who might study their tracks. The ghost of this spot is the specter of a huge dog with wolfen teeth, glittering eyes, and a jet coat that here comes back from a dog-pound beyond the grave to plague the servants at midnight. Inside the gate of my estate is the undying spell of blooming roses, plush green trees, emerald green lawns, flowers the color of gems, elegant statues, and the sun makes a dazzling spectacle of the sea green mansion. The orchards are abloom with the promise of a fruitful harvest, but at night, one passes through the gate into the twilight of the great shadowy mansion and its encircling walls, and one feels ice cold hands taking hold of them, a certain death none can excel, as the door is opened to Heaven or Hell. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
People wander through the doors to areas where visions of spirit orbs and spectral children dwell; where long dead residents or perhaps soldiers, true to their duty unto death (and beyond) still practice their lives and manifest themselves by talking, touching and interacting with employees and visitors alike. Once a tunnel ran from the nine story observation tower to the basement. Thence it led to the fields. Its entrances were eventually blocked by fallen stone. I have led guest to the well beneath the observation tower and pause impressively to drop a stone into it. Long afterward the faint tinkle of a splash comes echoing back. The shaft of the surface is far below the surface. The mile-long tunnel was cut deep in the rock by men with considerable patience and ingenuity. As you enter the house, it certainly does not look haunted, but in that first room a number of dark, unexplainable, paranormal events have occurred. One night I was alone in the house. The place was quiet…until I heard something entirely out of place. Echoing softly from the dark stairwell across the room—and apparently across decades of time as well—came footsteps. I herd them lightly descend, one step at a time, and could actually follow the sounds, as the footfalls came slowly down the stairs and stopped at the bottom. I peered into the darkened hall, but saw no one. I bravely walked around the desk and cautiously peeked around the corner to the foot of the stairs. No one—at least no one visible—was there. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
Two hours later, my eager ears detected nothing ghostly or grisly in the unseen aura. There was the soughing of the pines, the solemn organ tone of the mountain breeze and a faint whistle of an air current somewhere. Letting my mind wander a bit, unknowingly putting my mind in a state where it was more receptive to the supernatural. Slowly from the darkness at the bottom of the stairs, out of nothing, there materialized a small boy age 6 or 7. He had blonde hair, and was wearing a light shirt with dark pants and suspenders. He stood there, looing into the front room, at the oddly out-of-place (at least to him) desk. Then, as suddenly as he had entered this strange World, he left it, before my eyes could pick up any more detail of what was clearly an impossibility anywhere else but in “The Winchester Mansion.” At night, the silence is engendered by the ghostly sounds of a phantom horn and the eerie baying of the devil’s bloodhounds. For many years, a ghostly man on a horse has been riding through these shadowy glens and over the fields, scarcely an arrow-shot ahead of the hellhounds that seek his soul. And the wild chase must continue until Judgement Day. One evening when I was in the restroom, no sooner than I entered, the handle of the door began to rattle and squeak. As I stood there, rinsing my hands and watching it, the knob of the sink began to slowly and methodically twist. After I dried my hands and threw open the door to discover the perpetrator–no one was there. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
My home, The Winchester Mansion, was still considered as a mythical abode of devil-nurtured nightriders. The stern tower that crown the mansion act as monuments to a great house. The spirits that dreamt of them were imaginative and resourceful, as were the carpenters who built the historical achievement. Might has been sculptured in their designing and they suggestive a glorious wealth. The mansion stands intact, a splendid mass of wall and buttress, rampart and turret, crowing a gentle slope in the middle of a peaceful valley, like a living illustration of royalty. But sometimes the spirits play sad havoc with treasures. Here is a wreck of a broken crystal from a massive chandelier, rotting leather, tattered and faded tapestry. The echoing of smashing glass as one walk the otherwise well-kept corridors sounds like a demonic war long ago. My homes has become qualified in some special way to form a link between the living and the dead. I see more than dreamlike apparitions, I hear voices, and receive visions of truth. More than that, my soul sometimes leaves my body to go wandering. I have assembled a séance room for the opportunity of hearing messages from departed loved ones. During séances, I have made contact with the spirits of deceased men and women in another World. However, the concept of an eternal soul is steadily eroded by an emphasis on brain cells, conditioned responses, and memory patterns that could exit only while the body remains alive. I have conducted many séances and eternal life has been proved to me. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
During one séance, I sensed the presence of a spirit. The room was by no means dark. A few candles gave enough light for me to clearly distinguish the shape of a small girl materializing beside me. The spirit girl came up beside me and grabbed my hand. Her flesh was somewhat cooler than that of a living human. She reminded me of my precious Annie. I touched her silken hair, and was able to hear her heart beat. When I asked the spirit girl what the spirit World was like, she did not respond to any of the questions. However, when I asked if she missed and loved her mother, the rapidly responded with “Yes.” This caused me to weep. It was such a deeply emotional moment. After what seemed like just a few moments, the spirit girl, whom I believed to by my precious daughter Annie, began to fade back into her ethereal state. Moments later, I froze, for I saw an image of a woman, and she was throwing herself at the door. I could hear a crash as she would hit it. Suddenly the door exploded into pieces. This led me to be overcome with information that there was great danger in my home. After the spirit in the séance room had demonstrated such an incredible explosion of energy, she was suddenly gone. The ghosts of the ancients sit in the councils of their descendants. The spectral guardians of the illustrious Winchester Mansion gather on this estate. People have made trek for many years to my estate to glimpse the specters rising from the Earth on moonlit night. Let the dead rise from the tombs. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
I cite, require, and command thee, Human Spirits, who frequentist this place, and in thy life has has interred by treasure herein, who also of recent time, to wit, in the day or night of May 8, 2023 and the hour of thirteen hundred hours, show thyself in the form of spirit at this spot: I conjure thee by God the Father, by God the Son, by God the Holy Spirit, by the most glorious and Holy Mother of God by the mot holy wound of our Savior, by all miracles performed through His Divine sorrow, passion, and tears, by His material death, by His descent into Hell, by Hi triumphant Resurrection, by His most glorious ascension into Heaven, by His sitting on the right hand of God the Father, giving rule to His angels from thence over the whole Earth, I conjure thee by the terrible Day of Judgment, by the power and virtue of St. John the Baptist by all the martyrs, apostles, and prophets. Come to me. I adjure and beseech thee by the terrible, ineffable, and Divine Names inscribed on this sheet, and in reverence and cosign, visible, without lightning, without thunder, without noise of dread tempests, without causing fear or trembling, harm to body or soul, or annoyance of any kind. But do thou perform my will in all things, even as I shall command thee, by the virtue of the one stupendous and holy Name, which even the adverse and inferior powers of the Abyss do venerate and adore, ever confessing the Almighty, whose creatures we all are. Incessantly do I call, adjure, conjure, ordain, and require thee, Human Spirits, by the Most Holy and Undivided Trinity, by the immortality which cometh after death, by the power and victory of Hell, by the bearer of the Seven Swords, and by the terrible torments of demons. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
Although there remain 160 of approximately 600 rooms, only 110 are open to guests. Areas of the house are off limits to visitors for very good reasons. Fifty of these rooms have revealed childlike, ghostly, spirit orbs playing games and taunting one another, and unseen hands playing tricks on employees. True, documented events have happened and continue to happen within the walls. Many people have come away from The Winchester Mansion with their own stories to tell, but we caution anyone attempting to visit here to do so only with respect. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
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Dabbling in its Dark, Cruel Possibilities
It was one of the brisk winter mornings that begins in a fog, promising the cold to come. A mist was rising from the fruit orchards as I dropped down the hill into Llanada Villa in the valley below the mansion. It was a fair-tale mansion, all turrets and towers, stained glass and plush Victorian gardens, sitting majestical on the most valuable plot of land. As I entered my home, I heard the music playing softly from the morning room. I sat sipping coffee at nine thirty, glad it was Saturday. I knew that life was going to be vastly more complicated now. Well, it was going to be more dangerous, too. Overhead, the morning sky had turned a vivid blue, intersected by fading vapor trails. It was bright enough blue, the sky. However, it had a depth and stillness suggestive of the steady retreat of sunlight and a slight warmth. I have seen real ghouls in my home, and I knew that magic was something that could be harnessed and exploited and there were people in the World with hunger for power and influence enough to risk dabbling in its dark, cruel possibilities. The whisper of water dropping on to leaves as the rain began to fall could be heard. The lights flicked on and off. I looked around, half-waiting for the sound to stir again. The rain strength. I heard drops begin to fall on the roof. For many years the staff reported hearing a little girl crying. She has been seen on occasion, and is described as about seven years old. She has been seen in the house at the main stairwell, on the lawn, and on the third floor. I passed on through the passages of crystal and rooms of silver—spacious chambers, empty and silent. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
This house felt older than the memory of man. It was an accursed mansion. There were strange noises in the mansion. Every night the wailing of a woman could be heard above the moaning of the wind. If ghost must walk the Earth, they could find no spot on the globe where their appearance would be more natural, or better understood. The staff tells tales of disembodies footsteps, lights that switch themselves off and on at will, and objects moving. The Daisy Bedroom has lights that switch themselves on and off after dark and phantom footsteps are often heard in the hallway near the room. One day a housemaid was speaking to a guest as she served dinner downstairs. To everyone’s surprise, the serving tray sitting on the table picked itself up and tipped itself upside down. The tray was filled with plates of hot foot that went everywhere. The sacrificial stones of the Druid priests, oriented after the fashion of the ruin of ruins of Stonehenge, the blood-vats, imperishable adjuncts to human sacrifice, have stood through the ages, grim guardians of the mysteries of the haunted fruit orchards. If someone were to tell me that the fruit orchards at Llanada Villa echoed nightly with the shrieks of sacrifice and that the ghost fires of forgotten priestcraft still glowed in the morning, I would find it hard to disbelieve. That ghastly curse remained on my family and fortune. The mansion has picked up a few permanent guests. One evening, from the observation tower, I saw a huge black figure gliding along the grounds. It could not be human because of the rate of speed it was going. I felt not just fear, but absolute dread. I experienced a bone-chilling could throughout my body. I ran down nine flights of stairs, while crying uncontrollable and my heart was pounding. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
Only in the understanding of the stock from which the Victorian mansion’s ghosts are sprung can one appreciate the immortality with which long-accepted tradition has endowed them. Ghostly itself is the history of the Winchester Mansion. While the carpenters were painting on the fourth floor, one of them was startled to see the word MURDER appear in the freshly rolled paint, as if written with someone’s finger—only the words were backwards, as though being written from the other side of the wall. One of the painters explained: “We were quite surprised when a shadow started moving towards us.” As they realized that the “shadow” was approaching them, they also realized that area of the mansion was a very lonely place, especially at night. Not many people ventured up there. And although in their haste to leave, they could only give brief glances at the dark figure, they were sure of one thing: “The only outstanding feature was the outline of a wide brim hate.” Another evening while the carpenters were painting, they heard a quiet creaking emanating from the wood floors. They steeled their nerves before investigating. That is when they saw a young woman sitting in a chair directly behind them. The woman was there for just a moment before disappearing. Later the evening as the farmers were picking fruit in the fields, the dark figure “floated” diagonally across the field. It drifted rapidly to a clump of trees with two flat rocks near by and disappeared over a slight drop-off beyond. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
One of the farmers screwed up his courage and, in spite of the bizarre, dark figure’s mysterious and even menacing appearance, volunteered to walk down to the spot where the apparition disappeared. After five minutes of observation, he returned, like an efficient scout, with his report, unsettling as it might be. He said when he reached the far side of the hill there were two “soldiers-dressed” figures stilling on the two flat rocks near the clump of trees. Neither one spoke to the other; nor did they acknowledge the other’s presence. Instead they just sat, seemingly rigidly fixated, staring down into the field. Other ghost haunting the mansion include those of two little boys, who have been heard running on the second floor. One night, while I was preparing for company, I found two sets of muddy boot prints coming from the door to nowhere and crossing the room. When I told Daisy about the boot prints. She said they must be made by the same boys who keep coming in the door the opens to the wall, and we had locked them out. Looking toward the door she said, “It’s OK, if you prefer this door, go ahead and use it.” Immediately the door swung open. Needless to say cold chills ran through both of us. We never worried about the door that opens to the wall again. My idea for the mansion was not only to create a place for the spirits, but also to build an estate that would inspire awe. The gorgeous series of fields gardens, forests, and grassy acres are as fascinating as they are beautiful. However, when the sun goes down, the shadows creep and spread, giving the Victorian Mansion an entirely different look and feel. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
With grounds lit by a full moon hanging low in the sky, just to the side of the columns of the mansion, one begins to ponder the many mysteries surrounding the Winchester Mansion. One night I was putting out a candle when I heard the sound of a singing voice. At first I thought: “Oh, that sounds nice.” However, then I wondered what it was and where I could be hearing singing from. After all, the staff was asleep and there was no one around, and the sound definitely was not coming from outside. It was frightening, but it was not explainable. It was just a couple of phrases of singing and it took me by surprise. I could faintly see the hazy shape of a woman moving down what the hallway. One night, a group of farmers were packing up for the evening. A they looked around with a lantern for their tools, they were shocked to see what appeared to be the black form of a man moving toward them. The figure was larger than human and had no features—it was a black mass that seemed to sway toward them in the bright light. The man wielding the lantern quickly put it out and they all ran away. For weeks the men thought about what they had seen; they just could not forget it. They spoke to other servants about the vision or sighting. They were quite disturbed and unable to let the subject drop. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Take heed! Come, all Spirits! By the virtue and power of your king, and by the seven crowns and chain of your Kings, all Spirits of the Hells are forced to appear in my presence before this circle of Solomon, whensoever I shall call them. Come, then, all at my order, to fulfil that which is in your power, as commanded. Come, therefore, from the East, South, West, and North! I conjure and command you, by the virtue and power of Him who is three, eternal, equal, who is God invisible, consubstantial, in a word, who has created the Heavens, the sea, and al which is under Heaven. I conjure thee, Lucifer, by the living God, by the true God, by the holy God, who spake and all was made, who commanded and all things were created and made! I conjure thee by the ineffable name of God, ON, ALPHA, and OMEGA, ELOYM, YA, SADAY, LUX, MUGENS, REX, SALUS, ADONAY, EMMANUEL, MESSIAS; and I adjure, conjure. I command you, O all ye demons dwelling in these parts, or in what part of the World soever ye may be, by whatsoever power may have been given you by God and our holy Angels over this place, and by the power Principality of the fernal abysses, as also by all your brethren, both general and special demons, whether dwelling in the East, West, South, or North, or in any side of the Earth, and, in like manner, by the power of God the Father, by the wisdom of God and the Son, by the virtue of the Holy Ghost, and by the authority I derive from our Savior Jesus Christ, the only Son of God. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
The idea that we survive physical death, that some part of our being is immortal, profoundly affects the loves of those who harbor such a belief. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
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All is Well that Ends Well?
The family is sacred to the ultimate concern and is the most important social unit in time and eternity. The ultimate cause established families to bring happiness to its creations, allowing them to learn correct principles in a loving atmosphere, and prepare them for eternal life. The home is the best place to teach, learn, and apply virtuous principles. It is where individual learn to provide love, food, clothing, respect, shelter, security and other necessities they require. The mother and father, as equal partners, should help each family member. However, sometimes things do not go as planned. Because we live in a World with many influences, people may become criminals. Men and women can both become involved in crime. When it comes to burglaries, for the females who worked as partners, this could involve a variety of tasks. Many of these tasks were indistinguishable from those traditionally associated with men, such as gaining entry, searching the house, carrying goods outside, and disposing of them. The following interview segment describes some of the tasks performed by a female acting as a partner. Although this was her first offense, she heled to find the transportation to reach the target (by stealing a truck) and took part in the actual break in: “Well, it wasn’t up on me, somebody else who was in there different, not state, in a different county. He just came up and told me he knew about it, a rich guy that was gonna be gone for the weekend. He knew this person, knew who it was, and he knew about it. #RandolphHarris 1 of 24
“When he left that night about two or three in the morning, we went down there. We had stolen a truck, we had stolen my ex-boyfriend’s father’s truck, went down there. We tried to get in, but we couldn’t get in. Everything was locked. Right…We couldn’t get in for nothing, so what we does was, we had some sh*t in back of the truck and we took some tape. Then we put it over the window real tight, then we busted it, and then we took the tape down and the window was shattered. It had no window in it. So—everybody used gloves of course—so we went in there, you know, and we knew when we went, we knew nobody was gonna be home. There wasn’t a house around for two blocks, each way you went. So…my first one was basically the easiest one.” The target often was located by a female partner, who also took the lead in planning the offense. In these cases the women had a substantial say in determining how the proceeds of the crime were divided: “…whatever you chose to give to the other person. We tried to split everything equally. We were all good friends, you know, so I got the best deal out of it because of the fact that I needed the money more than everybody else. Me and my sister needed the money more than everybody did and…we were the ones that said hey, we pointed it out, we found a way to get in, we knew where everything was, we told them how, we had everything planned out down to the TV. This is where this is at and this is where this is at.” #RandolphHarris 2 of 24
The roles played by female burglars are dynamic and can chance over time. Many of the women who currently participate in offenses as partners started out as accomplices. The woman quoted below clearly has an equal relationship with her co-offender, but this was not always the case: “The first burglary I ever committed, I was in the house and I was smoking weed at the time. A friend came in and said ‘I want to go in this house.’ I said ‘Okay, it was around the corner….what part am I going to play?’ He says ‘All you got to do is watch the doors for me. The bags I bring down, take them out, and you also drive the car for me.’” As should be obvious from above, women who work as accomplices in burglary play much more limited roles. They seldom participate in planning the crime, and often do not even enter the dwelling. Some claimed to prefer working with others because they lacked the skills needed to be a successful burglar: “I can’t do all by myself…I haven’t mastered that yet.” Others simply felt more comfortable when relying on a colleague’s expertise; they were uncertain about their ability to work alone. In the following case, a woman reports that she deferred to her boyfriend’s judgment in determining the suitability of a given target. #RandolphHarris 3 of 24
“He can look at them and tell. He’s better at it than me. Sometimes I give him tips to go on, but he checks them out. I feel safer for him to check them out.” A common work assignment for accomplices was acting as a lookout or driver. Several of the women stated that driving was their primary job in burglaries: “Well, see, me and my boyfriend had been together for a year, and he done them all the time. Well, not all the time, but it was no big deal, and all I had to do, all I ever do, is drive. I just go like he’ll go, him and his friend. He don’t do ‘em every week or anything like that. Like it’s not really ‘cause we need the money or anything either. Like he’ll go during the day and he’ll look at a house and he’ll find one, and then he’ll tell me about where the house is…all I have to do is drive to the place and wait for them to start bringing out the stuff, and then drive off.” Other said that they typically kept a lookout for their colleagues: “They came and picked me up with a stolen automobile. I didn’t know that it was stolen. We went out there to this house and they got out. I just assumed—I didn’t know what was going on at first. We got out and they went in first, and then they came back out. One of the men came back out and told me to come in and to keep an eye out to see if anybody was there or anybody comes down the sidewalk or if anybody drives down the street or anything.” In both of these cases the women, as accomplices, did not choose to perform these secondary tasks. Instead the tasks were assigned to them by a dominant co-offender. #RandolphHarris 4 of 24
What light does this quantitative and qualitative information shed on the nature of female criminality? Our sample was not generated randomly; with this fact in mind, the quantitative findings suggest that women involved in residential burglary do not differ significantly from their male counterparts on a number of relevant dimensions (exempli gratia, drug and alcohol use, degree of offense specialization). Nevertheless, the results show that some important differences may exist as well. Compared to the males, for example, the females more often committed burglaries with others, began offending at a later age, and had less contact with the criminal justice system. Further examination of these apparent differences is warranted. The qualitative data demonstrate that women’s involvement in residential burglary is marked by diversity and that the debate about whether women play a primary or a secondary role in the offense is probably a red herring. In fact, as among males, some assume primary roles exclusively, some adopt secondary roles exclusively, and others move from one type of role to another s they become more experienced. This observation has important implications for research into women’s involvement in crimes committed more often by males. To be sure, a much lower percentage of women than of men participate in residential burglary. Even so, our qualitative data reveal substantial similarities be tween males and females. #RandolphHarris 5 of 24
This fact suggests that the activities of women who do engage in such offenses may be explained by some of the same factors that explain men’s participation. When it comes to the stole property system (SPS), we must consider the law of supply and demand shape the SPS. This term refers to the loosely formed relationships that bring about the theft of property and the subsequent repackaging and resale of these goods via the “black market.” We use contacts with law enforcement authorities to formulate a revised view of property crime. Instead of viewing burglaries as isolated incidents of theft, we argue that we should conceive of the acts and actors involved as spanning a more broadly defined set of roles and behaviors. They identify the thief, fence, and person who buys the stolen goods as key players in the SPS. They also identify multiple stages in the process: research and planning, extraction, exchange (id est, conversion of the goods to money), marketing, residtribution/resale, and evaluation. Moreover, the roles and behaviors of the various players are said to be interchangeable and flexible. In the end, we reconsider the way that we think about property crime. We become more sensitive to the potential for business concepts such as division of labor, entrepreneurial spirit, supply and demand, and marketing to manifest themselves in the World of property theft. In doing so, we are able to drive home the complexity and fluidity tht can beset property crime events. Moreover, we illustrate how the criminal calculus can lead to mutually beneficial relationships and roles that allow the criminal subculture to expand and innovate. #RandolphHarris 6 of 24
Perhaps no area of contemporary criminal activity holds more potential for improved understanding and successful intervention through analytical reorientation than does that of property theft. This area of crime is by no means new, a situation which may in fact constitute the greatest barrier to fresh thinking on the subject. Centuries of experience with thefts of property have give us a fairly strong conceptualization of this crime area, a conceptualization which centers almost exclusively on the thief. There is of course nothing illogical or erroneous about a concern for this individual; it is one after all who steals property. What is argued here, however, is that an exclusive concentration of the thief yields a myopic view of the process of theft, a view which draws the boundaries of the crime too tightly around that individual. It is a view which tends therefore to consider each incident of theft as a unique event, determined and constrained by the motivations, needs, and skills of the perpetrator. This “conventional view of theft” (if we can use this phrase) prescribes a response to this crime which largely consists of a fairly sophisticated sorting process, linking one individual (or one group of individuals) with each event as it occurs. Such an “individualistic” approach to crime and criminals is not, of course, confined to the property theft area. For example, we suggest that it is the most prevalent approach to crime in general. Consistently, both the popular and scientific tendency is to view the criminal’s behavior as a problem of individual maladjustment, not as a consequence of his participation in social systems. #RandolphHarris 7 of 24
Perhaps it is for this reason that in criminology we have had thousands of studies that have sought some damaging trait in the personalities of individual criminals, but very few studies of the organizational arrangements among criminals who commit crimes in concert. The tendency toward an individualistic interpretation of criminal behavior cannot be laid to the idiosyncrasies of either the public or the scientist, but rather is undoubtedly influenced by the nature of the legal systems, with their concepts of individual responsibility an intent, upon which most democratic societies are based. However, while such an interpretation may conform well to the needs of a legal system, it may have the additional effect of causing us to ignore some important dimensions of contemporary criminal behavior. It is the perspective that property theft is one area of criminal behavior that has sorely suffered both conceptually and practically from a failure to probe the relationships among criminals (and)…the structure and operations of illicit organizations. Perhaps the mot glaring evidence of this failure concerns what the President’s Crime Commission called “little research…done on fencing,” id est, on the criminal receiver of stolen property. This crime figure, although tallying an impressive list of protestations to one’s importance over several centuries has remained little explored, while one’s relationship with the thief has been virtually ignored by the criminologist. #RandolphHarris 8 of 24
However, if the popular and scientific tendency has been to overlook the fence, the police detective assigned the responsibility of dealing with property theft has not found it possible to do so. Instead, as the authors discovered in the course of an ongoing study of patterns of criminal receiving, police detectives possess a great deal of information about the fence. Other researchers have reported similar experiences. Because the police know about the fence does not imply that one’s activities are either successfully or efficiently interdicted, for the police agency is as influenced by an individualistic approach to crime as is the social scientist. Thus the bulk of enforcement resources and activity against theft is directed to the thief, and the situation in which police effort is devoted directly and exclusively to the fence appears to be rare indeed. The criminal receiver remains a curiosity to the criminal justice system, being infrequently arrested and even less often convicted. The model of property theft employed here—the Stolen Property System—is an operationally based one, derived from the author’s research into patterns of criminal receiving in a large urban area of the northeastern United States of America. As a part of this study, access to police intelligence reports on the activities of burglars and fences has been obtained, as well as records of these activities maintained in a special investigative unit in the office of the district attorney. Now, as burglaries are crimes of economics, this indicates that economics plays a kay factor in our lives. #RandolphHarris 9 of 24
China is an economic power house, and it growing production and export power enhances its financial strength as well. This is natural. However, compared to its sensational emergence as a leading manufacturing and trading nation, the process of its ascending to the position of a major financial power is more fragmentary and complicated. China has by far the largest foreign exchange reserves in the World, about three times as large as Japan, which is number two. It is also rapidly emerging as the leading international lender. In contrast, China’s role as a foreign direct and portfolio investor is still considerably smaller than that of America, major European countries, and Japan. For the time being, the story of China’s growing financial clout is, first and foremost, the story of the unprecedented increase of the financial power of the Chinese state. As of the end of 2021, the gross financial assets of China increased 13.6 percent to USD $29,689 billion. That is an increase of USD $25,563 billion since 2010. In December 2022, the reserves of China stood at USD $3,120 billion. The exact composition of China’s foreign exchange reserves is classified information. Foreign direct investment into China totaled $42.5 billion between July and December 2022. That constituted a 73 percent decline on the year. #RandolphHarris 10 of 24
China’s net international investment position reached USD $2,531.328 billion in December 2022. As of the year 2022, the United States of America’s net international investment position was USD -$16.12 trillion. The United States of America is currently the World’s largest debtor nation. Thinking about the pre-cybernetic machine—with minor exceptions, state socialism had led not to affluence, equality, and freedom, but to a one-party political system…a massive bureaucracy…heavy-handed secret police…government control of the media…secrecy…and the repression of intellectual and artistic freedom. Setting aside the oceans of spurting blood needed to prop it up, a close look at this system revealed that every one of these elements is not just a way of organizing people, but also—and more profoundly—a particular way of organizing, channeling, and controlling knowledge. A one-party political system is designed to control political communication. Since no other party exists, it restricts the diversity of political information flowing through the society, blocking feedback, and thus blinding those in power to the full complexity of their problems. With very narrowly defined information flowing upward through the approved channel, and commands flowing downward, it becomes very difficult for the system to detect errors and correct them. In fact, top-down control in the socialist countries was based increasingly on lies and misinformation, since reporting bad news up the line was often risky. The decision to run a one-party system is a decision, above all, about knowledge. #RandolphHarris 11 of 24
The overpowering bureaucracy that socialism created in every sphere of life was also, a knowledge-restricting device, forcing knowledge into pre-defined compartments or cubbyholes and restricting communication to “official channels,” while de-legitimating informal communication and organization. The secret police apparatus, state control of the media, the intimidation of intellectuals, and the repression of artistic freedom all represent further attempts to limit and control information flows. In fact, behind each of these elements we find a single obsolete assumption about knowledge: the arrogant belief that those in command—whether of the party or of the state—know what others should know. These features of all the state socialist nations guaranteed economic stupidity and derived from the concept of the precybernetic machines as applied to society and life itself. Second Wave machines—the kind that surrounded Mr. Marx in the 19th century—for the most part operated without any feedback. Plug in the power, start the motor, and it runs irrespective of what is happening in the outside environment. Third Wave machines, by contrast, are intelligent. They have sensors that such in information from the environment, detect changes, and adapt the operation of the machine accordingly. They are self-regulating. The technological difference is revolutionary. While Mr. Marx, Mr. Engels, Mr. Lenin all bitterly assailed the philosophy of “mechanical materialism,” their own thinking, reflecting their era, remained steeped in certain analogies and assumptions based on pre-intelligent machinery. #RandolphHarris 12 of 24
Thus for Marxian socialists the class struggle was the “locomotive of history.” A key task was to capture the “state machine.” And society itself, being machine-like, could be pre-set to deliver abundance and freedom. Mr. Lenin, on capturing control of Russia in 1917, became the supreme mechanic. A brilliant intellectual, Mr. Lenin understood the importance of ideas. However, for him, symbolic production, too—the mind itself—could be programmed. Mr. Marx wrote of freedom, but Lenin, on taking power, undertook to engineer knowledge. Thus he insisted that all art, culture, science, journalism, and symbolic activity in general be placed at the service of a master plan for society. In time the various branches of learning would be neatly organized into an “academy” with fixed bureaucratic departments and ranks, all subject to party and state control. “Cultural workers” would be employed by institutions controlled by a Ministry of Culture. Published and broadcasting would be monopolies of the state. Knowledge, in effect, would be made part of the state machine. This constipated approach to knowledge blocked economic development even in low-level smokestack economies; it is diametrically opposed to the principles needed for economic advance in the age of the computer. #RandolphHarris 13 of 24
The Third Wave wealth-creation system now spreading also challenges three pillars of the socialist faith. Take the question of property. From the beginning, socialists traced poverty, depression, unemployment, and the other evils of industrialism to private own-unemployment, and the other means of production. The way to solve these ills was for the workers to own the factories—through the state or through collectives. Once this was accomplished, things would be different. No more competitive waste. Completely rational planning. Production for use rather than profit. Intelligent investment to drive the economy forward. The dream of abundance for all would be realized for the first time in history. In the 19th century, when these ideas were formulated, they seemed to reflect the most advanced scientific knowledge of the time. Marxists, in fact, claimed to have gone beyond fuzzy-headed utopianism and arrived at truly “scientific socialism.” Utopians might dream of self-governing communal villages. Scientific socialists knew that in a developing smokestack society such notions were impractical. Utopians like Charles Fourier looked toward the agrarian past. Scientific socialists looked toward what was then the industrial future. Thus, later on, while socialists regimes experimented with cooperatives, worker-management, communes, and other schemes, state socialism—state ownership of everything from banks to breweries, rolling mills to restaurants—became the dominant form of property through the socialist World. (So complete was this obsession with state ownership that Nicaragua, an imitative latecomer to the socialist World, even created “Lobo Jack,” a state-owned disco). Everywhere, the state, not the workers, thus became the chief beneficiary of socialist revolution. #RandolphHarris 14 of 24
Socialism failed to meet its promise to improve radically the material conditions of life. When living standards fell in the Soviet Union after the revolution, the decline was blamed, with some justification, on the effects of World War I and counterrevolution. Later the shortfalls were blamed on capitalist encirclement. Still later, on World War II. Yet thirty years after the war, staples like coffee and oranges were still in short supply in Moscow. In the period preceding Mr. Gorbachev’s perestroika, the diet of a middle-class researcher at a state institute in Moscow was heavily based on cabbage and potatoes. In 1989, four years after the start of Mr. Gorbachev’s attempt at reforms, the U.S.S.R. had to import 600 million razor blades and 40 million tubes of shaving cream from abroad. Remarkably, though their number is declining, one still hears orthodox socialists around the World calling for the nationalization of industry and finance. From Brazil and Peru to South Africa and even in the industrialized nations of the West there remain true believers who, despite all historical evidence to the contrary, still regard “public ownership” as “progressive” and resist every effort to de-nationalize or privatize the economy. #RandolphHarris 15 of 24
It is true that today’s increasingly liberalized global economy, uncritically hailed by the great multinational corporations, is itself unstable and could suffer a massive coronary. The distended debt balloon on which it rests cold be punctured. Wars, sudden interruptions of energy or resources, and any number of other calamities could cause its collapse in the decades ahead. Under catastrophic conditions, one might well imagine the need for temporary emergency nationalizations. Nevertheless, incontrovertible evidence proves that state-owned enterprises mistreat their employees, pollute the air, and abuse the public at least as efficiently as private enterprises. Many have become sink-holes of inefficiency, corruption, and greed. Their failures frequently encourage a vast, seething black market that undermines the very legitimacy of the state. However, worst and most ironic of all, instead of taking the lead in technological advance as promised, nationalized enterprises, as a rule, are almost uniformly reactionary—the most bureaucratic, the slowest to reorganize, the least willing to adapt to changing consumer needs, the most afraid to provide information to the citizens, the last to adopt advanced technology. For more than a century, socialists and defenders of capitalism waged bitter war over public versus private property. Large numbers of men and women literally laid down their lives over this issue. #RandolphHarris 16 of 24
What neither side imagined was a new wealth-creation system that would make virtually all their arguments obsolete. Yet this is exactly what happened. It is super-symbolic. It is knowledge. The same knowledge can be used by many people simultaneously to create wealth and to produce still more knowledge. And unlike factories and fields, knowledge is, for all intents, inexhaustible. Neither socialist regimes nor socialists in general have yet come to terms with this truly revolutionary fact. An established firm in an industry stands to gain by keeping out new competition. Then it can raise prices to monopoly levels. Since monopoly is socially harmful, the antitrust authorities try to detect and prosecute firms that employ strategies to deter rivals from entering the business. In 1945, the Aluminum Corporation of America (Alcoa) was convicted of such a practice. An appellate panel of Circuit Court judges found tht Alcoa had consistently installed more refining capacity than was justified by demand. In his opinion, Judge Learned Hand said: “It was not inevitable that it [Alcoa] should always anticipate increases in the demand for ingot and be prepared to supply them. Nothing compelled it to keep doubling and redoubling its capacity before other entered the field. It insists that it never excluded competitors; but we can think of no more effective exclusion than progressively to embrace each new opportunity as it opened and to face every newcomer with new capacity already geared into a great organization. #RandolphHarris 17 of 24
This case has been debated at length by scholars of antitrust law and economies. Here we ask you to consider the conceptual basis of the case. How could the construction of excess capacity deter new competitors? What distinguishes this strategy from others? Why might it fail? An established firm wants to convince potential new competitors that the business would not be profitable for them. This basically means that if they entered, the price would be too low to cover their costs. Of course the established firm could simply put out the word that it would fight an unrelenting price war against any newcomers. However, why would the newcomers believe such a verbal threat? After all, a price war is costly to the established firm too. Installing capacity in excess of the needs of current production gives credibility to the established firm’s threat. When such capacity is in place, output can be expanded more quickly and at less extra cost. It remains only to staff the equipment and get the materials; the capital costs have already been incurred and are bygones. A price war can be fought more easily, more inexpensively, and therefore more credibly. This makes sense in the logic of strategy, but will such a device work in practice? There are at least two qualifications that limit its success. First, if there are many firms already in the industry, then discouraging newcomers gives more profit to all of them. Will any one firm bear the costs of capacity when it gets only a part of the benefit? #RandolphHarris 18 of 24
This is a standard prisoners’ dilemma. If one firm is large enough, it may in its own interest provide such a service to the rest of the industry. Otherwise the firms must collude in building capacity; this may be hard to hide from the antitrust authorities. In the Alcoa case, only may not regard the dilemma of whom will install capacity as a serious problem, because Alcoa had a 90 percent share of the primary aluminum ingot market. However—and this is the second qualification—is that the relevant market? Even if there are no other producers of primary ingots, secondary production from scrap is a source of competition. So is Alcoa’s own future production. Many aluminum-based products are highly durable. If Alcoa puts more aluminum on the market in the future, then the values of these durable goods will decrease. If the company cannot credibly guarantee the users that it will restrict its own future, output, they are willing to pay for aluminum now. This is just like IBM’s problem of pricing mainframe computers. The solution of renting is much harder here: you cannot rent aluminum as such; Alcoa would have to extend its operations into all sorts of aluminum-based products. In accordance with the directions of the ultimate concern, and in view of the critical time through which the World is passing, every expression, “view,” or theory which we hold concerning things should now be examine carefully, and brought to the proof, with open and hones desire to know the pure truth of the ultimate concern—as well as every statement that comes to our knowledge from the experience of others, which may throw light upon our own pathway. #RandolphHarris 19 of 24
Every criticism—just or unjust—should be humbly received and examined to discover its grounds, apparent or real; and facts concerning the verities from every self-actualized being should be analyzed, independent of their pleasure or pain to us personally—either for our own enlightenment or for our equipment in the service of the ultimate concern. For the knowledge of truth is the first essential for warfare with the lying offenders, and truth must be eagerly sought for and faced with earnest and sincere desire to know it and obey it in the light of God: truth concerning ourselves, discerned by unbiased discrimination; truth from the virtues, uncolored, unstrained, unmutilated, undiluted; truth in facing facts of experience in all members of the hierarchy of self-actualization. Sometimes we are we can be too engrossed in our own internal struggle to intervene and prevent someone else from being hurt, but gradually the fragments and splinters and hurts began to disturb us. We may experience internally the broken moments, shattered dialogues, and cruelty of neutral faces. Here were people committed to the rescuing of “dropouts” and “rejects” from the public school, blatantly ignoring the crucial feelings being expressed. In this room, in the many passing hours and in that moment were people who hungered for a vital, active, listening human presence. #RandolphHarris 20 of 24
However, what they get are intellectual arguments and words with little or no feeling. What they get are dead faces and lifeless bodies. Within one is growing an indignation against these denials or elemental human values until at last one’s own existence, one’s own isolation, one’s own desire for a solitary state crumbles away and vanishes. For the first time in weeks, one may experience intense and vital feelings from within, a full response to others. One’s anger mounts at the surface way in which fundamental matters are handled, at the ignoring of potential for intensity and depth, and at people committed to serving abused and rejected children failing to reach out, recognize and affirm each other. It may take one back to another time and place. This may cause of to reflect on the coldness and indifference others have to the personal struggles and feelings, an avoidance of intensity and depth in interactions, an intellectualizing and professionalizing or values and concepts of the ultimate concern. Mystery, spirit, feeling, the human sense, the unspoken and ineffable, the sense of awe and wonder, aesthetic appreciation—all might be missing. What else is the ultimate concern but a willingness to submit to the unknown, to learn from the unseen and intangible what we must fulfil? Where else do powers of life, actions to living in the deepest and fullest sense, come but from felt presences that awaken us to a fuller realization of what it means to be unique and human. #RandolphHarris 21 of 24
There will be pronouncements, lineal objectives and goals, definitions, rules, all carefully edited and articulated. We must be concerned with deviance and social injustice, and be aware of the importance of using political and economic powers to being about beneficial social changes. We have to speak about poverty and war, the end of killing and hunger. However, these are devotions to abstractions: for there before us are instances of human suffering, and individuals struggling to rise, and they are being met with indifference, with a refusal or inability to listen and respond. Some may speak glibly of the value of love in enlightenment, but these words do not strengthen and affirm, not support or encourage individuals in their search and struggle. The words are empty. The soul of life dies quickly in the presence of doctrines, rituals, and intellectual reactions. The central concern, the only immediate and intense here-and-now feeling, is a fear of the people who rate us, an incessant anxiety boarding on paranoia that they are being judged in every detail and nuance. Without exception, the fear of being tossed out, or of being put on probation, is paramount. The way to success is to be silent, to speak in abstractions, to avoid action in any living, breathing terms. They will be startled at one’s indignation, at one’s efforts to arouse genuine caring, interpersonal involvement, and decent human responses. When we examine the sacred of the “is” namely, actual purity, or the present reality of the revered it is the mysterium tremendum et fascinosum. #RandolphHarris 22 of 24
The mysterium tremendum et fascinosum is the experience of ‘the ultimate’ in the double sense of that which is the abyss and that which is the ground of man’s being. The mysterium tremendum et fascinosum is the beneficial side of sacredness; it attracts because, as the ground of being, it implies the fulfilment and the beatitude of the creature. The negative side is the mysterium tremendum et fascinosum which terrifies because, as the abyss of being, it implies an infinite, unbridgeable distance between the finite and the infinite. In the ecstatic experience of revelation one feels both the elevating power of the divine presence and its annihilating power. This is the experience of the actual sacredness of the ultimate concern. A man who has never tried to flee from the ultimate concern has never experienced the ultimate concern that is the ultimate concern. The ultimate concern of our own making, fashioned after the image of man, is easy to live with, but man cannot stand the ultimate concern that is really the ultimate concern. Man tries to evade the ultimate concern, and hates it, because one cannot escape it. The protest against the ultimate concern, the will that there be no ultimate concern, and the flight to nihilism are all genuine elements of profound philosophy. Such is the shaking power of the mysterium tremendum et fascinosum. The eyes of the Witness we cannot stand are also the eyes of One of infinite wisdom and supporting benevolence. #RandolphHarris 23 of 24
The center of being, in which our own center is involved, is the source of the gracious beauty which we encounter again and again in the stars and mountains, in flowers and animals, in children and mature personalities. The scared can be viewed not only from a phenomenological point of view, but also from an ontological one. The sacred contains the meaning of individuals and of the whole, and is the ground of meaning. It is also the abyss of meaning because it transcends every individual meaning and cannot be fully grasped in any act of meaning. Unconditioned meaning is the mysterium tremendum et fascinosum, the abyss and the ground of the meaning of things, not only in so far as they are, but also in so far as they ought to be. Against this ontological background, the sacred is not unperceptible, but it is not objective. The sacred is contemplated not as an object; it I contemplated as transcendent meaning. To be sure, there exist also sacred objects to see them as purity is to grasp through them the meaning of the unconditioned. The sacred is being-itself or the power of being. What is required in the professional sense is the fullness and depth of a truly human commitment to self and others, and the love that connects one man with other men. This love must be allowed to develop because love is immediate and grows out of a willingness to enter into interpersonal dialogue and communication, out of the willingness to permit the unknown in one’ self to connect with the unknown in others. #RandolphHarris 24 of 24
Temptation to Give in to Jealousy is Especially Strong
As young adult, we might find the temptation to give in to jealousy especially strong. We are all eager (if not anxious) to find the sense of security that comes from becoming self-reliant and reaching certain cultural and spiritual milestones. Watching someone else get what you righteously desire at this phase of life can leave you feeling frustrated and even envious. Experiencing feelings of jealousy is natural in mortality. However, what really matters is what we do with those feelings. Do we let them fester and cause relationship-damaging resentment? Or do we turn to the ultimate concern to find a way to manage our feelings? Everyone’s experiences will be different. Sometimes feelings of jealousy are what leads to people committing burglaries. In some ways, female residential burglars may differ from their male counterparts. However, we need more information. Do female burglars, for example, tend to play “secondary roles” during offenses? We need to consider the typology of female residential burglars. In constructing our typology, we used the categories of accomplice and partner. (Our sample contained no sole perpetrators. By definition, conspirators were not included in research because they did not participate directly in committing the offenses.) We categorized six of the females in our study as accomplices because of their subservience to others—usually men—during their burglaries. (Not only females act as accomplices; a few of the males whom we interviewed also assumed this role. In no case, however, did a male respondent admit to being subservient to a woman during offenses.) #RandolphHarris 1 of 14
We did classify the 12 remaining females as partners because they participated as equals in their burglaries. Although some of these females co-offended with males, they did not take orders from them. Partners could be distinguished from accomplices in a number of important ways, including their motivation for committing the crimes, their participation in target selection and planning, and the work roles they adopted while committing burglaries. The factors that the female burglars regarded as leading them to commit their crimes differentiated the partners clearly from the accomplices. Those whom worked as partners, whether with other women, with men, or both, reported making an independent decision to commit their burglaries. They did not see themselves as drawn into offending against their will by other offenders or by the irresistible pressure of circumstances. The independence of such offenders is illustrated in the following quote: “My partner ain’t got to influence me. I just want to do it. I’m so used to doing it.” Women who carried out burglaries as partners often were motivated by material or instrumental concerns. Their responses reflected an affirmative commitment to burglary. Some, for example, saw the offense simply as an easy way of obtaining money. As one of them said, “[Burglary’s] a damn good way of getting over. It’s like a white-collar crime. Hell, it’s just fast money.” The women who worked as partners displayed considerable diversity in motives. Some reported engaging in burglary because they found it fun or enjoyable. These women derived a psychic reward from such offense. #RandolphHarris 2 of 14
One of these women said she committed burglaries for “the thrill,” adding “I get off on it. I do it for the enjoyment, ‘cause I do truly enjoy it. It’s a hobby; it’s recreation to me.” The women who worked only as accomplices had a far different perspective. These offenders felt that they were caught up in circumstances beyond their control, which compelled them to commit burglaries. Often these circumstances arose in the context of an unequal relationship in which the females were reduced to carrying out the will of other, more dominant people. They dominant parties in such cases typically were males, though occasionally they were females. The women quoted in the following passage expresses the belief that she was trapped by her companions’ activities: “[The burglaries] got worse when we moved and I started hanging with a different crowd. It wasn’t too bad where I first did it. It’s getting worse now, though, ‘cause I’m with older guys and they go for bigger things, and when they go, they got things planned—if somebody walks in before they are done, they would rather hurt them first.” Another entanglement for accomplices involved the lack of employment: “Sometimes I have to wonder myself my I [commit burglaries]. And I always come to the conclusion that my kids need things. I always go and fill out applications and everything like that, but they don’t never seem to call back. Every time I want to go and finish school, something is always in my way.” #RandolphHarris 3 of 14
Drugs also played a prominent role: “I got into this thing with cocaine with my friend, and she don’t work or anything, and it ain’t cheap. So I pretty much go out with the boys to get what we want. It is getting pretty deep.” Alcohol also was contributory factor. One woman explained that she and a male friend were enticed into burglaries by a third offender while they were intoxicated: “[Another offender would] always get us both either drinking alcohol, or [my friend] smoked marijuana a lot. I only smoked it two times in my life and I didn’t like it and I don’t do it, but he would get me drunk and say we need some more money. Then they would go to a house.” Females’ participation in burglary can be examined with reference to their role in finding targets and planning offenses. The extent to which offenders participate in these tasks distinguishes partners clearly from accomplices. A number of the women with partner status played an important role in finding targets and planning offenses, as illustrated by the following quote: “Last time I took hm. It was a real good, decent neighborhood, you know, like in the country. I mean, we just sit up and…spot them up, and I find what I find and get what he get and we just go. It’s like a sharing thing with us. He come to me and ask me what’s up. I tell him nothing, but I know where we can get some money. We just come to each other. ‘I ain’t doing nothing, what’s happening?’ ‘Well, I ain’t got no money either, but I know where we can get some.’ #RandolphHarris 4 of 14
“He asked me if I been watching a house. ‘Yeah, I’ve been watching a house. There’s some old people and they go to church every Sunday. Every Sunday they go. They be gone from like about four to five hours. They go to church in the morning, Sunday school then, you know, all of that. I had watched that one. They be old people. They be having good stuff.’” Planning was crucial for many of the females who worked as partners in committing burglaries: “That’s one reason why we got so many youngsters in jail today. I see this, so let’s make a hit. No, no, no. If they see this and it looks good, then it’s going to be there for a while. So the point is, you have to case it and make sure you know everything. I want to know what time you go to work, the time the children go to school. I know there’s no one coming home for lunch. So plan it with somebody else. We’ll take the new dishwasher, washing machine, and this other stuff. We just put it in the truck. Do you know when people rent a truck, nobody every pays that any attention? They think you’re moving [but] only if you rent a truck. Now if you bring it out of there and put it in the car, that’s a horse of another color.” A few of the females classified as partners occasionally engaged in more spontaneous burglaries. The women who worked in this way, however, did not do so exclusively. These “spur-of-the-moment” burglaries emerged in the course of their day-to-day activities. #RandolphHarris 5 of 14
Women involved in burglaries as accomplices exercised much less control over the selection of targets and the planning of crimes. (In fact, some were unaware that a burglary was going to take place until they arrived at the site.) Other people invariably set up the burglaries: “He’ll call e, you know. And he’ll say, ‘I don’t think we’re going out today.’ I’ll say ‘OK.’ It’s nothing really specific why he do it that way. He just stop for a little while and start back…[H]e’ll pick them out. You can tell if it’s a nice neighborhood or bad neighborhood. What areas we go in, he picks them out. However, the self-actualized individual should investigate and decide all things. The self-actualized is to use one’s renewed judgment. The ultimate concern respects the intelligence of those who follow the righteous path, and knows that such a person judges and examines one’s own workings by one’s cognitive functions. One does not need to be spoon fed by a higher power as to the path to take, while it is good to study ethics, morals, laws, and virtues, a self-actualized being should reject all things that are deviant, and until such a time one knows who to discern with clearness what are the things that are proper. And not only is the self-actualized to discern or judge the things of ultimate concern—id est, all things in the higher realms of the pyramid—but one is also to judge oneself. For if we discriminated ourselves—the Greek word means to make a thorough investigation—we would not need the dealing of a higher power to bring to light the things in ourselves which we have failed to discern by discrimination. #RandolphHarris 6 of 14
Do not be led by false information and misunderstandings. However, in your mind know how to see the truth without fiction. Make sure you are mature and reasonable in all dealings. And when you make a statement, be sure to bring proof, and prove all things. Self-actualized beings are abound in knowledge and all discernment, so as to distinguish the things that differ, that one may be sincere and void of offence unto all minds have been enlightened. But we want to delude ourselves that love is the root. It is not. It is only the branches. The root is beyond love, an unveiled kind of isolation, an isolated me, that does not meet and minge, and never can…it is true what I say; there is a beyond, in you, in me, which is further than love, beyond scope, as stars are beyond the scope of vision, some of them. The way back is within you. Within the darkness inside of each individual, there must be a light that will shine forth in one’s solitude. What it requires is an unveiled kind of loneliness. It is understood that one’s life may not move forward through the caring or help of others. It is even possible to be completely at home with oneself in one’s detachment from significant communication and relationships. The passions within may had died, the joys of living may diminish, yet in solitude, one may be convinced that something vital will emerge and awaken one’s soul. At many crucial times, it is not therapy or love and understanding that move a person forward but rather what happens between meetings when the person is utterly alone. #RandolphHarris 7 of 14
It is in this state of unveiled isolation and loneliness that the potential for growth and change exist, that the desire to live and to be joyous again are reborn. We have emphasized the value of relationship and communication with others as essential in learning and in living, and how little we have encouraged and assisted the individual to know the significance of solitude, how little we have recognized the significance of communion with one’s self in all real living and personal growth. What we do not see is often what matters; invisible sources of life contain the seeds for new growth, and a profound experience of inner silence is required to start the new life. One may only be able to discover this on one’s own. What matters is not what others do for us but what we do for ourselves in the internal sense when we are alone with the powers of life that surround us—the stars, clouds, water, Earth, and air, and senses, feelings, and awareness that emerge from the unknow. In days of isolation, one may realize that out of conflict, tension, and despair a new truth arises that enables a person to return to life with others. In a time of personal crisis, it is important that the individual not seek an answer from outside. Neither friendship nor therapy can provide the awareness, direction, or shift that is required when a pattern of living is ending, when life has lost its vitality and meaning, when the person is no longer responding in depth, in a full way. In such times it is essential that the person look within, detached and isolated, that he or she be opened to the unknown sources of energy in life and in the Universe. The alternating rhythms of work and solitude are in one’s salvation. #RandolphHarris 8 of 14
Each day, one should honor the simple, ordinary routines that help one to move with real energy. Nothing seems to matter, yet everything one does as one waits to be reborn. Remember to keep faith with internal rhythms, with the integrity of one’s self. The new life will come in a resounding way, not while one is alone but in a heavy stream of involvement with others. Sacredness is an experienced phenomenon. The mysteriousness of the ultimate concern veils itself even when it reveals itself. The individual feels one’s annihilation is near; so does the soul which echo’s this feeling. A twofold meaning s expressed in the soul’s cry: majesty and purity. The terrifying and annihilating encounter with the majesty of the ultimate concern shakes the foundations, masking, yet revealing itself. The purity of the ultimate concern implies the moral perfection, the goodness, truth, and justice of itself which compels the individual to confess with one’s whole being that he or she is unclean. This concrete example indicates the two elements which constitute the notion of the sacred: The experience of the sacredness as being, and the experience of the sacred as what it ought to be. The sacred has a double relation to man, a relation of giving presence and commanding transcendence. Furthermore, man experiences the sacred as a gift and as a demand. This leads to the sacredness of the “is” and the sacredness of the “ought.” There are going to be times in our lives when someone else gets an unexpected blessing or receives some special recognition. May I pled with us not to be hurt—and certainly not to feel envious—when good fortune comes to another person? #RandolphHarris 9 of 14
The King Lear Problem: “Tell me, my daughters, since now we will divest us both of rule, interest of territory, cares of state, which of you shall we say doth love us most? That we our largest bounty may extend where nature doth with merit challenge.” Shakespeare, King Lear. King Lear was worried about how his children would treat him in his old age. Much to his regret, he discovered that children do not always deliver what they promise. In addition to love and respect, children are also motivated by the possibility of an inheritance. Here we look at how a strategic use of inheritance can manipulate children to visit their parents. Imagine that parents want their children each week to each visit once and phone twice. To give their children the right incentives, they threaten to disinherit any child who fails to meet this quota. The estate will be evenly divided among all the children who meet this quota. (In addition to motivating visits, this scheme has the advantage of avoiding the incentives for children to suffocate their parents with attention.) The children recognize that their parents are unwilling to disinherit all of them. As a result, they get together and agree to cut back the number of visits, potentially down to zero. The parents call you in and ask for some help in revising their will. Where there is a will, there is a way to make it work. But how? You ae not allowed to disinherit all of the children. As before, any child who fails to meet the quota is disinherited. The problem is what to do is all of them are below the quota. In that case, give all of the estate to the child who visits the most. This will make the childrens’ reduced visiting cartel impossible to maintain. We have put the children into a multiperson dilemma. The smallest amount of cheating brings a massive reward. A child who makes just one more phone call increases his or her inheritance from an equal share to 100 percent. The only escape is to go along with the parents’ wishes. (Obviously, this strategy fails with only children. There is no good solution for couples with an only child. Sorry.) #RandolphHarris 10 of 14
The dramatic death of state socialism in Eastern Europe and its bloody anguish from Bucharest to Baku to Beijing did not happen by accident. Socialism collided with the future. Socialist regimes did not collapse because of CIA plots, capitalist encirclement, or economic strangulation from outside. Eastern Europe communist governments toppled domino-fashion as soon as Moscow sent the message that it would no longer use troops to protect them from their own people. However, the crisis of socialism, as a system, in the Soviet Union, China, and elsewhere was far more deeply based. Just as Gutenberg’s invention of moveable type in the mid-15th century led to the diffusion of knowledge and loosened the Catholic Church’s grip on knowledge and communication in Western Europe—ultimately igniting the Protestant Reformation—so the appearance of the computer and new communications media in the mid-20th century smashed Moscow’s control of the mind in the countries it ruled or held captive. As recently as 1956, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev could dream of “burying the West.” Ironically, this was the very year when blue-collar workers in the United States of America were first outnumbered by knowledge and service workers—a shift that signaled the coming decline of the smokestack and the rise of the super-symbolic economy. Equally ironic is the fact that mind-workers were typically dismissed as “nonproductive” by Marxist economists (and many classical economists as well). Yet it is these supposedly nonproductive workers who, more perhaps than any other, have given Western economics a tremendous shot of adrenaline since the mid-fifties. #RandolphHarris 11 of 14
Today, even with all their supposed “contradictions” unresolved, the high-tech capitalist nations have swept so far ahead of the rest of the World in economic terms as to render Khrushchev’s boast merely pathetic. It was computer-based capitalism, not smokestack socialism, that make what Marxists call a “qualitative leap” forward. With the real revolution spreading in the high-tech nations, the socialist nations had become, in effect, a deeply reactionary bloc led by elderly men imbued with a 19th-century theology. Mikhail Gorbachev was the first Soviet leader to recognize this historic fact. In a 1989 speech, some thirty years after the new system of wealth creation began to appear in the United States of America, Mr. Gorbachev declared, “We were nearly one of the last to realize that in the age of information science the most expensive asset is knowledge.” He rose to power not just as a remarkable individual, but as representative of a new class of better educated, largely white-collar Soviet citizens—precisely the group despised by earlier leaders. And precisely the group most closely connected with symbolic processing and production. Mr. Marx himself had given the classic definition of a revolutionary moment. It came, he said, when the “social relations of production” (meaning the nature of ownership and control) prevent further development of the “means of production” (roughly speaking, the technology). That formula perfectly described the socialist World crisis. Just as feudal “social relations” make it all but impossible for socialist countries to take advantage of the new wealth-creation system based on computers, communication, and above all, on open information. In fact, the central failure of the great state socialist experiment of the 20th century lay in its obsolete ideas about knowledge. #RandolphHarris 12 of 14
China is on its way to becoming a World Superpower. America can still sharpen its competitive edge without becoming an appendage to China. It could help them to enhance the lead in the lead in the fastest growing sector of the global economy having the greatest potential for the expansion of demand in the future. For America and Europe and, maybe, also Japan, time is ripe to use their edge in full to conquer the Chinese services market, still largely underdeveloped. In this regard, a combination of three factors is working in favor of Western service providers. First, in today’s China, the level of development and penetration of most services is low. Second, Chinese consumers’ awareness about various kinds of services and their importance is growing. Third, contrary to manufacturing, Chinese domestic service companies are growing significantly. Let us pick up the insurance industry as just one of the examples. Life insurance penetration (total insurance premium income as percent of GDP) in China in 2022 stands at a 13 percent against the 7 percent global average. America has a life insurance penetration rate of 11.7 percent. However, China’s general insurance penetration rate is at 1.3 percent, which is below developed markets’ average of 4 percent. This may be due to culture. Some people in China see insurance as a curse. It is like casting demons on a person. Americans penetration in the non-life insurance stood at 1.00 percent in 2022. #RandolphHarris 13 of 14
As domestic public and private institutions do not provide a sufficient level of protection against accident, disease, disability and death, as well as against the risks associated with unemployment and retirement, families in Chia are boosting their low-yield bank deposits to have money at hand for the “rainy day.” Around 72 percent of all personal financial assets are held in cash deposits. On the other hand, as time foes by and consumers’ education progresses, more and more people come to understand the advantage of being insured, especially the fact that long-term insurance products can help them address the risks mentioned in a much more efficient way, freeing significant funds for consumption activities. The Chinese government is gradually pursuing deregulation and improving the regulatory framework. Steps are made to promote insurance services in the vast country side. The industry’s growth rates are remarkably high even by Chinese standards. For instance, between 2009 and 2022, the life insurance industry grew by 200 percent. The total assets of Chinese insurers amounted to USD $3.91 trillion at the end of December, up 11.5 percent from the beginning of 2021. That is 56 percent of the Americas total assets of insurers, which amounts to $7 trillion. Chinese insurers are quickly catching up. As a result, for service exporters, man believe the Western government should press Beijing harder to open up its services market. This way, the West will not be just exporting jobs to China, they will be in China making Chinese money. #RandolphHarris 14 of 14
Ruin is the Destination Toward Which All Men Rush
With equality and gender-based studies becoming more important, it is a goo idea that we take a look at a gender-based analysis of residential burglary. The study is based on interviews with 105 active residential burglars, 87 of whom were males and 18 were females. The project employed a snowball sampling strategy in which an ex-offender recruited known burglars who were presently operating in a city. The gender-based compassion suggests that, in many way, female burglars resemble their male counterparts. For example, both group display long criminal histories that span a variety of property, violent, and public order offenses categories. Both groups accumulate long, diverse substance abuse histories that overlap with and contribute to their involvements in burglary. At the time, the gender-based comparison reveal several differences. Female burglars begin offending at a later age, are more likely to co-offend, and have less contact with authorities. The typology of female burglars describes offenders as either accomplices or partners. Factor of motivation, levels of target selection and planning, and patterned work roles serve to differentiate these two conceptual categories. Despite growing interest in female criminality, little is known about the nature of women’s participation in crimes statistically dominated by males. Certainly that is the case for residential burglary, an offense labeled as an overwhelmingly male enterprise. For example, we hardly know how female become involved in such offenses or what roles they play. Are they tempted into these crimes, for instance, by the influence of delinquent peers or by the use of drugs? #RandolphHarris 1 of 21
Because we lack detailed knowledge, we cannot assess the extent to which the processes underly burglaries committed by females differ from those underlying burglaries by males. This lack also restricts our capacity to detect important differences among female burglars. An assessment of these difference, however, is crucial in formulating effective policy responses to female criminality and to developing theories of lawbreaking by women. Short of observing burglaries, perhaps the best way to acquire this information is to go to the offenders themselves. The most pressing need today, in researching the agenda for feminist criminology, is observation and interviewing so we can plunge more deeply into the social Worlds of girls and women. Such a strategy will allow researchers to comprehend women’s crime on its own terms. Often it is claimed that offenders are versatile and commit a wide range of offense. This observation, however, is derived largely from studies of males conducted in criminal justice settings rather than on the street. During our interviews we asked the subjects whether they ever had committed other sorts of crimes beside residential burglary. We did so because we were concerned primarily with prevalence—that is, whether the subject ever had engaged in other kinds of offenses. Stealing (which includes shoplifting and corresponds to the legal definition of this activity), auto theft, and assault were the offenses most commonly reported by males. Stealing and assault were mentioned most frequently by the females; these offenses were comparable in rank of frequency to those reported by the males. #RandolphHarris 2 of 21
Beyond these two offenses, however, little other criminality was reported by the females. The only meaningful differences between the men and the women for this measure was found in regard to auto theft. This crime was fairly common among the males, but unknown among the females. The explanation for this difference might reside in a strong cultural tradition linking masculinity to driving and car ownership. Alternatively, males may have “cornered the market” in auto theft; to be profitable, such a crime requires sophisiticated coneections with garage owners, automotive recycle yard employees, and car dealerships. One important aspect of offending style concerns the degree of crime specialization—that is, the extent to which offenders concentrate on one particular type of offense. When we asked offenders whether they had been involved in crimes other than residential burglary during their most recent period of offending, thirty-four percent of the males and 42 percent of the females claimed that they had committed only residential burglaries during this period (roughly the last six months). This finding is consistent with a substantial body of previous research showing that offenders display considerable diversity over the course of their criminal careers, but may specialize in a particular “line” for short periods. This phenomenon is labeled as “short-term specialization.” Another element of offending style concerns the inclinations to work with others in carrying out cries. #RandolphHarris 3 of 21
Previous research demonstrated that more often than not, [burglary] is committed by two or more persons acting in concert. The results of our study bear this out: 79 percent of the males and all of the females reported that they had worked with others in the past. The males showed considerable variation in frequency of working with others: 39 percent said they “seldom” worked with others, while another 39 percent reported that they “always” did so. For the women, however, the picture was much clearer: an overwhelming 83 percent reported that they “always” worked with others, and the remaining 17 percent states that they “usually” did so. The final aspect of offending style that we examined here relates to drug and alcohol use among our respondents, as well as to their perceptions of the role played by intoxicants in leading them to commit such crimes. Our research reveals that there is little difference between the males and the females in self-report drug use. When the drug users were asked whether addiction had anything to do with their burglaries, 71 percent of the males and 82 percent of the females answered affirmatively. A majority of those in both groups said they committed burglaries to obtain the money they needed to buy more drugs. In addition, slightly more than three-quarters of the users in each group—76 percent of the males and 79 percent of the females—claimed that they used drugs before committing their burglaries. A higher percentage of females than of males started that they “always” or “usually” used drugs beforehand. #RandolphHarris 4 of 21
One explanation seems to be that many female burglaries arise from crack “runs.” This point, however, is difficult to determine conclusively because use of the drug is heavily stigmatized. We explore male-female differences on three dimensions designed to measure burglary offending histories: age at first burglary, total number of lifetime burglaries, and lambda, the mean number of annual burglaries. The ages at which males and females committed their first residential burglary differed significantly: the males generally started much earlier in life. None of the female burglars had committed their first offense before age 12, but 22 percent of the males had done so. The modal category for males was the 13-16 age bracket, which accounted for 53 percent of the cases. Sixty-one percent of the females, on the other hand, were over 16 years old when they carried out their first burglary. Given that the females started to commit burglaries later, on average, than their male counterparts, we are not surprised that a greater proportion of females had been involved in fewer than 20 residential burglaries in their lifetime. Perhaps more interesting, 39 percent of the females had committed more than 70 lifetime residential burglaries, a proportion roughly comparable to the males’ figure of 41 percent. The bimodal distribution of the females’ responses suggests that women are likely to engage in burglary at two very distinct levels, and perhaps to employ two different styles. #RandolphHarris 5 of 21
The males were more likely than the females to have had contact with the system for offenses of all types. This difference was most notable at the stage of the criminal justice process that resulted in incarceration. Over ninety percent of the respondents in each group had been arrested previously, but only one woman (6 percent) had been convicted and sentenced to a term of imprisonment. In contrast, 26 percent of the males had served time in the past. This difference may exist in part because the females began offending later and consequently had fewer “years at risk.” Other factors, however, are probably at work as well including an assumption by the police that most burglars are male, which allow females to remain above suspicion and a tendency for those females who are arrested to receive preferential treatment in the courtroom. Certainly the women in our sample believe that their gender conferred a degree of protection from the law. Several expressed the belief that authorities would not take action against them simply because they were female. Is it not becoming clear, in light of the existence of deceiving offenders and their methods of deception, that close examination is needed of modern theories, conceptions, and expressions regarding things in connection with the ultimate concern and its way of working in man? For only the certainty of ultimate concern, apart from “views” of truth, will avail for protection or for successful warfare in the conflict with wicked offenders in the self-actualized hierarchy. #RandolphHarris 6 of 21
When we reach self-actualization, we are at the highest hierarchy of the pyramid, and this is denoted by morality, creativity, spontaneity, problem solving, lack of prejudice, and acceptance of facts. There are five levels in the pyramid. At the very bottom, people are interested in physiological functions only which include: breathing, food, water, pleasures of flesh, sleep, homeostasis, and excretion. At the second level of the pyramid, individuals are concerned with safety and this entails security of: body, employment, resources, mortality, the family, healthy and property. At the third hierarchy most are concerned with love and belonging. This includes friendship, family, sexual intimacy. At the fourth hierarchy, this realm focuses on esteem: self-esteem, confidence, achievement, respect of others, respect by others. All that is in any degree the outcome of the mind of the “natural man” will prove to be but the weapons of straw in this great battle, and if we rely upon others’ “views of truth,” or upon our own human conceptions of truth, offenders will use these very things to deceive us—even building us up in these theories and views so that under cover of them he or she may accomplish one’s purpose. We cannot, therefore, at this time, overestimate the importance of believers having ready minds to “examine all things” they have thought, and perhaps taught, in connection with the things of ultimate concern and the self-actualized realm—all the “truths” they have held, all the phrases and expressions they have used in “virtue teachings,” and all the ideas they have absorbed through others. #RandolphHarris 7 of 21
For any wrong interpretations of truth, any theories and phrases which are man-conceived and which we may build upon wrongly, will have perilous consequences to ourselves and others in the conflict with truth and individual self-actualized people passing through. Because in the present offenders will comes to them with deceptions in DOCTRINAL form, self-actualized individual must examine carefully what they accept as “doctrine,” least it should be from the emissaries of the deceiver. Some people are tired of struggling and want only to know a quiet silence. This can be a shock to one’s own awareness of who he or she is. One may have always considered struggle essential in growth, and in many crises and conflicts it has provided the turning point in one’s life. Not wanting to be burdened and overwhelmed by heavy feelings and thoughts or by complicated searching and painful of what is wrong with oneself, people, and life, this can create the desire to turn away from the struggle. And this is what causes the requirement to be alone in simple and ordinary ways. Once one goes through this process of healing in solitude, and by only engaging in simple routine, gradually, with each day, an individua is able to listen a little more to what others are saying. (This is why during a break up, space, instead of forcing the issues is important. Of course, there are times when you need to know what the reason it so it may be a good idea to press for answers to start a dialogue and not necessarily to just focus on getting back together.) #RandolphHarris 8 of 21
Slowly it becomes each to be interested in and comfortable with other people’s problems. Although there may be some drawbacks. Some individual may be able to be with others while you struggle to make decisions, but one may not be opened to questions or personal comments and responses directed to one. This may cause one to offer nothing of oneself and comment only on what one is hearing and understanding from others. During this period, some find work a truly rewarding activity; it is a place that feels like home. It does not matter whether the work takes the form of writing—reports, references, and letters—or reading. Or, if it involved physical activities, one may become totally absorbed in what one is doing, get lost in the activity and experience a full sense of relief. Active mental and physical involvement in solitary projects can be a sense of salvation. By surrendering to powers within to powers within and sources of light in the universe, in some mysterious way, a miracle happens. It is the loss of the old man and the discovery of the new man. When the light reveals itself, the individual is ready to accept it. This reduces the need to force or push or beseech. One simply waits with firm faith that one is meant to be whole again and that one will live more in a full and complete way. It becomes clear that people one loves and those who love one cannot reach the individual going through changes. And so, life has to come from another source, and that new direction will emerge in solitude. #RandolphHarris 9 of 21
The problem of the truth of faith presents itself from both the subjective and objective sides. Subjectively, faith is true if it adequately expresses an ultimate concern, that is, if the symbols of faith are alive and speak to the heart with an urgency of concern that impels to action and replay. This criterion is more a rule of thumb that works best for obviously dead symbols and is not so useful in judging contemporary ones. However, it is the objective truth of faith that interests us here. The content of faith is true if it is really and not just apparently ultimate. The great danger is demonization, elevation of the symbol to ultimacy, which results in idolatrous faith. Therefore, the criterion of faith is self-negation. The true symbol not only conveys the ultimate, but proclaims its own non-ultimacy. It pronounces a Yes and a No. For the Christian the Cross of the Christ is such a symbol. Name for this criterion—the No that follows immediately on the heels of the Yes—is the Protestant principle. The Protestant principle pervades in this whole theology, both systematically and chronologically. Chameleon-like, it changes its formula of expression against the background of diverse theological problems. Hence, a rapid rundown of its various formulations is useful for identifying it. #RandolphHarris 10 of 21
In addition to being the objective criterion of faith, the Protestant principle expresses man’s infinite distance from God and his dependence upon the divine initiative. The Protestant principle is the prophetic protest against every form of self-absolutizing—for example, the demonic elevation of the churches, of the Christian Bile, and the priesthood to absolute validity. The Protestant principle is “resistance to idolatry,” that is, it stands for non-conformity in family, school, state, and church. The Protestant principle protests the objectifying of grace (die Vergegenstandlichung der Gnade) and so smashes the barriers between the holy and the secular. For, by the Protestant principle, God is as near to the lowest as he is to the highest, as close to the material as to the spiritual. These manifold expressions of the Protestant principle can be summarized in and derived from the basic doctrine that the Protestant principle is justification by grace through faith. We reject the traditional Protestant formula of “justification by faith” on the grounds that is has been misunderstood to mean that the human act of faith sets in motion God’s justifying act. Faith itself is a gift of grace, all justifying actions is entirely on the part of God, and, consequently, the more accurate formula is “justification by grace through faith.” The Protestant principle ultimately rests upon an experience of God’s majesty that attributes absoluteness and holiness to him alone and denies such dignity to all else. #RandolphHarris 11 of 21
Untrammeled choices of individuals could lead to disaster for society. Picture a paster open to all. It is to expected that each herdsman will try to keep as many cattle as possible on this commons. Therein is the tragedy. Each man is locked into a system that compels one to increase one’s heard without limit, in a World that is limited. Ruin is the destination toward which all men rush, each pursuing one’s own best interest in a society that believes in the freedom of the commons. Overpopulation, pollution, excessive fishing, and depletion of exhaustible resources are all part of the problem. People Worldwide must recognize the necessity of restricting individual freedom in these choices, and accept some mutual coercion mutually agreed upon. Depending upon the circumstances, the tragedy of the commons could be a many-person prisoner’s dilemma (each person grazes too many cows) or a spillover problem (too many people choose to become herdsmen). The economist’s favorite solution would be the establishment of property rights. This is what actually happened in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries in England: the common land was enclosed and claimed by the local aristocrats or landlords. When land is private property, the invisible hand will shut the gate to just the right extent. The owner will charge grazing fees to maximize one’s rental income; the grazing fees will make the owner richer, and the herdsmen poorer. This approach is not feasible in some instances. Property rights over the high seas are hard to define and enforce in the absence of an international government, as is control over air that move from one country to another carrying pollutants. #RandolphHarris 12 of 21
For this reason, whaling and acid rain must be handled by more direct controls, but securing the necessary international agreements is no easy matter either. Population is an even harder problem. The right of decision about one’s family, including its size, is enshrined in the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights and in many countries bills of rights. Countries like China and India that have at times used some coercion in their population-control efforts have evoked widespread disapproval. Sometimes, when the group is small enough, voluntary cooperation solves the problem. When two oil or gas producers have wells that tap into the same underground deposit, each has the incentive to speed up one’s uptake, to get more of the resource before the other does. When both of them follow this policy, the excessive speed of depletion can actually lower the total amount that can be recovered from the deposit. In practice, drillers recognize the problem and seem able to reach production-sharing arrangements that keep at the proper level that total flow from all wells tapping one deposit. All’s well that ends well? For the less developed countries (LDCs), as for the rest of the World, power stems from the holster, the wallet, and the book—or, nowadays, the computer. Unless we want an anarchic World, with billions of poverty-stricken people, unstable governments led by unstable leaders, each with a finger on the missile launcher or chemical or bacteriological trigger, we now need global strategies for preventing the de-coupling that looms before us. #RandolphHarris 13 of 21
In the years immediately ahead the LDCs will acquire sophisticated new arms—enormous firepower will be added to their already formidable arsenals. Why? As LDC economic power diminishes, their rulers face political opposition and instability. Under the circumstances, they are likely to do what rulers have done since the origins of the state: They reach for the most primitive form of power—military force. However, the most acute shortage facing LDCs is that of economically relevant power is no longer through the exploitation of raw materials and human muscle but, as we have seen, through application of the human mind. Development strategies make no sense, therefore, unless they take full account of the new role of knowledge in wealth creation, and of the accelerative imperative that goes hand in hand with it. With knowledge (which in our definition includes such things as imagination, values, images, and motivation, along with formal technical skills) increasingly central to the economy, the Brazils and Nigerians, the Bangladeshes and Haitis must consider how they might best acquire or generate this resource. It is clear that every wretched child in Northeast Brazil or anywhere else in the World who remains ignorant or intellectually underdeveloped because of malnutrition represents a permanent drain on the future. Revolutionary new forms of education will be needed that are not based on the old factory model. Acquiring knowledge from elsewhere will also be necessary. This may take unconventional—and sometimes even illicit—forms. Stealing technological secrets is already a booming business around the World. We must expect shrewd LDCs to join the hunt. #RandolphHarris 14 of 21
Another way of obtaining wealth-making know-how is to organize a brain drain. This can be done on a small scale by bribing or attacking teams of researchers. However, some clever countries will figure out that, around the World, there are certain dynamic minorities—often persecuted groups—that can energize a host economy if given the chance. The overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia, Indians in East Africa, Syrians in West Africa, Palestinians in parts of the Mideast, Jews in America, and Japanese in Brazil have played this role at one time or another. Transplanted into a different culture, each has brought not merely energy, drive, and commercial or technical acumen, but a pro-knowledge attitude—a ravenous hunger for the latest information, new ideas, skills. These groups have provided a kind of hybrid economic vigor. They work hard, they innovate, they educate their children, and even if they get rich in the process, they stimulate and accelerate the reflexes of the host economy. We will no doubt see various LDCs searching out such groups and inviting them to settle within their borders, in the hopes of injecting a needed adrenaline into the economy. During World War II the Japanese military actually drafted a plan to bring large numbers of persecuted European Jews to Manchuria, then called Manchukuo, for this purpose. However, the “Fugu Plan,” as it was known, was never implemented. #RandolphHarris 15 of 21
Smart governments will also encourage the spread of nongovernmental associations and organization, since such groups accelerate the spread of economically useful information through newsletters, meetings, conferences, and foreign travel. Associations of merchants, plastics engineers, employers, programmers, trade unions, bankers, journalists, etcetera, serve as channels for rapid exchange of information about what does and does not work in their respective fields. They are an important, often neglected communications medium. Governments serious about economic development will also have to recognize the new economic significance of free expression. Failure to permit the circulation of the new ideas—including economic and political ideas, even if unflattering to the state—is almost always prima facie proof that the state is weak at its core, and that those in power regard staying there as more important than economic improvement in the live of the people. Governments committed to becoming part of the new World will systematically open the valves of public discussion. Other governments will join knowledge consortia—partnerships with other countries or with global companies—to explore the far reaches of technology and science and, especially, the possibility of creating new materials. Instead of pandering to obsolete nationalist notions, they will purse the national interest passionately—but intelligently. #RandolphHarris 16 of 21
Rather than refusing to pay royalties to foreign pharmaceutical companies on the lofty ground that health is above such grubby concerns, as Brazil has done, they will gladly pay the royalties—provided these funds stay inside the country for a fixed number of years, and are used to finance research projects carried out jointly with a local pharmaceutical firm’s own experts. Profits from products that originate in this joint research can then be divided between the host country and the multinational. In this way the royalties pay for technology transfer—and for themselves. Effective nationalism thus replaces obsolete, self-destructive nationalism. Similarly, intelligent governments will welcome the latest computers, regardless of who built them, rather than trying to build a local computer industry behind tariff walls that keep out not merely products but advanced knowledge. The computer industry is changing so fast on a World scale that no nation, not even the United States of America or Japan, can keep up without help from the rest of the World. By barring certain outside computers and software, Brazil managed to build its own computer industry—but is products are backward compared with those available outside. This means that Brazilian banks, manufacturers, and other businesses have had to use technology that is inefficient compared with that of their foreign competitors. They compete with one hand tied behind them. Rather than gaining, the country loses. #RandolphHarris 17 of 21
Brazil violated the first rule of the new system of wealth creation. So what you will with the slowly changing industries, but get out of the way of a fast-advancing industry. Especially one that processes the most important resource of all—knowledge. Other LDCs will avoid these errors. Some, we may speculate, will actually invest modestly in existing venture capital funds in the United States of America, Europe, and Japan—on condition that their own technicians, scientists, and students accompany the capita and share in the know-how developed by the resulting start-up firms. In this way, Brazilians or Indonesians or Nigerians or Egyptians might find themselves at the front edge of tomorrow’s industries. Astutely managed, the program could well pay for itself—or even make a profit. Above all, the LDCs will take a completely fresh look at the role of agriculture, regarding it not necessarily as a “backward” sector but as a sector that potentially, with the help of computers, genetics, satellites, and other new technologies, could someday be more advanced, more progressive than all the smokestacks, steel mills, and mines in the World. Knowledge-based agriculture may be the cutting edge of economic advantage of tomorrow. Moreover, agriculture will not limit itself to growing food, but will increasingly grow energy crops and feed stocks for new materials. These are but a few of the ideas likely to be tested in the years to come. #RandolphHarris 18 of 21
However, none of these efforts will bear fruit if the country is cut off from participation in the fast-moving global economy and the telecommunications and computer networks that support it. The maldistribution of telecommunications in today’s World is even more dramatic than the maldistribution of food. There are 7.33 billion unique mobile phones users in the World today, which makes 91.40 percent of people in the World cell phone owners. The lopsided distribution of computers, data bases, technical publications, research expenditures, tells us more about the future potential of nations than all the gross-national-product figures ground out by economists. To plug into the new World economy, countries like China, Brazil, Mexico, Indonesia, India, as well as the Soviet Union and the East European nations, must find the resources needed to install their own electronic infrastructures. These must go far beyond mere telephone services to include up-to-date, high-speed data systems capable of linking into the latest global networks. The good news is that today’s slow countries may be able to skip over an entire stage of infrastructure development, leapfrogging from First to Third Wave communications without investing the vast sums needed to build Second Wave networks and systems. The Iridium systems, for example, announced by Motorola, Inc., placed 77 tiny satellites into low orbit, which make it possible for millions in remote or sparsely populated regions like Soviet Arctic, the Chinese desert, or the interior of African to send and receive voice, data, and digitized images through handheld telephones. #RandolphHarris 19 of 21
It is not necessary to lay cooper or even fiber optic cable across thousands of miles of jungle, ice or sand. The portable phones communicate directly with the nearest overhead satellite, which will pass the message along. Other advances also similarly slashing the huge costs of telecommunications, brining them within reach of today’s impoverished counties. Large scale production and hyper-competition among American, European and Japanese suppliers will also drive down costs. The new key to economic development is clear. The “gap” that must be closed is informational and electronic. It is a not gap between the North and the South, but between the slow and the fast. However, China’s inadequacy in services is of a structural character. It has it historical and cultural roots, especially the legacy of several decades long epoch of Soviet-style socialism. The mentality of many Chinese service companies and workers may have exceeded those in America. When I was in China, I was impressed by their customer service. They were extremely polite, spent time talking to me, even offered me candy and gave me a soccer ball for shopping at one of their malls. They did treat me like a king. I did not want to come back to America because I loved China so much. Maybe people have different experiences? #RandolphHarris 20 of 21
The overall picture of the service economy in China is not gloomy. Even on the airplane they were polite and told me to stop being so “Western.” The hotels were awesome, as well as the recreation facilities and restaurants. As local consumers’ demand for a variety of good services is increasing, American, European and Japanese service providers have a good chance to exploit their competitive advantage in this area, establishing a stronger position at the Chinese market. Here, however, comes a surprise. You may expect that, in the wake of what was written earlier, America and Europe are enjoying substantial surpluses in their services trade with China, not incomparable to their huge deficits in merchandise trade. But the thing with the people in China, one cannot tell when they are just being nice. Things are so different. They try so hard to like people and make them happy that it seems like they really like you. And they try really hard to keep a neat appearance, are very careful with their work, and take pride in what they do. Because their image and reputation depends a lot on word of mouth, they are very careful not to hurt your feelings and to conceal negative topics, ideas, thoughts and behavior. And their houses are really clean, many of them have never heard of “racism” and the student work very hard in school. It is amazing how many hours a day they spend studying. They really went out of their way to impress us, like hosting us in a restaurant, but making it a private event, of course it meant getting up at 3 A.M. in the morning, but I was happy to. They are so polite and taught me if something is meant to be, you will meet that person again. #RandolphHarris 21 of 21
Hallowed by the Life of Blood
The rain lashed with vindictive fury at the windows of my mansion. My skin was crawling with gooseflesh, listening to the mournful recording crackling with static under the needle of the gramophone as the song grew louder through the rain. There is an eerie undocumented history that simmers below the surface and appears periodically to frighten and confuse people. The last thing I wanted to do is see whatever sight might accompany it. The wind was strong up here on the fourth floor and I could hear rain spatter hard against the sitting-room window. I walked on into the room, past the beckoning Hall of Fires, looking out and down at the night. I could see the dome to the nine-story observation tower through the stir of trees surrounding it. A swath of rain bleared the glass in front of my face and made me blink and recoil slightly. “Hello, Aunt Sarah.” The voice of my niece Daisy. “What I have to say concerns this mansion.” A few items of lovely furniture occupied the room. Two of these were armchairs. Daisy sat in one of them. She had paused, perhaps for effect. “I’m sorry to intrude on you. But there really isn’t a choice. A visitor, strolling along the ground near the fruit orchard, heard wisps of strange tunes. Listening more closely through the dusky evening, he was lured inside of the mansion. And he is now dead.” I took my head into my hands. “Aunt Sarah, I need you. There is no time for prevarication on this.” “Daisy, I will meet you in the Venetian Dining Room this evening,” I replied. I rose from my chair thinking that God had very little to do with anything that ever occurred within the grounds of the walls of my mansion. From wars to executions, to suicides and untimely death from injury, plague, or disease, Victorian mansions are, for all their majesty and splendor, tragic places where death stalked the cold lonely corridors. These are the places of the bloodiest history, whether it be a place raided by the unlawful, or a battle for ownership. With such a history of violence and tragedy, it is little wonder that this mansion is regarded as haunted? #RandolphHarris 1 of 7
I walked back to the window. It was a quarter to six. Strange noises and an occasional sighting of the larger-than-average soldiers with the oddly pointed hats have been seen roaming the grounds. Any attempt to speak with them or approach them, they simply vanish into the mansion. Odd doors and gated entrances punctuated the length of the mansion. There was a Gothic, deliberate atmosphere about my home, a sepulchral character to the mass of its wooden buttresses andre treats. Geometrical shapes snatched inexplicably at the eyes. And often one could hear laughter, high-pitched with contempt or teasing mockery that made one hurry on, even though it may be rationalized as the cold wind gusting through the elaborate masonry. The wind whistles in the trees and leaves and wisps of thick mist blow across the farmland. With the trotting of horses and constant sounds of construction, the heart is suddenly racing, and one thinks they hear something behind them. After all, this is an ancient land, a house built by spirits, occupied by ghosts, pixies, goblins and all sort of mythical creatures of the night. Anything is likely to happen. Looking around the interior of the estate, one can discern a deep, foreboding blackness that seems to be following one, as if it is alive and in pursuit. Stepping out into the fruit orchard, the wind suddenly drops and one’s senses are heightened. Indeed, one can hear one’s very heart beating in their chest as they continue to canter forward into the night. The mist becomes thicker, darker, and as one glances furtively from side to side, the darkness of shadows of the orchards hides their secrets, but perhaps you are not alone. Sometimes I tell myself that the scraping sounds at the window is simply a branch being blown in the breeze and the footsteps heard in the hallway are old timbers creaking and groaning with a change in the air or weather. #RandolphHarris 2 of 7
If there was something serious going on, the housekeeper and the butler would try to keep it quiet. They might talk together, but they would be tight-lipped in front of me. The clock struck seven. I met Daisy in the dining room. “Aunt Sarah, we all talked. We weren’t meant to,” Daisy said. “We were all talking about it. We didn’t know what to make of it. The body was found on a cold stone passage, that was said to lead directly into the opulent state rooms where you normally conducted meetings.” Not a moment too soon, five housemaid trooped into the dining room. Taking off their white starched aprons, they formed up in a line. The room, echoing with their footsteps and voices, as in a church. The mahogany floor, almost three thousand square feet of it had to be hand polished. It was an onerous task, one of the housemaids least like doing. Bending down, they placed their tins of wax of the floor. “Daisy, it looks like we will have to continue this conversation later,” I said. “Goodnight, Aunt Sarah,” she replied. The maids stooped on their hands and knees, their long black dresses spread out around them. Working in union, they dabbed their clothes in wax; then they rubbed the floor vigorously in quick tight circle. The observation tower staircase was the place the servants feared most. The observation tower sits ominously over the mansion, along with sever distinctive turrets jutting proudly into the skies. Sweeping down to the Guard Room eight floors below, it was the main thoroughfare in the tower. Family portraits adored its walls. The steps, of bare stone—framed by a wrought-iron balustrade, topped by a mahogany rail—were wide and shallow. “We were all scared of the tower’s stairs,” said Elsa. “I was coming down them one evening, halfway down, I felt somebody push me. They were behind me, trying to push me down the stairs. I turned round, and of course there was no one there.” The Winchester Mansion is a land of appealing features seemingly embedded in the sense of a deep-rooted and permanent history that emanates from almost every corner of the land. It has rustic grounds and quaint gardens, a hulking mansion with many towering features, having been fostered over decades to create a comfortable and pleasing landscape that guests recall like their favorite arm chair. #RandolphHarris 3 of 7
A number of the male servants, skeptical of ghost as they were, had experienced a similar sensation. “I used to keep an eye on the mansion,” Edvin recalled. “I would walk around the dark with the dogs, no lights on, no torches, or anything. One night, I was coming across the first floor of the tower—and I got up to the stairs and felt hot breath on the back of my neck. I turned round. There was nobody there. But the dogs wouldn’t go any further, their hackles went right up. It was ages before I could get them to move.” I often examined the possibility of evil. I had a notion that evil was communicable. Something that can, as it were, contaminate. However, one must not confuse evil with manifestations. My secret rooms, by their very nature, held the servants in thrall. It was an area that they never entered, never saw or ever knew what went on. It was a place of mystery. The rooms were subjects of wild speculations, fueled by the servants’ fear of me, and their knowledge of my eccentric interests. My servants knew I was fascinated by the occult and this played to their fears. They knew the mansion was haunted and I often had the mediums in. However, they never whether any ghosts or sprits were actually summoned. It went on behind closed doors. Of course, they knew of the ancestral curse. It had been cast in the mid-19th century by a coven of witches. The curse had also been cast over future generations; aimed at Winchester heirs; it determined that the children would die before they reached the age of thirteen and those who survived would be haunted by ghosts and demons. For decades, it had seemed to me and my servants that this was a cruse from which the family could never escape. #RandolphHarris 4 of 7
One night, it was shortly before three o’clock in the morning when a shadowy figure, dressed from head to foot in back, crossed the landing of the staircase. The night was cloudless, the moon almost full. There was a blackout and the mansion was shrouded in darkness. The light from the moon set tiny point of balance dancing in the darkened windows. I could hear footsteps moving stealthily across the floor and the occasional cry of an animal from the fields. A headless horseman was riding near the tower. I got out of bed, and turned the corner into a passage in one of the parlors. As the men worked in the hallways, they froze. Coming down the hallway was a pair of green eyes belonging to a child. The eyes were about two or three feet up from the floor, leading me to believe that child was three years old. They eyes simply floated up the hall, and then turned into one of the maid’s room where we lost sight of them. That night I also saw dark shapes. There was a dark shadowy thing flying from the Grand Ball Room to the and down the hallway. Then above the chandelier there were several dark shadowy things. They flew outside, barely illuminating the background of the trees and then were blocked out by an even darker shadow, moving slowly, methodically along the tree line. Meanwhile another shadow ran through the hallway, it was tall. The carpenters looked at each other in suspense. Closing the heavy steel door behind me, I had left the Grand Ball Rom to find my way long the labyrinth passages. A long passage reached into the distance. It was gloomy, lit by only the strip lighting in the display cases that ran along with wall. Ahead was a solid oak door, carved in the Gothic style. Another passage led off to my right, I could see that it branched in two. One end led into a small hall. It was in darkness. “No one goes in there,” a mysterious voice whispered. The spirit gave me a fright. Everyone, it seems, even hardened sceptics and disbelievers, has seen a ghost. For some reason, in the back of their minds, ghosts may be real. Everyone has known the feeling of their heart racing for a second when they see a shadow moving in the corner of their eye or they feel some sort of presence standing over them. Or worse still, a tortured face in a window that paralyses their body and retards their breathing to the point that they can hear the blood pumping around their own body. #RandolphHarris 5 of 7
I took the left passage. I went on some distance ahead, there was a kink in the passage. A man emerged from it and started waling me. He was wearing knee breaches and a nineth-century coachman’s jacket. As we drew level, he stopped. “Mrs. Winchester, those rooms are forbidden,” he said, “What are you doing in this part of the house?” Once again, he repeated, “Those rooms are forbidden.” I did not want to stop and talk; I was anxious to get back to my room. I assumed that the servants were being proprietorial. Finally, I had made it to my destination sometime later. The bedroom was not dark, because the bright light of a full moon entered through the window. I had just lain down, ready to go to sleep, when I suddenly noticed that I was not on my own. I heard a rasping breath in the darkness only a few feet away. Right in front of the wardrobe and looking directly at me was a middle-aged man, dressed like a Catholic priest. I rubbed my eyes and pinched my arms to make sure I was fully awake Yes, I most certain was. Was I having hallucinations? The priest was still standing there, looking at me. He was a rather frail man with hollow cheeks. His face showed traces of a hard life and illness. If he had any hair at all, it was covered by his hat. He looked so real, not like a ghost. I was not a bit scared, because he radiated vibrations of utter peace and tranquility. There was nothing to be afraid of, so I decided to talk to him keeping my voice as low as possible. “Hello, Father,” I said. “God bless you.” “And God bless you, my child,” came the priest’s prompt reply. He was well-spoken, his voice was soft. His English accent was not hard to distinguish. After giving me a few personal messages and stressing the point that there is survival after death, he told me who he was. #RandolphHarris 6 of 7
His name was John Ogilvie, and in had lived in Scotland from 1580 to 1615, he wanted hanged at Glasgow Cross for his faith. When I remarked that at the time of his hanging, he was only 36 years old, he confirmed this. After quietly talking about religious matters for a few moments, he bade me farewell and disappeared. It seems that he refused to pledge allegiance to King James, and it was for this crime that the was tried, found guilty and hanged. After his execution, his followed were apprehended and put in jail. If this was not a genuine case of a visit from beyond the grave, what is it? Most of the time, the mansion is benign. Unfortunately, sometimes people find exactly what they are looking for. I had been in bed half an hour when I heard the music playing softly from my sitting room next door. I listened to the same, faintly relentless song. Starting to sweat and grow cold in bed, I recognized the song. Or I thought I did. And it continued. It wavered through the wall and door frame in strained, distended chords, and choruses, swelling and facing, ragged and persistent. The door was to my right. I pulled back the duvet and got out of bed and walked through the door to the sitting room. Where the music was louder. The must persisted, repetitious, frighting me. As I turned the corner, I discovered that Gerhardt hanged himself from the cross beams. Badly wounded, Mr. Hansen carried to the attic to await medical attention, but he died there. Since that time people have claimed that he haunts the attic room. He has been seen and heard there from time to time. Servants have reported hearing the creaking of a rope and the soft thud of a body swaying against the wall. Though they often look for the source of the sound, they never find it. There is a disheveled, aged specter, bound at feet and hands and rattling chains haunting the basement. A journey through my mansion is a passage through history. A real history, one that you can live and breathe, one that you can feel and be part of. You can walk serenely miles through my mansion, it is a place that inspires contemplation and wonderment. It is a living history, of memories as far back as history recalls. It is a place of myth, legend, of ghosts and ghouls, of giants, and dwarves, mermaids, cupid, another other half-remembered, half-whispered-about creatures. #RandolphHarris 7 of 7
If a sudden, horrifying death is what it takes to make the spirit linger, surely, this place—is a candidate. Certainly, where men grappled back and forth, engaged not only in the struggle for their own precious lives, but for the life of their respective countries, where in the balance was the future of the very world, and this place produce the mechanism of defense, if that does not qualify for the lingering-place of souls wondering for eternity the outcome of their struggles, then we cannot name a place. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
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Los Angeles Will be Two and a Half Hours from Tokyo
Given that burglars are disproportionately young, poor, city-dweller, they tend to have frequent contact with other habitual offenders. There are various structures and processes that go along with the “stolen property system”—the underground market through which in-demand goods are stolen, housed, marketed, and resold on the street of America. Burglary is a crime that is marked by varied levels of social organization. Only on rare occasions do we find burglars who work as loners or within formal organizations. More often, burglars will operate as colleagues—the offender commits the crime along but relies on other members of the criminal subculture to supply him or her with inside information or to assist in converting stolen property into cash. Burglars who take the situation to the next level and enlist help in the actual break-in follow a more peerlike existence. Here, loose partnerships are maintained and invoked when a burglary opportunity presents itself. A primitive example of the peer model would be two or three drug users who randomly stumble upon an unlocked home or unsupervised business and decide to work together to take it down. In some cases, burglary offenders will align themselves in a teamlike format. These offenders invoke a division of labor with each participant serving an owned predetermined role and duties. One person might be assigned to lookout/driver role. Another might serve as the entry specialist, defeating any lock and alarms that are confronted. Still another person can take on the “muscle” role, responsible for doing the heavy lifting. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
Socialization scripts play an important part in how and why burglars commit their crimes. Interview-based research suggests that novice or occasional burglars often rely on the tutelage of more seasoned offenders as a way of learning the proverbial ropes of burglary. Novices receive advice and instructions on issues such as target selection, how to foster informants, how to defeat burglary countermeasures, and how to best convert stolen goods into cash. This socialization generally takes shape as informal street corner conversations or jailhouse bravado. On paper, burglary appears to receive serious treatment from the criminal justice system. The Model Penal Code classifies burglary as a felony in the third degree. In most jurisdictions, such as offense is subject to 1 to 5 years in prison. If the burglar is armed or threatens or inflicts bodily harm on another while unlawfully within a dwelling, that individual might see the charges elevated to second degree felony. In practice, however, burglary receives mixed levels of formal response from the various components of the criminal justice system. First, let us consider the response of law enforcement authorities. Police agencies were able to effect an arrest for only 13 percent of the nearly 2.1 million burglaries that were reported to them in 2022. No other form of index crime yields such a dismal clearance rate. Some of this slippage can be attributed to the covert nature of the crime—police often have no witnesses and minimal clues to guide the investigation. However, these low clearance rates are also impacted by the fact that many police officers and police agencies afford a low priority to burglary cases. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
Court data reveal a different trend in terms of the veracity with which burglary cases are adjudicated. U.S.A. courts produced nearly 90,000 felony burglary cases in 2022. This figure represents 10 percent of all felony convictions that year. In fact, 68 percent of the burglary cases that were tried resulted in a conviction for the same offense and only 24 percent avoided some sort of conviction. The researchers found that burglary defendants do not receive a reprieve from the courts when it comes time for sentencing. A full 74 percent of the convicted burglars were sentenced to time behind bars. This rate was surpassed only by murder, robbery, drug trafficking, and driving-related offenses. While the median prison sentence for a convicted burglar was 41 months, nearly 10 percent received sentences in excess of 10 years. Our correctional system does not appear to be particularly forgiving to persons who are convicted of burglary. On average, burglary offenders can expect to serve almost half of their sentence—roughly two years. These time-served figures are on par with those of other property offenses (theft, fraud, and motor vehicle theft) but somewhat lower than that observed for violent (54 percent) and weapon-related offenses (60 percent). Accounts from known burglars clearly suggest that informal social control efforts go as long way to deter and/or displace burglary activity. A minimal amount of vigilance on the part of homeowners can go a long way. Measures designed to combat the relatively small population of high incidence “professional” burglars tends to overemphasize the skill and determination of most burglars. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
Burglaries are expensive, complex, and require long term commitment at many levels. In fact, most burglars are young, unskilled, and opportunistic. This suggests that emphasis should be directed at such factors as surveillability, occupancy, and accessibility. More specifically, dogs, good locks, and alarm systems deter most burglars. Community-level informal social control can also play an important role in burglary prevention. When it comes to surveillability cues, burglars tend to avoid neighborhoods with a lot of foot traffic or active neighborhood watches. This implies that observant or even nosy neighbors can have a measurable impact on burglary. However, these types of collective efforts are difficult to enact and maintain in the areas that burglars most prefer—urban neighborhoods. If nothing else, tenants of “crime prevention through environmental design” should be considered at a neighborhood level. Simple environmental characteristics such as cul-de-sac street design, high levels of lightening, and well pruned landscaping that minimizes unobservable entry and exit points can have a significant impact on burglary victimization levels in a given community. The aforementioned informal social control efforts represent examples of target hardening strategies aimed at deterring would-be burglars from victimizing a given house or displacing offenders from a given community. Also, measures should be designed that aim to undermine offenders’ strong attachment to street culture. Expanded employment opportunities are one possible, but foreboding avenue to lure offenders out of street life. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
There exist even more simple and realistic measures that might effect change in this area. For example, a coordinated burglary prevention program that was implemented in a midsize U.S.A. city during the early 1980s. Community activism and community involvement (id est, block meetings, neighborhood cleanups, and raised awareness of vulnerabilities and potential offenders) showed promise for reducing burglary. If community members care about the condition of their neighborhood and are willing to take steps to clean it up and exercise vigilance over problem people and places, there is hope for reducing burglary and other forms of street crime. Most crime occurs during the nighttime. A close examination of NCVS and UCR data suggests that 50 percent to 60 percent of all residential burglaries go unreported. The figure reported here was derived by adding the NCVS data on residential burglaries to an adjusted estimate of nonresidential burglaries that were reported in the UCR—one that factors a 60 percent nonreporting rate. These data must be viewed with caution because 50 to 60 percent of all burglaries go unreported to police and only 14 percent of these lead to arrest. Over time, the crime of burglary has slowly slipped down the list of crime fighting priorities. At present, less than half of all burglaries get reported to police, and only 13 percent of those result in an arrest. What kinds of social and legal factors have contributed to this present level of empathy when it comes to the formal and informal society control of burglary? #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
Adjudication data suggest that accused burglars face a high certainty of being convicted and sentenced to prison. This should send a message to police that burglary is a high priority for our nation’s prosecutors and judges. Still, burglary investigation and arrest efforts remain lukewarm at best. What kinds of factors contribute to police officers’ attitudes and behaviors regarding burglary patrol and enforcement? Considerable evidence suggests that burglars refine strategies and cues that help them identify soft and potentially lucrative targets. Does this mean that burglars are more rational and planful than other types of criminals? The Lord has declared that “no unclean thing can inherit the kingdom of Heaven,” reports Alma 11.37. Our sins make us unclean—unworthy to return and dwell in the presence of our Heavenly Father. They also bring anguish to our soul in this life. Repentance is sometimes a painful process, but it leads to forgiveness and lasting peace. The power of sin is great. To become free from it, we must turn to your Heavenly Father, pray in faith, and act as He asks us to. The Holy Spirit should never become the center and object of thought and worship, place which He Himself does not desire, and which it is not the purpose of the Father in Heaven that He should have or occupy. “He shall not speak from Himself,” reports John 16.13, said that Lod Jesus before Calvary, as He foretold the Spirit’s coming at Pentecost. He would act as Teacher (John 14.26), but teaching the words of Another, not to Himself (John 15.26); He would only glorify Another, not His own; He would bear witness to Another, not Himself (John 16.14); He would only speak what was given Him to spear by Another (John 16.13). #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
The Spirit’s entire work would be to lead souls into union with the Son and give proper knowledge of the Father in Heaven, while He Himself directed and worked in the background. If a man who is untaught in the scriptural statements about the work of the Triune God makes “obeying the Spirit” his supreme purpose, the deceiver will aim to counterfeit the guidance of the Spirit, and even the presence of the Spirit Himself. It is just here that the ignorance of the seeker about the spiritual Word now opened to one, the working of evil powers in that realm, and the conditions upon which God works in and through one, gives the enemy his opportunity. It becomes the time of greatest peril for anyone unless one is instructed and prepared by the Lord, as the disciples were for three whole years. The danger lies in the area of supernatural “guidance,” for one must know the conditions of cooperation with the Holy Spirit in order to discern the cooperation with the Holy Spirit in order to discern the will of God and be able to recognize counterfeit manifestations. The “discerning of spirits” is required to detect the workings of the false angel of light, for he is able to bring about counterfeit gifts of prophecy, tongues, healing, and other spiritual experiences connected with the work of the Holy Ghost. Those who have their eyes opened to the opposing forces of the metaphysical realm understand that very few believers can guarantee that they are obeying God and God only, in directly supernatural guidance, because there are so many factors liable to intervene, such as the believer’s own mind, spirit, or will and the deceptive intrusion of the powers of darkness. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
Knowledge is essential here. Scripture teaches that there is a God-given gift of “discerning of spirits” (1 Cor. 12.10) which enables one to detect that an unwelcome spirit is at work, but there is also a test of spirits which is doctrinal (1 John 4.1-6). In the former, a believer can discern in his spirit that lying spirits are at work in a meeting, or in a person, but one may not have the understanding needed for testing the doctrines being set forth by the teacher. One needs a level of knowledge in both cases: knowledge to read one’s spirit with assurance in the face of all contrary appearances, that the supernatural workings are not “of God,” and knowledge to detect the subtlety of “teachings” bearing certain infallible indications that they emanate from the pit, even while appearing to be from God. As to personal obedience to God, the believer can detect whether or not one is obeying God in some “command” by judging its fruits, and by being aware of the character of God—such as the truth that God has always a purpose in His commands, and He will give no command out of harmony with His character and Word. Often times people wait for something to happen, for some sure way to nurture oneself, to live from within. Music, art, poetry, hot baths, savory foods, wind, rain—nothing affects them. In the past, within days after a solitary retreat, many had found solace and strength in their loneliness. They had always found a way, at least a beginning that would lead to action and to life with others. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
However, it is impossible to find what one is looking for, and one is still on a lonely journey, waiting from a spark from within. Because some people feel empty and eroded inside, they avoid all significant communication. More than anything else the interpersonal aspects of living exhaust some and move them to withdraw from real meetings with others. This leaves an individual certain that one does not want to struggle anymore. Doubt, risk and anxiety—inherent elements of faith—can be overcome only by another of its elements, courage. Courage is an ontological concept, the self-affirmation of being in spite of non-being. Faith is the experience of the holy; it is the state of being grasped by the power of being-itself. From this experience flows the power to assert oneself in the face of anxiety. Faith is participation in the object of faith, and yet is the separation from it. In spite of separation, courage expresses participation in the power of being and meaning. This in spite of element is the courage that takes all doubt, risk, and anxiety into itself and overcomes them without removing them. Faith, then, is the basis of courage, and courage is the manifestation of faith. In the extreme situation of a person seized by radical doubt and confronted with the specter of universal meaninglessness, the question arises: Is there such a thing as the courage of despair? Such a courage is entirely possible, for that act of accepting meaninglessness is in itself a meaningful act. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
The courage of despair enables one, even while in the grip of meaninglessness, to declare one’s situation, and this declaration has meaning. In other words, there cannot be an infinite regression of negatives—in this case, negativity of meaning. At least, one has to admit, negation of meaning is meaningful, or meaninglessness will have lost all meaning. The faith which feeds the courage of despair is called “absolute faith,” for it can have no specific content. Its content is indefinable, since everything defined is dissolved by doubt and meaninglessness. However, certain elements that constitute absolute faith can be discerned. There is an experience of the power of being in the face of nonbeing, an awareness of a hidden meaning within the destruction of meaning. There is the dependence of nonbeing upon being, of meaninglessness upon meaning, of the negative upon the positive. And, lastly, there is the acceptance of the power to accept meaninglessness. Thus, absolute faith is faith which has been deprived by doubt of any concrete content, which nevertheless is faith and the source of the most paradoxical manifestation of the courage to be. Faith is without a special content, yet it is not without content. The content of absolute faith is the “God above God.” When people speak of God, they usually refer to the God of theism. Now theism can mean either a vague, unspecified affirmation of God, or a divine-human encounter of persons, or theological theism which makes God a being beside other beings. However, the God of absolute faith is above and beyond the God of any theism, for the God above God is the power of absolute faith as experience of the God who appears when God has disappeared in the anxiety of doubt. #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
The morning traffic from Oakland to San Francisco across the Bay Bridge gets backed up from 7.30 to 11.00 A.M. Until the jam clears at 11.00, each additional car that enters the traffic makes all those who come later wait just a little longer. The right way to measure this cost is to sum up the additional waiting-times across everyone who is delayed. What is the total waiting-time cost imposed by one additional car that crosses the bridge at 9.00 A.M.? You may be thinking you do not know enough information. A remarkable feature to this problem is that the externality can be calculated based on the little amount you have been told. You do not need to know how long it takes the cars to cross the toll plaza, nor the distribution of cars that arrive after 9.00. The answer is that same whether the length of the traffic jam stays constant or varies widely until it cleans. The trick is to see that all that matters is the sum of the waiting time. We are not concerned with who waits. (In other circumstances, we might want to weigh the waiting times by the monetary value of time for those caught in the jam.) The simplest way to figure out the total extra waiting time is to shuffle around who waits, putting all the burden on one person. Imagine that the extra driver, instead of crossing the bridge at 9.00 A.M., pulls his car over to the side and lets all the other drivers pass. If he passes up his turn in this way, the other drivers are no longer delayed by the extra car. Of course, he has to wait two hours before the traffic clears and the road is clear. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
However, these two hours exactly equal the total waiting time imposed on all the other drivers if he were to cross the bridge rather than wait on the sidelines. The reason is straightforward. The total waiting time is the time it takes for everyone to cross the bridge. Any solution that involves everyone crossing the bridge gives the same total waiting time, but distributed differently. Looking at the solution in which the extra car does all the extra waiting is the easiest way to add up the new total waiting time. Looming on the horizon is a dangerous de-coupling of the fast economies from the slow, an event that would spark enormous power shifts throughout the so-called South-with big impacts on the planet as a whole. The new wealth-creation system holds the possibility of a far better future for vast populations who are now among the planet’s poor. Unless the leaders of the less developed countries (LCDs) anticipate these changes, however, they will condemn their people to perpetuated misery—and themselves to impotence. For even as Chinese manufacturers wait for their steel, and traditional economies around the World to crawl slowly through their paces, the United States of America, Japan, Europe, and in this case the Soviets, too, are pressing forward with plans to build hypersonic jets capable of moving 250 tons of people and cargo at Mach 5, meaning that cities like New York, Sydney, London, and Los Angeles will be two and a half hours from Tokyo. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
Jiro Tokuyama, former head of the prestigious Nomura Research Institute, and now a senior adviser to the Mitsui Research Institute, heads a fifteen-nation study of what are called the “three T’s:” telecommunications, transportation, and tourism. Sponsored by the Pacific Economic Cooperation Conference, the study focuses on three key factors likely to accelerate the pace of economic processes in the region still further. According to Tokuyama, Pacific air-passenger traffic is likely to reach 134 million…at the turn of the century. The Society of Japanese Aerospace Companies, Tokuyama adds, estimates that five hundred to one thousand hypersonic jets must be built. Many of these will ply Pacific routes, speeding further the economic development of the region, and promoting faster telecommunications as well. In a paper prepared for the Three T’s study, Tokuyama spells out the commercial, social, and political implications of this development. He also describes a proposal by Taisei, the Japanese construction firm, to build an artificial island five kilometers in length to serve as a “VAA,” or “value added airport,” capable of handling hypersonics and providing an interactional conference center, shops, and other facilities to be linked by high-speed linear trains to a densely populated area. In Texas, meanwhile, billionaire H. Ross Perot is building an airport to be surrounded by advanced manufacturing facilities. As conceived by him, planes could roar in a day and night bearing components for overnight processing or assembly in facilities at the airport. The next morning the jets would carry them to all parts of the World. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
Simultaneously, on the telecommunications front, the advanced economies are investing billions in the electronic infrastructure essential to operations in the super-fast economy. The spread of extra-intelligence nets is moving swiftly, and there are now proposals afoot to create special higher-speed fiber optic networks linking supercomputer all across the United States of America with thousands of laboratories and research groups. (Existing networks are regarded as too slow. The proposed new nets would send 319 Terabits per second streaming across the country). The new network is needed because the existing slower nets are already choked and overloaded. They argue that the project merits government backing because it would help the United States of America keep ahead of Europe and Japan in a field it now leads. This, however, is only a special case of a more general clamor. In the words of Mitch Kapor, a founder of Lotus Development Corporation, the software giant, “We need to build a national infrastructure that will be the information equivalent of the national highway-building of the ‘50s and ‘60s.” An even more appropriate analogy would compare today’s computerized telecom infrastructures with the rail and road networks needed at the beginning of the industrial revolution. What is happening, therefore, is the emergence of an electronic neural system for the economy—without which any nation, no matter how many smokestacks it has, will be domed to backwardness. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
In its commercial service trade, in 2021, India trade balance for 2021 USD$-79.19, a 665.96 percent increase from 2020. The United States of America is the largest services exporter in the World. In 2019, U.S.A. exports of service were USD $875.8 billion, up 1.6 percent (USD $13 billion) from 2018. U.S.A. exports of services account for 35 percent of over all U.S.A. exports in 2019. Germany World Development Indicators (WDI) 2020: trade balance in USD$221,534 million. Trade services as a percentage of GDP is 5.82 percent. Trade in services with the United Kingdom (exports and imports) totaled an estimated USD $140.7 billion in 2019. Services exports were USD $78.3 billion; services imports were USD $62.3 billion. The U.S.A. services trade surplus with United Kingdom was USD $16.0 billion in 2019. Trade in services with China (exports and imports) totaled an estimated $56.0 billion in 2020. Services exports were USD $40.4 billion; services imports were USD $15.6 billion. The U.S.A. service trade surplus with China was USD $24.8 billion in 2020. Trade in services with Japan (exports and imports) totaled an estimated USD $68.6 billion in 2020. Services exports were USD $38.0 billion; services imports were USD $30.6 billion. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
The U.S.A. services trade surplus with Japan was USD $7.4 billion in 2020. Japan was the United States of Americas’ 4th largest goods export market in 2020. As for the services, France exported around USD $303 billion worth of services in 2021, while it imported services for the total value of USD $258.3 billion. Service trade in Italy in 2020, Italy exported $73.1B worth of services. The outsized U.S.A.-Ireland commercial relationship, which exceeded USD $1 trillion in 2021 is significant by international standards and is particularly impressive relative to the country’s population of five million people. In 2021, U.S.A. good exported to Ireland exceeded USD $13.8 billion. The statistics for services from 2012 record the value of U.S.A. service exports to Ireland at $74.8 billion. In 2021, global services exports were valued at USD $6.1 trillion, representing 6.3 percent of total World trade in both goods and services. Overall, as far as the nations’ trade balances are concerned, the picture in the services sector is almost the opposite of the one in the merchandise trade. In services, the West has a significant competitive edge versus China and is in a good position to establish a much wider presence in the Chinese market. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
We All Know What Ghosts Look Like, Right?
Without saying a word, I rose from the sofa and walked straight to the kitchen. As I drew near a soft of mist seemed to pass before me; and as I looked at it, I saw William. I said to myself, “Poor William!” Daisy looked up. She feared something unimaginable had happened. “Are you okay, Aunt Sarah? Is anything the matter?” And when she drew near, she touched me as if I were as fine as a fabric. Her little hands hovered for a moment on my shoulders. “My dear; nothing is the matter. I simply had a thought of your uncle William and could not think of the pain and discomfort he had gone through. A supernatural breath of cold showed me his icy apparition,” I explained. “Aunt Sarah, I think it was very imprudent to sit with the window open. I will see to it that we light a fire to keep you warm,” said Daisy. Oh, she was lovely, and innocent, so sheerly innocent, her large dark eyes gazing at me as if I were a child. Life was hard in the valley even without the threat of Indian raids, hostile whites, and animal attacks. The women worked from dawn to dusk washing clothing and linen, preparing food, cleaning, tendering the gardens. It was such a large house that I had built. One could walk for days and not see the same room twice. Two of the servant women, Tindra and Sibylla, were comely with beautiful long dark hair that they would let loose like curtains of darkness across their shoulder. They did not have fancy jewelry. If they were vain about anything, it was their pretty hair. One afternoon the girls took the laundry down stairs. It was a pretty day. While they washing the clothes, hostile eyes were watching them from the shadows. #RandolphHarris 1 of 7
They belonged to a war party they had broken into the mansion. The hatchet-hard faces of the natives, daubed with red and black war paint, were ferocious to behold. Their hair was shaved along the sides and stood up in cockscombs on the top of their heads. They knew that they had found easy prey. Suddenly from downstairs came terrible cry and the girls looked behind them in terror. The sound was unmistakable to them. They dropped the laundry and gathered up their skirts to run. From the hallway ran demonic-faced, tawny figures. The girls fled like deer, but not fast enough. Within moments the terrible deeds were done and the two girls lay mangled and broken not far from the Venetian dining room. Their beautiful hair was gone, carried away to be sold and traded. Hours went by before anyone discovered the girls. They were found not far apart bloodied and their beautiful hair scalped. It was a tragedy that played out all too often in the valley. The girls were buried but not soon forgotten. It was not long until people began to claim that the girls, with their bloody scalped heads, were seen wandering the halls of my mansions. It was believed that they girls could not rest because their hair was taken. They had comeback to find their beautiful hair. On January 7, 1892 Ansgar Bergstrom, a farmer on the estate, died as the result of a fall. Although Ansgar was survived by his widow and four sons, the will that had been duly arrested by two witnesses on March 13, 1875, left all of his property to the third son, Olsson. #RandolphHarris 2 of 7
One night in August 1894, Svensson Bergstrom, the farmer’s second son, saw the spirit of his father standing at his bedside, while he was staying in one of the guest rooms in my home. The specter told him of the existence of another will. According to Sevensson, his father appeared before him that night as he often had in life, wearing a familiar black overcoat. “You will find the will in Mrs. Winchester Bureau,” the spirit said. The next morning Sevensson arose convinced that he had truly seen and heard the spirit of his father, and that the spirit had visited him for the purpose of correcting some error. After breakfast, he located the Bureau, and found inside a will. In this testament, the farmer stated that he desired his property to be divided equally among his four sons with the admonition that the provide for their mother as long as she lived. Although the second will had not been attested, it would be considered valid if it could be proven that it had been written entirely in Ansgar Bergstrom’s own handwriting. Olsson Bergstrom, the sole beneficiary under the conditions of the original will, had passed away with a year of his father. Olsson’s widow and son prepared to contest the validity of the second will, and the residents of the county anticipated a long and bitter court battle between members of the Bergstrom family. At that moment, an Indian appeared, telling the Bergstrom family to share the wealth or they would be doomed to wander Eternity. #RandolphHarris 3 of 7
The Bergstrom family proceeded with the court battle. That evening, an Indian woman broke into my home, where they had been staying while contesting the will. With knives, she sliced their thighs so they could not walk through the afterlife; decapitated them so they could not function headless; and copped off their feet so they could not return home. My horses were torn to pieces, and some ran wild. It was a ritualistic mutilation, but no bloody hand prints nor footprints were found. I did not believe these immortal deeds were done by mortal men. I have seen and heard a number of mysterious, unexplainable things in my home, but this was by far the most gruesome. There were often phantom sounds of people cheering from the fruit orchards, to gun fire echoing off the nine-story observation tower in this distance. However, perhaps the eeriest occurred only at certain times—after a thunderstorm of during full moon when the shadows dance a mournful waltz in the Grand Ball Room. Along the darkened and dismal skyline, one could often see a lone figure moving in the observation tower, then bending low, as if he knows he has been spotted and is hiding. By dusk, everything sounded like noise. I was quite disturbed and could not work anymore. The house was full of busy servants and clerics. I knew something was not right when I stepped into the parlor. The Cardinal was dressed for ceremony and duty, a silver crucifix gleaming on his chest. The city was filled with rumors about the number of people who had lost their lives in the tragedy. #RandolphHarris 4 of 7
Some thought that everyone, including myself, had been slaughtered. There was a rare light to the expression of the Cardinal, an innocent exuberance. “Sit down, beautiful one,” he said. He told his attendant to go out. The door shut; the quiet seemed to close around them like water washing back from a shore. I looked up with just the slightest hesitation; I saw the Cardinal’s green eyes were filled with an infinite patience and wondering, and I felt the pang of warning. A dull sense of finality slowly came over me before the Cardinal spoke. “Come here to me,” The Cardinal whispered as though summoning a child. I had slipped far, far away into some realm that was not even thought, and I rose slowly and approached the Cardinal, who had risen from the chair. We stood almost eye to eye. “Mrs. Winchester,” he said softly, confidentially, “it is obvious that this is a return to ancient pagan practices, and witchcraft.” I smiled, “I believe that you are mistaken.” I cast one glance at the door—it stood wide open. “Look here, Cardinal,” I said, all of a sudden; ‘life’s not child’s play. That door is the trouble you have now to face, and you must face it.” The Cardinal sighed. He seemed lost in his thoughts for a moment, and he and his men escorted themselves off of my estate. It was not anger I felt so much as astonishment. He and his men haunted the valley and mountains and saved families from Indian attacks. #RandolphHarris 5 of 7
The Cardinal killed Indians whenever he could and always protected settlers. The Cardinal and his men eventually faded from the lands. Still, he was said to be a nomad who could not rest. You see, one day the Cardinal went out hunting, and came back to find his home on fire. He rushed into the house and immediately realized that Indians had attacked his family. He found their mutilated, scalped bodies inside the house. I thought it was the work of demons. In time, the Cardinal simply disappeared. No one knows where or when he died, but soon people began to say that they saw his specter in my home wearing that silver cross. Some believe that the Cardinal was staying in a cabin on Mount Umunhum, and a small group of Indians were watching the cabin for signs of life. The Indians, emboldened by the silence, drew ever closer. By noon, one day, they were just outside the cabin when the Cardinal started to shoot at them. As he desperately tried to think of a way out, suddenly flaming arrows were launched at the wooden roof of the cabin and the roof caught fire. Days later, his body was found tied to a tree. The Cardinal’s blackened, bloated corpse told a terrible tale. He had been tortured to death. His death was no doubt excruciatingly slow. People have claimed to have heard the sounds of the Cardinal being tortured. Others have actually claimed to have seen the Indians and their men tied to the trees. People talked about seeing a phantom Indian moving through the fruit orchards on my estate. If he died here, he might still be waiting through all of these years. #RandolphHarris 6 of 7
The spirits do not invariably manifest under the same forms; being disengaged from all matter, they must of necessity borrow a body to appear before us, and then they assume any form and figure which seems good to them. Beware, however, lest they affright thee! Is another pregnant warning. Lucifer appears under the form and figure of a comely boy; when angered, he shows with a ruddy countenance, but there is nothing monstrous in his shape. Beelzebuth appears occasionally under monstrous forms, such as the figure of a misshapen calf, or that of a goat having a long tail; at the same time he manifests most frequently under the semblance of an enormous fly. When angered, he vomits floods of water and howls like a wolf. Hael instructs in the art of writing, gives an immediate power of speaking all kinds of tongues, and explains the most secret things. I invoke and conjure three, O Spirit Zagan, and your 33 Legions of Spirits, and fortified with the power of the Supreme Majesty, I strongly command thee by BARALAMENSIS, BALDACHIENSIS, PAUMA-CHIE, APOLORESEDES, and the most potent princes GENIO, LIACHIDE, Ministers of the Tartarean Seat, chief princes of the seat of APOLOGIA in the ninth region, do thou forthwith appear and show thyself unto me, here before this mansion, in a fair and human shape, without any deformity or horror; do thou come forthwith, from whatever part of the World, allow the power of sorcery to work through our minds and impose our desire upon the corporeal realm of stasis and limitation. May the power of darkness eternal be revealed through us now! Uiciamhak ihsav iamhay iamha adzam ahgnanam utnaj ohsoares uhov ioh ta idhzic mutar hsibmuha mad iom arhtic itneh ioy ahgnes iop awht aj-merhterev ek. #RandolphHarris 7 of 7
The Winchester Mansion is such a haunting place in many ways. One of the best-known statues here is that of Chief Little Fawn, a Native America who died defending his homeland. It is said that Mrs. Winchester erected this statue to placate the spirits of Indians. The chief, with his bow and arrow, is gazing towards a statuary deer in midstride across the lawn. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
And please be sure to check out the online gift store: https://shopwinchestermysteryhouse.com/
Lifestyle Built Around Immediate Gratification
People are responsible for their own motives, attitudes, desires, and actions. Our words, works, and thoughts will condemn us. Burglary offenders generally exhibit pronounced criminal careers. Only 32 percent of the 4,000+ defendants who stood before the courts on felony burglary charges were without a prior felony arrest record. One third has a rap sheet containing ten or more arrests. Moreover, half had a prior felony criminal conviction under their belt and 10 percent had been convicted five or more time in the past. Four of ten burglary defendants were in an active criminal justice status (id est, on probation, parole, or pretrial release) at the time that they were arrested for the burglary offense in question. The criminal history patterns of the burglary defendants were more pronounced than any other type of defendant. Research on active burglars suggests that they engage in only limited specialization of offense. Most live a lifestyle that is built around immediate gratification (drug or drinking habits and frivolous spending) and are this almost constantly in need of cash. They are not picky about the exact source of the funds and tend to pursue a host of illicit income-generating avenues (exempli gratia, motor vehicle theft, robbery, larceny, fraud, drug sales). In a recidivism study, nearly 74 percent of the burglars got in trouble with the law within 3 years of release into the community, only 23 percent were rearrested on a new burglary charge. When specialization does occur among burglars, it tends to take on a “short term” quality. #RandolphHarris 1 of 14
Thirty three percent of burglars restricted their criminal activities solely to the crime of burglary during the past 6 months. This finding suggests that some habitual street offenders may fall into a groove and rely exclusively on burglary to support their drug use or fast-paced lifestyle. Over time, factors such as an opportunistic introduction to other criminal outlet, increased perceived risk, or saturation of “desirable” targets will inevitably lead them astray from their short-term specialization. Burglary is a crime that is principally guided by shallow instrumental motives. Most would-be offenders are drawn to the crime because of its monetary payoff. Habitual offenders describe burglary as a low-risk, high-yield form of crime. These risk perceptions are shaped by several factors. First, by implementing a minimal level of vigilance and commonsense, most offenders know that they can get in and out of a home or business without being identified. Second, they know that in lieu of physical evidence or eyewitness testimony, burglary offenses are difficult for police to solve. Third, seasoned offenders know that urban burglary victims (especially repeat victims) tend to have little faith in the police department’s ability to remedy their property losses or effect an arrest and thus may not be inclined to pursue the matter with the authorities. Finally, criminals know that burglary offenses are a low priority for law enforcement—numerous urban police forces now funnel burglary calls for service into an automated phone system that does little more than generate a police report for home owner’s insurance purposes. #RandolphHarris 2 of 14
Most burglars become accustomed to a fast-paced lifestyle and/or are addicted to drugs and thus continue to commit burglaries in the face of increasing risks and diminished rewards. In rare instances, burglars are known to exhibit expressive motivations. Inquiries reveal that burglars sometimes commit their crimes for excitement, revenge, or while in a drug- or alcohol-induced stupor. Issues of planning and target selection are critical to the burglar’s decision-making process. Planning refers to any prevent preparations that the burglar might put in place to assist him or her in more smoothly accomplishing goals. These preparations might include recruiting of accomplices with specific skills, “casing” the targeted establishment, or arranging for transportation. Research indicates that most burglars engage in only minimal prevent planning. They see no need to spend a lot of time thinking through the how, when, and where of their offending. Instead, they tend to operate in advance. There is a term known as opportunistic planning, which refers to the more spontaneous breed of burglar who identifies break-in opportunities as they arise and quickly formulates and implements a plan of attack. Alternatively, seasoned professionals often engage in search planning, whereby they are willing to spend considerable time looking for lucrative targets or wait for tipsters to supply them with such locations. These burglars might even limit their offending to specific types of dwellings (supermarkets, hotels). #RandolphHarris 3 of 14
Once a target is acquired, the offender(s) will formulate a predetermined division of labor, become familiar with the dwelling, and map out a contingency-based extraction and escape scenarios. Interview data reveal that these meticulous prowlers view planning as the cornerstone of low-risk, high-yield approach to the trade. Target selection refers to the strategic criteria that attract or repel a would-be offender from a given dwelling. Oftentimes, offenders wait for someone lese to direct them toward desirable targets. More precisely, they may rely on inside information from someone who is familiar with the dwelling. For example, an acquaintance, an employee, subcontractor (pest control worker, landscaper, maid, cable guy, manager, et cetera), or pizza deliver driver might identify a home or business as being particularly susceptible to a break-in. These informants sometimes go as far as to leave the doors or windows unlocked or provide the location and type of valuables that are available for the taking. Such tips are invaluable to the burglar and usually result in some form of payoff for the informant before or after the crime is committed. Or, in high scale neighborhoods, they will have pretty white girls case the block looking for houses they want to hit, and then knock on the door, ask to use the phone, start a conversation, visually memorize the layout of the homes and where the valuable are. Then, they draw a blueprint of the house and highlight things to get, and give it to their team. #RandolphHarris 4 of 14
Much of what we know about offender decision-making processes comes from a series of innovative studies specifically undertaken to assess the “in-the-field” thought processes of active burglars. Collectively, these studies suggest that burglars are sensitive to the physical space and architectural design. These characteristics play an important role in whether they follow through on a desire to victimize a given home or business. Offenders’ target selection processes are broken down into three categories: occupancy probes, surveillability cues, and accessibility cues. Occupancy cues allow the offender to determine if the dwelling is currently vacant. Empty homes or businesses are ideal because they minimize the likelihood that the assailant will be observed, interrupted, or reported while engaging in the crime. Burglars, therefore, become well versed at scanning the environment for signs of occupancy. Cues such as cars in the driveway/garage, silhouettes in the windows, or the sound of voices tell them that someone is home and that they are wise to keep moving along their way. A burglary might go so far as to look for newspapers on the stoop or a mailbox full of mail. Some will even knock on the door or call on the phone to see if anyone is inside. The most seasoned burglars will take a few days to study the daily routines of the occupants and even the neighbors. #RandolphHarris 5 of 14
Surveillability cues direct attention to the perimeter of a potential target. Here, the offenders seeks to determine whether they will be able to get into and out of an unoccupied structure without drawing the attention of neighbors or passers by. Ideal targets are poorly lit, secluded, fenced-in locations with minimal traffic and easily accessed entry and escape points. Conversely, nosey or nearby neighbors, significant foot traffic, neighbors with dogs, and the absence of shrubbery or fencing can encourage a burglary to move along their way. Som burglars seek to blend into the environment by wearing uniforms or driving service vehicles that deflect attention. Accessibility cues focus on the issue of entry. Here, the assailants seek out soft targets with unsophisticated or inoperable security devices. Unlocked doors or windows are appealing, while target hardening devices such as deadbolt locks, burglar alarms, burglar bars, or dogs sever as deterrents. Some burglars claim to have knowledge or skills regarding how to defeat sophisticated locks or alarm systems but, in practice, almost always chose to avoid undertaking the task. It appears that offenders are pragmatic on these issues; namely, they see no reason to take on a challenging target when they can bank on the fact that a “soft” one exists somewhere nearby. Drug and alcohol use appears to have an important impact on the thought processes of burglary offenders. Survey of federal and state prison inmates found that the majority (56 percent) of incarcerated burglars were under the influence of drugs or alcohol at the time of their most recent offense. #RandolphHarris 6 of 14
Urinalysis testing of arrestees suggests that the actual level of offense-related substance use may be even higher—nearly 80 percent of the burglars who were tested via the Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring (ADAM) program were shown to have drugs or alcohol in their system. These alarming statistics have led some to look more closely at the relationship between substance use ad burglary (id est, drugs/crime relationship). We interviewed active burglars with established drug habits. Several significant trends were revealed. As expected, these offenders explained that they relied on burglary as a primary source of money to support their drug habit (id est, instrumental motive source). Somewhat unexpectedly, drug use was said to facilitate the actual commission of burglars. That is, the burglars claimed that they routinely used drugs to enhance their skills (alertness, steadiness, et cetera) or to calm their nerves just prior to offending. Respondents described a tenuous relationship between burglary and drug use—they recognized that some drugs such as cocaine or other stimulants will predictably yield poor decision making and increased risks. Burglars appear to rely on simple and pragmatic normative neutralizations to account for their criminal indiscretions. Most burglars attach a sense of necessity to their crimes. For those with substance abuse problems, burglary is viewed as a primary means by which they can feed the habit and thus avoid withdrawal. For the nonaddicted offenders interviewed, burglary represents a reliable source of illegitimate income (along with robbery, theft, and drug dealing) by which they could solve pressing financial crises and/or sustain their free-wheeling lifestyle and delicate social status. #RandolphHarris 7 of 14
In our premortal life we had a moral agency. One purpose of Earth life is to show what choices we will make. If we are forced to choose the right, we would not be able to show what we would choose for ourselves. Also, we are happier doing things when we have made our own choices. The Lord has said that all people are responsible for their own actions. Even though we are free to choose our course of action, we are not free to chose the consequences of our actions. The consequences, whether good or bad, follow as a natural result of any choice we make. “The Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey Him,” is the principal phrase giving rise to the expression “obey the Spirit.” It was used by Peter before the priestly council in Jerusalem, but nowhere else in the Scriptures is the same thought given. The whole passage needs to be read carefully to reach a clear conclusion. “We must obey God” (Acts 5.29), Peter declared to the Sanhedrin, for “we are witnesses…and so is the Holy Ghost whom God hath given to them that obey Him” (v. 32). Does the apostle mean “obey the Spirit” or “obey God,” according to the first words of the passage? The distinction is important, and the sense of the words can be rightly grasped only by noting the teaching of other parts of Scripture, that the Triune GOD IN HEAVEN is to be obeyed through the power of the indwelling Spirit of God. For to place the Holy Ghost as the object of obedience, rather than God the Father, through the Son, by the Holy Spirit, creates the danger of leading the believer to rely upon, or obey, a “spirit” in or around one, rather than God on the throne in Heaven. #RandolphHarris 8 of 14
God is to be obeyed by the child of God untied to His Son—the Holy Spirit being the medium, or means, through whom God is worshipped and obeyed. Sometimes in life, we may experience a strong desire to be alone, and may deliberately cut ourselves off from others. We may seek within, not for an answer, but for a way to live, but sometimes nothing will come. Each day, some wait for the sun to rise, but only darkness persists. The World may look remote, strange. Its color may fade away, its breath becomes cold. One may see everything through a cloud…a thick veil alters the hue and look of everything. Persons mov like shadows, and sounds seem to come from a distant World—there are no longer any past for one; people appear so strange; it is as if one cannot see any reality, as if one was in a threatre; as if people are actors, and everything is scenery; one can no longer find oneself; one walks, but why? Everything floats before one’s eyes, but leaves no impression. Each day some people experience a continuing feeling of detachment and a desire to be alone, immune to life. One only wants internal dialogue, and believes that through an internal sign one will discover the next step. The concreteness of the content of faith brings in its wake doubt, risk, and anxiety. Elementary psychology dictates a direct ratio between concreteness and concern; one can be far more concerned about a concrete object than an abstract one. However, the more concretely the content of faith is expressed in a symbol, the greater is the possibility of error, for the element of absoluteness, of transcendence, may be edged out. #RandolphHarris 9 of 14
A preliminary concern, so alluring in its concreteness, may become the content of faith. Nor do we enjoy any immediate awareness that the content to which faith has committed us is truly ultimate. Consequently, doubt is an element which is always and will be always present in the act of faith. This doubt is neither methodological doubt, which is a mode of scientific inquiry, nor sceptical doubt, which is really a cloak for concealed faith. It is existential doubt arising from the tension between the ultimacy of concern and the concreteness of content. To complement the appearance of doubt, mention must be made also of risk and anxiety. Risk can be used to include both objective doubt about the concrete content of faith and subjective commitment to it. Risk is decision for the uncertain. Anxiety is a much broader concept, and, in fact, we build an ontology of anxiety. In this ontological sense, anxiety is the existential awareness of nonbeing. Nonbeing can threaten in several different ways. The way it threatens man’s spiritual life is by the anxiety of meaninglessness, an anxiety aroused by the loss of a spiritual center, of an answer, however symbolic and indirect, to the question of the meaning of existence. The doubter has lost God, truth, and the meaning of life, but one cannot rest in this loss, for one encounters the demand to what one has lost. One is gripped by the relentless power of truth, and, since one cannot fulfill the law of truth, one falls into despair. One doubts about one’s salvation, except that in one’s case loss of salvation is not the divine sentence of condemnation, but the abyss of meaninglessness. Radical doubt is not an ethical problem of flight from God. It is the struggle for participation in the unconditioned meaning of life. #RandolphHarris 10 of 14
The justification of the doubter (die Rechtfertigung des Zweiflers) paradoxically is accomplished by faith. For faith is ultimate concern, not the acceptance of theological truths, even truths about God and Christ. It is legalism to insist upon adoption of creedal beliefs before God grants justification. With the principle of justification by faith being applied to the religious-intellectual life—nothing only the sinner, but the doubter, too, is saved by faith, by one’s ultimate concern. The more serious the doubt and the more despairing the doubter, the greater is one’s concern for the meaning of life. This unconditional seriousness is the expression of the presence of the divine in the experience of utter separation from it. Faith is found in the depths of doubt. To put doubt in its proper context, attention is called to the fact that we intend to analyze the structure of faith, not describe an actual state of mind. Consequently, doubt is not a permanent experience within the act of faith. However, it is always present as an element in the structure of faith. Similarly, extreme anxiety is not a common occurrence, but the rare occasions in which it is present determine the interpretation of existence as a whole. In an economic sense, China has a lot to do with existence of the United States of America. China’s sensational performance as a manufacturing superpower left in the shadow its rapidly growing presence in the global market of commercial services. On other hand, in the services sector the West retains a significant edge it can sharpen even further. Here it is in a good position to capture the rapidly expanding markets of China and other large developing countries, but at this point its services exports to those countries are surprisingly small. #RandolphHarris 11 of 14
As of 2022, global services exports are estimated at USD$7 trillion. International services exports account for 6.3 percent of World GDP. With USD$795 billion worth of services sold internationally in 2021, the United States of America remained the World’s leading exporter, capturing a 13 percent share of the global market. It was followed, at some distance, by the United Kingdom (USD$418 billion), China, the leading exporter among developing economies, ranked third (USD$392 billion). The top five service exporters from developing exporters are: China, India, Singapore, United Arab Emirates, China, Hong Kong SAR. The top five service exporters from developed economies are: United States of America, United Kingdom, Germany, Ireland, and France. In exports of commercial services by country, the top seven are: United States of America, UK, Germany, France, China, Japan, Spain, Italy, India. In the transportation and especially travel services, the sectors where China achieved most is still significantly lagging behind the Western powers. The latter continue to command global markets. Growth of India’s exports of those services was remarkable, but in absolute terms they remain minor. In the financial and telecom services sector, China’s global presence is almost invisible: It is not among the top 15 exporters (here and in the flowing, the EU is counted as a single exporter). India, at number seven, accounted for 1.9 percent of global exports of telecom services. Its share of the global financial services market was 1.4 percent. In the latter sector it is about to catch up with Japan (1.9 percent of the World’s total), though remaining far behind the United States of America (21.1 percent) and the EU (25.6 percent). #RandolphHarris 12 of 14
The only sector where Western countries are not leading is computer and information services. Computer service export were dominated by the European Union, India and China in 2019. With a dominance distant from the rest, although en bloc, the European Union registered external sales of these services for USD$250.616 million, after, India with USD$55.472 million, and China USD$44.96 billion, other exporters of computer services were the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Israel, Singapore, Canada, the Philippines and the United Arab Emirates. When it comes to economical labor, a jolting blow is likely to hit the Less Developed Countries (LDCs) even harder and change power relations among within them. Every since the smoky dawn of the industrial era, capitalist manufacturers have pursued the golden grail of inexpensive labor. After World War II the hunt for foreign sources of inexpensive labor became a stampede. Many developing countries bet their entire economic future on the theory that selling labor inexpensive labor would lead to modernization. Some, like the “four tigers” of East Asia—South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore—even won their bet. They were helped along by a strong work ethic, cultural and other unique factors, including the fact that two bitter wars, the Korean conflict in the 1950 and Vietnam in the 1960s and early ’70, pumped billions of dollars into their region. Some Japanese referred to this dollar influx as the “divine wind.” #RandolphHarris 13 of 14
Because of their success, it is now almost universally believed that shifting from the export of agricultural products or raw materials to the export of goods manufactured by inexpensive labor is the path to development. Yet nothing could be further from the long-range truth. There is no doubt that the inexpensive-labor game is still being played all over the World. Even now Japan is transferring plants and contracts from Taiwan and Hong Kong, where wages have risen, to Thailand, Malaysia, and China, where wages are still one-tenth those in Japan. No doubt many opportunities still exist for rich countries to locate pools of inexpensive labor in the LDCs. However, like leasing military bases or shipping ore, the sale of inexpensive labor is also reaching its outer limits. The reason for this is simple: Under the newly emerging system of wealth creation, inexpensive labor is increasingly expensive. As the new system spreads, labor costs themselves become a smaller fraction of total costs of production. In some industries today, labor costs represent only 10 percent of the total costs of production. A 1 percent saving of a 10 percent cost factor is only one tenth of a percent. By contrast, better technology, faster and better information flows, decreased inventory, or streamlined organization can yield savings far beyond any that can be squeezed out of hourly workers. This is why it may be more profitable to run an advanced facility in Japan or the United States of America, with a handful of highly educated, highly paid employees, than a backward factory in China or Brazil that depends on masses of badly educated low-wage workers. Inexpensive labor, is no longer enough to ensure market advantage to developing countries. #RandolphHarris 14 of 14
Their Unnumberable Sins and their Dubious Redemption
It was a chilly night late November, and I was deep in my thoughts. I had been working all evening in the library, and at last I had some time to rest, and was tired. Completely alone, I came and sat down in an armchair by the hearth. Shivering, I was cold, and rubbing my arms and about to give up when suddenly, there was a roaring sound, and the mahogany logs in the fireplace burst into flame. Glancing wildly about the room, I then heard the sound of my beloved William’s voice, even though he had been taken from me nearly a decade ago. The voice spoke again, seemingly just over my right shoulder. “Look sharp, Sarah,” I heard William say. As I made my way to the front parlor to investigate further, I pondered these things, and began to consider quite strongly that my mind might have played a mental recording of William’s voice. I heard a noise in the front yard and looked out a window to see a graceful family of deer moving down toward the fruit orchard An owl hooted mournfully from somewhere deep in the trees. All was peaceful as it should be. I convinced myself that I must have only awakened from a strangely vivid dream, when, as if in answer to my mental debate and its rational conclusion, I heard William’s voice again, “If you are in any trouble, telegraph to me.” After the chill which had crept through me to the bones was gone, I returned to library and the crackling wood in the fireplace was still burning. At the same time, I heard something clattering in the back of the house. Cautiously I walked to the kitchen and caught a glimpse of a man standing in the shadow near the stove. #RandolphHarris 1 of 6
I did my best to quiet the trembling fear that seized me: What if there is an intruder in the house? I opened several of the door to see if anyone was there. Then, suddenly a new terror seized me and sent my heart ponding. When I opened my bedroom door, I saw a man near the balcony. My brain struggled with a hundred different fears. But then, to my complete amazement, I heard the man singing softly, “Thoughts that have been for years sleeping.” “Who are you?” I asked the man. I could not distinguish his face in the dim light. “Who are you?” I repeated, trying to control all inflections of fear in my voice. As the man turned towards me, I was startled to see the face of my husband, William. That is when I collapsed. In the morning when I was awakened, I found myself in my bed. I knew that William’s great love for me had drawn him back to protect me. And I will never forget the glimpse that I received of him or the beautiful sound of his singing. William gave me the greatest gift imaginable: proof that there is life and love from beyond. To help out with the house, I hired a young woman Lovisa Schmidt. Lovisa was a lovely petite girl with a milky white complexion, soulful gray eyes, and long black hair. The young woman quickly learned that I has pangs in my back so she threw herself into her tasks and tried to life the burden from me. Lovisa was a gentle girl who behaved herself impeccably. The servants came to care for Lovisa, but one of them came to care for her too much. Young Calder was very lonesome. He became taken with Lovisa and pursued her. Lovisa, for her part, refused to accept his attentions. She told him that it was not right to pay attention to servants. #RandolphHarris 2 of 6
Early on the morning of December 20, 1890, Lovisa went to the barn to milk the cows while I had my tea in the library. Calder found her in the barn and demanded that he run away and marry him. Lovisa refused and Calder pilled a revolver on the girl. He shot her through the heart and she fell dead in the barn. He proceeded to turn the gun on himself, but his wound was not serious. Calder Webber was tried and convicted for the murder of Lovisa Schmidt in his first trial. His defense was that he was insane. His mother testified to Calder’s mental instability and childish behavior and related example of his strange behavior. The conviction was later overturned and a second trial was held. At this trial the boy was again convicted, despite testimony about his mental instability. In the end, though, he stoically accepted his fate and died like a man on the gallows. His body was claimed by his mother, who placed it in the back of a wagon she took Calder home where she and her husband laid him to his final rest under an oak tree in their backyard. A sone maker sits at the spot to mark the grave of Calder Webber for all time. Throughout the years, servant had come to believe that the barn was haunted. When Gjord would milk the cows, he often senses another sensed another entity by his side. On one occasion, he turned apprehensively, and was shocked to see Lovisa. She stopped and gazed right directly into his eyes with a soulless expression. #RandolphHarris 3 of 6
Daisy was living with me. She had numerous out-of-body experiences and visited the “other side.” While outside of her physical body, my niece Daisy encounter the spirit of Gjord, who had been killed nine months earlier. She conversed with him, as well as with many other spirit beings. Daisy informed me that, my husband, Mr. Winchester and daughter Annie, were present in the mansion. Daisy assured Mrs. me that my infant daughter Annie was an adult now. I shook her head in wonder. “But my little daughter was just a new born when she died.” Daisy smiled and assured me that Annie was all right now: “Cousin Annie is thin, tall, and beautiful; and Uncle William is looking so noble and happy. He says Heaven is perfect harmony and love, and it is a person’s inner life that makes for righteousness and happiness.” With tears streaming down her cheek, I had evidence that I had been making contact with my husband. I had sometimes seen a woman standing on the main staircase and ghostly footsteps. The spirited lady had been know to move tea cups before the eyes of amazed servants. There seemed little doubt that whoever she is, this spectral lady is still very much at home. I spent a great deal of money to accommodate the spirits. I brought in marble, granite, and find hand carved furniture from Europe. However, the spirits were not always happy. One evening, I was learning the parlor to go to bed. I paused a second, then went up to the attic to view my wedding dress. It was kept in a heavy glass case, which would sway on occasion. Even more interesting, my parasol and wedding slippers inside have changed position. #RandolphHarris 4 of 6
My home has hosted a plethora of haunts throughout the years. At one time a skeletal handprint appeared, as did orbs of light and footsteps. The front lawn and the fruit orchards are particularly haunted. In the month of July, 1892, the hauntings had become more odious every day. There was the heat and the rain, and decomposed bodies would randomly appear. The fields drank up the blood of thousands of young me and boy. The bodies were at first blackened from the sun and bloated from the gasses building up inside of them: then, after they had deflated—some in violent, horrid explosions when they were touched for removal—they very flesh began to slough off as the farmers tried to drag them away for proper burial, then they would dematerialize as if they were never there. No would could explain their appearance or disappearance, except with a begrudging nod to forces beyond comprehension. This mansion was becoming very restless. There was a haunting melancholy I had never experienced before. The cupboard doors would be closed at night and mysteriously be opened in the morning; clothing and jewelry would be moved and rearranged; books from the library would disappear and turn up in strange places. The unexplainable events continued. They must grow as weary now, as they did in life, of the fear, the never-ending stress of being timelessly and forever at war. Scatter flesh and bone and blood in my home, as their souls have been ripped from their mortal bodies, until like the primordial creatures, those who remained limped off to find solace and sustenance around their fires, to rest, to try and ponder their horrible deeds, their unnumberable sins, and their dubious redemption. #RandolphHarris 5 of 6
O ADONAY, most strong and powerful God, grant that these stones may stretch this skin, and do Thou remove from them all illusion, so that by Thy power they may possess the virtue which we desire. Feed and grow in powers as the consciousness of the sorcerer expands. JE, AGLA, HEU, HE EMMANUEL, by ye guardians of this parchment or skin, so that no phantoms may possess it. Spirits of the Winchester Mansion, I awaken the powers of darkness which dwell within you by the power of the blood of the three headed Dragon Zohak that you may serve to empower our great work! Through serving the greater cause of dark magick which break the shackles that bind the Blacked Fire of Spirit, may you be uplifted and liberated! Awaken and empower the forbidden rites of Angra Mainyu! Awaken to empower my great work of counter creation as an Apostle of the Lord of Darkness eternal and as a warrior of the Path of spiritual energy. Through the gateway of blood, spirit, mind, and body receive life from the deepest depths of Arezura, in the name of Zohak, and by the power of Angra Mainyu it is done! King of Darkness, bring mountains to the plains of our lives as obstacles overcome. Breed achievement. Bring beast to the field of our existence that we may grow cunning and might. Make this breed victory. I DO conjure thee, O Spirit Agares and the 31 Legions of Spirits under your government. Thee I invoke, the Bornless one. Thee, that didst create the Earth and the Heavens: Thee, that did create the Night and the Day. Thee, that didst create the Darkness and the Light. Thou art Osorronophris: Whom no man has seen at anytime. Hear Thou Me, for I am the Angel of Paphro Osorronophris: that is Thy True Name, handed down to the Prophets of Ishrael. #RandolphHarris 6 of 6
It appears that humans are not the only spirits trapped in time, forced by Whomever controls such things to toil endlessly and anon, walking roads they have walked before and inhabiting, seemingly forever, places where they have suffered. Other entities too, are caught in the cruel circular labyrinth that brings them back again to the places where they have lived. On occasion, visitors claim that they hear sobs coming from the vicinity of the statues of Hebe and Demeter. When they investigate, they find no one crying, but the ghostly sobs continue. Some think it is because the two Greek Goddesses can no longer see each other and are lonely. Legend has it is that the statues used to step down off their pedestals and walk around the grounds at midnight on New Year’s Eve to inspect the estate, but one night they did not returned on their own. When the caretakers found them, they placed them back on opposite pedestals are punishment. Others say it is so they can watch each other’s back. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/
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Randolph Harris II International Institute 