Random Thoughts

I am noticing more hits onto my site, so I figured I should continue with my blog, lest anyone get bored and stop coming.

Since Earth Day I have been thinking more about the environment. It might seem trivial, but it's not. Without a biosphere, we can't have any of the things we take for granted. We wouldn't be able to sit here and read or write blogs on our computers. We wouldn't have much of anything. It is for this reason that I wanted to write about the environment for the integralworld website. I don't want to inundate people with a barrage of scientific facts, just the most relevant and alarming ones. My interest is in relating the environment to other important issues, such as economics, war, terrorism, and technology. I haven't yet figured out how to say something that hasn't already been said, and get more people thinking about this.

I've realized recently the true purpose of my website. Whether people read my essays or not is unimportant. If people find them interesting or informative, great. But as long as I've reeled in a few people, I really hope they will go to my links page, because I believe it is there that the important sites lie. A crude way of putting it is that my site is really just a vehicle to spread awareness of important issues. Not that what I'm focused on are the only important issues, mind you, but they include causes dear to my heart.

As for integralworld.net, I'm happy to say that my stuff has been put up. I will not comment on that, as the reader can go to the site and check it out for him or herself. I honestly thought the chances of getting them up would be low. I understand now just what a service Frank Visser has done for Integral Studies. He has created an open forum in a new and exciting area. Of course, with a forum that open, it is bound to let in lower quality work. As with my site, I make sure to include a disclaimer - I'm just a layperson. Maybe I state it too often, which shows some kind of self-deprecating insecurity. The reason I do state it is because I think it's important to know your limitations and not misrepresent yourself.

Happy Earth Day!
If any of you out there are following my blog, you're probably wondering why I write so sporadically. I've wondered that myself (I can say I'm just busy, but that's an escuse). I think the reason is that I have approached this blog like a writing assignment, seeing each piece as a finished essay. Really, that's not the norm for blogs which, aside from news commentary, tend to be highly personal journeys into which people allow their stream of consciousness to run wild. I'm not going to do that, but perhaps it wouldn't hurt to be a little more organic and a little less polished.

Last month I wrote a newspaper commentary about the cartoon controvesy in Jillands-Posten on the Prophet Muhammad. Now that the vandalism has died down, I'm much more worried right now about the Iran situation. I want to focus on a broader question - Is it OK to use/have nuclear weapons?

NO. And I don't just mean that for Iran, but for ANY country. Nuclear weapons do not make the world safer.

Nuclear energy itself, even for peaceful purposes, has serious environmental consequences. Right now there's still room underground to store radioactive waste, but pretty soon we'll run out. Safer sources of energy are not just a luxury, we have to get on the ball with this. We don't need to do it to make ourselves feel better, we need to do for our basic survival and quality of life. If people decide to buy hybrids and solar powered lights to flatter themselves, fine. Shallow, but fine. Whatever the motivation, we need to do this without haste.

I don't want to live in a world where conflicts are resolved with threats of weapons that can destroy the entire biosphere. Call me a whiny liberal, but that doesn't strike me as very healthy.

This is not a presciption for how to deal with Iran. My position on that the international community should find sensable ways to allow them to develop peaceful energy programs, for now. Hopefully their own people will decide to implement other sources of energy (I realize that's highly unlikely given the political situation, but let's not meddle in that right now). It might indeed be possible Iran is secretly trying to build a bomb, but by all accounts they are years away from even having the capability. Let the UN and the IAEA investigate into the matter. Also, work with countries who are working with Iran. I'm sure Iran doesn't want sanctions and inspections all the time.

There's an argument - if we don't threaten them with serious consequences, they will have no fear of building a bomb. There are three unspoken assumptions here: 1.) The US is morally superior and has every right to be the world's authority, 2.) The US alone decides who has nuclear weapons and who doesn't, 3.) Iranians are inherently more dangerous than anyone else. Suffice to say I reject those assumptions. If the US is really serious about making the world safer, than by all means lets dismantle our own weapons and pressure our allies to do the same.

The sad truth is that the US is the only military that has actually used nuclear weapons, and the US is openly declaring its intentions to consider doing it again. Even if it's a bluff, it's a pretty dangerous game to play.

There are reformists in Iran who want to change its regime. If we care at all about them and their goals, attacking Iran is the worst possible thing to do. When you're your survival is at stake, what are you going to do but seek protection from your government? How are reformists going to sway its population when the government uses propaganda to link reformists with a country that is threatening its people? Iranians are not stupid, they know what the US has done to them. Hopefully, more Iranians will distinguish between progressive voices and American hegemony, but that is increasingly hard to do under threat of annihilation.

Karma - It Keeps Going and Going
We all know that what goes around, comes around. Just read the news, or look at history. Those who live by the sword, die by the sword. And if we believe in reincarnation, we can be assured that those who do not taste justice in this life will get it in another.

I might not be a hell-fearing Christian anymore, but I certainly do fear karma. Freedom from karma is an incredibly lofty goal, but it sure would be nice. Do I have the discipline to reach that goal? Am I willing to pay the price? I don't know.

If any of you remember, one of the first entries on this blog mentioned a CD called "Burning Karma." Well folks, I'm happy to report that I finally ordered it from Amazon.com and received it in the mail the other day.

I've listened to it a few times, and I'd say it's pretty good, better than I thought it would be. The first time I listened to it the batteries gave out halfway through, so it was quite a distration.

The second time the same thing happened, though perhaps the calm state of mind I was in lessened the anger I would normally feel towards the obviously defective batteries I bought (that's what happens when you try to save a few bucks by going with the store brand).

The third time I used quality batteries, and the CD player worked fine. So what do I think?

I think it's probable that Leslie Temple-Thurston is highly awakened. They say that enlightened people can transmit their joy even through their voice. It sounds flaky, but I don't doubt it. Your state of mind cannot be fully hidden, it affects others in one way or another. Haven't you ever been around someone and felt good or bad "vibes"?

Well, it's a nice meditation, and I like her voice. I don't know if I burned away any of my karmas. Maybe after a few more listens I'll let you know.

Happy New Year!
It's been a few months since I've written here, and I can technically say that I haven't written since last year (ha ha ha). Of course I hope everyone had a good holiday (not just Christmas). And of course I hope we all have a good year ahead of us.

Interesting, as this is a personal blog about my personal thoughts, I have contemplated why we give credence to personalities over ideas. Why are we so married to our opinions? Why do we have such fantasies and projections about those who hold opinions, rather than just focus on the merit of the opinions themselves? I wrote an essay about it, a section of which will fill today's entry.

Most lay-people don’t seem to worry about such numbing abstractions [the mind/body problem, substance versus process, etc]. It is merely assumed that the personality is a thing and it is real. A person does not merely perform, they own a certain ability that makes them special (and often there are judgments of the superiority and inferiority of the individual in relation to the ownership of such traits). We look at heroes as mythic personalities, not just their deeds. For Red Sox fans it is not merely the struggle of Curt Schilling during the world-series that so impresses them, but the fact that he, the man, the individual athlete, was willing to sacrifice his injured body for the sake of the team’s victory, that gave him a special status. The priority goes from the act to the actor. We don’t just value skills, we value the individual performing them (and this is mostly positive in that people are not just used like machines, but respected for their inner desires and feelings. Ironically, this was the key point of Marx, the father of Communism, who argued that factory work was alienating for workers who were not valued as humans and were separated from the fruits of their labor because they didn’t own the means of production).

Similarly, in academia, we don’t just follow arguments, we praise or condemn those who make the argument. We don’t just criticize an immature argument, but an immature person making the argument. The competence of the individual is focused on, not just their performance. Praise tends to boost the self-esteem of the scholar, valued as an intelligence human being, and rejection in academia is devastating because if an intellectual.

The shifting influence of personality over idea, it seems, has risen recent decades. Public speeches in American prior to World War II, even by the so-called common man, contained far fewer “I-statements,” instead favoring the third person. Currently this is seen as impersonal (again, the priority of the personal), indirect, cold, and pretentious. We assume, falsely, that a politician is more honest if they appear more genuine, that is, if they talk about themselves personally – my values, my beliefs, my life, etc.

Now this is not to say that personal values, beliefs, skill level, or competency don’t exist or have no effect on formulating ideas. But the role of the individual, apart from the environment, apart from relationship, is over-emphasized to create needless personality conflicts. Rather than what is right, we focus on who is right. If we like that “who” then we must trust everything this who says, regardless of the evidence. When we don’t have the time to think through all the issues, we look to the experts, because we assume they personally have this superior skill in knowing everything. Naturally, if that who is someone we don’t trust, we assume that nothing they say can be correct. This exaggerated loyalty can lead to real disasters, where people who were very wrong about certain things were trusted and valued over the truth, and therefore, over the rights and well-being of others.

A better way to go about the search for truth is to focus on good ideas, wherever you find them. Now, what is a good idea? Naturally, there are subjective, that is, personal, criteria one accepts in distinguishing a good idea from a bad one. There are also standards outside one’s narrow purview we can use to make such a judgment. It doesn't matter who agrees with me. Rather, it is prudent to examine the effectiveness of certain ideas to achieve certain ends, and more importantly, the consequences certain ideas have on others.

The Politics of Enlightenment
As Buddhism entered Europe and North America it has mixed with social activism, resulting in the Engaged Buddhism movement. Although it was shaped by earlier philosophers, it came to the fore when the Buddhist monk and writer Thich Nhat Hanh spoke out against the Vietnam war. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. even nominated him for a Nobel Peace Prize. When asked whether he sided with the North or South in Vietnam, he said "I'm from the middle." He saw that the problem was the suffering of all who were involved in the war, which itself is a perfectly Buddhist sentiment. But he also stepped out of the monastery to make controversial statements about the activities of governments, thus ushering in a new role - the Buddhist social advocate.

The traditions of social work and political activism in the West have both secular and religious foundations, and these schools of thought differ from the philosophical foundations of Buddhism. Not that Buddhism and social movements can't co-exist, but we should be wary of distorting the purposes of either.

Buddhism is a religion in every sense, and despite popular belief, traditional Buddhism does not share all of the assumptions of modern secular humanism. Buddhism has a metaphysics, it has a distinction b/w holy people and ordinary people, and it has an ultimate, non-worldly tragetory.

Buddhism can inspire one to take up social activism, but that's not its main purpose. It can work the other way as well, with social activists drawing upon Buddhist ideas. But social activism, both its methods and purposes, does not require Buddhism as such.

Buddhism's raison d'etre was never material charity for the tired, the poor, the huddling masses. True, the Buddha did have some political ideas, but it was to create a society condusive to transcendance. Buddhism's elite monasteries are radical precisely because those involved markedly depart from worldly life. Buddhism's popular forms, particularly in Asia, involve praying to Bodhisattvas and Buddhas, hoping for a good rebirth. There's nothing wrong with this, indeed these rituals are meaningful. But they don't necessarily eliminate the specific social conditions that cause suffering, such as extreme poverty, lack of upward mobility, depleted resources, child-labor, forced prostitution, or over-taxed farmers.

It would be great to have more Buddhas in the world, and if everyone was enlightened, well, I bet that would eliminate 99% of our problems. But before that can happen, the social conditions of the world must be engaged on their own terms.

Prayer and meditation primarily affect the individual doing so. Prayer and meditation can increase one's sense of compassion and empathy, and in that sense these practices affect how individuals relate to others. But the same can also be said of moral codes. Some claim that praying for others can facilitate healing, even when the patient doesn't know they're being prayed for. But we don't really know how that works, and under controlled research conditions the results are unpredictable. Medical science is the most effective way to treat medical problems. I draw the same conclusion from social science - social work is the best way to deal with social problems.

However, if you want to talk about preventing health problems, this is a different ballgame. No matter how much medical care you receive, it doesn't make a difference if you ignore your doctor's advice and live an unhealthy lifestyle. With social health, contemplative practices can help prevent problems that social work, which treats already existing problems, cannot. The true power of meditation is not just being free from stress, but a transformation of one's relationship to oneself and the rest of the world.

Information Overload

I recently read Ted Rall's latest opinion piece "A Fate Worse Than Death" (http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ucru/20050824/cm_ucru/afateworsethandeath ). He argues that we're commiting cultural suicide by converting all information to digitalization. He points out how there are serious storage flaws with digital technology, and we may lose too much information too quickly before we can record everything that is important. This may be an exaggeration, I don't know. But this reminds me of an insight I had when I was in college.

I was in history class, and something occured to me. Historians typically record the past as though it's a linear timeline. Well, the future keep moving forward, no? So the amount of events to record increases more and more. Will there be a point where it's too much? In the past, natural disasters, and man-made ones, or just time itself, eroded the records our ancestors made of their times and accumulated knowledge. Of all the seven wonders of the world, we have only the pyramids to remind us of past glories. Even those monuments have faded, compared to how they used to look, towering white limestone structures blazing in the desert sunlight, they're now just a big pile of crumbling bricks on top of sand. Who knows how much knowledge was lost when the library of Alexandria was burned down? Or how about the canon of books lost during the Crusades, or during other conquests? Perhaps another disaster will wipe out our logs, leaving people of the future wondering what life was really like in good old 2005.

As we've left the industrial age and are full swing into the information age, there's so much going on that it's become increasingly difficult to sort out what's meaningful.

No one knows all the facts, so we are in constant need of experts who specialize. With computing technology speeding up in efficiency at an exponential rate the cyber-world is taking on a life of its own.

This change is maddening, no? This was a theme in a lecture by Jon Kabat-Zinn. He was talking about how this speed influences us. We are great at processing information, but we don't receive training for our attention (hence, meditation). We go through our day, thinking about work, chores, endless tasks, acting on automatic pilot. We're not aware of our actions in the present, and we miss the space in which real life happens. We have no lives, in other words. The more time is saved by labor saving devices, the more opportunity we have to be productive. It's not that we won't stop, we can't stop. We have to maintain the system or it will crash. Remember, no machine can eliminate work, because energy cannot be created nor destroyed. Machines only speed up work.

Zinn doesn't believe we can turn back time. He prescibes being mindful of this flow, lest it sweep us up into a whirlpool of madness.

But I want to address a potential misunderstanding of the Buddhist discipline of mindfulness. The Buddhist solution to our modern woes is not to be a more sensual person.

In Indian philosophy, there isn't a duality between mind and body. There is a triad - mind, body, AND spirit. Buddhism and Jainism are full of warnings about the dangers of sensual indulgence. The middle way is to neither deny nor indulge, but to do what's necessary to keep our body alive, at least until there is realization. It's there in Greek philosophy as well, known to the ancients as "sophrosyne" or moderation.

Look at American culture today. We are an alienated, overworked, confused people. We cope by escaping anxiety through random pleasures. We meet so many people, but instead of lasting friendships we get associates coming and going, coming and going. Our news rarely focuses on issues that affect our lives, and instead on gossip, sound-bites, slogans, and the cult of personality.

What should we do? Slow down the machine of mindless consuming, sure. And meditation, yes, is wonderful. But let's have a clear understanding of what meditation is for. The senses are a fine instrument for interacting with the world, but not the only vehicle we have to enjoy life. The exclusive focus on things plays into the consumer machine that needs us to spend money on objects to feel good about ourselves. Ever hear the saying "the best things in life aren't things"? It's true.

It's A Small Universe After All (well, sort of)
"Do for this world as if you were to live a thousand years and for the next as if you were to die tomorrow." - The Hadith

Give wordly matters due consideration in proportion to the scope of the world. Timely matters have timely solutions. The timeless, that can't wait, it doesn't wait. It always already is, and it is we who wait to enter, not vice-versa.

The world is important, no doubt. But let's put it in perspective. The physical universe is not all there is, and therefore it is not more important than the immaterial source from whence it comes. The physical universe is impermanent. According to David Jon Peckinpaugh, the consensus of the wisdom traditions regarding how to live in the world is:

"Do not seek for an advantage over others. However, if you have been blessed by God Almighty with what may be seen as some kind of advantage — a natural gift or talent of some sort — then use that advantage for the benefit of others, and not for the benefit one one's self and one's closest and most intimate relations."

I might add, use your gifts not only for yourself, friends, and family, but also for others. Really, if you live right, all the right needs can be taken care of. I see no reason why you can't help those who are close to you. Of course help can take different forms, you don't have to spoil your kids for example. But you certainly do have a duty to be a kind, loving, and responsible parent or caretaker, if you choose to have children or take care them.

Why am I thinking of such things? On the practical level, I'm planning out my life, so it's always on my mind. But also, I have been reading the book "How the Universe Got Its Spots" by Janna Levin.

Levin is a brilliant physicist, and her book reads like a memoir of her personal life interspersed with commentaries on her life's work. In this way it reminds me very much of Wilber's "One Taste." In this book, and in her scientific work, Levin posits that the universe is not infinite in size, just really, really big. She explains why in mathematics infinity is a valid concept, but in nature it is not.

Being the mystic that I am, you'd think I'd disagree. Actually, I don't. Let me explain.

First, we must define infinity. There is a countable infinity (that's right, a lesser infinity). The number line goes on without a limit, but the number line of rational numbers only consists of even and odd integers. Then there are irrational numbers. And, if you consider both rational and irrational numbers, that itself is an infinity of possibilities. Yet, infinity is not a quantity, infinity plus infinity is, you guessed it ... infinity.

The universe is neither a countable infinity, nor any other kind. It is big, ridiculously so, but it does not extend forever. I won't go too much into the geometry, just sum up the basic points.

Like the global earth, the universe has no edge and no middle. As Levin says, the universe is "finite and edgeless, compact and connected."

In the scheme of the great chain of being, this makes perfect sense. Limitlessness is only a possibility in the realm of mind. The senses register limitations. There's a lot the senses don't tell us, but there are basic units of matter. If you mess with subatomic quanta, matter is fundamentally altered in a way you can't do to matter on a larger scale.

The Christian mystics say we have an eye of the flesh (or senses) to register the physical, an eye of the mind (or intellect) to register ideas, and the eye of the spirit (or soul) to register the divine. Science is a tool of flesh and mind. The mind tells of realities the senses sometimes can't believe, such as mathematical truths (Plato's realm of ideation). But when the mind and the senses are applied to the universe, it reveals an elegant map of finitude. The soul, beyond mind and body, is in touch with true infinity. The divine is divine precisely because it is limitless.

"God is great, God is great. God is greater than, God is greater than ..." That is the Muslim call to prayer. The second sentence is intentionally left with a pause for us to fill in the blank. God is greater than anything you can see or imagine. The Christian philosopher St. Anslem had the same argument, whatever you think God is, God is still more than that.

The entire universe, as damn big as it is, still has limits. What lies outside these limits? If you traveled in a space ship, you certainly wouldn't reach an edge. Just as if you were in a ship sailing around the world, if you could travel the whole universe you would eventually end up where you started.

If you really want to know what's beyond the limits of the universe, you have to use the eye of the Spirit.

The Arms Race and Teology
As you can probably tell, I'm reading a lot of Robert Wright lately. His major critic in his field (evolution) is Stephen Jay Gould. It's a fascinating debate.

Wright's view of evolution is that, basically, complexity breeds complexity in a linear direction.

Gould argues that evolution goes up and down, that random selection has no direction. His analogy is a drunk moving down a sidewalk. There's an equal chance the drunk could stay on the sidewalk or stumble into the road. A brick wall in a certain place can determine whether he heads east instead of west, or north instead of south. Put enough drunks and enough brickwalls, and some will make it all the way to the end of the road. This does not mean the end point of the road was really the goal of each drunk. Given the conditions, the result was likely, not inevitable.

When it comes to how evolution works, both Gould and Wright agree about randomness. But why evolution works the way it does, there could be higher intelligence involved. The "intelligent" designer could have set up the brickwalls and other conditions on purpose. Who knows.

Let's leave metaphysics aside for now (Wright claims that his theory is not "orthogenesis," that progress means things are moving towards spiritual perfection). Wright counters Gould's argument with several examples of the arms race in nature, such as the spray of the Bombadeer Beetle and the Skunk. As each animal ups the ante to defend or prey upon the other, eventually there will be communication between allies to defeat rivals, which requires cooperation.

Critics point out cooperation and communication are subgoals of survival, not necessarily the endpoint of evolution. What I find troubling, and perhaps unintended on Wright's part, is that the arms race in nature could be used to justify the arms race in society.

Reagan gets a lot of praise for winning the Cold War by hyper-inflating the military budget. But let's put it in context. The Cold War (and its many hot wars) was primarily economic. Russia tried to surpass the US, but just couldn't compete because it suffered more damage after WWII than the US did, and certainly dictatorship didn't help (the same devious tactics and powerful leadership Stalin used to defeat the Nazi invasion also lent to his evil dictatorship later on). Russia essentially went bankrupt trying to compete with the US arsenal. So does that mean weapons made us safer? Is the all-encompassing power of nuclear weapons the answer to the world's ills?

No. It was diplomacy and fear of death that saved the day. If there wasn't at least a modicum of goodwill between the superpowers, or fear of a "mutually assured destruction," the Cold War could have been a lot worse. Religious extremists think that the supreme power of the universe is automatically on their side, so they have nothing to lose and everything to gain by a valiant death, with its supernatural rewards. They have no fear.

This is why the world is scared of groups like al Qaeda getting WMD's, and is also scared of Christian fundamentalists taking over the US. I wasn't particularly concerned by Saddam Hussein, a secular dictator, at the time we invaded Iraq. He didn't have WMB's. That doesn't mean he wouldn't try to make more money by selling weapons to al Qaeda, but Iraq experts said that was unlikely, and when that deal was considered it fell through. Al Qaeda has lots of potential donors, and we should consider them all. Greed is a sickness that can override common sense. Think of the experiments in which rats preferred addictive drugs over food, and went with starvation rather than drug deprivation.

If we want to look at inspiring examples in nature, the arms race is not the only one. But even in this context, the advancement is not only the ability to kill better, or kill more. The advancement is to create a defense to protect without killing at all. Animals have many ways to do that.

It might be good to look at UN reform. I know some people who advocate global government. I think it's a good ideal, although probably not achievable in our lifetime. If it was, it could turn out to be our worst nightmare, the opposite of what global government people intend. We don't need to be hasty and make some poorly thought out, half-baked government. In Star Trek for example, it takes hundreds of years of war, and some major calamities, before a politically unified earth comes to fruition. By then, earthlings are busy exploring other planets, and major conflicts are between planets rather countries. We're a long way off from that.

I'm really on the fence with teology, the idea that history has a singular movement towards better conditions. Ken Wilber believes that, though he allows that the more complex things get, the more ways things can possibly break down (dogs get cancer, rocks don't). Wilber takes the vertical Plotinus (the traditional great chain) and spreads it horizontally over time. Perhaps Wright is correc that nature inevitably gets more complex. But whether there is improvement, I don't know.

What I do think is that if we are to survive as a species and improve the quality of our lives, change needs to happen from the inside out. The problem with extremist religion, and secular dictatorships, is that they rely only on strict rules alone. We can't ignore human motivation and moral reasoning.

Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Eye for an eye was an innovation for Hammurabi, but we need rules that fit the needs of today.

Flat Thinking In 3 Dimensions
On Slate, Robert Wright wrote about Friedman’s book “The World is Flat.” I have not read it, so I’m responding only to Wright.

Globalization is great if we mean an increase in world-centric values (think globally, act locally). But the idea that Friedman supports economic freedom and other liberals don't is a spurious notion. Liberals are not against freedom per se. A progressive liberal (as opposed to a "classical liberal" what is now called "libertarian") does not assume that capitalism is the absolute best system, or that the free market is entirely free. Global capitalism certainly had advantages over old-school colonialism. Governments and NGO’s have systems in place to expose human rights abuses. We even have a global court to persecute the worst violators, however ineffective these structures are. These mores did not seem to be relevent in the age of exploration, when fascination with foreign lands became exotic and chic (in addition to the usual reasons for travel - war, trade, and conquest). Travel is no longer just an idle curiosity, a pastime of the rich or adventurous, but a normal part of an increasingly complex world. People move wherever there are jobs (Americans will just have to get over their isolation as the economy changes. In the past century, increased emigration to America became normal, and Americans will eventually learn that it's OK for them to emigrate too). While all this moving about threatens our sense of rootedness, and tradition, it also challenges us to find ways of preserving tradition in new contexts (and sharing them).

What we should be wary of, as I'm fond of pointing out, is hegemony. Globalization doesn't look like "in varietate concordia" (unity-in-diversity). Globalization looks more like a bland, uniform, suburbanization of the world with a McDonalds and strip mall every 10 miles. Perhaps sharing and spreading on an equal footing is unrealistic, but it's still sad to view old cultures getting wiped out before we stop to ask whether this is a good idea.

Whether globalization economically benefits all is debatable (consult an economist, I don't know). But surely it’s not all bad. I’m not against Indians getting more computer jobs. They work really hard for less money, and their educations need to amount to something. People in other countries deserve the same opportunities as Americans. Some would argue they could get that by immigrating to our country, but not everyone can do that. Some might like to stay home and improve their own country (globalization critics might argue the opposite - people don't have to come to America to be assimilated. The ways things are going, everyone will end up working for America).

Labor statements that others are "taking" our jobs sound rather xenophobic. If Friedman's flatworld means there’s an equal trade-offs of jobs, great. If unemployment is really declining and the purchasing power of the lower and middle classes are really increasing, wonderful. Even according to Marx, capitalism is not totally bad. It’s an improvement over feudalism and monarchy, for example. I say we need some new ideas beyond capitalism and socialism. We need to think outside the box, like PR Sarkar’s Prout (Progressive Utilization Theory). Win-win thinking, as Wright puts it, non-zero-sum.

Another hotbed issue is the democratization of the Middle East, and economic development in the Muslim World en toto.

Wright asserts that Iraq war opponents didn’t take into account that a prosperous, free market in places like Iraq reduces terrorism (though like me, he thinks war was the wrong way to go about it). But let’s not forget that Iraqis actually benefited from some Ba’athist policies. (I know I’ll get slammed for that, so let me state for the record that I condemn Ba'athist pogroms, and terrorism against Israel, in the strongest terms possible). It’s not like Iraq has never known advancement. The base is already there (one good outcome of this war was the removal sanctions) and Iraq could prosper again. Is Iraq the domino that will change the whole landscape of the Middle East?

It seems right now the monarchies in the Middle East are the most progressive, I'm not sure why. Jordan is a modern, liberal state (though they have not done enough to address women’s rights issues like honor killings). Bahrain and UAE are like futuristic cities that landed in an ancient desert.

Saudi Arabia needs to change the most. The modernization developments started by the recently deceased King Fahd (and his half brother Prince Abdullah) has angered fanatics. Coupled with the US military presence in Saudi Arabia, this spawned groups like al Qaeda. While there is genuine corruption in the house of Saud, at least King Fahd supported projects other Muslims benefited from. He supported health care for all of his citizens. He gave over 5% of GDP to development projects. The problem now is that too much Saudi charity goes, advertently or inadvertently, to fund terrorism and radical madrassahs.

There is a growing rift of unemployed youth in the Saudi peninsula. If you combine free time, radical ideologies, and wounded pride, you have a recipe for disaster.

As for the rest of the Muslim world - Iran needs a secular government, with the elite clergy separate from government. Pakistan needs to settle the Kashmir issue once and for all, reduce its military budget, improve public education, and crack down on radical madrassahs. African countries need to clean up corruption and tackle poverty. The recent aid and debt relief is a start, but there's a lot more things that need to be done. Syria needs to get out of Lebanon, which won’t happen as long as Hezbollah holds sway (and gets funding from Iran). Hezbollah will remain in Lebanon as long as the Israel/Palestine issue is yet to be resolved. After Saudi Arabia, Israel/Palestine is the next big domino that needs to fall in place. With the recent Gaza pullout, it looks like the road map might actually begin to actualize, but both sides have reason to be skeptical.

But I think Israel gets too much attention. Surely, the Kashmir issue is just as dangerous. Elsewhere, Indonesia is an unstable Republic dealing with the aftermath of US supported dictator Suharto. Like many post-colonial nations, it's rife with ethnic conflict and guerilla movements. Chechnya needs independence, as do the Kurds. Malaysia is doing really well, but some fanatics have even lodged there. The Muslim world has a lot of challenges, to say the least.

This leads to questions about UN reform and the need for global government, but I won't go into that now. How do we unite a single world, when it's divided into a first, second, and third? Do we flatten it?

Spiritual Materialism
I reread Huston Smith's "Forgotten Truth," and perhaps I was unfair. In chapter 6 "Hope, Yes; Progress, No" he warns us that his speculations would be scandalous. But he pulls no punches when it comes to the myth of progress. He doesn't deny that the fossil record shows an order of species in time, he denies that early species are bridges to later ones. He believes that simpler does not cause more complexity, and earlier species are not the cause of later, more complex species. He offers his own explanation of how each species changes in time, however implausible.

He also has reason to go off on Teihard de Chardin. His main problem with Chardin's book "The Phenomenon of Man" is that Chardin states it is a matter of scientific fact, when it's actually theology. I've read similar critical reviews by scientists - facts do not reveal divine purpose. .

While I think Wilber has done a better job uniting spirituality and evolution, he too makes mistakes. The first book of his I read, as a naive young man just out of highschool, was "A Brief History of Everything." I bought it thinking it was Hawking's "A Brief History of Time," not knowing the title was sort of a spoof. Anyways, Wilber relies on the discreted argument against random selection that "you can't have a half-wing, half leg." Intelligent Design theorists use "puncuated equillibrium" to bolster the position that sudden mutations are too numerous to be random. Except, as Wright points out, there's plenty of evidence that evolution occurs in increments. The same protein in simple eyeless organisms that enables light sensitivity codes for eyes in complex organisms. Darwin may have a black box, but it's getting brighter.

What's intriguing about the last chapter of Smith's book is that he looks at why our secular ideals dissappoint. If nature is cyclical, it only makes sense that the more we try to change things, the more things stay the same. With material abundance and technological advancement, life is not necessarily easier, just more complex. Indeed, our primitive ancestors in the neolithic age, in spite of their hard life, actually had more free time then we do!

Our modern ideals have roots in 19th ideas of progress. Science will slay the oppressive mythology of the past, capitalism (or communism) will improve the lot of all.

The 20th century was supposed to be "The Century of the Common Man," with its "War to End All Wars," "The War to Make the World Safe for Democracy," "The Four Freedoms," and "The Great Society." As noble as those ideas were, they either turned out to be wrong, or have fallen short. Now we have a new one - "The Global Struggle Against Extremism."

Many Bush foes harp on his religious fundamentalism, and there is a fair share of that among his chosen cadre. But he's also following this same ethos, it's another version of making the world safe for democracy.

The unworldly part of the theology is the belief that doomsday is coming soon. Only the believers will ascend to heaven during the rapture when the Jesus army comes. Everyone else will go to an eternal hell. So as long as you believe, go ahead, make war, pollute, get as much money as you want. In Calvin predestination, God already chose which few souls are blessed.

I've noticed a standard mantra in new age thought, perhaps influenced by this social darwinism - there are no victims. I agree that no one remains a victim forever, simply because nothing lasts forever. But evil things do happen. If we think there really are no victims, then when misfortunate befalls us we can suffer new age guilt. If I have cancer I must have given it to myself. If there truly were no victims, there could be no victimizers, so there is no blame. And yet, victims are to blame for their own suffering. This idea isn't new to the new age (see the "just world" theory in social psychology).

If you are raped, assaulted, molested, it's because your higher Self is trying to teach you some kind of lesson. You can't have real justice with this mindset, for no one can hurt another, only you can hurt yourself, as though you somehow brought it on yourself.

I think we can make distinctions between genuine victimhood and just uncomfortable situations we all go through. The death of a loved one probably causes us more grief than having to wait in line at the supermarket. But maybe not, it depends on the individual and their circumstances. You can't predict all outcomes and how it will affect people, but there's evidence that certain events will likely traumatize people in significant ways, and will alter their thinking and behavior.

Traumatic events affect us on an emotional level, and this is where self-defeating ideas originate. Someone who is traumatized can become fatalistic, and develop a self-concept of weakness, dependency, and worthlessness. So yes, it's better to believe you are a survivor of abuse rather than a victim.

In Buddhism, generally, we're all victims of samsara. But there are relative differences because we all have different karmas. But to justify injustice through the theory of karma is a gross misunderstanding. Even if it is someone's karma to be destitute, if we abuse someone who is down and out, or ignore their plight, we create our own bad karma.