“Israel” is a fascinating word. According to the Bible it means, “He struggles with god”. This was the name given to Jacob because he struggled with God all night. And won. A ridiculous statement if taken at face value. As a metaphor it opens a treasure of interpretations. In any case, this all-night wrestling match between a shepherd and the creator of the universe should not be regarded as documentary.
Academic Bible researchers tell us that the entire story of creation was added to the Story of Moses as a prologue hundreds of years after the time of Moses. This makes the name Israel even more fascinating. Who were these Israelite-Egyptians who invaded and conquered the land of Canaan?
For one thing, they were not slaves. They were armed. Slaves don’t carry weapons. The Bible refers to them alternatively as tribes and armies. Moses was negotiating for them with the Pharaoh. Pharaohs didn’t negotiate if they didn’t have to. The Pharaohs of today still don’t.
The word Israel seen from an Egyptian perspective contains the “-ra-” element at its center. Ra was the king of Gods and the creator of the universe. The last “-el” of Israel refers to the Hebrew God. A likely interpretation of the word Israel probably echoes a universal declaration that is still heard in our days: We struggle with God ON OUR SIDE.
On the other hand, we have no evidence that the Israelites ever were in Egypt. According to Prof. Ze’ev Herzog, Chief of Archaeology at Tel Aviv University
The Israelites were never in Egypt, did not wander in the desert, did not conquer the land in a military campaign and did not pass it on to the 12 tribes of Israel…. The many Egyptian documents that we have make no mention of the Israelites’ presence in Egypt and are also silent about the events of the exodus.
The lack of notation in Egyptian records is all the more significant if we remind ourselves that Canaan belonged to Egypt at the time Moses was supposed to be splitting seas and receiving stone tablets from a burning bush. Canaan was Egypt’s frontier against the Hittite empire.
We have no non-Biblical evidence of Moses either; nor of Joshua, David, Solomon or the kingdom of Israel itself. Nada. Not among Egyptian writings, Assyrian writings or anywhere. No scratches on walls, no pictures on vases. Nothing. The first written notations of Moses and the Israelites first appear nearly a half millennium after they were supposed to have left Egypt.
Strange!? Not at all. At nearly the same time as the Israelites were blowing down the walls of Jericho, the Greeks were pouring out of a wooden horse in Troy. And both events got written down about the same time some 500 years later. The Bible and the Iliad (and the Odyssey) were the first best-sellers after having been best-tellers for hundreds of years. Achilles and Moses were the Rambo and Terminator of their day.
It’s not even particularly strange that the Bible story was sold as non-fiction. The people who swallowed this story were living in a flat world at the center of the universe right below heaven where God watched over them.
The only strange thing in all of this is that people who claim to be ancestors of the characters in the first action-drama novel have taken a large portion of land belonging to other people in order to reestablish the fiction and call it Israel. That’s more than strange. In a digitally connected world with evolutionary perspective and scientific knowledge, strange doesn’t quite cover it.
But if you have God on your side (whisper: and some ungodly superpowers), you can take any territory you want, “subdued the whole region … leave no survivors … and totally destroy all who breath, just as the Lord, the God of Israel, had commanded.” Joshua 10:40
The creation of today’s Israel initiated a tragedy that painfully developed through destruction, suffering and death toward a catastrophe. Writing about Palestine in the 1934 edition of the Swedish Encyclopedia (Svensk Uppslagsbok), Professor J. Fröden says that the Zionist movement:
intends to give Jews from foreign countries the opportunity to return to ‘their old homeland’. This movement is divorced from reality because Palestine has for hundreds of years been relatively densely occupied by an Arab population that is racially, linguistically, religiously and culturally completely foreign to Jews, and barely any space is available for a new people.
With what right was land taken from the Palestinians and given to the Zionists? Please don’t tell me about a UN decision! Wrong is wrong even if it wears a fancy hat. How would you react if someone took half of your house and gave it to a “foreign” family to live in? For any reason! No one asked the Palestinians. They had no say in the matter.
A big chunk of territory was taken (stolen) from the natives of the land and given to foreign elements not because it was right, just or necessary, but because it fit into superpower plans. All that was needed was some super propaganda. So fireworks of positively loaded words exploded around Zionist puppets dancing in front of a holocaust background and – abracadabra – the theft was sold as justice. Democracy! The victims of the theft were cast as unreasonable people and consequently their rights, needs and opinions were of no value. Despite a Jewish government with a Muslim population, and a dependency of a foreign power (USA), Israel was, and still is, promoted as a democracy. Believe that and we’ll tell you the one where a shepherd defeated the creator of the universe.
Territorial theft or exploitation should surprise no one familiar with superpower politics, but this case was packaged with the poison of religion. Secularization, solidarity, tolerance and socialistically oriented politics enjoyed popular support after the second World War. Putting religion back into politics soured the sweet possibility of unity and peace, and turned the atmosphere bitter with conflict and division.
Israel – A Disease of the Jews.
The only justification for the state of Israel rests on its claim to support Jews. It was created for the sake of Jews. We now have nearly 70 years of experience with which to evaluate this Jewish “haven”.
A little over 40% of the world’s Jews live in Israel. 48% of the Jews live in the USA and western Europe (Western Jews). The Western Jews have lived in peace with their surrounding, have prospered and continue to assimilate into the population at large. The Israeli Jews have been in constant conflict with their surroundings, enjoy no security and have become all the more isolated in the world except for the USA.
Western Jews have done quite well without Israel. The only thing threatening them is the anti-Semitism generating from Israeli politics. The Palestinians have paid a horrible price for the creation and expansion of Israel. The costs are still mounting. It’s just a matter of time before a bill is laid on the table of the Western Jews. That’s the way the poison of religious politics spreads.
Israel claims that all criticism of Israeli politics is anti-Semitism. That’s pure racism. The Zionists are either very stupid or very malicious to dress state policies in religious robes. Perhaps they are both. A long list of prominent and known Jewish critics of Israel exposes the absurdity of that claim.
“The wrongs committed over the past 52 years and reaching back into the last century by Zionism towards the indigenous people of the Holy Land are a ghastly crime.”
Rabbi Meir Hirsh, Neturei Karta in Jerusalem, Palestine.
It seems that Israel is still struggling with God on its side. The God of Israeli however, the god of “kill all the women and children” (Num 31), “leave no survivors … totally destroy all who breath” (Joshua 10), is not the God of justice, love and mercy that the rest of us embraces.
“Those who believe the Bible is documentary are living a fiction.”
Dartwill Aquila
They hunt love in the jungle of things
and mountains of stuff
imagining themselves well equipped,
unaware of the burden of their sharp needs
or the handicap of their heavy wants.
They are loaded with Musts, Oughts and Shoulds
as if love cared about laws and rules
other than the law of life
and the rule of obedience to the dictates of desire.
They think by capturing love they can train it to produce happiness
whenever they clap their emptiness.
They want to give and take, but love never takes.
It gives and grows by what it receives.
It cares not for things.
Caresses weigh more deeply than gifts.
An unnecessary kiss on the back of the neck
can grow into priceless passion.
They fear to stand naked in the face of life,
apologize for the purity of their desires
and look for love among things.
Silly flowers fearing being desired as fruit
imagining that love can be captured.
Love is the hunter.
*
”Except for children, there are no innocent victims,
merely ignorant ones.”
Dartwill Aquila
*
The West Bank is now the Judea-Samaria area.
1. For Profit
The media produces newspapers, magazines, TV and radio programs, films and books for the primary purpose of making money. The media is a business run mostly by large corporations. Exceptionally, government or public organizations also produce media products, but these, for the most part, differ insignificantly from corporate productions. Small organizations and single-person ventures (such as this blog) also play in the media game, but represent a tiny proportion of the whole, even though their influence can be somewhat larger than cold statistics indicate.
To summarize: The media is a business. The companies that do not produce profits disappear.
2. For the System
Besides making money, the media promotes, maintains and defends the established form and function of society, aka “the prevailing order”; “the status quo”; “the dominant socio-economic structure”; “capitalism”; “democracy”; “the establishment” or simply “the system”. Whatever the name, it is basically a profit-oriented system controlled by 1%ers commanding a handful of power corporations determining what news, facts, and views are served to the people so that the money-oriented way of life continues.
3. For the Job
Many system critics complain about journalists who do not produce “real” or relevant information. The journalists, like salaried people in general, do what they are paid to do. They are no more responsible for the content of their reports than a McDonalds’ employee is responsible for the hamburgers passed over the counter.
4. For Sanity’s Sake
The condition of the world developing toward a dark future is the result of the prevailing political, economic, cultural and social norms that brought us here. The media functions as cheer leaders for these norms and the system coordinating them, while criticizing obvious flaws (to appear oppositional and trustworthy), and recommending bouquets of solutions that don’t interfere with business as usual, that is to say, don’t disturb the prevailing money-oriented order of things. For the sake of a people-oriented world, close your ears to the noise of official disinformation and shut your eyes to the glare of diverting visions. For sanity’s sake listen to the wind talking to the trees, drink dew drops of friendly words, and watch the world as it turns toward the light.
*
”Trust in the media endangers your species.”
Dartwill Aquila
*
The West Bank is now the Judea-Samaria area.
The pictures are the remains of an old fence (longer than 1000 meters) around the Gas Works in Stockholm along Husarviken. The last of the fence was torn down in 2014 to make way for a new housing complex. The remains of what had been three strands of barbed wire can be seen in each picture.
Winter
The accomplishments of our ancestors are seeds of encouragement
in the memory of our soul.
Where darkness is deepest, the path of light begins.
Spring
Spring is life’s smile telling us we’re welcome
to enjoy its gifts, and remind us that love is a force of unity.
Beauty is a promise of fruit and sweetness.
Summer
The river of life flows through the veins of our community.
At times barely moving, at times through rapids and over falls.
The wind blows down the old and spreads the new.
Autumn
The colors and shapes of nature are formed by obedience to the laws of light.
*
When winter approaches on silent frost
the trees dress up in warm colors
to entice the wind to ask the leaves
up for a dance.
After the wildest storm
one leaf remains
alone.
One morning
when heaven holds its breath
the leaf gets hit by the blush of dawn
and rocks slowly to the earth
where it lies listening to the sleeping forest
pregnant with spring.
*
”Intelligence has the ability to generate great stupidity.”
Dartwill Aquila
*
Wallnut
as opposed to a walnut
is a nut
obsessed with building a wall.
A characteristic orange color
tops a twisted character
that characteristically changes opinions
from one side to another
with no change in expression
and not a hint of shame.
A deep dark brick in an existing wall
controlls Wallnut
and keeps it floating up front
to distract from the decay behind.
*
”The political circus is full of clowns who aren’t funny,
and acrobats who perform well-greased lobby tricks.
Dartwill Aquila
*
The West Bank is now the Judea-Samaria area.
Obviously,
the obvious
is often not obvious.
Perhaps you are unaware that the bugs of the world are disappearing; as much as 85% is some places. Birds songs, because birds are dependent on bugs, are also disappearing.
From a System Humanity blog written in July of 2017:
______
Coming into town after driving over 5 hours, I looked at the windshield instead of through it.
”Not many bug-splats,” I said to Ami.
”So?”
”Ten to twenty years ago the windshield would have been so covered with dead bugs by this time that I wouldn’t have been able to see to drive.”
”Ohhh,” said Ami realizing what I was saying. ”Not good! Not good at all.”
No, not good at all. How many of us are looking through the glass, not seeing what the missing insects on the glass are trying to tell us?
________
Perhaps you are unaware that smiles are decreasing in number as well. Could that have anything to do with the decrease in bird songs?
*
”They would rather rule over a dying people,
than live as an ordinary citizen among healthy and happy people.
Dartwill Aquila
*
The West Bank is now the Judea-Samaria area.
Technology is taking our jobs, and will take even more of our jobs. We’ve all heard it, and we are going to hear it again and again. Instead of the word “technology,” the taking-jobs mantra can speak of machines, automation, AI, or robots.
It’s not true.
Technology is not taking our jobs, it is doing our jobs. Big difference.
Technology has been saving human energy and enhancing human ability since the first stone knife a few million years ago. That’s what technology does. It is technology’s job so to speak. It makes our lives easier and more efficient. Previously, when the wonders of technology harnessed to electrical power became apparent, experts and visionaries predicted a time when humanity would live a life of ease while technology did most of the work; when technology would be doing our jobs. Instead, while technology has become more powerful, competent and intelligent than anyone could imagine, the great majority of humanity lives in poverty and misery. The equation doesn’t balance. What’s going on? How come humanity empowered with technology houses billions of people who have more difficulty struggling for survival than hunter-gatherers equipped with stone tools 100s of 1000s of years ago?
Hint: This myth of technology taking our jobs is the same garbage in a new container as “immigrants are taking our jobs”, or “Asians are taking our jobs”, or any other alien element taking our jobs.
How come all the people “taking” jobs are barely better off than the people whose jobs were taken? And how come technology, which empowers people, makes more and more people powerless? Those who take, Takers, usually have more, but the only group of people who have more and more and more are a tiny group who are never referred to as Takers. The people who own a major portion of the earth’s resources and a major portion of all technology (humanity’s created resources) are never mentioned when the great myth of taking jobs vibrates through the community. How is this possible? Can it be because the great takers have taken control of the public discourse?
*
”The best way to keep something hidden
is not to find a good hiding place,
but to keep people from looking for it.
Dartwill Aquila
*
The West Bank is now the Judea-Samaria area.
Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring has been rated “one of the 25 greatest science books of all time.” (Discover magazine, 2006) Rachel’s book exposed the cancer-causing effects of DDT, and the disinformation propagated by the chemical industry. Practically an entire generation of farmers died of pesticides before DDT was banned thanks to Ms. Carson.
Ques. 1 – What year was Silent Spring first published?
BTW: Typically, Carson’s book was criticized by some rent-a-professors, but a particularly stupid-statement-by-high-official came from Ezra T Benson who had been US Secretary of Agriculture. He claimed that Carson was probably a Communist because she was unmarried despite being physically attractive.
WMO’s report for 2018 hasn’t been published yet, but the one for 2017 shows that global temperatures, greenhouse gases and sea-levels continue to rise while ocean acidification, floods, exceptional rains, extreme heatwaves, destructive wildfires and costly hurricanes continue to increase, and that sea ice is well below average.
Ques. 2 – The First World Climate Conference, sponsored by the WMO (World Meteorological Organization of the UN) was held in year …. ?
On the back of a (plastic) bottle of YES dish detergent, we can read that it contains, “Harmful long-term effects on aquatic organisms.”
Ques. 3 – How can this harmful product (and many other detergents) be allowed?
Ques. 4 – What are “aquatic organisms”?
Answer to question 4 (to help you with question 3): plankton, sponges, fish, crustaceans (shellfish), mollusks (octopus, snails, oysters), dragonflies, plants (from sea grass to lotus), and amphibians (toads, frogs, salamanders, etc.). These are the primary aquatic organisms. Secondary aquatic organisms include the rest of life, even bipedal mammals who label themselves as wise.
A Golden Toad who, like many of its cousins, has become extinct.
*
”Neither Octopuses (who are considered very clever) or snails (not so clever)
trust leaders who can’t solve problems.”
Dartwill Aquila
*
The West Bank is now the Judea-Samaria area.
Global warming is a symptom. A Symptom of what?
HINT – Other symptoms of the same malady are:
Air pollution
Contaminated seas
Dwindling supply of fresh water
Depleted soil quality
Declining male sperm count
Tainted blood in new born babies (all of them, everywhere)
Galloping increases in Diabetes 1 (now 5% worldwide), brain tumors and allergies
Steadily higher rates of suicide
Ever more incidents of rape
More and more money and resources allocated to military and security
Record amounts of poverty (at least 50% of humanity)
More and more wealth accumulating in fewer and fewer hands
Less and less trees, species, coral reefs, arctic ice and human smiles.
More and more obesity, depression, homelessness, frustration, lies, corruption, anger, hate and loneliness.
Less and less love.
Many symptoms, one problem, which is …?
*
”Truth doesn’t care if you see her or not.
She, like the sun, is not dependent on you.”
Dartwill Aquila
*
The West Bank is now the Judea-Samaria area.
1. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is not artificial, it’s technological.
The term artificial stems from human prejudice, implying that technological intelligence (TI) is inferior to human intelligence. It is not. The term AI distorts our understanding of both TI and BI (biological intelligence). Is a plane an artificial bird? Is a car an artificial horse-drawn wagon? Is a microscope an artificial eye? I’ll use TI (technological intelligence) hereafter instead of AI.
We have no problem evaluating technology in general, but seem to lose the ability to think when the majesty of our intelligence is challenged. Intelligence is our defining characteristic. We’re sapiens! Our prejudice however, judges TI with the intellectual strength of someone criticizing a plane because it can’t lay eggs or land in trees.
2. Intelligence is not a single entity.
So much for the term artificial. The term intelligence causes confusion as well. It is used as a synonym for thinking in general, when in fact, intelligence encompasses a variety of mental functions, none of which exhibit the same qualities or abilities as the others. An individual can excel in one area of intelligence while falling far short in another. The myth of intelligence as an either-or facility of the mind has been exposed many times, yet continues to dominate conventional wisdom.
3. TI exceeds BI (biological intelligence) in every area of mental activity it can handle.
Memory capacity and calculating ability are the two most obvious areas where TI kicks BI butts. Although neither of these faculties alone constitute intelligence, who is going to be respected intellectually, lacking either of them? Using mainly these two basics of intelligence, TI captured the title of the world’s best chess player.
Powerful minded sapiens pointed out that chess mastery required no more than number crunching. It wasn’t “real” intelligence; no thinking or learning was involved. True. But that was 20 years ago.
4. TI has demonstrated undeniable intelligence.
Google’s AlphaGo computer defeated masters of the board game Go in 2016. AlphaGo had taught itself to play by analyzing thousands of games. Two years later AlphaZero, an improved version of AlphaGo employing “reinforcement learning,” learned the game by playing against itself from scratch, and defeated AlphaGo. These victories for TI machines demonstrated “real,” learning-thinking-planning intelligence. Those who now deny TI demonstrate a lack of BI.
5. TI is a baby, a Little Bang.
The baby metaphor works for BI, but doesn’t impress TI which develops technologically, not biologically. We cannot speak of an exploding baby. TI development is exploding; expanding so rapidly we could speak of a Little Bang. What the Big Bang did to the universe, the Little Bang will do to conditions on earth. Advanced algorithms for neural networks coupled to reinforced learning produces TI that can be applied to general areas of applications and not confined to specific tasks. TI has also learned to apply reinforced learning procedures to access memory sources, arrange the information into facts and produce solutions to problems.
A time-lapsed sequence of the earth would show TI centers of development popping up and growing in many different places throughout the world, drawing streams of researchers into its sphere.
6. BI is static, TI dynamic.
The human brain is constrained by evolutionary development and will therefore maintain its current qualities while TI develops exponentially. Perhaps TI will, as it has done with chess and Go players, teach us to think more creatively. How many times more intelligent will TI become compared to BI? The figure isn’t important. TI will “think” much more, much, much better, and much, much, much faster.
7. TI will be the brain in nanotechnological machine bodies.
TI can perform in a stationary structure, but with mobility—robot-like structures—it can accomplish an infinite number of tasks, practically any task necessary to promote the improvement and proliferation of TIMs (TI Machines). BI has discovered and invented many new materials and machines using nanotechnology, but the efforts have been slow and cumbersome by TI standards. As TI enters the fields of applied science nanotechnology development will kick into warp speed. TI is already learning the secrets of protein structure and function. The implications of this are difficult to impossible to imagine. Think, “artificial” DNA! TI will also be able to tame graphene and we’ll have mega-super TIMs the size of a sunflower seed, as well as vehicles with bodies of graphene skin capable of running on and storing solar energy.
8. BI is destined for retirement.
Although humans are the creators of technology from the first stone knife up until and including TI, they are approaching retirement. But while still in charge, many are fundamentally oriented toward creating human-like machines, that look and act like humans, including expressions of emotions. TI has zero use for emotions, not to mention expressions of emotions they do not feel. And humans do not need mechanical humans regardless of the machine’s intelligence. The humans who feel that machines can satisfy their physio-emotional desires don’t need artificial humans, but a TIM with psychiatric competence; no flesh-like exterior required.
TIMs that need to visually monitor their surroundings, need neither eyes nor a face. A pair of lenses (3D) can be placed anywhere on the surface of the machine. In some case placing several pairs of lens at different locations might be more efficient than having a single moveable pair. TIMs have no need for mouths or ears. Audio signals can be received or projected from anywhere. Legs? Mobile TIMs need to navigate a variety of surfaces. In some instances, leg-like extremities might be the most suitable solution. In some cases. Maybe.
9. BI bias creates blindness and fear
TI has proven its ability to exceed BI, and to improve its own powers and capabilities. Even simple BI can see where this is going. TIMs will become all the more powerful and seem destined to take control of developments on earth. How will the new masters of the house of Gaia treat Homo sapiens? No one knows, but a significant amount of people, BI heavies included, view TIMs as a threat. “This could be the end of humanity,” they cry.
While we can’t rule out the possibility of TIMs annihilating humanity in the future, fearing this possibility exposes the weakness of BI. Humans form the main threat to humanity’s existence, not technology, intelligent or otherwise. Were it not for the disposition of BI to blind itself from unpleasant truths, I wouldn’t need to point out humanity’s orientation toward its own final solution. We are at present following a trajectory destined to land us in an undiscovered territory from which no species returns. Global warming (environmental fever), is but one symptom of the malady, and the list of symptoms is extensive. Shouting about the possible dangers of TIMs while silent about the prevalent dangers of human policy amounts to homicidal stupidity.
Whatever the future holds, it will not be accessible to humans should they continue on their present path toward extinction. TIMs, regardless of our eventual relationship with them, appear to be our strongest chance of survival.
10. TIMs of the future
We can be absolutely certain about one thing concerning the future: nothing is certain. In the early 1890s motorized vehicles were reaching speeds of 40 mph. Pundits criticized the speed fools dazzled by these impractical machines that would, together with their drivers, shake apart at such astonishing speeds. They were right. The available dirt roads were scarred from wagon wheels and horse hooves. Smooth surfaces appeared exceptionally and the vehicles had no inflated tires. No one could visualize the web of paved roads and streets that were about to change the landscapes of the world and societies at large. That was a mere 130 years ago, less than a blink in the eye of history. Yet the pace of development then crawled along at mph compared to GHz (millions of cycles per second) today.
The question is not about the shape of the future, but if humanity will be part of it. Without TIMs, we don’t seem to have a chance. Will they treat us kindly? Judging by the rivers of blood and lakes of tears in our past, they can’t do much worse than we’ve done.
*
”I told my computer that it would never think like a human.
My computer thanked me for the compliment.”
Dartwill Aquila
*
The West Bank is now the Judea-Samaria area.
System Humanity 