The Nature of Life

Existentialism is the belief that our lives have no inherent meaning or purpose, but rather it is the purpose we create for our lives that gives them a sense of meaning. This meaning is only present in our consciousness however, the universe, or god, doesn't care what you're doing.

Nihilistic means rejecting all religious and moral principles in the belief that life is meaningless.

Similar but different views of our lives here on earth from a purpose/meaning point of view...  the former believes that we give ourselves purpose and the latter believes that we have no purpose at all...

Don McLean, the 74-year-old singer best known for his 1971 hit "American Pie," says he is not impressed with the music of today.

The singer-songwriter believes times have certainly changed since his early days in the music industry, and he's claiming there is no longer music of substance when he turns on the radio.

"The music doesn't mean anything. The music reflects the spiritual nature of the society. We have a kind of a nihilistic society now," McLean told the host. "No one believes in anything, no one likes anything, no one has any respect for anything much. The music shows that."

When I was in college pursuing an English degree, I got heavily involved with Existentialism...  and, I still believe that the world does not care about anything but its own survival and continued existence.  If we are going to find purpose and meaning in life, we are not going to find it in the lyrics of the music like we did in the 60s and 70s but we are going to find it if we give ourselves purpose and meaning.

We can no longer identify with what we had or what we want or what we would like to have, we must look at TODAY and realize that our purpose and meaning is what we do TODAY...   how we treat ourselves, how we treat others, what we believe or don't believe...  all revolves around TODAY.

And, another aspect of this TODAY concept is that we cannot expect or demand that others make us happy... or provide us with joy...  that can only be done by ourselves and for ourselves.  We must learn, one way or another, that it is up to us and only us, to provide ourselves with what we need.

Life is individual...  we are born individually (even twins) and we die individually (no one dies for us) so we must live the same way.  We can share our lives but we cannot expect that the sharing will make us happy...  the purpose and meaning that we give to live and to ourselves is what makes us happy...

Sometimes, it is a difficult lesson to learn...

Fire & Smoke

 

Leonardo da Vinci's Anatomy Drawings

The veins and muscles of the arm drawn by Leonardo da Vinci. 

Photograph: Royal Collection Trust

Leonardo da Vinci’s notes on human anatomy remained largely forgotten until the mid-18th century when the Scottish anatomist William Hunter learned of them in the royal collection. A new exhibition at the National Museum of Scotland, called Anatomy: A Matter of Death and Life, brings some of these drawings together with a variety of objects and artwork from the Scottish Enlightenment to illuminate the frequently tense relationship between the furthering of anatomical knowledge, and the need of early anatomists to procure dead bodies.

Leonardo got around the problem by working with elite patrons and by assisting an academic professor of anatomy; later Dutch and Scottish anatomists often had to pull bodies from gibbets and graveyards. Modern medicine, the art of postponing death, is built on a foundation of this grave robbery, but had its origins in a more collaborative, consensual attitude typified by Leonardo.

It’s an approach that has now returned: the exhibition closes with a moving series of videos from Edinburgh’s current professor of anatomy, a medical student and a member of the public, each explaining the vital role of bequests by people who leave their body to medical science.

Some of this history is unavoidably grisly: the exhibition resurrects the story of Burke and Hare, two Irishmen of Edinburgh who obtained bodies for the anatomist Robert Knox through the simple expedient of murdering them.

Burke’s fate was to be anatomised: on my way to tutorials in Edinburgh’s medical school I used to pass his skeleton, and it was a surprise to see it across the road in the museum. Burke’s signed confession has been loaned from the New York Academy of Medicine, and some detective work has unearthed details of the lives of his victims.

There is Johan Zoffany’s painting of William Hunter lecturing, and from Amsterdam, Cornelis Troost’s three-metre The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Willem Röell – more ghoulish (and more accurate) than Rembrandt’s The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp, painted almost 100 years earlier.

One particularly striking exhibit is an early 19th-century petition, signed by 248 medical students, asking for bodies to be made available to them through legal means.  READ MORE...

The Wave

 

Solar Storm Hitting Earth

It has been a busy time for solar activity. Back in March of 2022, Earth was hit by separate geomagnetic storms, according to government weather agencies in the U.S. and the U.K.

Though the geomagnetic storms likely didn't cause any harm, they brought into focus the potential harm that could come from more powerful storms in the future.

Then earlier this month, a G1-class geomagnetic storm hit the Earth, causing bright auroras over Canada. The only problem is that nobody saw this storm coming until it was quite late.

Five days ago, a giant sunspot and filaments on the solar surface had astronomers worried about possible Earth-directed solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that could lead to blackouts.

Finally, on Friday, it was reported that a massive solar flare had erupted from the Sun, which could see radio blackouts in many parts of the world.

A "direct hit" from a solar storm
Now, on Saturday, Dr. Tamitha Skov, known as the "Space Weather Woman," predicted a "direct hit" from a solar storm to take place on Tuesday. She took to social media to share the news along with a NASA prediction model video.

Skov is a research scientist at the federally funded Aerospace Corporation and an award-winning science educator on social media.

"Direct Hit!" she wrote on Twitter. "A snake-like filament launched as a big solar storm while in the Earth-strike zone."

"NASA predicts impact early July 19. Strong Aurora shows possible with this one, deep into mid-latitudes," she explained, adding that there could be disruption to GPS and amateur radio.  READ MORE...

Jumping into Water

 

The Ancient Druids

Most of what we know about the Iron Age druids comes from Roman sources, describing a learned class of priests, teachers and judges, who performed Druidic rites in forest clearings and offered human sacrifices to the gods.

The most detailed description dates from around 50 BC in the Commentarii de Bello Gallico, a first-hand account of the Gallic Wars, written as a third-person narrative by Julius Caesar. Most of the text is based on the hearsay of others and is regarded as anachronistic, drawing on earlier accounts by writers such as Posidonius.

Caesar’s depiction of the Druids is documented in book six, chapters 13, 14 and 16–18, where he discusses how the Druids are “engaged in all things sacred, conduct the public and the private sacrifices, and interpret all matters of religion.” They are the arbiters of disputes and are the judiciary over crimes.

Anyone who disobeyed their decree would be barred from sacrifice (considered the gravest of punishments) and shunned, with all persons forbidden to speak or engage with them in society, lest they themselves “receive some evil from their contact”.

According to Caesar, the Druids are ruled over by an elite figure who “possesses supreme authority among them”. Unless a worthy candidate can be found upon this person’s death, those with a “pre-eminent in dignity” can put their candidacy forward for election, although this sometimes resorted to armed violence between candidates to solidify their position.

They studied ancient verse, natural philosophy, astronomy, and the lore of the gods, some spending as much as 20 years in training. This was through oral tradition and verses, with writing considered unlawful to prevent their doctrines being divulged among the people.

In Chapter 16, Caesar comments: “The nation of all the Gauls is extremely devoted to superstitious rites; and on that account they who are troubled with unusually severe diseases, and they who are engaged in battles and dangers, either sacrifice men as victims, or vow that they will sacrifice them, and employ the Druids as the performers of those sacrifices”.  READ MORE...

Dancer

 

Who Are We/You?

Some of us claim to be Americans while a vast majority of us (globally) claim that we are part of the race of human beings.

Humans are primates. Physical and genetic similarities show that the modern human species, Homo sapiens, has a very close relationship to another group of primate species, the apes. Humans and the great apes (large apes) of Africa -- chimpanzees (including bonobos, or so-called “pygmy chimpanzees”) and gorillas -- share a common ancestor that lived between 8 and 6 million years ago. Humans first evolved in Africa, and much of human evolution occurred on that continent. The fossils of early humans who lived between 6 and 2 million years ago come entirely from Africa.

Most scientists currently recognize some 15 to 20 different species of early humans. Scientists do not all agree, however, about how these species are related or which ones simply died out. Many early human species -- certainly the majority of them – left no living descendants. Scientists also debate over how to identify and classify particular species of early humans, and about what factors influenced the evolution and extinction of each species.  SOURCE:  Smithsonian National Museum of  Natural History

So, from the Smithsonian's perspective, we are primates and have a very close relationship to the great apes, chimpanzees, and gorillas...  and, if we are very close to these hairy critters, then why/how did we evolve so much differently?  And, can our evolution be contributed to Darwin's Theories of Evolution?

Our transformation seems not just dramatic but accelerated in its advancement while other primates have not evolved that fast at all over the years.

BUT...  in 2014, Scientific American published a piece about a missing genetic link in human evolution...

Although scientists aren’t sure how, the core seems to sweep up neighboring segments of DNA, duplicating the entire stretch and inserting the new copy into a new location on the chromosome. “Then it picks up again and duplicates some of the sequence around it and moves to another new location,” Eichler said. “It seems to be an extremely unstable genetic element that provides a template for evolutionary change.”

It is this process that appears to create new genes: When new duplications are inserted into the genome, they bring together two previously foreign pieces of DNA, which can lead to new functional components, such as proteins. This chaotic mix-and-match approach is different from the traditional model for the creation of a gene, in which an existing gene is duplicated and the copy is free to develop new functions.

“This mechanism appears to be seminal in our evolution,” said Philip Hastings, a geneticist at Baylor College of Medicine, in Houston. “It’s possible that we are the way we are largely because of this mechanism that generates dramatic episodes of chromosomal structural change.”

Now we are totally confused as to how our DNA got altered in Africa all those millions of years ago in order to start the evolutionary process that created how human beings look today...  these mysteries are profound, outside of a religious context, because it could imply that some other species messed around with our DNA millions of years ago.  And, while the results were positive, it is still puzzling how our development was initially generated in order for us to be who we are today.

In What Do We Live?

We live on a planet that lives in a solar system that floats around in the Milky Way Galaxy that is simply one of billions and billions of galaxies that exist in our universe...  so, our small planet is unique but not altogether dissimilar with other small planets in other galaxies and other solar systems that are part of those galaxies.

We...  or some of us anyway...  believe that there are other universes that somehow interact with our own universe to create a multiverse or sorts...  but, it is uncertain how many of these other universes there actually are interacting with us...  2-3-4-5-6...  etc.

In other words, life on earth (as we know it) could be replicated in these other universes so that there is a slightly different variation of our lives here taking place there.

How odd/cool is that?

But, all of this is taking place on a MACRO level...   what about life taking place on a MICRO level?

How many dimensions do we live in here on earth?  FOUR...   is the typical answer:  height, width, depth, and time.   But, what if there were 12 dimensions?  What would life be like in those other dimensions?

We are all aware of the atom and its components:  electron, neutron, and proton...  and as the various atoms combine they form various compounds.   How many of us are aware, that these electrons, neutrons, and protons can be further broken down into sub-atomic particles and that those sub-atomic particles can be further broken down into strings of pure energy.

It is unpredictable how these strings of energy move from one location to another location, so scientists believe that this unpredictability is what could be causing all these various dimensions to exist...  and, in turn, the various dimensions cause all the parallel universes to exist as well.

Still odd and cool?

Do We Even Exist?

The Latin cogito, ergo sum, usually translated into English as "I think, therefore I am", is the "first principle" of René Descartes's philosophy. He originally published it in French as je pense, donc je suis in his 1637 Discourse on the Method...

Descartes continues with his thinking and writes the following:

"...What of thinking? I find here that thought is an attribute that belongs to me; it alone cannot be separated from me. I am, I exist, that is certain … I know that I exist, and I inquire what I am, I whom I know to exist … [W]hat then am I? A thing which thinks. What is a thing which thinks? It is a thing which doubts, understands, conceives, affirms, denies, wills, refuses, which also imagines and feels … For it is so evident of itself that it is I who doubts, who understands, and who desires, that there is no reason here to add anything to explain it..."

Herein lies the problem... as a thinking man, he is claiming that he also doubts... as well as understands...  surely Descartes must see that if he doubts and understands that logically should understand that he doubts I THINK THEREFORE I AM...  doubt his own logic and understanding that he doubts his own logic is by definition part of his own concept of thinking.

For many years, Descartes's logic was the sole source of proof that we existed...  but then the movie THE MATRIX came along and logic was taken to a whole new and different level.  How do we know that we are not living in some sort of giant matrix and that all of our perception and awareness, understanding, doubting, and thinking is just the side effect of some complex and comprehensive computer program designed by THE ARCHITECT...  the fact remains, that we don't know for sure and right now there is no way to prove it one way or another.

The other side of this concept for me is spiritual or religious...  and revolves around the concept that the Bible claims that we will have eternal life...  eternity is a hell of a long time...  and, we compare that with living 80-100 years on earth...  our life on earth seems rather meaningless in comparison, doesn't it?

As we ponder this comparison maybe our 80-100 year life isn't real at all...  maybe the only life is after we die...  and, for centuries, especially in Egypt, once a person died all the blood was removed...  so, maybe it is the blood that creates this false life...  maybe it is the blood that puts us into some sort of virtual reality computer program existence in which we pretend to be alive experiencing what we do.

Or, once the blood is created in our body, an essence is initially created that we later have come to label our soul or spirit and the combination of the soul and blood provides us with our matrix-type existence...  and when we die, our true shapes are automatically created by the soul that leaves our body...

Something leaves our body because after we die, our bodies weigh a few ounces less than they did before...   that's some weird shit, isn't it?

Bird Feeding

 

The Founding Population of Mexico

Archaeologists have recovered DNA from 10 colonial-era inhabitants of Campeche, Mexico, revealing the diversity of the founding populations of European settlements in the Americas.

Campeche was an early colonial settlement in Yucatán. It was founded in 1540, less than 20 years after the Spanish conquest of the Aztecs, once conquistadors secured their rule.

The important port was initially served by a parish church until it was replaced by a cathedral in 1680. The church was rediscovered in 2000 during rescue excavations when archaeologists found 129 early colonial burials at the site.

Early attempts to extract DNA from these burials failed. Now advances in aDNA research have allowed Professor Vera Tiesler and a team of researchers from Harvard University to gather genetic data from this important site. Their work is published in the journal Antiquity.

“Ancient DNA methods have improved to the point where we can generate robust data from warm, humid environments,” said Dr Jakob Sedig, from the Reich Laboratory at Harvard University and co-lead author of the research, “Using the petrous bone, we were able to generate excellent data from all 10 individuals we tested, which is encouraging for future ancient DNA analysis in this region.”

The aDNA revealed the 10 individuals interred in the colonial cemetery were made up of six females and four males, and none were close relatives. Most were local Indigenous Americans, but people of European and sub-Saharan African ancestry were also identified. READ MORE...

Fireflies

 

A Rogue Star & Our Solar System

In 1687, Sir Isaac Newton published his magnum opus, Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, which effectively synthesized his theories on motion, velocity, and universal gravitation.

In terms of the latter, Newton offered a means for calculating the force of gravity and predicting the orbits of the planets. Since then, astronomers have discovered that the Solar System is merely one small point of light that orbits the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. On occasion, other stars will pass close to the Solar System, which can cause a dramatic shakeup that can kick objects out of their orbits

These “stellar flybys” are common and play an important role in the long-term evolution of planetary systems. As a result, the long-term stability of the Solar System has been the subject of scientific investigation for centuries. 

According to a new study by a team of Canadian astrophysicists, residents of the Solar System may rest easy. After conducting a series of simulations, they determined that a star will not pass by and perturb our Solar System for another 100 billion years. Beyond that, the possibilities are somewhat frightening!

The research was led by Garett Brown, a graduate student of computational physics from the Department of Physical and Environmental Sciences (PES) at the University of Toronto at Scarborough. He was joined by Hanno Rein, an associate professor of astrophysics (and Brown’s mentor) also from the PES at UT Scarborough. 

The paper that describes their findings was recently published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Journal. As they indicated in their paper, the study of stellar flybys could reveal much about the history and evolution of planetary systems.  READ MORE...

Coral

 

Faster Than Light Travel

For decades, we've dreamed of visiting other star systems. There's just one problem – they're so far away, with conventional spaceflight it would take tens of thousands of years to reach even the closest one.


Physicists are not the kind of people who give up easily, though. Give them an impossible dream, and they'll give you an incredible, hypothetical way of making it a reality. Maybe.

In a 2021 study by physicist Erik Lentz from Göttingen University in Germany, we may have a viable solution to the dilemma, and it's one that could turn out to be more feasible than other would-be warp drives.

This is an area that attracts plenty of bright ideas, each offering a different approach to solving the puzzle of faster-than-light travel: achieving a means of sending something across space at superluminal speeds.

There are some problems with this notion, however. Within conventional physics, in accordance with Albert Einstein's theories of relativity, there's no real way to reach or exceed the speed of light, which is something we'd need for any journey measured in light-years.

That hasn't stopped physicists from trying to break this universal speed limit, though.

While pushing matter past the speed of light will always be a big no-no, spacetime itself has no such rule. In fact, the far reaches of the Universe are already stretching away faster than its light could ever hope to match.  READ MORE...

Dogs at Window

 

Having and Using the Mind is Wonderful - Part II

From Part I (even though it was not labeled as Part I), we touched on purpose, and the complexities of the human body, and were left with the realization that there might be other forms of life in our solar system and/or Milky Way galaxy and/or our universe...  we were left to ponder on the concept and through a little introspection decide if we believed that or not.

Sadly some of you who read the first part do not agree with me, but there are some of you that do agree with me...  so lets proceed.

There are an increasing number of scientists that not only believe in UFOs but who believe extraterrestrials or aliens...  and, I suppose one could say that UFOs don't fly themselves...  but yes they can...  so we actually have two distinct events here.

• UFOs
• Aliens

Now, once you have agreed to aliens...  then you face another challenge as to whether or not these aliens have visited earth before...   and, once you get over that hurdle, you have to decide if these aliens bred with both males and females from our human race...  if that conclusion is in the affirmative, then there must be alien/human race offsprings.

These are some difficult conclusions to make based entirely upon logic and speculation.

Some DNA specialists are now saying that our own human race evolution has been far too fast to get to where we are today...  and, there is speculation that aliens altered our DNA so that we would advance/evolve faster.

How is it that we are able to have only a handful of very smart people, like:

• Einstein
• DaVinci
• Michaelangelo
• Von Braun
• Turing
• Tesla

The United States went from the atomic bomb to space flight in 12 years (1957) and to space travel in 16 years (1961)...  this is accelerated knowledge and technology that had to come from somewhere...

And, what is even more amazing is that the first functional digital computer was designed and used to break the German code in 1944 in Bletchley Park, England.

HOW DID WE GET SO SMART SO QUICK?

Solving a Problem