Science of the Spirit
God as Imagination: the Image and the Imaginer in the Sufism of Ibn 'Arabî
MindMatters: The New Unclean: How Our Psychology Was Hijacked to Make Us See Each Other as the Enemy
This week on MindMatters we look at an in-depth examination of these issues as they're explored in Norman Doidge's seminal essay "Needle Points". No stranger to the study of how people think, and why, Doidge, a psychiatrist, psychoanalyst and author of The Brain That Changes Itself and The Brain's Way of Healing, examines the foundations of vaccine-hesitancy, and why, far from being "fringe" or "paranoid", they have a legitimacy that simply cannot, and shouldn't be, ignored by anyone taking a position on this highly contentious subject matter. He also discusses the "behavioral immune system" and what it can teach us about what is going on. Doidge so successfully outlines his needle points in his work that colleague Jordan Peterson encouraged him to produce a video narrating the text which may be watched here.
A PDF of the essay may be obtained here.
Running Time: 01:39:43
Download: MP3 — 137 MB
Researchers have revealed that dogs show key signs of grief after the death of another dog in the same household.
This includes an increase in attention seeking, eating less and whining, according to the team from the University of Milan.
While grief has previously been reported in other animals including birds and elephants, this is the first time it has been confirmed in dogs.
Key signs of grief in dogs
The study found that the dogs displayed many key signs of grief, including:
- More attention seeking (67%)
- Playing less (57%)
- Less active (46%)
- More fearful (35%)
- More sleep (35%)
- Eating less (32%)
- More barking and whining (30%)
© Sydney Shaffer Getty Images
This is not an isolated incident, and there is even a clinical term for it: Hybristophilia. On sites such as PrisonPenPals.com, WriteaPrisioner.com, ConvinctMailbag.com, and Meet-an-Inmate.com, there are thousands of dating ads from "prisoners who are waiting to hear from you!" Kyon in New York writes "Send a picture of yourself so I may be able to see the beautiful rose in your friendship garden." Joel in Wisconsin writes, "My favorite subject is revisionist history." Eugene from Oregon-- who is sentenced to jail for life-- writes, "I have a very good sense of humor." And there are plenty of women who respond.
What is the source of the attraction to dangerous people? There is no shortage of speculation, ranging from a drive to feel like a rebel, to a drive to become a celebrity or increase one's popularity, to a drive for a more exciting and adventurous life, to self-esteem issues typically resulting from past abuse, to the drive to be a caretaker, to the drive to control and have power over a person which can result from dating a person who needs you more than you need them.
Today on MindMatters we discus the "schizo-autistic" worldview - hyper-rational, cynical, detached, technocratic - its flaws, and how it has dominated the intellectual life of humanity for at least the past 200 years. From Descartes and Kant to Freud, Marx and Ryle, this style of thinking has its uses, but can never provide an adequate picture of reality and how to act within it. If that isn't enough to burst your bubble of illusions, we also discuss Machiavelli and what he may actually have achieved in bringing to light the true intentions, workings and dynamics of the political class.
Running Time: 01:22:39
Download: MP3 — 114 MB
© AP / Adrian Wyld / The Canadian Press
Protesters walk past trucks parked in downtown Ottawa. February 2, 2022.
Protesters walk past trucks parked in downtown Ottawa. February 2, 2022.
Now, it hasn't always been quite like that. As it happens, I wrote my doctoral thesis (for all the good it did me) on the Canadian populist movement of the early 20th century. In large measure beginning as a spillover event from the U.S. populist insurgency of the late 19th century. That was a movement fueled by farmers, rather than truckers. And when I pick up the occasional signal from the trucker protest suggesting that it may not be enough to simply have the mandates repealed; that the political system which allowed these draconian measures to be initiated must be reformed; I reflect fondly upon the agrarian populist movement of a hundred years ago. A sterner bunch than those joyously dancing for freedom at Parliament Hill in recent weeks, they were laser focused on the need to reform the very core of Canadian governance to create a more grassroots democracy.2 How that farmers populist movement eventually failed is an interesting and instructive story, which I will explore in a future post. For today, though, I want to reflect upon the lessons I've learned of value to contemporary populism, seen through the lens of more recent study on the circulation of elites and the dangers of pathocracy.
Comment: For more insightful analysis from the author, see:
- The Psychorium: A needed new analytical tool in the study of pathocracy
- Is the Surplus Elite's class coup possible without degenerating into pathocracy?
Running Time: 01:24:22
Download: MP3 — 116 MB
© Kevin Nixon/SFX Magazine/Future/Getty Images
Terry Prachett
Terry Prachett
When the poverty campaigner and cookbook author Jack Monroe realised that the Office for National Statistics (ONS) was reporting a skewed and unfair version of the cost of living, they reached for Terry Pratchett, the brilliant author of comic fantasy whose books bristle with fury at the injustices of the world. Pratchett best expressed his anger through the character of Sam Vimes, the police chief who grew up on the breadline but, through a chain of unlikely events, finds himself among the monied elite, and one of the most powerful men in the city.*
In Men At Arms (1993), the second of Pratchett's novels to feature Vimes and the City Watch, the author gives his protagonist a searing monologue that he called the "Captain Sam Vimes Boots theory of socioeconomic unfairness". In full, it runs like this:
"Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles. But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet."
None of the messaging examined by researchers involves conveying factual evidence that supports the claims — widely disseminated by Big Pharma, Big Media and public health agencies — that the vaccines are "safe" and "effective."
Researchers last month published the results of a clinical trial involving two survey experiments on how to manufacture consent for COVID vaccines.
The Yale-sponsored study, "Persuasive messaging to increase COVID-19 vaccine uptake intentions," examined how different persuasive messages affected
- intentions to receive a COVID-19 vaccine,
- willingness to persuade friends and relatives to get the vaccine,
- fear of those who have not been vaccinated, and
- social judgment of people who choose not to vaccinate.
This could seem nightmarish: life as a constant assault of rubber ducks and whiffy fish — a gustatory whack-a-mole — but it produces no intrusion. I consider it nothing other than a party trick, although it can also be useful as an aide-memoire. When starting a new job it has helped me remember colleagues' names: the nice lady on reception is a salty white pebble and the security chap is a packet of Cheese & Onion Ringos.
Comment: It remains to be seen just how accurate the author's conclusion is, and whether perhaps it's applicable to some, but not all, of the syndromes mentioned above:
- Some people really do 'feel your pain'
- CIA agent claims Malachi Martin, priest who inspired The Exorcist, was pushed off cliff by invisible force
- Even in the depths of sleep our brains are alert to stranger danger, new study reveals
- The Truth Perspective: The Strange Order of Things: The Common Roots of Consciousness and Culture
- The Truth Perspective: Powers, principalities and UFOs
- The Truth Perspective: Unlocking the Secrets of Consciousness, Hyperdimensional Attractors and Frog Brains
- The Health & Wellness Show: When the body says, 'Whoah!': Rare diseases and strange ailments
Comment: See also: