New horizons, ...

I believe the direction of this blog will be changing.  Whereas I'd always wanted to be an activist of sorts and was using this blog as outreach - I’ve pretty well given up on that notion.  

I'm thinking I should start using this blog simply for its mental health therapeutic value.  Use writing to help process the monstrosity I am witnessing unfold.  Then, like a message in a bottle, I’ll toss my words into the digital void.  Maybe some AI will find it, wouldn’t that be exciting?  

Although for me, destination isn’t the point, it has always been the journey itself that matters.  After all, with time the destination point becomes another departure point.  No matter where you go, there you are.

Yeah, it's funny/sad, I used to entertain visions of connecting with a few good sharp people (of the more educated and endowed set).  A few who related to my words, that were defending climate science and Earth sciences, and Evolution Appreciating efforts, and such thoughts that I worked on enunciating and getting people interested in.  

People who could look past my rough edges, knowing that with a little mentoring those edges could be smoothed, since my core perspective was solid regarding society’s need to get real about our evolved biological selves - and our dependence upon this planet's biosphere & its global heat and moisture distribution engine.  In short, the Physical Reality we were nurtured within.

I dreamed of becoming a part of a dynamic team, looking for that interaction and networking, inspiring each other to rise up and confront the Faith Based War on Science with rationality.   I knew I was under educated and under endowed, never any financial backing, nor safety net, with kids and family to work for and worry over, etc.  

Dancing the sword’s edge of life the whole way.  

Once my kids grew up I got involved in local Democrats caucus and the convention process, attending State Convention at least four times.  

I've engaged and argued for a more dynamic Democratic Party and all I got was patronizing, and dismissal - as I was forced to watch politics as usual and Democrats losing one crucial heartbreaking battle after another.  I always wondered why the DNC didn’t have talent scouts at their conventions actively looking for self-starting individuals out there on the floor, etc., etc.  If I had Republican values, I’d have been snapped up in a moment, that hurts most of all!  

Now here I sit, early days of post election 2024, struggling to come to terms with the voters of this one time “land of the free” and home of the brave rejecting USA's very government - its established Constitution, the Rule of Law, and the principle Fair Play, along with our pluralistic aspirations and rejecting serious science to top it off.  

I mean this election is handing our government over to a bunch of convicted and unconvicted criminal minds, who have billionaire backers, - yet most Americans seem clueless that something truly profound has happened.

To my eyes we have crossed over into dystopia territory, things will start moving faster yet. 

Billionaires who are self-absorbed and self-serving and possessing utter contempt for our very government, and we just handed them control of our government.  It's insanity.  American’s will find out the cost of willful ignorance in short order - and oh how I wish I’m wrong.  

But that’s the thing, appreciating there is a difference between our fantasies and the real lives we live.  Not respecting that divide, is at the root of many mistakes.  Time after time, after time.

Okay, so now the Christian Warriors have won their self fabricated “War Against Everyone Else,” even at the cost of the very USA government that protected them in the first place.  But who cares, too much is never enough, and greed is good, and these days self-interest is all that matters - when you have God in your back-pocket, all the better.

When is someone going to start explaining to the God Fearing that we create our own Gods from within our own body/brain/mind/experiences? 

God's are real, but only within the metaphysical realm of our mind (individual and collectively) - - -  our planet, her complex systems, our biosphere and biology, all that happens in a totally different realm.

The physical realm needs to be differentiated from our mental realm, our consciousness, our thoughts and emotions.

Our body is the cumulative product of some half billion years of Earth’s evolutionary processes, with your specific bloodline evolving all that time without a missed beat.  

Your consciousness is the cumulative product of all the days and experiences of your life, as processed through your singular body.

Your Gods are the product of your mind processing the challenges and tragedy of living a human life, knowing death is always at hand - and your inevitable destination.  

Thinking about it, it seems self evident that buried memories of infancy and innocent peaceful security, must have served as the kernel, from which various notions of God could grow within our mindscapes.

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My GoFundMe update report - November 10, 2024 - In Defense of Women (v.3)

Let us try to elevate this reproductive rights discussion beyond the same old cliches to a more empathic thoughtful level.

My GoFundMe update report of November 10, 2024 

In Defense of Women (postcard activism)

 * I want to send my heart felt thanks and appreciation to GoFundMe, and staff, for allowing me this opportunity, and for allowing me to hang on despite so little support. I have the postcards ready to go, and there's a greater need than ever for these simple and constructive thoughts to be shared and discussed. If we aren't changing minds we are losing.

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November 10, 2024

Since my last update, my life has been tremendously crowded busy, with some civic work, travel and caretaking grandchildren, working around our cabin, and of course my Maddy dog and the many walks she expects and that keep me exercising. I'll admit, I was brought low by the lack of support and interest, topped off by another brush off from my friends within the Local Democratic Party when I personally reached out to them for a little help and support in reaching out with this postcard and some help with stamps. Seems they thought it was a mute issue, already won and not important just then - another belly punch that knocked the wind out of me and had me returning to other chores.

In Defense of Women. A postcard advocacy campaign. (v.3)

In defense of women.  

A postcard advocacy campaign.

I have a dream that someday our society can learn to recognize and acknowledge the woman, above all others, possesses the situational awareness, and the moral, ethical, and legal standing to decide the future of the growing life within herself.

I myself can never figure out how/why people can be so cold and ruthless as to deny a woman those fundamental dignities, though I’ve spent decades trying.  As a man with wife and children and grandchildren, including caretaking infants and toddlers, whom I get along with quite well I might add, it matters to me that there’s been so much manufactured misunderstanding.

That’s why I've taken the challenge to refine my personal argument “In Defense of Women”.

It took a while, you know how it goes, rewrite, rewrite, rewrite, now after 250@v.1 (Nov 6, $109) and 1000@v.2 (Jan 24, $155).   I do believe v.3 finally says all I want to share, as concise and well as I can.  Last month I ordered up 2,000 postcards (at $220).  Postage Stamps $0.53@ to send.  Although they'll also make great handouts at certain events.  I make no claim on the text and welcome anyone to copy and reuse, or rework, as they see fit.

 

Now I’m hoping, I’m asking, I’ll even plead, for some help with purchasing postage stamps so I can broadcast these thoughts, by sending out these postcards in defense of a women's right to self defense and sovereignty over her own body.  

I’m starting to address the postcards, first to various woman’s organizations, followed by Democratic Party county offices in key states, various reporters and news agencies, among others, (Help with some stamps and I’ll send them to any addresses you may suggest.).  After the election I want to send one to all 119th Congressional US Senators and Representatives.  With a little luck, add some ammo to the coming debates.

I may be a man of big dreams, but also one of modest means.  Without help from some people who support these values I’m striving to share, the postcards will only be trickling out.  Please help me turn up the volume.

If we aren’t changing minds, we are losing.

Thank you, Peter Miesler

Email: Citizenschallenge at gmail

Please help at GoFundMe

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In Defense of Women, Postcard Activism - Can you help me?

 Please

In Defense of Women, Postcard Activism

Can you help?

I believe there are too many misinformed individuals out there, and that Democrats need to work harder at gaining and sharing basic solid information and arguments.

It would help us to enable the choir to become more persuasive in our regular interactions and discussion with people, friends, & family.  After all, if we aren’t changing minds, we are losing.

I believe that the better we can verbalize the issues, the easier it is to engage and stand up for justice.  The better our chances to help evolve people’s thinking on issues that matter.

Diary Dec 31, 2023 - Reflections on this New Year's Eve.

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Saying good-bye to 2023.  

Here's a quick year end hello and a note that this blog, ain't dead yet.  Though it is mighty neglected.  

There is hope, this past May was the 50th anniversary of my high school graduation and escape from Burlingame.  Right now, this evening, 50 years ago, I was celebrating at the Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite Valley, California and at the beginning of my fascinating long and strange and blessed trail of people and experiences.  Considering what a lone wolf character I started as, and what a network of families bind my heart these days it's mind boggling.  Given my crop of recent and (surprise!) future grandchildren, I feel a particular desire, perhaps even a challenge to write something different, and to share some memories with them, tell a few stories like only someone who was there can, before I'm gone. 

As for my Earth Centrism project, it is getting pretty near completion.  Been spending five years digesting the concept and the evidence behind it, I've written long articles and short bullet points, fielded some push and a lot of handwaving - there's only so many ways to refine something so fundamental and straightforward and that elusive final draft of my Earth Centrist perspective summary, is just around the corner, as they say.  

I have been taking the discussion online at CFI Forum (Center for Inquiry) a small discussion board and have been receiving interesting feedback and pushback.  I'm also participating in a college philosophy club.  Then, this past July I wrote up a dialogue with a short book, Buddha Science, by Daut.

It made for a nice contrast to dealing with Don Hoffman's ideas, in that I agree with much that Daut wrote, but I do come at it from a very different evolutionary biological bottom up perspective and I enjoyed this excuse to review and try to enunciate my Earth Centrist concept in a more constructive atmosphere.

Science has learned a great deal about Evolution, our animal biology, and also consciousness across the entire animal kingdom.  Philosophers and the general public would do good to lay to rest old brainteasers and to catch up on the significance of current scientific biological evolutionary breakthroughs.

This Earth Centrist writing project has been dedicated to people who appreciate nature and evolution and scientific understanding about how evolution weaves us together with all other living beings on this planet.  

Which includes a deep appreciation for how our body/brain produces consciousness, as in, the inside reflection of our body communicating with itself (see Dr.Solms) and realizing how that offers keys to better understanding our own endless flesh vs spirit conflicts.

I'm looking to connect with people for whom a notion such as "Appreciating the Human Mind ~ Physical Reality divide" makes sense and who are unfazed by recognizing themselves as evolved biological thinking creatures, products of Earth's processes. People, who glory in the Pageant of Evolution that created our body and love learning from serious scientific efforts.

These aren't irrelevant trifles, they are keys to a more straightforward understanding of those dogged questions: Who am I?  Why am I here?  Why doesn't my body do what I tell it to?

In Defense of Women

Please

In defense of women, postcard (activism)

I need a little help with postage.

I'm looking at this from 68 years old, having been blessed with all the stages of life starting as a son, brother, husband, father, step-father, uncle, grandfather, friend, with women being intimately interwoven into every phase of my life (and at every level) - I've lived life's personal dramas, loses and successes.  This is my distillation of this facet of my experience - A woman deserves the right to be the jury and judge of her own fate, which by nature includes her fetus.  

Respecting a woman's right to her own self-defense and sovereignty over her body seems to me the least repugnant of all options.  

I made an initial run of a 250 postcards and addressed them to women's rights organizations and key Washington Democrats.  I also starting a thread over at the CFI Forum in case anyone out there wants to join the discussion.  Now I printed another thousand and around 250 addressed and stamped, and it'll be a few weeks before being able to purchase another couple hundred dollars worth of postcard stamp at .53@.  That's why I've decided to see if anyone might be interested in helping with stamps.  Should it go well, I'd love to buy more postcards.  Can you help?

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January 22, 2024

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At CFI I received a good comment worth airing over here:

Lausten:  "Just a quick note, the most glaring; your language specifically weighs one life against another, putting the fully grown human first, the one who CAN make a choice. Their language states “all life is sacred” and claims to defend the thing that can’t defend itself. This hits an emotional note. 

It also avoids the discussion of the trade-off. They claim that most abortions are about a woman choosing to not be responsible, or not caring about the consequences of their actions. Truth is, almost all of them are medical decisions, made with a lot of thought, even prayers.

Even those that are for healthy fetuses, the decision is about how the future person can be cared for, or IF it can be cared for. If the same pro-life person was also taking actions to care for unwanted, unloved, undernourished children, I’d listen to them, but at the policy level, this isn’t happening. ..."

Definitely, perhaps the way to go is to point out this isn’t about the immorality or morality of abortion, nor what name one places on the act.  

This is about the morality of who is making the decision!

My insistence is that:

In the end, it’s the mother who possess the greatest moral "holding” in that fetus, and in the end it’s the mothers who carry the scars of a fetus's death.  Let it be, outsiders don't have a clue, they aren't God, if you believe in God, let God handle it and stay out of other's private lives, as you want them to stay out of your business.

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Do Abortion Bans Violate Jews' Religious Rights?

Lisa Fishbayn Joffe  - June 16, 2022 (1200 words of lucid persuasion)

Lisa Fishbayn Joffe is the director of the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute and director of the Project on Gender, Culture, Religion and the Law which explores the tension between women’s equality claims and religious laws. Her research focuses on gender and multiculturalism in family law and on the intersection between secular and religious law. She is a co-founder of the Boston Agunah Task Force, devoted to research, education and advocacy for women under Jewish family law.

“… there is widespread agreement among scholars and rabbinical authorities that a complete prohibition on abortion is inconsistent with Jewish law and tradition. Under Jewish law, an abortion to save the life of the mother is permitted.

“For this reason, Lisa Fishbayn Joffe, the Shulamit Reinharz Director of the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, argues that extreme anti-abortion laws risk infringing on Jews' religious freedoms. Earlier this week, a Florida synagogue made this argument in a suit filed in a state court against Florida's law banning abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. …”

“Are Jews across denominations arguing that anti-abortion laws infringe on their religious freedoms?

“Yes. It's an argument being put forth by advocates like the National Council of Jewish Women. It holds that since Jewish law supports reproductive rights, abortion restrictions violate Jewish people's right to make choices about their lives in accordance with Jewish law.  This position has many strengths. …”

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Earth Centrism - A Student's Bibliographic Resource - (2/2)

Appreciating Earth’s Evolutionary Pageant and Our Animal Nature

The previous post is my summary of an “Earth Centrist” outlook on life and our human condition, a perspective that acknowledges Earth as our fundamental touchstone with reality.  

This Earth Centrist's perspective can’t be attained by reading a description of it - unless it already resonates within you thanks to your own previous inquiry and inclination.  That's because each of us must engage in our own learning effort.  

That is, living your moment and doing the homework and drawing your own conclusions from the evidence you’ve been able to gather.  Your deeper understanding emerges out of your own efforts. 

Since I’m no scholar, I’ve done my learning by way of some wonderful science communicators, mostly real scientists giving lectures via YouTube along with writing articles and books, with a few talented writers and science documentarians in the mix.   

I’ve put together a bibliographic list of my favorites, and of course, it's geared to the intelligent high schooler or early college student, and for other informed enthusiasts such as myself.  It follows a natural progression from matter forming followed by mineral evolution & our planet evolving a "global heat and moisture distribution engine," to geology and biology combining forces, on to the mysteries of complex dynamic living creatures.  Then on to the greatest show on Earth with life's collective consciousness spectrum.  

Since my bandwidth is limited by my crowded day to days filled with other obligations, I'm sure I’m missing many awesome gems.  So please do share should you believe you know of some presentations worth adding to this collection.

Featuring:  Sean Carrol, NOVA/NASA, Robert Hazen, Robert Rohde, Richard Alley, Nick Lane, David Qualmen, Carl Woese, Lynn Margulis, Tsutomu Wantanabe, Angela Hessler, Svante Pääbo, Mark Solms, Antonio Damasio, Susan Greenfield, Jim Al-Khalili.  Finishing with introductions to David Attenborough’s incomparable tour of the evolution of Earth’s living creatures: "Life on Earth", and James L. Sadd’s wonderful introduction to the fundamentals of geology: "Earth Revealed."

I've found my first addition to this list in an amazing lecture by Mike Levin: "Non-neural, developmental bio-electricity as a precursor for cognition" it adds a new dimension of insights into the evolution of consciousness and mind, that fits right into my overall theme of Earth's pageant of evolution. 

Another must addition to this list, was written by professor and historian of science and technology James Poskett: "Horizons: The Origins of Modern Science.  In it Poskett "recasts the history of science, uncovering the vital contributions of scientists the world over to what is truly a global story."  The first couple chapters are down right thrilling, with the book then settling into an enthralling exposition of facts and enlightening surprises.  A must read, if the history of human curiosity and development of science is your thing.