2nd Renaissance -42 : Melbourne Indymedia

Further Hypotheses [280]
Rick Strassman's work on DMT led him to many other conclusions and hypotheses that are not covered here - read his book to learn about his many other ideas. More can also be drawn from Strassman's research than he might have chosen to tease out. He would only have included speculative notions where a linkage to scientific data and findings existed. For example, the reason for so many (42%) of the volunteers experiencing either neutral or non-benevolent feelings emanating from "them" is not pursued. Probably, Strassman considered that there was only so far it could be taken before all linkage to hard science was lost and speculation reigned.

But speculation does no harm if is identified as such, and not passed off as fact. When considered in terms of the board-game of life, or the Snakes and Ladders analogy, the finding that a large proportion of the volunteers reported "adverse" aspects within their DMT experiences seems completely consistent. Most non-western religions place considerable emphasis on the recycling of the soul from life to life, in a reincarnation process. Strassman discusses this aspect in relation to the function of the pineal gland (see below). Although conjectural, it is possible that some volunteers were either already at low levels on the game-board of life, or were going down rather than up the board at the time of their experiences.

In his book Strassman describes the possible role of the pineal gland in birth and death. Here are relevant excerpts from DMT The Spirit Molecule.

* "I already knew that the Tibetan Buddhist Book of the Dead teaches that it takes forty-nine days for the soul of the recently dead to "reincarnate". That is, seven weeks from the time of death of one person elapses until the life-force's "rebirth" into its next body. I remember very clearly, several years later, feeling the chill along my spine when, reading my textbook of human fetal development, I discovered this same forty-nine day interval marking two landmark events in human embryo formation. It takes forty-nine days from conception for the first signs of the human pineal to appear. Forty-nine days is also when the fetus differentiates into male or female gender. Thus the soul's rebirth, the pineal, and the sexual organs all require forty-nine days before they manifest."

* "As we die, if near-death experiences are any indication, there is a profound shift in consciousness away from identification with the body. Pineal DMT makes available those particular non-embodied contents of consciousness. All the factors previously described combine for one final burst of DMT production: catecholamine release; decreased breakdown and increased formation of DMT; reduced anti-DMT; and decomposing pineal tissue. Therefore, it may be that the pineal is the most active organ in the body at the time of death. Might we say that the life-force therefore exits the body through the pineal?

The consequences of this flood of DMT upon our dying brain-based mind is a pulling back of the veils normally hiding what Tibetan Buddhists call the bardo, or intermediary states between this life and the next. DMT opens our inner senses to these betwixt states with their myriad visions, thoughts, sounds, and feelings. As the body becomes totally inert, consciousness has completely left the body and now exists as a field among many fields of manifest things.

The spirit molecule has outlived its usefulness as a scout for these realms. It has led us to the other shore, and we are now on our own. During the next forty-nine days, we use our will, or intent, to process our unique life's signature, the accumulated experiences, memories, habits, tendencies, and feelings of the life that has ended. This conscious contending with our personal histories, where complete, results in a joining of those fields with ambient ones. It is as if a bell has been rung; the sound, loud at first, joins background noise, then gradually fades away.

What is left over settles onto the next physical life-form that seems most appropriate for subsequent processing of unresolved issues. There is a resonance, a sympathetic vibration, of similar fields: C-minor gravitates to C-minor, animal traits to animals, plant qualities to plants, human issues to humans.

In the case of human beings, these unmetabolised tendencies, this unfinished business, can enter the fetus only when it is "ready". This readiness may require forty-nine days, too, and may take the form of a pineal gland able to synthesise DMT. The pineal could act as an antenna or lightning rod for the soul. And sexual differentiation into male or female, occurring at exactly the same moment, provides the biological framework through which the life-force now may assert itself.

The movement of this energy, the residual life-force of the past into the present, through the pineal and into the fetus, might be the first and most primordial DMT flash. this is the dawning of consciousness, of mind, of awareness as a distinct biological and sexual entity. The blinding light of pineal DMT, secreted within the developing brain, marks the passage through this threshold."

Much of the above, as Rick Strassman discusses in his book, is speculative. He honestly states that, as far as he could determine, nobody actually knows whether the pineal gland does produce DMT, because no scientific study seems ever to have looked for it there. However, he says, DMT is known to be produced within the body; in blood, it the lungs, and in the brain. Strassman is 'joining dots' when he hypothesises that the pineal generates DMT and acts as an antenna for the soul.

However, there are certainly existing dots for Strassman to join. For example, the enzymes and precursors required to synthesise DMT are known to exist in quite high concentrations in the pineal. Also, the pineal is known to exercise control over other glands in the endocrine system, as a type of 'master unit', and it is the source of melatonin, that controls among other functions, the reproductive cycle. The pineal is, therefore, a good candidate for being the primary source of endogenous DMT.

René Descartes (1596-1650) the great philosopher, scientist and mathematician, also considered that because the pineal is the only single, or unpaired, organ in the brain it is likely to handle our thoughts - one at a time. The Ancients knew the pineal as the "third eye", related to insight and intuition.

Although Strassman notes the lack of hard evidence of DMT production in the pineal gland within the scientific literature, there nevertheless is an account of how the formation of such a compound could occur there. It is published on the WWW in an article by Albert Most, titled Eros & The Pineal, (1983). It says in part:

* "Located almost in the centre of your brain is a small projection of tissue called the pineal gland. It is shaped like a tiny pine cone, roughly a quarter of an inch long, and weighs about a tenth of a gram. Despite its small size, the pineal gland contains enormous amounts of serotonin, a physiologically active biogenic amine and chemical neurotransmitter. But pineal cells are not neurones and do not use serotonin for neurotransmission. Instead, pineal serotonin functions as a substrate for the enzymatic production of other biologically active molecules."

* "A unique biochemical mechanism exists within the human pineal gland. A pair of naturally occurring pineal enzymes, hydroxy-indole-O-methyl transferase (HIOMT) and indole-N-methyl transferase (INMT), are capable of converting serotonin into a number of potent hallucinogens. Regulated by a variety of neuroendocrine mechanisms, these enzymes normally act on specific substrates and function as catalysts in the formation of biogenic amines. However, if they get out of phase with their normal substrates and act on pineal serotonin, they form potent psychoactive compounds within the human brain.

Interestingly enough, pineal catabolism can be intentionally shifted toward the production of these endogenous hallucinogens by a simple manipulation of amine metabolism. If you increase the concentration of pineal serotonin and block its normal enzymatic inactivation, it becomes a substrate for other pineal enzymes, like HIOMT and INMT. As their names imply, HIOMT and INMT are methyl transferase enzymes. They catalyse the transfer of a methyl group from one compound to another. As these enzymes add methyl groups to indole-oxygen and amino-nitrogen positions, serotonin is converted into 5-methyl-N,N-dimethyltryptamine, a relatively unknown but extremely potent hallucinogen."

Given the distinct possibility that the soul enters and leaves the body with the assistance of the spirit molecule, it is not too surprising that volunteers under its influence should have experienced different 'receptions' from the beings they encountered. Basically, those individuals who had been making progress climbing ladders would be in a happier state than those facing the consequences of going down too many snakes on the game-board of life. Whether the DMT travellers were being judged by "them" or simply facing their own consciences, their recollections of the experience could well be less positive than those people who had achieved higher positions (climbed more ladders and gone down fewer snakes) in their life.

This is not to say that 42% of Strassman's volunteers were bad people, only that they had been playing the game of life a little worse than their colleagues who had felt more comfortable, even euphoric, during their time in the bardo.

The implication of this hypothesis is that if you go down too many snakes in your life you probably won't like your forty-nine days in the bardo. This will be the fate of those who ordered the firebombing of Dresden and the use of DU ammunition against the peoples of Afghanistan and Iraq. It is why we don't need to rush to judgement on others. There is a reckoning at the end of each life, and whether they are winners or losers depends on each individual. Free will cuts both ways, if you slide down many snakes you will surely lose, but if you climb enough ladders you are sure to win. Sadly, it seems likely that many of us simply 'tread water' in successive lives. We remain at about the same position on the game-board, about a third of the way up, and neither do anything too bad not anything very good. The Leaver-Giver philosophy offers all of us encouragement to change that situation and, instead, climb ladders that help our fellow beings.

Another startling conclusion - at least for taker-thinking humans - can be drawn from Strassman's study. It concerns the other animals. Since dogs, cats, rats, pigs, whales, dolphins, elephants, and the rest, have pineal glands near the centre of their brains, it is likely that they also have souls that enter an leave their bodies in the same manner as ours do. This will come as no surprise to native people such as the American Indians, the tribes of the Amazon, or the Australian Aborigines - they have always known this.

Since the spirit molecule is also known to occur in many plants, it is also possible that, although they lack a pineal gland, there is some form of lower-level consciousness operating in these living things. They might not have free will in the same way that we do, but there is an argument that plants are only alive when they house souls, and that DMT plays a similar role in easing life in and out of the various plant species.

Again, this will not strike many indigenous people as surprising. It is only among Westerners, with their single-life model of existence, and a view of themselves as being far above other forms of life, that there will be disquiet about this hypothesis.

However, all of us who have ever fallen under the spell - and unconditional love - of an animal companion, whether a dog, a cat, a horse, a budgerigar, or some other species, already know that all animals are conscious and that they possess souls. Given how obvious this fact is, it is remarkable that many highly intelligent scientists, and others in all walks of life, still require "proof" before they will accept it.

Attack Lethal Memes - Not Those Who Follow Them [281]
Whether they can yet be proven, or ever will be proven, the insights that spiritual teachings and models provide us are going to be of crucial importance as the old civilization fails around us. There will be extraordinary pressures to fight and struggle against the increasing brutalities and controls of the old order. It will be only natural to want to take to the streets to protest, to riot, to man the barricades. However, spirituality and new tribalism are the ways to better lives - not violence.

The worst action we could possibly take in response to the new barbarities of the 2nd Inquisition and the War on Freedom is to retaliate with violence. If we do that we will be letting the OWO define the location and nature of the battlegrounds, and we will be committing to resolve our disputes with their rule of law.

Instead of massing to demonstrate outside government buildings and capitalist institutions we must employ Us-2-Us dialogue, and not go anywhere near traditional demonstration locations. Rather than congregating there, we should gather outside the cities, on the riverbanks, by the sea, and also on Freenet. We should carry and use PPDs, to confuse Big Brother, and we should exchange ideas and understanding among ourselves. There is no point in arguing or fighting with the madmen who are vainly trying to maintain the status quo amidst a giant wave of technological and spiritual change. We must decide our future without them.

To do so we need to develop a common understanding of the dominant ideas that govern the outgoing society and its institutions - what Richard Dawkins would call its memes.

The following excerpts from Daniel Quinn's book Beyond Civilization explain the concept of memes.

* "The best [way] would be for you to read Richard Dawkin's The Selfish Gene, but in case this isn't convenient for you right this second. I'll summarise. Briefly, memes are to cultures what genes are to bodies.

Your body is a collection of cells. Every cell in your body contains a complete set of all your genes, which Dawkins likens to a set of building plans for the human body - your body in particular. ... A culture is also a collection of cells, which are individual humans. You (and each of your parents and all your siblings and friends) contain a complete set of memes, which are the conceptual building plans of our culture. Dawkins coined the word meme (rhymes with theme) to apply to what he perceived to be the cultural equivalent of the gene."

* "One of these fundamental memes is Growing all your own food is the best way to live. Apart from a few anthropologists (who know perfectly well that this is a matter of opinion), this meme goes unchallenged in our culture. And when I say that a few anthropologists know this is a matter of opinion, I mean they know it chiefly as a professional obligation. As anthropologists, they know that the Bushmen of Africa wouldn't agree that growing all your food is the best way to live, nor would the Yanomami of Brazil or the Alawa of Australia or the Gebusi of New Guinea. As individuals, however, these anthropologists would almost universally consider this to be the best way to live and would unhesitatingly choose it for themselves above all others. Outside this profession, it would be hard to find anyone in our culture who doesn't subscribe to the belief that deriving all your food from agriculture is the best way to live."

* "Every culture is a collection of individuals, and each individual has in his or her head a complete set of values, concepts, rules, and preferences that, taken together, constitute the building plans for that particular culture. Whether you call them memes of marglefarbs is irrelevant. There can be no question whatever that they exist."

* "Only a very small percentage of memes differentiated the Renaissance from the Middle Ages, but obviously the new ones "made all the difference." The authority of the Church waned, new humanist ideals emerged, the development of the printing press gave people new ideas about what they could know and think about, and so on. To produce the Renaissance, it wasn't necessary to change out ninety percent of the memes of the Middle Ages - or eighty or sixty or thirty or even twenty. And the new memes didn't have to come into play all at once. Indeed, they couldn't have come into play all at once. The Renaissance was ready for Andrea del Verrocchio long before it was ready for Martin Luther."

On this latter point, Daniel Quinn is undoubtedly correct regarding the first Renaissance, but he is probably mistaken about how rapidly the key memes of the old society need to be abandoned, and new ones adopted. Modern technological developments are now driving change through the old Level 3 Civilization at rates that will totally undermine it in the space of less than a decade. There is an urgent need to find and agree the right new memes for a Level 4 Civilization. The longer we wait the more people will suffer unnecessarily.

* "Which memes do we need to change? This question is a lot easier to answer than might be expected. The memes we need to change are the lethal ones.

Richard Dawkins puts it with irreducible simplicity: "A lethal gene is one that kills its possessor." It might well strike you as unfair and somehow unreasonable for such things as lethal genes to even exist. You may wonder how lethal genes manage to remain in the gene pool at all. If they kill their possessors why aren't they eliminated? ... Lethal genes that come into play in early adolescence are of course quickly eliminated from the gene pool because their possessors are unable to pass them on by reproduction. Lethal genes that come into play early in adolescence also tend to be eliminated, but those that come into play in middle or old age remain in the gene pool, because their possessors are almost always able to pass them on through reproduction before succumbing to their lethal effect.

... A lethal meme is one that kills its possessor. For example, the Heaven's Gate cultists possessed a lethal meme that made suicide irresistibly attractive to them - but I'm not much interested in memes that are lethal to individuals. I'm interested in memes that are lethal to cultures (and to our culture in particular).

... The memes that made us the rulers of the world are lethal, but they didn't have a lethal effect ten thousand years ago - or five thousand or two thousand. They were at work, turning us into the rulers of the world, but their deadliness didn't become evident until this century, when they began turning us into the devastators of the world.

There is no point in attempting to persuade the likes of the movers-and-shakers within the American Military Industrial Complex (AMIC) to abandon the ingrained memes they have carried all their lives. Not only are they disinterested in giving up their memes, they can't give them up - not even to save their own lives. But the ordinary people can be persuaded to abandon the lethal memes that threaten their future. This broad populace must be the focus of all public dialogue from leaver-givers, and not the 'leaders' who presently run nations and industries.

Related:

2nd Renaissance -41

Today, Western pharmaceutical corporations are feverishly collecting - and patenting - the store of pharmacological knowledge possessed by such 'primitive' people. Will the West soon be forced to also adopt the explanations of how shamans have obtained their extensive knowledge and repertoire of cures for hundreds of diseases and ailments? That they simply tuned their consciousness to a different channel of reality?

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/06/114426.php

THE GENERAL STRIKE FOR INDUSTRIAL FREEDOM

Thousands of thoughtful and class-conscious workers in years past have looked to the General Strike for deliverance from wage slavery. Today their hopes are stronger than ever. Their number has been increased with additional thousands who are confident that the General Strike, and the General Strike alone, can save Humanity from the torture and degradation of the continuation of capitalism and the misery and privation of its recurrent wars and depressions.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/06/114440.php

2nd Renaissance -40

Those in their middle-life stages would also be concerned with meaning, but they are so enmeshed in their repayments - mortgages, credit cards, etc - and a daily struggle to advance within a system of relentless economic scarcity, that they have little time to think about such esoteric matters as the meaning of life. Even women, who used to stay at home and raise their children on a full-time basis, are now forced to work to make ends meet. Only the very young and the very old presently have the luxury of time to wonder and search for meaning. But the situation will change as it becomes apparent that there are new alternatives to economic scarcity and predatory globalism. Soon, everybody will be seeking new meaning and new opportunities to climb as many ladders in the game of life as they possibly can. Once this happens a Level 4 Civilization will be assured.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/06/114153.php

2nd Renaissance -39

We are living through the downfall of a whole system of civilization, and growing chaos is inevitable. All the while the snowmen and the parrot people will trumpet the 'advances' being made in the War On Terror (aka War On Freedom) and lionise 'good' citizens such as federal agents, police, border guards, and the like. Citizens will be encouraged to inform on each other to 'keep our country safe'. This had already started to happen. It will accelerate as the threat of people breaking away from the control of the old order increases,

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/06/113936.php

2nd Renaissance -38

The prison system has never been reformed except in name. The prison system is, by now, incapable of reform, and the same can be said for the law enforcement and justice systems which feed it. This reality applies in most nation states within the old Level 3 Civilization, it is not confined to Australia, Britain and the USA. But that doesn't make it right for those administrations to be engaging in the incarceration of women and children. The practice is barbaric wherever it is practiced and by whomever it is authorised and administered.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/113687.php

2nd Renaissance -37

The World Organisation for Human Rights USA site also documents another innovation that enables guards to control greater numbers of prisoners, with consequent savings in operating costs.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/113467.php

2nd Renaissance -36

It is not fanciful to believe that criminals can be rehabilitated or that the harm they have caused might be repaired, various tribal societies managed to achieve such outcomes for thousands of years. It can be done, and discussing the presently catastrophic regimes of justice and incarceration will lead people to fathom ways of doing so again, within a Level 4 Civilization.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/113284.php

2nd Renaissance -35

But, before considering the implications of the death penalty, there is reason to consider how we already treat each other in relation to the imprisonment and punishment of women and their families. Great barbarity is going on right now in this area; within the ambit of the rule of law and the revenge and punishment systems of our "civilized" societies.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/113143.php

New Strategy for an Autonomous Politics

My aim in this article is to present some hypotheses on issues of strategy for anti-capitalist emancipatory movements. The idea is to rethink the conditions for an effective politics, with the capacity to radically change the society we live in. Even if I will not have the space to analyze concrete cases, these reflections are not a purely "theoretical" endeavor, but spring from the observation of a series of movements I had the chance to be part of -the movement of neighbor's assemblies in Argentina, some processes of the World Social Forum, and other global networks- or that I followed closely in the past years -the piquetero (unemployed) movement also in Argentina, and the Zapatistas in Mexico.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/113147.php

2nd Renaissance -34

Punishment By Imprisonment Is A Medieval Concept [258] Although this is the 21st century, the societies of the Level 3 Civilization have not yet abandoned the medieval notion of prisons being places of punishment. Today’s institutions of incarceration are called 'Correctional Centres' and other sanitised terms, but they remain vehicles for revenge and punishment exacted by courts under the Rule of Law.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/113003.php

2nd Renaissance -33

The natural, some would say instinctive, organisation model for humans is the tribe. But there is no suggestion here of attacking or harming the less numerous members of big government and big business organisations that are structured along institutional and militarist lines. Any physical attack on the forces of the OWO would not only violate the sixth commandment, it would fail to advance humanity or benefit society in any way. No, the conflict between the OWO and the rest of us is a battle of ideas and, as such, it holds great potential as a transformational force that will benefit all of humanity - even those people who are presently on the side of federalism, capitalism and a creeping totalitarian control of the many by a few.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/112747.php

2nd Renaissance -32

Then the penny drops, literally. The earthlings are selling water, they are treating it as a commodity. For the sellers of water this means that the scarcer fresh water is the higher the price and the greater the profit. There is still CAPITALISM on Earth; a system that became redundant in most galaxies aeons ago. No wonder water is scarce here.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/112562.php

2nd Renaissance -31

The dissemination of information about the end of the 20th century scientific Dark Age and the advent of wondrous new spike technologies is something we can all do. It is not yet illegal to write or talk about such matters. In order to help raise general awareness of already existing opportunities to end economic scarcity it is necessary to first discover and absorb information that is never presented by the OWO controlled media. Then it is time to spread those alternate perspectives of science and technology at the interpersonal level.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/112310.php

2nd Renaissance -30

"Near-Spike technologies will ensure that everyone could have access to this cornucopia, and while different cultures and moieties within those cultures will respond idiosyncratically to the great change, we might expect a general drift back toward the ancient codes implanted by evolutionary pressures. Humans have evolved in a million years and more of moderate ease, each tribe's small numbers drawing modestly upon the self-replenishing bounty of the earth. We will slip easily back into that blissful state, spared its occasional murderous bouts of uncontrollable fire, flood, drought, plague and infestation.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/112101.php

2nd Renaissance -29

There is a simple answer, however, and that is to set up the bomb, and arm it to go off when the Sun passes through the required geometric point. The newspapers warn us that the tests will be carried out over a series of months, so we sit back with a set of astro tables and paper on which to calculate Sun positions, and wait for the results. When the first start coming in, we must confess to a certain excitement. What began as a theory is proving in actuality to be perfectly correct. We have cracked a code that the atom bomb countries have long tried to hide. "

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/111933.php

2nd Renaissance -28

Far Out Ideas For a Far Out Century [226] This freesite is not concerned with the existence or otherwise of aliens or UFOs, nor is it concerned with what such beings might be doing in our skies. There are thousands of web sites and publications that deal with UFOs and aliens. This freesite is concerned with far more serious threats to the freedom and well-being of humanity than extraterrestrial visitors. These threats have already been identified as takerism, nationalism, capitalism, and militarism. The iron grip of the OWO on the world's resources has far more serious consequences than the alleged activities of aliens and UFOs.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/111733.php

2nd Renaissance -27

At first impression this might seem a good thing, but the real price of such a concealment has been more than seven decades of denying the means and capability to bring abundant energy to the whole world. Not only could the release of such knowledge have ended all militarism and the related suffering caused by wars, it could have enabled presently 'developing' countries to feed, house and clothe their populations to levels that would have freed them from poverty, disease, and the burden of debt they currently 'owe' to the capitalist West.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/04/111574.php

2nd Renaissance -25

This diagram is not reproduced here to suggest that the absolute amount of energy that can be obtained from matter is known, Cramp points out that it is theoretical. The purpose of the diagram is to drive home the realisation that energy is by no means scarce. All that is required to tap it is the right knowledge. Tesla and many others have already shown that such knowledge exists and that it is practical to draw energy from beyond matter - from the ether itself.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/04/111235.php

2nd Renaissance -24

The defection of large numbers of people from federal citizenship, and the establishment of free cities that will run on free energy, can and will break the hold of old ideas and false scientific notions that held us back during the entire 20th century. That 2nd Dark Age is now behind us and the way to a better, Level 4 Civilization, is open. How soon the transformation is accomplished is now in the hands of ordinary folk, it has very little to do with our federal 'representatives', the industrial councils of big business, the parrot press, or the dogma specialists of orthodox science.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/04/111028.php

2nd Renaissance -23

While it is far less radical than Tesla's idea of 'broadcasting' power to everyone on earth, the Christie/Brits generator could revolutionise domestic power supply, if it were ever allowed to do so. Once a household had one of these devices it could not only meet all its own power requirements, it could also feed around 10 kW of energy into the local power grid each day. When a family moved home, it would be practical to take the generator with them to their new residence. Given the long service life of the device, many generations of the family would inherit it, and it would continue to pump out 24 kW of clean power every day.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/04/110786.php

2nd Renaissance -22

Tesla was arguably one of the most outstanding geniuses of the late 19th century. But he was never astute in business, being far too naive and trusting. Tesla thought that everyone would readily support a discovery that would make energy available to all, and do much to end poverty and scarcity in the world. The capitalist/militarist establishments of the US thought quite differently.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/04/110212.php

2nd Renaissance -21

Who Is Running The Universe? [205] There is a common piece of street wisdom that describes how to determine who is really running any strange town that you come to on a journey. The advice is to listen to who is mentioned in conversations about the affairs and administration of the town. It is never the people who are talked about in connection with town matters or politics who are actually running things. The rule says that it is always the people who are never mentioned who are in real control. If you want to know who has the power, find out who is never mentioned as having any. When you begin to learn about and debate science with other non-scientists like yourself, remember this piece of street wisdom. Nothing is what it seems to be. The mayor or the police chief might seem to wield the power but, in reality, the power lies elsewhere, and that truth is seldom mentioned.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/04/109956.php

2nd Renaissance -20

Who are the most imaginative and lateral thinking people in our present society? Are they the scientists, or possibly the high IQ individuals employed to find new products and markets? Are they the entrepreneurs of the world, or are they advisors and consultants to industry and government? The answer to this question is known, and it is surprising to most people.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/109767.php

2nd Renaissance -19

A key principle in such situations will be to limit the time that any individual can serve in political office. One or two terms should be the limit, there should be no opportunity for people to make a career out of politics. Nor should it be possible for generation after generation of any family to be employed in politics or as politicians. One only has to look at the distortions and inequalities that some of these political dynasties have introduced to the course of legislation in Australia and the US to know that long-term careers and generation to generation successions are not a good idea.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/109519.php

2nd Renaissance -18

It is worth learning geometry as the ancients taught it because music is geometric. It is worth studying music in a geometric sense because this uncovers truths about vibrations and patterns of vibrations, Vibrations are important because all matter is formed from them. The 2nd Renaissance involves an explosion of knowledge and discovery that is taking humanity beyond the old 'drop in on your foot' materialistic and mechanistic view of the world and the universe beyond. The 21st century talent collectives that will build new technologies to defeat scarcity and create abundance will do most of their work in the realms of invisible vibration patterns. All young people, both boys and girls, now need to learn within these fields of knowledge, because humanity's future will be built there.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/109198.php

2nd Renaissance -17

Education systems in free cities and regions must be very different to those of nation states. It is not just the methods of encouraging learning that will distinguish education in free cities from that of nation states, but the truth that the knowledge is rooted in. There is no point in swotting to pass examinations in subject knowledge that is wrong. Yet, that is exactly what young people in state education systems are doing. Neither they, or their parents, or their teachers realise this fact, but it remains the case.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/109002.php

2nd Renaissance -16

Supporting secessions and the formation of free cities and regions is going to be crucial. Only in these new beachheads of tomorrow’s society will such innovations as home-schooling, and a lack of state censorship and media spin, enable young people to discover the truths they will need to know to build a Level 4 Civilization.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/108722.php

2nd Renaissance -15

Historically, there have been periods when legal distinctions between animals and humans have been blurred. For instance, in medieval Europe, in the 14th and 15th centuries, numerous trials and executions of animals occurred. One source identifies 34 recorded instances of pigs having been tried and cruelly put to death. Besides pigs; rats, chickens, goats, and bees were similarly tried. Some of the pigs were fully dressed in human clothes at the time they were, inevitably, found guilty. In one case a vicar excommunicated a flock of sparrows that infested his church. All this happened despite the theological stance that animals had no soul, and no morals or conscience. They could not really be guilty of transgressing the Rule of Law.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/108557.php

2nd Renaissance -14

Withdrawing Support For Militarism [179] The problem with revenge is that it lowers the humanity of those who exercise it down to the same level, of even below, those who committed the original crime. Although we can't yet know who was responsible for 911 or 1012, we do now know that forces of the Coalition of the Willing (CoW) have, on occasions, been just as barbaric as the people who killed on those dates. This has been amply demonstrated in Afghanistan and again in Iraq. If you doubt this, seek out more facts about the CoW's use of DU and NDU weaponry and cluster bombs. These horror weapons continue, to this day, to put young children and adult civilians at risk of injury or death from unexploded munitions, radiation, and toxic substances in the ground water and the food chain.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/108373.php

Surveillance

It is up to ordinary people to raise the level of debate about the undemocratic surveillance practices of the many faceless and unaccountable agents who make daily intrusions on individual privacy, and about the apologists and propagandists for the War nn Terror who applaud every new attack on human rights and freedoms as "prudent" or "necessary". If there is no discussion of reverse surveillance in the national media, create it on the streets on a citizen to citizen basis. If nobody is talking about the outrageous assaults on privacy and human rights embodied in the new antiterrorist acts forced through US, UK and Australian legislatures, start talking about it to your neighbours and friends.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/108175.php

2nd Renaissance -13

Such a development is part of the phenomenon of reverse surveillance that will come to characterise the 2nd Renaissance and a rapid transition to a Level 4 Civilization and a truly free society. You can learn more about reverse surveillance at the 'Surveillance' freesite. Reverse surveillance principles extend well beyond the use of ubiquitous digital imaging technologies, and include audits of all aspects of federal government operations, by randomly selected teams of citizens. The Feds and the parrot people will be quick to pronounce that such monitoting is "not in the national interest," but it will definitely be in our interests, and those of future generations of humanity.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/107989.php

2nd Renaissance -12

There are reports that in one Balinese kampong that provided labour to the clubs in Kuta Beach, seven empty coffins were buried, because there were no identifiable remains of the missing workers. It was as if they had been vaporised. Scores of people, mainly locals, are thought to have disappeared without trace.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/03/107756.php

2nd Renaissance -11

Fortunately, the power and control of government and military elites is illusory in the 21st century. The world no longer works the way it did, and there is nothing to compel people to support failed, outdated systems any longer. This is an understanding that must be widely and quickly shared. The future of our children and the planet depends upon our changing our thinking about governments, and our support for them.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/107560.php

2nd Renaissance -10

In the Afghanistan turkey shoot the CoW forces used vast numbers of hard target weapons and other munitions containing depleted uranium (DU). This substance is almost twice as dense as lead. When it punches through concrete bunkers, armour, or mud huts, DU disintegrates into a chemically toxic and radioactive dust. In contrast to the earlier DU weapons used in Gulf War I, the newer ordinance produced deaths and deformities within weeks of the start of military action by the CoW. Between 1990-91 and 2001 the US arms manufacturers are thought to have "improved" the DU technology by introducing milled uranium ore to their warheads. This non-depleted uranium (NDU) is - wait for it - cheaper to produce and far more potent than DU. It poses massive health risks to civilian populations exposed to it, and constitutes, in every sense of the word, a weapon of mass destruction, or WMD. "Hey they're hunting them in Iraq, aren't they?"

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/107216.php

2nd Renaissance -9

The Old World Order will not do anything to smooth the path to a Level 4 Civilization, and a better world. On the contrary, they will do whatever they can to make it difficult. The police, the military, the media, the financial system, the rule of law, and all the mechanisms of civil control and surveillance will be mobilised in defence of the status quo. But, once they understand their options, the people of the world will not engage in a battle with the forces of the OWO. They will simply abandon the old way of living under national rule, for a better, freer, life in new tribal societies. Kinship mechanisms will help people cope with the pressures of official opposition to radical changes that will finally enable them to escape the invisible prison that the OWO had fashioned around them.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/107047.php

2nd Renaissance -8

Ultimately the old order will lose the battle to preserve their privileged way of life, based on all prevailing scarcity, pseudo-democracy, and the rule of law. But in the interim, hundreds of millions of innocent people might lose their lives in bloody resistance to the changes being made by the Old World Order (OWO).. If such a terrible thing happens, it will all have been for nothing, because:

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/106816.php

Tales of Adam
Daniel Quinn*
http://ishmael.com/index1.cfm

2nd Renaissance -7

When coupled with the introduction of artificial scarcity and taker concepts of property ownership and legal tender, Western death-fearing religions played a significant role in subduing, otherwise independent, tribal peoples.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/106537.php

2nd Renaissance -6

The second route involves the setting up of entirely new living spaces on tribal lands that were previously seized by colonising governments that espoused and followed Taker philosophies. This route has greater credibility, in the sense of secession rights, where clear historical ownership of the land can be shown.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/106327.php

2nd Renaissance -5

Quinn contends that while governments can imagine a revolution they can't imagine abandonment. As he puts it, "..even if it could imagine abandonment , it couldn't defend against it, because abandonment isn't an attack, it's just a discontinuance of support."

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/106136.php

2nd Renaissance -4

In due course, there is one achievement of overriding significance that Caral might well provide. One great contribution or lesson that can be applied to the 2nd Renaissance. How to live in peace, with spiritual meaning, and without warfare, for a thousand years.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/105935.php

The New Renaissance
Daniel Quinn*

http://www.mnforsustain.org/quinn_d_new_renaissance.htm

2nd Renaissance -3

Plichta writes of this model as follows. "There was a time I used to make fun of the Apocalypse of St John and believed it to be a totally unreliable historical source. Today I am filled with deep humility, perhaps because I am now able to give a concrete description of the foundation of the world as seen by St John with my mathematical discoveries, and thus possibly open a new way to all of humanity which has now reached a dead end."

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/105799.php

2nd Renaissance -2

Georg Cantor (1845-1918), by his origination of modern set theory and his studies of the nature of infinity, left science a valuable legacy. Cantor was regularly admitted to a psychiatric clinic within the University of Halle, in Germany, where he lectured and worked as a Professor of Mathematics. On each occasion that he became ill he had been thinking about infinity and the continuum hypothesis. Such intense thought, at the boundaries of his comprehension, caused Cantor to suffer repeated mental breakdowns. Infinity drove him mad.

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/105634.php

2nd Renaissance

This story was published in September 2004 and it was a big secret. I received it on disk but I think it should be public by now anyway. It is interesting to look back at it and in terms of today's world some two years on. I will link each chapter as I go along over the coming weeks.- The Old World Order - Happy reading!

http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/02/105519.php

Fight Iemma - Debnam

All they can say is 'lock em up'

It seems we are in the thick of it again - the stupid, heartless "Law & Order" auction.

Premier Morris Iemma and Opposition leader Peter Debnam are trying to outdo each other with idiotic "tough on crime" policies.

Original Article
http://oldsydimc.cat.org.au/front.php3?article_id=64701