10/05/06

In the "knee of the curve"

“It is a mistake to believe that a science consists in nothing but conclusively proved propositions, and it is unjust to demand that it should. It is a demand only made by those who feel a craving for authority in some form and a need to replace the religious catechism by something else, even if it be a scientific one.”
- Sigmund Freud

"In recent years, the scientific method and its underlying empirical methods has been studied by Thomas Kuhn. He suggested that sociological mechanisms were important in how science works. In this view, a scientific revolution occurs when scientists encounter anomalies which cannot be explained by the universally accepted paradigm within which scientific progress had thereto been made. Once new discoveries are made that cannot be reconciled with a current paradigm, and these results are repeatedly independently confirmed by other scientists, then the scientific community is forced to create a new paradigm in line with the evidence."
- Do scientists really follow the scientific method?, Scientific method, From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

“There is no place for dogma in science. The scientist is free to ask any question, to doubt any assertion, to seek for any evidence, to correct any error. Where science has been used in the past to erect a new dogmatism, that dogmatism has found itself incompatible with the progress of science; and in the end, the dogma has yielded, or science and freedom have perished together.”
- J. Robert Oppenheimer
 

     This is the section where I put several pieces together and attempt to make sense of them in order to alert people of 'possible' upcoming events.  Most or all of the things on these pages may initially appear completely absurd. This is because you would initially compare them to what you consider normal.  I allowed my imagination (extroverted intuition) free reign because I believe that when extremely advanced technology is involved anything is possible.  As Arthur C. Clark said, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."  Or from Robert Heinlein in the book Time Enough For Love, "One man's 'magic' is another man's engineering. 'Supernaturalism' is a null word."  Or as I've expressed it, there are no supernatural forces, there are only natural forces we've yet to fully comprehend.

Shermer's Last Law, By Michael Shermer, January 2002
As scientist extraordinaire and author of an empire of science-fiction books, Arthur C. Clarke is one of the farthest-seeing visionaries of our time. His pithy quotations tug harder than those of most futurists on our collective psyches for their insights into humanity and our unique place in the cosmos. And none do so more than his famous Third Law: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

This observation stimulated me to think about the impact the discovery of an extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) would have on science and religion. To that end, I would like to immodestly propose Shermer's Last Law (I don't believe in naming laws after oneself, so as the good book says, the last shall be first and the first shall be last): "Any sufficiently advanced ETI is indistinguishable from God."

“God is typically described by Western religions as omniscient and omnipotent. Because we are far from possessing these traits, how can we possibly distinguish a God who has them absolutely from an ETI who merely has them copiously relative to us? We can't. But if God were only relatively more knowing and powerful than we are, then by definition the deity would be an ETI!”
…
“Ergo, the probability that an ETI only slightly more advanced than we are will make contact is virtually nil. If we ever do find an ETI, it will be as though a million-year-old Homo erectus were dropped into the 21st century, given a computer and cell phone and instructed to communicate with us. The ETI would be to us as we would be to this early hominid--godlike.”
...
Although science has not even remotely destroyed religion, Shermer's Last Law predicts that the relation between the two will be profoundly affected by contact with an ETI. To find out how, we must follow Clarke's Second Law: "The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible." Ad astra!

     After consideration of what is possible I then went on a search for identifying explanations that were most probable given the admittedly fantastic nature of the evidence.  While I could do as others have and draw from typical prophecy and various scriptures I also find a lot of relevant concepts in several pieces of science fact and fiction.   I've read several books and seen films that seem related to contemporary international events.  So you say, "Hey, that doesn't make sense.  How could they contain significant concepts?".  Well remember in one of my earlier papers when I said all of the cognitive functions were multi-dimensional and there were features of Intuition that sound too bizarre to discuss at that time.  Well for this section to make sense, you need to consider that apparently intuition and quantum (dark) energy enable the use of mental telepathy.  As fantastic as that seems there is a significant quantity of theoretical and scientific evidence as well as credible personal testimony from such people as Carl Jung, Albert Einstein, John Lilly and others.  The fundamental science underlying telepathy is quantum entanglement which also forms the basis for quantum computing and teleportation (see links below).

In the hypothetical stage, scientists use their own creativity (currently not well understood), or any other methods available, to invent possible explanations for the phenomenon under study. For some philosophers of science the most important aspect of an explanation is that it must be falsifiable, whereby a contrary fact from an experiment must be possible (in other words, if no experiment can ever demonstrate the hypothesis to be false, the hypothesis is unscientific though perhaps true).

The scientist should also be--but need not be and often is not--impartial, considering all known evidence, and not merely the evidence which supports the hypothesis being developed. This makes it more likely that the hypotheses formed will be relevant and useful.
- Hypothesis, Scientific method, From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

     Several INFPs believe they are psychic.  Well, before some of my experiences I attributed their perception to their unconscious awareness and use of extroverted intuition in seeing larger patterns and the ability to understand people and motivations (Fi).  One INFP friend said she could quickly determine a person's "vice".  Well I'm not saying that any human on earth has the ability to transmit thoughts to another person but I have every reason to believe that someone (perhaps an AI) with access to technology based on quantum entanglement can both read peoples thoughts and put little intuitive ideas in peoples heads.  My perception of this is more like 'shared consciousness' because the voice or ideas in my head (on several occasions over the span of about two weeks) seemed like mine at the time I had them.  It's similar to the voice in your head when you read to yourself.  It's only later when I considered my thoughts, motivations, actions and the results do I realize that my behavior was out of character for me.  The results have to date been 'very' informative and at times entertaining.  Even the writers of The Matrix have wondered out loud, "Sometimes I wonder where I get my ideas".   I think one of them said that in an interview or on the DVD.  Hmm, It seems Dr. John Lilly died September 30th, (2001).  I had never heard of him before but I was familiar with some concepts of his work.  He apparently invented the isolation/sensory deprivation tank and did cognitive research with dolphins.  Please consider this excerpt from a page dedicated to him and the related supporting evidence;

Isaiah
65:1 I am sought of them that asked not for me; I am found of them that sought me not: …

Dr. John C. Lilly, M.D. January 06, 1915 - September 30, 2001
"Many people have claimed to have received messages via interstellar telepathy. Saul-Paul Sirag, a physicist, has said that over a hundred scientists in the United States have had this experience, but are reluctant to admit it publicly, for obvious reasons. Buckminster Fuller, renowned scientific philosopher, has stated that he sometimes thinks that he has received messages from interstellar telepaths. Dr. John Lilly, psychoanalyst, neuro-anatomist, cyberneticist, mathematician, and pioneering dolphin researcher, has made allusions to contact during the early seventies from interstellar entities he terms the "Cosmic Coincidence Control Center"." (See also synchronicity, collective unconscious and deus ex machina here.)

QLAOT -- Quantum Linguistic Aspects of Telepathy
"Saul-Paul Sirag, a leading consciousness physicist, told a 1979 Transpersonal Psychology plenary audience (in a talk entitled Consciousness and Physics ) that Einstein spoke favorably of telepathy at least three times in print (eg, Quantum theory seems to imply telepathy.) Its existence is therefore recognized in physics (as was validated at a recent Conference on The Nature, Role, and Power of Thought -- reviewed next issue], independently of recognition in either psychology or linguistics. My favorite quantum physics cartoon book, Spacetime and Beyond (Bob Toben, Fred Wolf and Jack Sarfatti), gives an excellent and plausible account of how information can move instantaneously through the wormholes of cosmic foam called space. Sarfatti gives a simple diagram of how telepathy works in an appendix to Jeffrey Mishlove's Roots of Consciousness, and elsewhere talks about the faster-than-light Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen transmissions as information without transportation. Finally, a somewhat technical but satisfying account of biological, structural, mathematical, and other theoretical considerations of telepathy can be found in Andrija Puharich's Beyond Telepathy."

Quantum Teleportation, IBM Research
Until recently, teleportation was not taken seriously by scientists, because it was thought to violate the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics, which forbids any measuring or scanning process from extracting all the information in an atom or other object. ...But the six scientists found a way to make an end-run around this logic, using a celebrated and paradoxical feature of quantum mechanics known as the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen effect.

Atom Experiment Brings Teleportation a Step Closer
By Reuters, 26 September 2001
“LONDON (Reuters) - Physicists in Denmark have made two samples of trillions of atoms interact at a distance in an experiment which may bring Star Trek-style teleportation and rapid quantum computing closer to reality. “

“It involves quantum entanglement -- a mysterious concept of entwining two or more particles without physical contact. Albert Einstein once described it as ``spooky action at a distance.''

Scientists Report 'Teleported' Data
Mon Jun 17, 2002
By PETER O'CONNOR, Associated Press Writer
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) - Australian scientists said Monday they had successfully "teleported" a laser beam encoded with data, breaking it up and reconstructing an exact replica a yard away.

"We have taken a beam of laser light ... and completely destroyed it and then made measurements of the destroyed laser beam and then took the measured results to the other side of the lab and reconstructed an exact replica of what we have destroyed," said Lam.

Teleporting a laser beam involves destroying and replicating billions of photons.

Lam said he believes the process, called "quantum teleportation" and which takes a nanosecond — one billionth of one second — will soon be used for teleporting matter.

Quantum information teleported from light to matter
By Patricia Reaney Wed Oct 4, 2006 11:08 PM ET
"It is one step further because for the first time it involves teleportation between light and matter, two different objects. One is the carrier of information and the other one is the storage medium," Polzik explained in an interview on Wednesday.

Royal Astronomical Society
20 March 2002
Their results show that the universe is full of dark energy, completely consistent with the earlier supernovae results. "It seems that Einstein did not make a blunder after all -- dark energy appears to exist and to dominate over more conventional types of matter," Efstathiou said. "An explanation of the dark energy may involve String Theory, extra dimensions or even what happened before the Big Bang. At present nobody knows. The ball is now firmly in the theorists court."

     That said here are some of the books or films I think can be applied to near future events.  Remember that they are exceedingly likely to contain one or more paradoxes.  Because of the considerable material, in addition to the following citations I have created several pages focused  on entertainment because there have been so many films and television programs Blending myth, popular fiction, fact and current events. 

"WTF does "DUNE" have to do with any discussion of reality?
Let's talk about "reality" for a second: The U.S. uses more oil than any nation on Earth.
Most of the oil in the world lies in the Middle East Any questions?"
- dontthrowpoprocksinthepool, Yahoo - BBS Message 10/13/03

     Be careful how you define reality. Do you believe Herbert’s story to be based entirely on fantasy?

“My father once told me that respect for the truth comes close to being the basis for all morality. ‘‘Something cannot emerge from nothing,’’ he said. This is profound thinking if you understand how unstable ‘‘the truth’’ can be.”
- From “Conversations with Muad’Dib” by the Princess Irulan, “Dune”, paperback p.207, Frank Herbert

"LISTEN TO ME!! The spice must flow... the spice has given me accelerated evolution for four thousand years... it has enabled you to live two hundred years... the spice helps make the sapho juice, which gives the red-lipped mentats the ability to be living computers... the secret side of spice... the water of life."
- Guild Navigator, Dune script 1983 ed.

"As I told you, I worked for four administrations under three presidents. And in every one of those, our policy was that we would go to war to protect the energy reserves in the Persian Gulf. That is a major and very significant national security interest that we have."
- James Baker in a PBS Frontline interview, October 2001

     More recently there has been a specific event similar to the Fremen (Yemen) desert dwellers protecting their land (Jihad) from imperial (western) exploitation, begin destroying the Spice (oil) harvesting equipment and carriers (pipelines and tankers) in order to disrupt production and bring pressure on the local oppressive government.

FREMAN: the free tribes of Arrakis, dwellers in the desert, remnants of the Zensunni Wanderers.  ("Sand Pirates" according to the Imperial Dictionary.)
- Dune: Terminology of the Imperium, By Frank Herbert

Yemen Certain French Tanker Was Deliberately Hit
Sun Oct 13, 9:18 AM ET
By Mohammed Sudam
SANAA (Reuters) - Yemen is convinced the blast which ripped through a French tanker off its coast was a deliberate attack, but the identity of the perpetrators is still unknown, sources close to the government-led probe said on Sunday.

Yemen, trying to shed an image as a haven for Islamist militants, had initially said a fire set off the explosion on the Limburg which killed one of the 25-member crew. But on Thursday it conceded a terror attack was possible.

  Here's another interesting number of paradoxical coincidences.  I suppose one could replace the planet Geidi Prime with the US state of Texas and have a rather convincing match (ever seen Houston, the land and air that surrounds it?).

The Geidi system is the homeworld of House Harkonnen. Once a lush, forested planet, years of ruthless Harkonnen rule have devistated the eco-system of Geidi Prime, polluting her oceans, and atmosphere. Global-warming caused by the pollution has melted most of her ice-caps. This raised the ocean level several feet; coastal devistation was extrodinary. Acid rain, disease, and natural disasters (floods, droughts, hurricanes) now plague the planet. Rich in industrial metals, Geidi Prime is still a center for industry. Her rulers, seemingly without a care to the devistation they are working, have turned -- with ever increasing frequency -- to extravagent gladiatorial entertainment to appease the masses of starving people and retain order.
- Description of planet Geidi Prime from Dune game

In the 1990s we witnessed the emergence of a small number of rogue states that, while different in important ways, share a number of attributes. These states: (1) brutalize their own people and squander their national resources for the personal gain of the rulers;
- White House, United States National Security Council

ExxonMobil and the Oil Barons of Houston, Texas
The Human toll of their pollution binge
Houston industries' "collateral damage":
“500,500 citizens (approximately 15% of Houston's population) are now affected directly by lung cancer, chronic bronchitis, childhood asthma, adult asthma and emphysema (American Lung Association)”

Bush oil firm did Enron-style deal - report
Wednesday October 9, 5:14 pm ET
BOSTON, Oct 9 (Reuters) - President George W. Bush's former oil firm formed a partnership with Harvard University that concealed the company's financial woes and may have misled investors, a student and alumni group said in a report on Wednesday.

The partnership between Harken Energy Corp. and Harvard, created with Bush's approval, bore strong resemblance to the partnerships that helped disguise Enron's problems, the report's authors said.

Harvard Management Co., which oversees the school's $18 billion endowment, was the biggest shareholder in Harken when the two sides agreed to create the Harken Anadarko Partnership in late 1990, when Bush's father occupied the White House and was preparing to drive Iraqi President Saddam Hussein from Kuwait.

Over the next two years, the partnership allowed Harvard to bail out Harken's business by removing from its books a large percentage of the company's loss-generating assets and debts in the Anadarko region of Texas and Oklahoma.

“I will have Arrakis back for myself and House Harkonnen! He who controls the Spice, controls the universe!”
– Baron Vladimir Harkonnen, Dune by Frank Herbert

In Iraqi War Scenario, Oil Is Key Issue
U.S. Drillers Eye Huge Petroleum Pool
By Dan Morgan and David B. Ottaway
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, September 15, 2002; Page A01
A U.S.-led ouster of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein could open a bonanza for American oil companies long banished from Iraq, scuttling oil deals between Baghdad and Russia, France and other countries, and reshuffling world petroleum markets, according to industry officials and leaders of the Iraqi opposition.

Forceful Tactics Catch Up With U.S.
Efforts to Build Support on Iraq Stymied by Two Years of International Resentment
By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, February 16, 2003; Page A26
"There have been really aggressive battles that have got people's backs up," said a diplomat from a country that publicly supports the U.S. position on Iraq. "The U.S. team often acts like thugs. People feel bullied, and that can affect the way you respond when someone makes a request."

U.S. plans total control in rebuilding postwar Iraq
By Karen DeYoung and Peter Slevin
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, February 21, 2003; Page A01
WASHINGTON - The Bush administration plans to take complete, unilateral control of a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, with an interim administration headed by a yet-to-be named American civilian who will direct the reconstruction of the country and the creation of a ``representative'' Iraqi government, according to an outline described by U.S. officials and other sources. ...said retired Army Gen. Barry R. McCaffrey, one of a number of senior military and civilian experts who have been briefed by the Pentagon on the plan. "My own view is that it will take five years, with substantial military power, to establish and exploit the peace" in Iraq.

Which Companies Will Put Iraq Back Together?
March 23, 2003, New York Times
WAR began last week. Reconstruction starts this week.

That, at least, is how it looks to government contract officers, who in the coming days plan to give American companies the first contracts to rebuild Iraq, a task that experts say could eventually cost $25 billion to $100 billion. It would be the largest postwar rebuilding since the Marshall Plan in Europe after World War II.

That comparison is being made at every opportunity by Bush administration officials, who emphasize American generosity and farsightedness. But the government's decision to invite only American corporations to bid on these contracts has added to the profound international divisions that already surround the war.

Texas oil industry set to profit from Iraq war
Texas oil and gas companies are well-positioned to benefit from the rebuilding of Iraq's multibillion-dollar oil industry, experts say
2003/03/17, Dallas Business Journal
John Gerdes, senior vice president and director of energy research at Dallas-based Southwest Securities Inc., said Texas oil and gas companies are already lining up for hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts to put out Iraqi oil well fires and rebuild the country's oil industry.

Baxter said he tried to arrange a visit to Iraq about three weeks ago with a group from Dallas and, "even with my contacts, 'mum' was the word of the day" on contract bids and negotiations.

Baxter said he's read that Houston-based Halliburton, Aliso Viejo, Calif.-based Fluor Corp. and San Francisco-based Bechtel Group Inc. have been asked by the U.S. government to bid on reconstruction of Iraq's oil industry.

Halliburton says KBR unit revenue profit, sales soar
Oct 29, 2003
HOUSTON, United States (AFP) - US oil industry services giant Halliburton said Thursday its Kellogg Brown and Root unit's profits rose four-fold and sales leapt 80 percent, boosted by work in Iraq.

KBR, the engineering and construction division that netted a no-bid government contract to help rebuild Iraq's shattered oil industry, also posted an 80-percent jump in sales to 2.3 billion dollars.

"This increase is largely attributable to additional activity in Engineering and Construction Group government service projects, including work in the Middle East," Halliburton said.

Overall, US government contracts for Iraqi reconstruction given to Halliburton are now worth some two billion dollars and could go higher, the army said last month.

FEDAYKIN: Fremen death commandos; historically: a group formed and pledged to give their lives to right a wrong
 - Dune: Terminology of the Imperium, By Frank Herbert

Fedayeen force pushes Iraqi army
Monday, 24 March, 2003, 18:49 GMT
By Martin Lumb
BBC News Online
Saddam Hussein's army may, on paper, be one of the biggest in the world but it is a small group of irregulars - the Fedayeen - which has been providing much of the resistance to the advancing Americans.  The Fedayeen was founded by Saddam Hussein's eldest son Uday in 1995, but command is now believed to rest with his second son, Qusay.

SARDAUKAR: The soldier-fanatics of the Padishah Emperor. ...By the time of Shaddam IV, while they were still formidable, their strength had been sapped by overconfidence, and the sustaining mystique of their warrior religion had been deeply undermined by cynicism.
 - Dune: Terminology of the Imperium, By Frank Herbert

Apocalypse now … Fedayeen vow to kill
25th June 2003, Arab Times - Kuwait
BAGHDAD, (Agencies): US troops psyched up on a bizarre musical reprise from Vietnam war film "Apocalypse Now" before crashing into Iraqi homes to hunt gunmen on Saturday, as Shi'ite Muslims rallied against the US occupation of Iraq.

With the strains of Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries" still ringing in their ears and the clatter of helicopters overhead, soldiers rammed vehicles into metal gates and hundreds of troops raided houses in the western city of Ramadi after sunrise as part of a drive to quell a spate of attacks on US forces. A previously unknown group, calling itself the Iraqi National Front of Fedayeen, vowed to intensify assaults on American troops until they leave Iraq.

Iraq now guerrilla war, top U.S. general says
Morale among troops plummets
Missile misses plane in Baghdad
Jul. 17, 2003
WASHINGTON - The top American commander became the first U.S. military official yesterday to say his troops are fighting a guerrilla war in Iraq and acknowledged that morale is plummeting among his soldiers.

Abizaid also made it clear that — low morale notwithstanding — his soldiers do not have the right to take shots at Bush and top Pentagon officials as some did on a national newscast Tuesday evening.

ABC aired interviews with soldiers who criticized Bush, Rumsfeld and others for leaving them to languish in the searing Iraqi heat where they have been described as sitting in a shooting gallery.

Since the sitting president declared major combat over on May 1, 33 Americans have been killed, eight of them in the two weeks since Bush challenged the enemy to "bring `em on."

On the ABC report, one member of the 2nd Battle Combat Team in Falluja, Iraq, talked about his "Most Wanted" list, a response to the deck of cards the U.S. administration had distributed in a bid to capture Saddam Hussein's loyalists. "The aces in my deck are (U.S. civilian administrator) Paul Bremer, Donald Rumsfeld, George Bush and (deputy defence secretary) Paul Wolfowitz," the sergeant told a reporter.

Another member, Specialist Clinton Deitz, told the reporter he would ask Rumsfeld to resign if he appeared in Falluja while another, Pte. Eric Rattler, said he once wanted to help Iraqis but "now, I don't care any more."
 

"Our shared enemy the Harkonnens, are once again in control of Arrakis. Stilgar, your leader, has asked me and my mother to crush the Harkonnens. We must do more than this. We must totally destroy all spice production on Arrakis. The Guild and the entire universe depends on spice. He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing".
- Paul Atreides/Usul Muad'Dib, Dune script 1983 ed.

Iraq oil pipeline fire blamed on sabotage
June 22 2003 at 02:09PM
By Alistair Lyon: Reuters
"This incident is an act of sabotage. The pipeline was blown up deliberately," said one Oil Ministry official of the latest blast. He did not elaborate and asked not to be named.

The pipeline exploded only a few hours after two US soldiers from the Third Armoured Cavalry were wounded when their Humvee vehicle detonated a landmine in the same area.  Eighteen American soldiers have been killed in hostile action since major combat was declared over in Iraq on May 1, and insecurity has hampered efforts to revive the economy.

The same day, a previously unknown group, calling itself the Iraqi National Front of Fedayeen, vowed to intensify assaults on US troops until they leave Iraq.

US officials blame the attacks on Saddam loyalists, though there is widespread resentment at the US occupation and the way the military conducts raids and detains people.
 

     Yes, you might be thinking that the brutal rule of Saddam Hussein and his sons is more similar to the Baron Vladimir Harkonnen and his nephews Rabban and Feyd, than the Bush regime and their family.  I too would support such an argument and encourage a search for supporting evidence.  But I would warn you that in that search you are likely to find that in many of the years Saddam was most ruthless and murderous he was in fact a valuable ally to industrialized states (the Imperium, U.N. = Landsraad, IMF = CHOAM) and a significant asset in US foreign (imperial) policy.  A foreign policy where apparently 'things' have more value than human life and strategy more important than ideals.