The end of foolishness

It is very easy to describe other people as stupid and very often this judgement does not base on a deeper consideration of a special person or his circumstances, but the personal disgust and negative feelings one has toward someone else. But this shall not be the topic of this article and I am going to discuss something more serious here.

Why do people act in a stupid way? What is it, which makes a certain person act in a way, witch cannot be understood by reason or any experience of life? I have been studying human beings for a long time and I confess, that this activity has always been one of my favourites, and I came to the conclusion, that stupidity is not a basic characteristic of the human, but one of his behaviour. Stupid people are not stupid per se, but in their action alone. Eric Berne, the great psychiatrist of the humanistic psychology of the 1950ies and 60ies, has found out, that human beings act according to a script which is created in early childhood, up to the age of six or seven. From that time onwards, people are occupied by executing the script in all aspects of their life, until the die (I consciously exclude the cases of the possibility of “liberation”, which exist in a human life of course).

It has been said, that you see the true intentions of a person, by his or her action. I believe that this is definitely true, especially if you consider the traditional psychology and it’s teachings, but if you look at human beings more as a creation to be, than as a fixed entity who cannot change, you see a lot of activity which cannot be explained by the ordinary way of academic teachings. What do I mean by this bold statement? Well, my provocative statement is the following: No human I born stupid, what we consider as stupidity is nothing else but the role someone plays within a social situation he is born into! In other word: People are stupid, because they are thought to behave in that way. Modern pedagogy knows that fear is producing stupid people. The shyer a person (a child normally) is, the more such a being will be considered as incompetent, and in the future as stupid. The more fearful children are, the poorer their academic achievements will be. The most scared children within a classroom of a school are also the children which succeed miserably in the academic world. Studies around the world have shown, that there is a direct correlation between courage and academic performance, at least in the eyes of the people who have to make the judgement, who have to pass on the school marks.

So, what does it need to change a “stupid” person into “normal” or even “intelligent” person? The key lies withing the mindset of the pupil. If we can change the way a child thinks about himself, we also can change his faith, his future. The first step of a system, which applies more to reality of life, is one which does not evaluated a child according to an “outside” standard, like a school system, which uses a hurdle according to which every person must obey by passing it. Staying in a class, because one could not take the hurdle, means, that someone could not fulfil the demands of the system. But what does that say at all? So abolishing staying in a class where else everybody else gets promoted to the next level, is crucial to a modern school system.

“Stupid” people stop being stupid, if they are allowed to be wise, if they are allowed to be intelligent. That is it, what is needed desperately. If an individual is allowed to be intelligent, he or she will also show intelligent results. Stupidity is no destiny. It is up to us to help others to reach this “higher” regions of being.

But what we also need instead is a system, where discipline has a very high value, so that learning, knowing something, fulfilling one’s purpose becomes something he or she gets promoted for, is very important. We need a system, which is promoting the “old” values of discipline, correctness, concentration on a issue alone, and achieving academic levels on the other side, very strongly. By the way, we must be sure about one thing: human beings are unique and everybody is able to show much more to the world, as anybody could ever imagine. Having this idea in mind, we could concentrate on the performance of any individual in a very different way. We would believe into the abilities of everybody and would consider every child as a champion, as a winner. By doing so, we would get not only much better result, but also make society much more productive and joyful. What we want from our children is not so much, what we want, but much more them to fulfil their own potential, to be the maximum they a person can be. Isn’t this a wonderful perspective? Much more, it could be a recipe for peace and harmony amount all humans, if nobody would have to compete to someone else, but be considered worthy because of what he or she really is, as the individual is created by god, the creator! It may be a dream of the future, but if we all dream it, there is a good chance that it is becoming the reality of tomorrow. Our children should be worth it!

Peter the great (1672-1725)

Peter I. known as Tsar Peter the Great, is one of the most illustrious and powerful figures which owned the Russian throne. He was the younger son of Tsar Alexis Mikhailovich and his second marriage wife. In 1682 he was proclaimed Tsar after the death of his half-brother Fedor III., together with his other half-brother Ivan, who was a very incompetent and weak character. The patriarch of Moscow and the Boyars (Russian nobility) strongly promoted Peter on the throne, as Peter’s half-sister Sophia and the palace guard wished to see Ivan on the throne alone. Making both of the half-brothers Tsar was the compromise which resulted out of this vivid conflict.

As many rulers of Russia before Peter and after him, a Coup d’état brought single power into the hand a one monarch alone. In the year 1689 on rumours of a plot, Peter could overthrow Sophia, the de facto ruler of Russia, and depose Ivan. The government was in his hand alone from that time onwards. Peter was studying European modern development from politics, army and technical advantages of most of European states. Soon his plan was to westernize and modernize his country. After hundreds of years of inner conflicts and wars against peoples of inner Asia, which threatened the empire from the east and from the south, Russia turned westwards. Peter saw, after travelling many parts of Europe incognito, how much his own country had fallen behind. Especially building a Russian navy, imitating western models (England and The Low Lands where Peter learnt to be an engineer of ship-building), became one of his most ambitious pursuits.

Inner conflict broke out again in 1697-1698 when the Streltsi (the palace guard) revolted against the Tsar. The result of this revolt was the modernization of the Russian army by recruiting one person of every 20th household and a massive restructurization. After successfully overpowering the revolt, Peter strongly supported building up an Russian iron and textile industry, as well as expanding industrialization into areas far away from Moscow (for example the region of Ural). Exports of Russia rose strongly and when Peter died in 1725, exports were twice the volume of its imports.

Foreign Politics lead to war for the dominion in the Black See with the big rival in the south - the Ottoman Empire (Turkey). Peter could expand his empire to the south, the city of Azov was conquered and a fleet was build up to secure Russian interests in the Black Sea. In 1700 war broke out with the kingdom of Sweden ruled by King Charles XII. The Russian defeated Charles in 1708, when he invaded Russia. In 1709 the Swedish were defeated at Poltava. In 1711 Sweden successfully stroke back, but Peter could prevent an alliance between Turkey and Sweden, when Azov war lost to the Turks again. Peter also started expeditions to expand his empire to the Caspian area to the costs of the empire of Persia.

The big symbol of the westernization of Russia was building the new Capital of St. Petersburg at the river Neva in 1703. It became Russia’s gate to the west and was always the most modern and western City of Russia up to our times. Between 1709 and 1719 Tsar Peter massively renewed the legal system and the administration of Russia. The country was overflowed by reform and resistance was very strong. One example became a tax on wearing beards. Beards, what most Russian men had worn at that time, were seen as old fashion and antiquated.

Peter was a very powerful and very often compromiseless man who demanded that the whole country had to follow him without debate. A savage criminal code, which was very similar to the military code, became feared in the whole empire. Anecdotes spread around Europe. Peter himself was a man of physically imposing stature. Very strong and tall, he was a domineering person and by character, his natural authority became visible to everybody. For example, when punishment for a revolt had to be performed, some few hundreds of the rebels had to be decapitated. After many executions the executioners were exhausted and couldn’t do their job any more. Peter was laughing at them took, the axe and decapitated a hundred men on his own. When he thought to have finished he asked: “Did everybody get was he deserved?” But one man to be executed was still lying on a block of wood and replied: “No my Tsar, you have forgotten me!” Peter was amused granted life to him and let the man free.

The reform and the administration and parting of the government into different departments of state, made Peter be known as the founder of modern Russia. But a lot of his reforms were ruined by incompetent and weak successors. Only one of his successors in the 18th century did reach partially his level of reform and gave another push of modernization to the Empire of Russia. It was Tsaress Catherine II. the great (1729-1796).

This was 2010

Christmas is over and the last days of the year 2010 have come. It is time to look back onto a year which comes to an end and into the future, which will hopefully be better. For some it was a very hard year for some others it was a boring year with no special incidents at all. After all 2010 was no year which will be remembered like many other years before. The big topic of “climate change” or the “financial crisis” are over yet. Stocks are going up again, the economy is stable and growing quiet well, and world trade has reached new levels. It seams that everything went better, than expected a year ago. But good news are seldomly remarked by the majority. Much more our society, driven by the media, is fascinated by bad news – the disease of our times. Well, we had a few this year, like earthquakes in Haiti, Chile and Japan, flood in Pakistan and an ongoing war in Afghanistan.
Terrorism was mild in 2010, only little damage was done to people and property worldwide. There has been no bigger war among nations or civil wars anywhere. All in all it was a quiet peaceful year. China is on the way of becoming economically Nr. 1 in the world, but will definitely no role model for a modern state. The strong support on European Nations which have stepped into big financial troubles, by buying bonds of states, is one sign of China’s rising political influence. On the one hand China is dependent on Europe as an important market for it’s products, on the other hand China is becoming more dominant on the global stage. It is hard to say a this point in history, which one will profit more from the deal: China or Europe? I personally have a strong tendency to believe it will be China. But one thing is for sure: It will be more difficult for European politicians to criticize China (for example for it’s problematic practise considering human rights and democracy). May be we will get a new definition for democracy under the influence of China, at least looking into the future for more than ten years.

The end of a year is also the time, when we make plans for the new year. Will we be successful, will we be happy, will we win or lose? These are fundamental questions which concern us all and many are very fearful of losing what they have. Unfortunately by being afraid of losing we rise our chances to fulfil our negative prophecies. Today I read of a poll made in Europe and America about the expectation for the new year. Most people are slightly optimistic, but a bit less than for the year 2010. It would be interesting to compare the new year polls of many years with the development which really occurred afterwards. Is there a correlation between expectation and what really becomes fact or not? Well if it is so, there are major dominant factors and powers in the world which do not seam to be interested in a prospering world. But that is just a thought of mine.

What about democracy in other regions of the world? We have seen a long period of dictatorship in the Arab world. May be people are rising their voices and can overthrow the one or other dictator in that region of the world – my hottest tip: Egypt.

2010 was a partially boring year. I hope that 2011 will be a glorious, prosperous and happy new year. A year which makes people more conscious about themselves and the world around them, would refresh the weery minds of western people. May everybody be happy and rich! That is my personal wish for the world in 2011!

Paganism – the decline of spirituality

Superstition, voodoo, belief in primitive forces of nature, astrology, idol worshipping and the like, have always been a part of mankind, especially among the less enlightened and educated classes of society. But two mighty forces have helped to overcome, at least to a certain degree, such foolishness: Organized Religions and Science. For a long time it seamed that the dark times had been overcome by reason und sceptical thinking. Christianity had overcome primitive pagan’s belief in fantasy figures like Thor, Odin, Freya, and had given to the people a more advanced concept of an almighty superpower in heaven – god. A higher development of consciousness destroyed the inferior belief in nature’s power. `Do not worship the creation, do worship the one creator alone!´, became the new dogma and we all can be very grateful for this new concept. It enabled mankind to belief in laws by which the universe can be understood, to overcome the uncertainty of life. One almighty being created the universe and therefore his laws are reliable. This gave birth, after a long period of time of course, to scientific thinking. Science is not a thing, as many people consider it, but a way of approaching life and the surrounding environment.

By science we see, that there are things outside of ourselves, things which exist independently from whatever we think about them. The laws of nature are not connection with our own mental state but are independent of it. The word is as it is, whether we like it, or accept it, or not. But although science has made tremendous progress and improved life of the people on planet earth, during the 20th century a new movement began to criticize science. Science is an authority, but not an authority of birth or position, but of knowledge and of reason. Therefore it is not arrogant of science to claim to be able to explain the world. But there is a group of people, rebelling against all kinds of authority, regardless of source, who live with the childish belief, that everything is possible. They think the limits of nature are not true, there would be a spiritual realm, in which everything goes. This is an infantile and immature point of view the belief in the magic of nature) and by the way most of these people are suffering from some kind of narcissism. It is the old illusion, which has already been described by Freud, of being almighty – a definite sign of not being adult.

What I am talking about is the movement which is known as the New (Dark) Age. An immature, uncritical – we can also call it dull and retarded – way of approaching life. What would not be a bad thing, for every society can hold out a few morons, but in the course of this movement we see an enormous decline of intellect and also of spirituality which lead to primitive forms of worship as for example the pagan (religion). This is a lose group of people without strong rules, structure and organization – just have a nice time and come together at magical places (like Stonehenge) and enjoy each others primitive infancy. It is more a kind of kindergarten for adults. They believe in stupid things like ghosts, the stars, angels, witchcraft and magic in common.

A reasonable society should only have cold contempt for people who engage in superstition, magic and illusions. Belief in magic is not only bad, it is an insult of mankind, something to be despises. In Britain for example paganism is the 6th largest of all religions in the country - a disgrace for a modern, secularized country. But it is the same in many western countries (whether Europe or America). We need a call to arms of all reasonable forces against such a decline of society caused by pagan people, who refuse to be adult. Times have come, when superstition should become banned from communities and especially of young children, who are indoctrinated by belief in magic and therefore must stay immature for the rest of their life, if not lucky circumstanced liberate them later in their lifes.

You have to make your choice. Either you stay a child for your whole life long or you enter the realm of adulthood by giving up all illusions and believe in magic. If you belief in angels, goblins, and the power of nature (for example by embracing a tree) you can also belief in Santa Claus, the Easter bunny or the tooth fairy. The difference is only the one is for adults and the other one for (so called) adults.

Pornography – no more!

A plague of our society is definitely the overwhelming use of pornographic material as well in private area, as in the public space. It is one of the reasons, why human communities have never reached such a low level of culture as we face it now everywhere on the planet in this fist decade of the 21st century. It is no question that no time in human history has ever been more disgusting, more immoral, more primitive, than the one’s we are all living in. Compared to the past, what we face is an enormous decline in everything that is good, that is right. No question we are living in the end times and the whole creation is not living for long from now on. Having been sure about this fact leads us to consider the immorality of our times from a much larger perspective than ordinary human being are able to.

So, what do I mean with this? I bring it all down to the issue of sexuality. Nothing is more a sign of immorality than this one. Sex without purpose, just enjoyed for the feeling of itself, is the most disgusting thing ever done by perverted people, not even the criminal inhabitants of Sodoma and Gommorra (read the first book of Moses) where that immoral as human beings are today, and nobody deserves to face a better fate than to be destroy by fire from heaven, brimstone (which are probably nuclear bombs nowadays). There are ignorant people who think porn is ok, they think porn is consenting adults doing consenting things for consenting adults to watch. Nothing could be more bullshit! Fact is, porn has no positive effect, destroys human dignity, destroys relationships and human existences. I therefore call for abolishing porn and sexual images in all areas of life. For example, seeing a women in a bikini advertising for a new car. That is more of a reason not to buy that car than buying it. A company which is going down to the level of using sexy women to promote their product (a technical one) to make people buy it, is not worth to be considered good. So whatever company is using sex to make people buy their products ought not to be bought than to be bought. We need a complete new kind of thinking. Sex is bad in any other way they practised by a loving married couple and it is a disgrace to use it to sell things and whoever uses sex as a stimulation to sell should be pushed out of business, should be pushed out of the whole industry!

But now to the negative and disgusting effects of sex an pornography on the human mind. Porn creates an illusion, it makes people not live in reality but in a fantasy world. Men and women expect their partner to be like a porn star, what will never happen. Millions of marriages have been broken of that reason. In the US porn is becoming one of the main reasons for divorce. It destroys the healthy development of human sexuality in children. Do you really think a 14 year old will develop a healthy sexual relationship after seeing a naked women being penetrated by two men? – Of course not! Sex is one of the big problems of our society and we have much too much of it. The prude behaviour of former times is over but the pendulum has swung to far into the other direction – we need more regulations, we need more discipline! Human beings are not capable to regulate sex on their own, therefore we need strong regulations, for humans always tend to be immoral and perverted, because of their sinful nature. Sex always needs to be restricted for the happiness and prosperity of society. Since old times, every society knew that the less sex you have, the more pure you are, the higher the standing in society is. Do you want to have a president who is having sex every week? Of course not. Superiority has always been linked to control of sex and sexual feelings and thoughts. We have to go back to the roots of reason in sexual behaviour. Less is more! Even in the culture of the South Sea only the primitive low class women had a lot of sex all the time, but the nobility has always lived a chastise lifestyle. As the apostle Paul mentioned the role model of humans is to live a life without sex, but if you cannot control your sexual drive and have to reproduce, the second choice is to marry and than have sex for the purpose of having children.

But there is no doubt, that the most noble, the most spiritual, beings do not have any sex at all. Even the misguided Indian guru Osho said that no human being should have sex after the age of 42. I would go much further and said that human beings should not have any sex at all. No question, that any sexual act is shameful, even within marriage, especially masturbation is a sin and it is a deathly sin! Self-pollution is one of the most disgusting things imaginable, even worse than theft, if not murder. There has never been a generation which has been bombarded by porn as the one between 15 and 25 nowadays. The biggest group of porn consumers is between 12 and 17 and the pornographers know very well, these are the consumers of tomorrow. It leads to desensitization and inhumanity, human beings are considered as objects not as subjects as they are. Approximately 14000 Porn-movies are produced every year in San Fernando Valley every year (the porn-capital of the world). It cannot be controlled by human beings on their own, that is an illusion, most people, even women, who are a third of all consumers!, cannot control the urges and fall into the trap.

You must see the bigger pictures behind the whole thing. Porn is bad (100%), it is completely destructive, and enslaves people. Behind the whole industry there is the power of evil which is running earth since there earliest days, human nature is not good, and therefore we need the help of an outside power, on our own we are lost – lost completely. Therefore god in his almighty grace has granted us his help to overcome the world and not live from it anymore. Stop looking at naked human flesh, do not fall in love with the world, for there is nothing good here, and come to the real salvation! Stop being sexual, live chastise, do not practise sex any more and become holy and a good person! I wish you all to be well!

Belief versus unbelief

Looking at the two pictures I posted at the beginning of this article, you recognize a special kind of advertising. It is not selling you illusions, but truth, as we can observe it. You may find your sense of life or be happy if you are a believer, but there is no guarantee. The same is true for atheism.

Nearly all people in the western world nowadays accept evolution and science, only few small groups of society deny it. Some religious groups try to use god as the power or person who planned and guides the process of evolution. But fortunately we have come to a point where religion and science exist side by side and respect each other. For a long time it seemed, they both can exist next to each other without major contradictions. But the more science evolves, and especially when it comes to the question of truth, more and more people doubt it’s attitude. Many philosophers have come to the conclusion of atheism, many scientist do the same. It seemed that what was going on in the mind of a believer was a myth, something science could no explain.

But modern psychology can explain how religion arises, what makes people belief (Of course it is can only partially explain what can be observed. Using the scientific method of verification and falsification onto the supernatural, the only solid conclusion is, that cannot be proofed that it exists. “So, but why should we use the scientific method?”, one may ask. Isn’t it arrogant to say this is the only method to find truth (as far as human beings can come to “truth” of course)? All the success of society, from medicine, to engineering, aircraft, computer, car, internet etc. and the better understanding of the universe, have come from using the scientific method. There was no other, we owe our advanced life 100percently to science. Since the beginning of enlightenment and successively declining influence of religion on society, life has become better and better. This method is working and it is the only one which is working properly. All other attempts to see reality base on evidence-less accepting, because of laziness of thinking, tradition or authority. The scientific method does not care for tradition or authorities, it gives science the power to self-correct itself, which is what religions never does – it sticks to the same ideas over centuries, whether they are right or not. The dogma is more important than truth, power is more seductive than knowledge. Right and wrong can be found by human reason, not by old scriptures of which authors and origins are very doubtful (not to say considering the political and social reasons, why they exist). So why does the observation of the world lead to other results than the scriptures describe?

Religious ideas are to some degree by-products of cognitive processes, of thinking. It comes from our ability to imagine worlds and people, which is an important ability for planning our lives. We can build up whole universes in our mind, but that does not make them real. The world does absolutely not care, for what we think is true or not. Looking at little children you see many of them have imaginative friends. God becomes such an imaginative friend (often a father-figure) for adults. Humans make compromises between, what they expect and what is interesting. Wishing for god very easily leads to believing in god, especially when you get social support. In some way whole societies stay children in there mind and they criticize the ones who become adults, what means being mature in mind, and think it is abnormal. Humans, as mammals, have a strong attachment-system, they sick to other group-members, not only when they are in trouble. And being part of a group is more important than truth. Therefore it is so hard to leave a group, you feel lonely and quickly start doubting your decisions. But there is good news nowadays. Society is fragmented that much, that everybody can leave majority and find his or her group. It may be as small group, but you do not have to be lonely. The majority of people is not thinking rationally, but to find people who think outside of the box is possible, everywhere.

But what about moral? Isn’t atheism immoral? The killer argument of the religious is that Hitler and Stalin, Mao and other dictator where atheist. Stalin and Mao where Atheist, Hitler a modern pagan, but there is no connection between Atheism and there deeds. They would have done there genocides, violations of human rights, crimes and inhumanity even if they had been religious people. Crime is a result of character, not of religion or unbelief. It is very often religion which deforms the (natural) moral feelings of people into obedience to a dogma or authority. Moral feelings are natural to humans, apart from religion and very often they are far better than religious dogma. Human beings are mature enough to know what is right and wrong, they do not need an “instruction manual”.

But this is where we come to another assumption of the religious. They think moral comes from religion. Without religion, they say, the result will be anarchy. So even if god does not exist and even if there is no supernatural, we could still use religion as a moral and ethical code. This argument is nonsense (and by the way a weak point of view, if you give up the claim for the supernatural and leave it to a simple code of behaviour). Moral means doing what is right, no matter what dogma says. Religions means to do what the dogma says no matter it is right or not.

Religions present supernatural, as “truth”, but that is often, a way to delude people. Religion is a social issue. It is about human societies and groups and belonging to a religion, especially to the dominating religion in a certain country, fulfils social needs, not the need for truth, or what is really going on in the universe, how was is created an the like. More intelligent people have always known for this. Many of the religious leaders are nonbelievers, they just use the faith of people for their own power – and as history shows it has always been working and it is still working. And that is a shame!
Some people say that religion has helped them. In most cases it is not religion which helped them but the social connection with other people. If it was the dogma it is the delusion, which fulfils personal wishes, which recognizes data, which confirm an opinion and closes the eyes before contradiction and opposite data. Religion may help, as alcohol helps a depressed person to feel better, the emptiness inside gets filled with an idea. Of course that may feel better and some may even get “happy” about that, but it is a happiness far away from truth. There are better ways of getting a happy and clear mind and that is a worldview based on reason and observation, a sceptical approach towards everything and true belief (make sure whatever I say about religion is about the human institution not the true and honest belief or the supernatural!). Skepticism is nothing negative, it is not pessimism, don’t mix that up, it means you test, what your are told, what you read – even be sceptical toward your own thoughts and especially feelings. Feelings make human beings vulnerable and they are very often nothing by lies. A life based on trusting feelings is not a life of success and high worth.

But what about the sense of life and happiness? Yes there are surveys which come to the conclusion that religious people are happier and the conclusion is that religion and belief are the reasons therefore. But that may be an illusion. In fact people are happier, when they are socially more integrated and in a society where religion, or in most cases a certain religion, is predominant, most people feel more happy when they join this religion, but of social reasons, not because religions has something to do with truth or the supernatural. We humans suffer from over-interpretation about many things in the universe. We think things are there with a certain goal; as egotists we often think all things where created for us. For example the naïve belief (of children) that the stars are there to lighten up a dark night. We have problems with random processes and rather think of an intention. We will not have any future using superstition instead of reason.

Quotes I

„I may not avail myself of the opportunity of denying once more the truth of the story that Prince Bismarck had ever likened Lord Salisbury to a lath of wood painted to look like iron.”
- Sidney Whitman –


“I must create a system, or be enslav’d by another Man’s; I will not Reason and Compare: my business is to Create.”
- William Blake: Jerusalem –


“I love to lose myself in other men’s minds. When I am not walking, I am reading; I cannot sit and think. Books think for me.”
- Charles Lamb: Last essays of Elia –


“There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written or badly written.”
- Oscar Wilde –


“Against the blown rose may they stop their nose. That kneel’d unto the buds.”
- William Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra –


“All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of every organism to live beyond its income.”
- Samuel Butler –


“I stood among them, but not of them; In a shroud of thoughts which were not their thoughts.”
- Lord George Gordon Byron –