It struck me some time ago that the people we think of as “geniuses” tend to arrive, over time, at surprisingly similar sets of conclusions. It further strikes me that a simple list of such thoughts might be of value.
And so, here is a list pulled from my quotes file and presented without commentary. Enjoy: Continue reading “What Geniuses Believe”
Millions of decent people are spending their time and energy, trying to identify the secret bad guys of the world, then to prove that they’re right.
This is a serious problem, especially because monster hunts divert people with strong ethics from building new and better things.
So, here are the five reasons why I’m not interested in secret bad guys: Continue reading “5 Reasons I’m Not Interested In Secret Bad Guys”
As we grew up, nearly all of us were inundated with stories of our glorious national fathers, our beautiful democracies, and so on. And being young, we for the most part believed them. The system gave us our prosperity, our comfort, our medicine, our sense of importance. Continue reading “2020: The Year The System Showed Its Real Face”
The title of this post, live dangerously and you live right, comes from the great author Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and he was ever so correct. The life of meek obedience is a sin against the self. It is a surrender of mind and passion. It’s a half life at best. Continue reading “Live Dangerously And You Live Right”
All of us with husbands and wives are beautifully positioned to make them better human beings. Unfortunately, many of us are squandering the opportunity.
Today I’d like to help fix that. Continue reading “Do You Have A Plan For Improving Your Spouse?”
(Originally published August 31, 2020.)
I’ve gone on for a long time about fear making humans stupid, and even about it being a weapon and a brain poison. But I’ve also wondered at times whether people would hit fear-fatigue… that point where people have simply had enough and walk out from under it. Continue reading “The Wages of Perpetual Fear”
Having recently experienced violent idealists roaming our streets, burning things, breaking things and generally enjoying the fact that they can scare people, I think a brief explanation of how idealism leads to destruction and death is in order. Continue reading “How Idealism Leads to Death”
“Shame,” wrote psychologist Silvan Tomkins, “strikes deepest into the heart of man… it is felt as a sickness of the soul which leaves man naked, defeated, alienated, and lacking in dignity.”
Shame is the great barrier that keeps people from acting as individuals and from expanding beyond a minimum-energy state. The expectation of shame is paralyzing to the vast majority of humans at some points of their life, and to some more frequently than others. Many people have spent their lives seeking shame-avoidance positions.
All of this is a horrific waste, and in this podcast, we take it on.
(Originally published July 22, 2020.)
Let’s be honest about something: We in the West have been overrun by a tidal wave of racial hatred, and it erupted from institutions “of higher learning.” Whatever exceptions may exist, this central fact is clear. We are free to close our eyes, of course, but when we choose to see, this is what stands in front of us. Continue reading “The Barbarians Have Taken The Institutions”
I would pay dearly for young people to feel what it was like to be a scientifically minded child in the 1960s. It was a special and beautiful moment. Each week there was a new step toward the stars. And this was not science fiction, this was real. There was an exhilaration to it that I don’t think can be found in any other venture. The door to infinite space was creaking open for us. Continue reading “To Be Young and Headed to the Stars”
