The Question Of Verifications - The Rules Of Facts

One of our biggest problems, as a species, is our lack of verifying information and resources. This habit was not a natural one, and has no genetic traits to cause it, it is something we learned.

You can easily guess how we were taught this, so let's look at what I mean in more detail. Often there is a news story, or talk show "expert," which mentions some finding or discovery that has little to no evidence involved.

Another common story us the misrepresentation of the facts, when a mistake is made they ignore the correction and just run with it as some sort of miracle or mystery. Ultimately these stories ruin the wonder and beauty of the world by keeling people from asking more questions about it.

The reason this is done by media is to placate the masses, to prevent them from asking the questions allows the media to, essentially, control what people think and thus engineer their personalities and behaviors. Rather beneficial to those who are running things, as conspiratorial as this sounds, we know this has been happening for a while now.

Now the part about engineering society this way may sound farfetched to those unfamiliar with psychology and neurology. What we know and remember defines how we respond to stimuli, these are what influence the neural pathways in the difference engine portions of our brain, in other words, the personality.

When information is handed to us without any any external stimuli, it becomes a null pathway, meaning your brain will produce less emotion and use less logic when a similar bit of information or memory is presented. Essentially, you ignore it.

Until an emotional response is tied to information it is dead weight, preventing us from exploring it further, preventing us from growing and experiencing the world. We require actually experiencing the information to begin to ask questions again, thus tragedy rarely evoked an emotional response until it affected us directly.

This is also why science requires lab time when studying any subject, you must experience the tests and experiments to associate emotional responses that permit, and encourage, further exploration. Leading us back to the topic at hand, why so many people in the USA are so complacent and unwilling to even verify the sources, much less the actual evidence.

By quelling our curiosity in this manner, people will recite "studies" or "cases" they hear about in media without realizing they are either misrepresenting the data, or lacking most of the important information. This creates a black hole of knowledge as they condition their children to do the same simply by not accepting when the child just happens to have more information than they do.

Today children are exposed to an excess of information, and, in a trail by fire fashion, they are forced to learn how to verify sources, information, even tests and experiments. Skills their parents see as dangerous or evil, so the kids pretend to be like the parents until they move out.

This is the great effect of the Information Age, our youth are measurably more intelligent than all of us before them, and only because they learn this one ability and use it without hesitation. The benefit is that us older folks have a bright future as our children thrust us into the future, the drawback is that it's scary in spite of how much fun it is.

So my challenge to all adults today, let your kids learn and explore the world, then let those kids teach you. I have learned a lot by observing the behavior of children in the last decade, and what I have witnessed fills me with hope for our future, which I will be able to see because those same kids are now solving the problems my generation refused to even acknowledge.

Mouth - Closed or Open?

In the shelters there was a saying "a closed mouth never gets fed." The saying applies to many needs, in a sane society. The problem is that society is far from sane. This leads to the bigger problem, how does one define sanity?

A psychologist will define sanity as being a state where you are capable of rational thought. A psychiatrist will define sanity was whatever they want it to be. A medical doctor will call whatever they can charge the most for as being sane. Religious people though, they define sanity as agreeing with what they say. So far, only the psychologist has a viable, and logical, definition of the word.

So rational thought is what defines a sane society, however, most societies are incapable of rational thought. Let's look specifically at one of the least sane societies in the world, the society in the United States of America. In this society a majority of people still believe that the theory of evolution is some made up story, while asserting that their myths of creation are fact. There are many reasons this, on it's own, makes the society insane.

Another point in this is that the society in the USA cannot understand that biological organisms, what humans are, cannot be "normal" by any definition of the word, even medically. No aspect of life, as a whole, can not in any way be limited to anything resembling a "normal." Typical, or even average, can and does exist for life, but no definition of "normal" can be applied to anything alive. This particular point is one of the most common insanities in the human species.

There are finer points, and many of those, we could get into, but then we'll stray too far from this topic. The end result is that society is often less sane than the individuals making it up. It also results in the majority often being less sane than any minority group within said society. This is precisely why the USA is not purely a Democracy, mob rule or anarchy is not a viable method of governing the populace. However, the problem is that when the majority of those in power are as insane as the society, that insanity is fueled, never corrected.

So then the responsibility for helping to correct the insanity of society falls onto the minority groups, like LGBTI and atheists. However, our voices are small. So we must keep yelling and screaming to get even a small improvement in this society. Thus, our mouths must remain open at all times, we cannot be silent for even on minute of the day, lest people forget to listen to us.

But how can I know that we are more sane than the rest of society? Being a minority in any society is more difficult than going with the flow, we have to rationalize our every thought, running those thoughts through a gambit of "what if" and "should I" scenarios. The result is that our thoughts are based not on emotions, not on what some hoodoo holy man tells us, they are based on solid information, logic, and rational ideas. It's being in the minority that forces us to do that.

But what if the minority group becomes the majority group? Well then we have to question not only others in that group, but ourselves. This is why the majority, at this time, is insane. They do not question each other, and often refuse to even allow their ideas to be challenged by anyone. This is not rational. So even in such a case, some groups will remain rational as the majority, atheists are a prime example of this.

Now I must elaborate on that particular point, lest I get incoherent screams from people with no more logic than one's opinion on what to wear for that day. As a rule, atheists must challenge everything, even our own perceptions. This rule is inherent with being a skeptic or any form of doubt, and that's the one common trait of all atheists, we have doubts. We doubt everything, even what science has discovered. We question everyone, even our own perceptions of reality. We cannot be content with any answer either, if a better one comes along that is support by solid logic and verifiable information we will change our minds.

The problem is that there are many posers, though some are unwitting. They will jump onto a bandwagon that opposes the majority, or better, the bandwagon that opposes authority. They will cling to this label, as if being a minority group gives them some power or strength, of course that is until the guns are aimed at them, then they run off scared. But being an atheist does not mean we oppose authority, nor that we oppose all majorities, it simply means we do not believe in any gods, and by-proxy we do not believe in anything without verifiable evidence.

So the next time you see a minority group talking, try to pay attention, to listen to what is said. It's more likely they are the sane ones, and the majority are not sane.

Information - Why the Free Information Has Increased It's Value

This era is often called the Information Age, a time when information became free, and at our fingertips. I have spent the last decade reading scientific papers, often donated by scientists who love to see someone fascinated in their area of expertise. I have watched lectures, of varying levels of education, for free on various sites. I have discussed this information with others, scientists in the fields and those studying them. All because I have the most insatiable sense of curiosity.

My primary focus has been on biochemistry, medicine, and neurology. This has brought me into neighboring fields of study to help supplement the information. I finally took a break then looked back on everything I had learned, refreshing my memory, basically. Suddenly it dawned on me, I had just learned enough to earn master's degrees in at least three fields of scientific research, and it didn't cost thousands of dollars. Far from it, most of it was completely free, often just for the asking.

First, what drew me to the fields was my strong background in chemistry, and a fascination with how chemicals interact with each other. When I learned that complex organisms were really walking chemistry labs, my curiosity got the better of me, I dove in head first. Picturing the chemical interactions within the human body became a way to relax, tracing the rout of a single carbon atom through all the chemical reactions while it travels into and out of the various cells. That sense of knowing something set my mind at ease during hard times.

But that's not the meat of this post, what I am illustrating is just how much more valuable information is today than ever before. Sort of the inverse of supply and demand constructs. One would think that the huge influx of free information, with all the excess junk also mixed in, the value of the information would fall to nothing. The junk is, luckily, not the reason for it increasing in value.

The reason it has increased in value is the same reason many lobby groups in the USA are trying to censor and control the flow of information, people can learn more than those who pay for it. This creates a huge imbalance of information in the real world, one which has upset many of those with higher educations to the point of decrying the internet as a whole. The phrase "where'd you hear that? Off the internet" is meant as a slur against those of us not stupid enough to pay for what we can get for free.

When I go to a doctor I have to pretend to be stupid, actually, the moment you betray even a small amount of knowledge in something, the rage that fills their mannerisms is plain to see. They genuinely hate you just for knowing even one thing that they spent thousands of dollars to learn. Professionals cannot tolerate any competition, nor do they like having their elitist clubs threatened by something they cannot control. So in spite of the fact that I know more about what's going on that most doctors, I play like I am ignorant so that I can get what I need from them, a second opinion and the proper medication legally.

I made the mistake of letting my general care doctor learn of just a small amount of what I knew, my diagnosis was accurate, her diagnosis made out of anger was not. Another doctor even said she was wrong, and stated my diagnosis was correct, even though I did not let him know it was my diagnosis. So the information I have learned is more valuable than the information they have learned, only because I learned it out of curiosity, for almost no cost, while they spent thousands in the hopes of making millions for that same information.

This does not mean you should take everything you read online as fact, far from it. You must sift through a lot of junk sometimes, forming connections online with various professionals can help, many of the ones who frequent the internet social sites are always too happy to talk about what they know. Scientists, real ones, who frequent social sites are also very happy to show off the papers they write that have passed peer review, meaning they are as close to factual as you can get at the time. That pesky peer review method, where everyone and their mother tries to destroy your hard work through any means possible, but more papers are withstanding this barrage every day.

That is he key to if a source is valid, the scientific method has produced an explosion of solid information that is often shared freely by those who utilize it. So don't be shy, learn what you can. Open up the links to scientific research, talk to the scientific communities, discuss and ask questions. Seek the lectures shared by universities, for free, on media sites. Most importantly, fuel your curiosity. Start letting the elitists know that they are no longer necessary, they can be replaced if they don't shape up, if they don't start treating everyone right.