NATURAL CHILD, NATURAL SOCIETY : A presentation

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NATURAL CHILD, NATURAL SOCIETY

A Talk given on May 23rd 20122 @ Inspiring Minds Forum,  Mango Landin', London

1. The Psychology of any emergent or given Society/Community/Family is both revealed, and perpetuated, in how that group treats it's children, and especially it's most vulnerable people... address that and you can change the whole society. Failure to address this where it is toxic ensures it's continuation.  Eg: Aboriginal Residential Schools were intentionally designed to alter Aboriginal Society forever. Compulsory Schooling has the same purpose.   John Taylor Gatto “Underground History of American Education” www.johntaylorgatto.com

2. Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein, Josef Stalin, Pol Pot, David Cameron, George Osborne, George Bush, Richard Nixon, Tony Blair etc  : What happened to these people when they were ‘in utero’, at birth, when they were babies, infants, toddlers, children, teenagers…. that they turned out like they have? This is a crucial question for each of us and for our culture. Alice Miller “For Your Own Good” http://www.nospank.net/fyog.htm

3. The disruption of the biologically mandated child-mother bonding process sets up a chain of events, leading to emergent violence. Attachment ‘theory’ research on primates.
   
   The flow is as follows: if the child is not related to in ways that nurture self-empathy, then the development of a loss of self-empathy occurs. With that loss comes a loss of empathy for others, a sense of disconnection is felt and with that comes more fear, compounding the fear the trauma generated.
   
   The compounded, layered fear leads directly to a perceived (often unconscious) need to control others and to control the environment.
   
   As all natural organisms are autonomous, self directing growing beings, so too they will resist, to one degree or another, efforts to control them. That resistance generates the use of violence or coercion to impose or retain that control.
   
   In human family or society, if this pattern starts, and is not resolved, then each successive generation will impose that control, and those who hold Power will seek to enhance it, learning as time passes, and the children will grow up in an environment that they will 'adapt' to, the situation demanding the internalisation of that psychological need to control. Anthropology – James Prescott - http://www.violence.de/prescott/bulletin/article.html
   
   
4. What baby/child/person would not be angry, confused or frightened at not experiencing the experientials our biology has mandated? Think of the child left to cry him/her self to sleep in a room away from his or her parents, to scream and cry until finally exhaustion brings sleep. Is this not a common practice in our culture? What of the resignation, the suppression of that rage, the loss of self empathy which ensues from that suppression which is a common outcome of such a practice? Adrenaline, Cortisol vs Oxytocin
   
   Thus the need to control then gets transmitted through the structure of that family or society and over time becomes codified, normalised, embedded, institutionalised. Empire, Hierarchically Violent Societies.

             SOME PERTINENT QUESTIONS

5.  Why has neither the general public nor the secular authorities not moved to confront the Vatican on it’s record of child abuse within it’s Organisation? Linkage of Hierarchical Power Systems.
6. What does this tell us about our Society? Psychological core or root.
7. Why has natural birthing been replaced with ever increasing utilisation of ‘ceasarian section’ as an elective procedure, as a matter of choice? http://www.birthpsychology.com
8. What does coercion of children speak of?   Insecurity, mistrust, fear.
9. Why is Society left out of the therapeutic process? http://www.davidsmail.info/talk01a.htm

Social-Behavioral Characteristics Of Affectionate/Nurturant And Non-Affectionate/Non-Nurturant Primitive Cultures by James W. Prescott

http://www.violence.de/prescott/letters/Social-Behavioral_Characteristics.pdf

James W. Prescott is a developmental neuropsychologist and a cross-cultural psychologist who received his doctorate in psychology from McGill University, Montreal, P.Q. Canada. He served as Assistant Head, Physiological Psychology Branch, Office of Naval Research (1963-1966); as Health Scientist Administrator, Developmental Behavioral Biology Program, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, NIH (1966-1980); and President, Maryland Psychological Association (1970-1971). He was the recipient of the "Outstanding Contributions To Psychology Award, Maryland Psychological Association (1977); the CINE GOLDEN EAGLE AWARD for his contributions, as Scientific Director, to the award winning Time-Life film, "Rock A Bye Baby" (1971); and has given expert testimony on the origins of human violence, particularly domestic violence, before the Senate of Canada; the U.S. Congress; and many other legislative and professional organizations.

SOCIETAL CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

1. Martrilineal

2. Polygyny has low incidence

3. Women's status not inferior

4. Low avoidance of In-Laws

5. Low incidence of Mother-Child households

6. Small community size

7. Low societal complexity

8. Large extended family

9. Wives are not purchased

10. Slavery absent

11. Grand-parental authority over parents is absent

12. Subsistence is primarily by food gathering

13. Low class stratification

14. Political integration at community and family level

15. Metal working is absent

INFANT/CHILD CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

16. High infant physical affection

17. Low infant physical pain

18. High infant indulgence

19. High reduction of infant needs

20. Immediate reduction of infant needs

21. Low infant/child crying

22. Prolonged breast-feeding over 21/z years

23. Low child anxiety over performance of responsible behavior

24. Low child anxiety over performance of obedient behavior

25. High smiling, laughter, humor

26. Low anxiety over transition: infancy/childhood

27. High number of food taboos during pregnancy

28. Abortion permitted

29. Strength of desire for children is low

SEXUAL BEHAVIORAL CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

30. Premarital coitus permitted

31. Extramarital coitus permitted

32. Post-partum sex taboo less than one month

33. Sex disability absent

34. Castration anxiety is low

35. Low sex anxiety

36. Narcissicism is low

37. Low exhibitionistic dancing

SOCIETAL CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

1. Patrilineal

2. Polygyny has high incidence

3. Women's status inferior

4. High avoidance of In-Laws

5. High incidence of Mother-Child households

6. High community size

7. High societal complexity

8. Small extended family

9. Wives are purchased

10. Slavery present

11. Grand-parental authority over parents is present

12. Subsistence is primarily by food production

13. High class stratification

14. Political integration at state level

15. Metal working is present

INFANT/CHILD CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

16. Low infant physical affection

17. High infant physical pain

18. Low infant indulgence

19. Low reduction of infant needs

20. Delayed reduction of infant needs

21. High infant/child crying

22. Breast-feeding less than 21/a years

23. High child anxiety over performance of responsible behavior

24. High child anxiety over performance of obedient behavior

25. Low smiling, laughter, humor

26. High anxiety over transition: infancy/childhood

27. Low or no food taboos during pregnancy

28. Abortion highly punished

29. Strength of desire for children is high

SEXUAL BEHAVIORAL CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

30. Premarital coitus punished

31. Extramarital coitus punished

32. Post-partum sex taboo greater than one month

33. Sex disability present

34. Castration anxiety is high

35. High sex anxiety

36. Narcissism is high

37. High exhibitionistic dancing

WAR/VIOLENCE/CRIME CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

38. Low adult physical violence

39. Low or no warfare

40. Low military glory

41. Bellicosity is low

42. Low or absent killing, torture, mutilation

43. Low personal crime

44. Incidence of theft is low

WAR/VIOLENCE/CRIME CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

38. High adult physical violence

39. High warfare

40. Military glory emphasized

41. Bellicositiy is extreme

42. High killing, torture, mutilation

43. High personal crime

44. Incidence of theft is high

JUSTICE/RELIGIOUS/SUPERNATURAL CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

45. High God is mainly absent

46. Low or no religious activity

47. Superordinate justice absent

48. Supernatural are benevolent

49. Fear of humans rather than fear of supernatural

50. Belief in reincarnation absent

51. Low ascetecism in mourning

52. Witchcraft low or absent

53. Religious specialists are part-time

NOTE: The above social-behavioral characteristics of primitive cultures have been derived from: R.B. Textor (1967) A Cross-Cultural Summary, HRAF Press New Haven.

JUSTICE/RELIGIOUS/SUPERNATURAL CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

45. High God is present

46. High religious activity

47. Superordinate justice present

48. Supernatural are aggressive

49. Fear of supernatural rather than fear of humans

50. Belief in reincarnation present

51. High ascetecism in mourning

52. Witchcraft highly present

53. Religious specialists are full time

Matrilineal cultures are those where inheritance follows the female line; Polygynous cultures are those where men have several wives and is a measure of sexual exploitation and control of women by men; High desire for children is a measure that reflects exploitation of children: high value of male and female fertility; and use of children as economic resource, thus, its linkage with abortion being punished. Presence of a Supernatural (High God) with high religious activity in low affectionate/nurturant cultures reflects the need for "divine love" when human love is absent or significantly diminished. Similarity, God is made unto the image and likeness of man — violent cultures have violent Gods; peaceful cultures have peaceful/benevolent Gods.

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BIOLOGY

WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENS IN NATURE AS A WHOLE?

FALSE LOGIC OF THE ‘EXCEPTION’?

H.ORMONES - THE HEART AS  HORMONAL REGULATOR, OCYTOCIN, ADNERALINE, CORTISOL, DISRUPTION OF NATURAL STRESS MECHANISMS

THE HEART AS A COGNITIVE ORGAN OF PERCEPTION – HOW THIS WORKS, BIOLOGICAL EMPATHY.

ADAPTATION AS A LEARNING PROCESS:  NOT ‘HIT AND MISS’, NOT ‘RANDOM’, BUT EXTREMELY PRECISE.

NEUROPLASTICITY – WHAT DOES THAT TELL US ABOUT ‘ADAPTATION’?

BEHAVIOUR

TRAUMA CYCLES AND BEHAVIOURS – COPING AND RECOVERY.

SOCIETAL BEHAVIOUR PATTERNS – HOW THEY EVOLVE.

INTERGENERATIONAL TRAUMA PATTERNS – WHY THEY PERSIST.

INSTITUTIONALISATION – GLORIFICATION OF WAR, POWER, HATRED, PROPERTY.

ANTHROPOLOGY

BIOLOGICAL EMPATHY – PARENTING, MEMORY OF CHILDHOOD, EXPERIENCE OF CARING IN EMPATHIC ABORIGINAL SOCIETIES, BACTERIA, EMPATHY AS A BODY-SENSORY EXPERIENCE,

WHY ARE WE DIFFERENT? WHAT ARE WE DOING AND WHY ARE WE DOING IT?

CHILD ‘REARING’ – POISONOUS PEDAGOGY, ELITE PRACTICE.

TRADING ON PARENTS FEARS – WHAT ARE THOSE FEARS?

JAMES PRESCOTT’S WORK WITH JOHN BOLWBY,AND BEYOND …

RESURGENCE IN ABORIGINAL MOTHERING, LANGUAGE AND CULTURE.

SOLUTIONS

PARENTING – TRUST IN OUR BIOLOGICAL MANDATE.

IF PARENTS CAN UNDERSTAND THE SITUATION THEY ARE PLACED IN AND HOW IT CAN HARM THEIR CHILDREN, WILL THEY ACT ON WHAT THEY KNOW?

WILL THEY ACT CONSTRUCTIVELY OR DESTRUCTIVELY?

COMMUNITY – HOW NATURE FUNCTIONS.

UNDERSTANDING THE SITUATION WE ARE IN – AVOIDING THE COMFORT OF CONSPIRACY THEORIES, FANTASY OR IDEOLOGICAL SOLUTIONS, STICKING TO RELIABLE PROOFS.

EMPATHY AND SELF EMPATHY IN SELF GOVERNANCE.

RAISING CHILDREN WHO WILL RESPOND RATHER THAN REACT.

REALISM : START WITH SELF, EXTEND OUTWARDS LOCALLY.

TIME AND PROCESS, NATURE AS A CUE, AND AS A SOURCE OF CLUES.

CONFRONTING ‘RECEIVED WISDOM’ WITH DATA, EXPERIENCE, EMPATHY.

NOTE : Another component of the heart-brain communication system was provided by researchers studying the hormonal system. The heart was reclassified as an endocrine gland when, in 1983, a hormone produced and released by the heart called atrial natriuretic factor (ANF) was isolated.

This hormone exerts its effect on the blood vessels, on the kidneys, the adrenal glands, and on a large number of regulatory regions in the brain. It was also found that the heart contains a cell type known as 'intrinsic cardiac adrenergic'' (ICA) cells. Theses cells release noradrenaline and dopamine neurotransmitters, once thought to be produced only by neurons in the CNS.

More recently, it was discovered that the heart also secretes oxytocin, commonly referred to as the 'love' or bonding hormone. In addition to its functions in childbirth and lactation, recent evidence indicates that this hormone is also involved in cognition, tolerance, adaptation, complex sexual and maternal behaviours, learning social cues and the establishment of enduring pair bonds. Concentrations of oxytocin in the heart were found to be as high as those found in the brain.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Mitt Romney : Cycles of abuse, Remorse or Denial, and Power

In The Rumpus, Steve Almond wrote a wonderfully clear piece about Mitt Romney, a Republican Presidential Candidate in the USA, concerning Romneys abusive behaviour (high school pranks) as a teenager. It is called THE WEEK IN GREED #6: To Behave Like the Fallen World

This piece is not so much about Romney as about the lack of empathy which we see all the time in those who assume or take power into their hands, be it national, international or at the local level or even within our own families, and the great difficulty the rest of us have when it comes to dealing with this, and the adverse outcomes for so many people of this dynamic.

Alice Miller wrote many books about how, if as  child, one is bullied or mistreated by parents, by Institutions, by society, or by circumstance and one is unable to resolve the situation, that suppression of one's true feelings becomes a mechanism of psychic survival, and this leaves the feelings anger, grief and sadness still alive, yet masked, buried, hidden from awareness.

These hidden, buried feelings then start to colour how one behaves towards oneself and others. The anger can be directed against oneself (shame, self loathing) or against the next generation, or against one's own children or against some 'other': the enemy 'created' by those in power as the receiver of these unresolved feelings, especially the anger and rage.

The problem is compounded by the fact that until these feelings are resolved, they remain alive within, and that even if a person acts out that anger, it will remain available for re-stimulation, again and again.

Alice Miller showed how this experience of mistreatment, abuse, trauma can become an intergenerational pattern, (the children of traumatised parents will grow up within that PTSD psychological environment, and whilst not all turn out with such adverse behaviours, many do, usually due to the lack of an ameliorating presence, what Miller calls an 'enlightened witness', certainly enough to populate systems of power and oppression, to fill the ranks of armies and paramilitary groups, often claiming 'it is for your own good') and others have written about Historical Trauma to show how any community that is traumatised can find itself traumatising it's own children, or each other, in a cycle of abuse and neglect.

This is akin to Lateral Violence, where violence erupts between those who have been subject to abuse from a more Powerful source which they cannot counter. Lateral Violence also occurs in hierarchical bureaucracies, in care systems.

Others have shown how Power can utilise that distressed behaviour to lay blame on those who show the signs of distress in addiction, obesity, psychological distress, inability to conform to 'standards' - people who are used as examples of how not to behave in conformity with 'a fallen world'.

And then there's the history of Power creating enemies to bind the people over whom Power has traction.

This is a very large part of what drives politics and power.

The writers own admission and remorse is the healing of all this, and is the kind of response required to lead towards ending the intergenerational re-traumatising cycles.

It is based on self-empathy.

For to feel the pain of another, beyond mere intellectual comprehension (compassion), is based on one's own sense of pain. And to feel remorse for hurt caused, is to understand that the others pain is real and visceral; it is a living sensation that pain has the same effect on the other as it does to oneself, and that one would not wish that upon any other any more than one would wish it upon oneself.

Expecting those who seek Power to have empathy is folly. Recognising this, it becomes essential to heal this dynamic in oneself as a personal praxis and study of power and oppression, and where it truly matters and where it can be extended is at the grass roots, in one's own life, one's own family and one's community.

If this can be done, then Power will find itself without the necessary accomplices, without which it cannot act.

From the comments on the piece (and elsewhere when such matters are raised), we can see that some people are yet willing to minimise what happened in Romney's case as being in the past, as being high school bullying, as being minor in comparison to the larger issues.

This is not the case. These events are linked in the lives of so many Power leaders, from the Kings of England, the Emperors of Rome, from Hitler to Stalin. And they are linked in the lives of the many people who populate bureaucracies of power.

The Vatican's 'response' to the testimony of courageous Survivors or clerical abuse is another example of this dynamic.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Letter : We should be grateful to Survivors who have spoken out.

A Chara,

The recent arrests of three men accused of sexual abuse of children at Carrignavar Boarding School reveals what has been studiously avoided by so many, that abuse was just as prevalent in fee paying boarding schools as it was in Industrial Schools. I know, as I attended five 'elite' fee paying Catholic boarding schools for 12 years.

Perhaps the reasons for this avoidance are two fold.

There are some who went to those schools, who were abused, though not sexually, and who to this day would claim that the experience made them the men they are today.

The second reason might be that some of these alumni of the 'better sort of boarding school' have been or are still in positions of power and prestige, and their lack of self empathy might affect their willingness to face the truth of their own experience, let alone the truth of Survivors testimony.

Perhaps it also affected and still affects their decision making in other areas, especially with regard to Governance, in that a lack of self empathy runs concurrent with a lack of empathy for others.

It is clear to all and sundry that Irish Governance has demonstrated a clear lack of empathy for the people of Ireland for a long time.

Perhaps the courage of Survivors who have spoken out, even when others have refused to accept their testimony, might be seen as part of the healing of Irish society, leading us all towards greater empathy.

We should be grateful.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

How could I NOT love ALL the children equally

ANY ADULT WHO DOES NOT immediately ACT effectively and with force and clear intent to STOP AN ABUSER OF CHILDREN is the abusers friend, and the child's enemy. They are enemies of healthy community.

There is in the 'lynch mob' also those who wish to use the Church as a way of avoiding looking at how the State treats children, how Society misinforms parents as to their proper relationships towards children, especially towards ALL children, not just 'their own children' .. for example mothers letting their children enlist in the Military ...

I recall looking at my daughter and welling up with a fierce love for her, and having an insight which said "I love you, and loving you as I do, how could I NOT love ALL the children equally, and I still recognise and know the deep personal connection I have with my daughter is special, but not separate".

At that moment my entire world changed forever. In that moment I became truly adult.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Catholic Church's 'scandal' is just a part of the issue.

David Quinn, in his comment piece for the Irish Independent, 4th May, ‘Abuse Cross Church must bear stems from decades ago’ wrote that a large scale study into child abuse, carried out in Holland, found that ‘the prevalence rate in Catholic-run Institutions was no higher than in other Institutions’ that were studied.

This is a fair comment. However, it does not mitigate the Church's behaviour in relation to the suppression of the truth and subsequent (avoidable) harms caused to so many children, over such a long time scale, one whit.

What he misses in his piece is that the abuse of children is a serious problem across our entire Society.

Whilst there is a huge focus on the abuse of children within Catholic-run Institutions, and rightly so, the issue of the sexual abuse, the mistreatment and brutalising of children is much larger than the Catholic Church.

Europeans often lay claim to the centrality of Christianity as a benign force in European development, as a central pillar of our Society. What kind of Society has this as a central pillar?

This is a matter of profound importance to Society at large. The fact that none of this (the 'scandal' of the Catholic Church) would be occurring without the courage of Survivors of abuse, who braved a prevailing societal unwillingness to accept the truth, is something David Quinn ought to have noted. It is something I reflect upon regularly. I am in awe of those who have shown such courage, well aware as I am of the shame, self-loathing, fear and confusion that are the outcomes for so many Survivors.

David Quinn's omission reduces his piece to a defensive polemic, on behalf of the Catholic Church, and does nothing for the children, be it those who have been abused, those who are being abused and those whose abuse might well be prevented, if the work of John Bowlby, (child mother bonding) James Prescott, (origins of violence) Alice Miller, (child abuse sanctioned by Society, intergenerational trauma) JosephChilton Pearce, (prenatal consciousness) John Holt (how children learn) and David Chamberlain, (child birth, infancy) and John Taylor Gatto, (the origins and intent of Compulsory Schooling) all of whom have examined in detail, and with courageous honesty, how we, as a society, treat our children, was not so studiously ignored by Government departments responsible for Education, Health and Child Welfare, so carefully avoided by the leading Psychiatric and Psychological Establishments, so rarely mentioned by leading media, in spite of  the verified and corroborated evidence that supports their collective contention, that the psychology of any given society is both revealed and perpetuated in how that Society relates to and treats the children.

The psychology of Power, (in simple terms, bullying), still dominates our Society and it is perhaps the single most important connective issue that we can, as adults, face in these tremulous times.

Suicide is the 3^rd leading cause of death amongst 10 – 24 year olds. A telling statistic indeed. Physical Health has been improved, yet psychological health is deteriorating.

War, Institutionalised Abuse (children, elders, prisoners, poverty) Ecological Destruction, the Competition of Power, be it secular, religious, economic or ideological are issues that cannot be avoided whilst at the same time the claim that we are a decent society is made.

The intergenerational trauma patterns associated with these issues will not diminish because we mitigate or ignore them. The work that has been done, mentioned above, and is being done is now more widely available, through the dissemination of information in this, the information age. Some of us, with access to that information, are genuinely better informed as a result.

It is surely time now for the organs of public discourse and the organs of Governance to fully engage with that information and that crucial work, to engage with what is known of this matter, in order to build a future that honours all our children, and with that all our peoples, for all of their lives.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

'Evolutionary' Origins of Religion: a trauma model

*the use of the tem 'evolutionary' is entirely satrical in the context of this essay. Religion and evolvution are two mutually exclusive dynamics..

My own view regarding Evolution and Religion (The Evolutionary Origins of Religion) emerges from my own life experience and from my readings of the work of John Bolwby, James Prescott , Alice Miller, Robert Sapolsky, Judith Herman, Allan Schore and many, many others who have explored the psychology of the biological mandate towards empathy,  (and the disruption of that biological mandate) which is based on the lived experience of self empathy from within the womb, through infancy and onwards throughout life.

 Joseph Chilton Pearce suggests in his research that self empathy, awareness of self, starts within the womb.

Self awareness and awareness of other exists in a pre-verbal reality that is experienced, in such manner that the material and social meaning of the experience is known to the experiencer: this is called direct or experiential cognition.

Others have described what is called  Liminal Consciousness a silent, non verbal full spectrum reality cognition that is shared within a group,  usually groups that are what we can call pre-conquest egalitarian cultures.

"When similar child nurture was later seen spawning similar consciousness in isolated enclaves elsewhere, it became clear that a type of mentality very different from world norms today existed widely in prehistory. Such mentality emerges from a sociosensual nurture common to such peoples but shunned in Westernized societies"

Prescott's  research has found an emergent pattern of Social Behaviour amongst Societies where the natural child-mother bonding processes are disrupted, of increased Religiosity, Hierarchy and Institutionalized Violence all of which exist in proportion to the levels of disruption to the child-mother bonding processes.

Furthermore he was able to link disruption of the adolescent exploration of sexuality to the emergence of these Societal traits.

All of these experientials are embodied lived experiences, that is to say they are experienced and known primarily through the body, the senses and are biologically mandated as vitally  important life learning processes.

This 'disruption' could be called the Trauma model of the Evolutionary Origins of Religion.

David Chamberlain has written :

"From the second month of pregnancy, experiments and observations reveal an active prenate with a rapidly developing sensory system permitting exquisite sensitivity and responsiveness. Long before the development of advanced brain structures, prenates are seen interacting with each other and learning from experience. They seem especially interested in the larger environment provided by mother and father, and react to individual voices, stories, music, and even simple interaction games with parents. The quality of the uterine environment is determined principally by parents.

The opportunities for parents to form a relationship with the baby in the womb are significant and remarkable. This contrasts sharply with the previous view that prenates did not have the capacity to interact, remember, learn, or put meaning to their experiences"

It is quite obvious that those with innate or natural self empathy intact know or can better better, at a visceral pre-verbal level, how to relate to others, to meet their own and others needs, because they sense the other in intimate ways associated with their own sense of self empathy. They are more perceptive and more responsive to information contained within the other because they can more fully sense themselves.

Conversely, those whose natural self empathy has been somehow damaged have greater difficulty in relating to others, and require a set of external guidelines to manage their relationships.

This is the thrust of the work of Heinz Kohut

The resolution of the issue of damaged self-empathy would lead towards a spiritual or personally rational 'inner' motivated outlook, rather than religious 'externally driven' or societally rationalised outlook on life. Prescott's research demonstrates that where these key experientials are not disrupted, a more egalitarian societal behaviour emerges.

In terms of evolution, and of well being, it is clear that empathy, founded on experienced self-empathy is a crucially vital socialising characteristic, because it enables a visceral understanding of the world within, and of the world in which a human being is living, an almost direct perception of the value and meaning of life, and a grasping of the value of others lives to those others, and in particular the lives of other organisms that are the food we eat. This is the basis for the oft quoted respect many Aboriginal societies afford the creatures and plants within their environments, upon which they are dependent for food, medicine and other materials.

James Prescott outlined in some detail the societal behavioural characteristics to be found within a spectrum or bandwidth of societies, ranging from empathic egalitarian through to totalitarian hierarchical societies, and traced the emergence of these characteristics to the disruption or nurturing of two crucial empathic experiential learning points in the life of a human being.

From an evolutionary viewpoint, Imposed Hierarchical Religion can be seen as an evolutionary mismatch.

That is to say that whilst spirituality of some form is probably innate, and that perhaps the natural wonder so many experience (especially small children)  when we allow ourselves to simply gaze at nature and allow nature into us, is an expression of this, and that this wonder tends towards assisting in the development of nurturing relationships.

Whereas Religiosity is learned, and tends towards exclusive yet low-urturant relationships primarily with those who share the same religious viewpoints, and at the same time, religiosity  tends towards aversion of the other and or fear of other viewpoints. The history of sectarianism within religions and ideologies is all too often bloody and brutal evidence of this.

In evolutionary terms this means the person or society who is subject to imposed religiosity, or indeed ideology, (which is almost always imposed through the agency of Institutionalised Power) will be less willing to co-operate with the 'other' or to recognise it's own interdependency with all of life, and this therefore increases the likelihood of sustained behaviours that damage the environment, which inevitably reduces it's long term survival possibilities. The evidence for this lies all around us.

I have traced a path way of disruption, based on my understanding of Trauma and PTSD, which leads to the excessive control and violence associated with Institutionalised Power Religions, with Lateral Violence, Abusive Family dynamics, and much else besides.


a basic outline : loss of  self empathy due to trauma -> loss of empathy for others -> sense of disconnection from what nurtures -> compounds fear associated with trauma -> leads to excessive desire for control of self, others, environment -> leads to violence to control self, others, environment

To survive a trauma event often requires that a person undergoing the trauma suppresses his or her feelings in order to survive. This would also apply to a community that is being traumatised. If, post trauma, that person or community is unable to resolve those suppressed feelings, the suppression remains, and children born to that person or community will grow up with that suppression as part of their psychology. Such suppression leads to a disruption of self-empathy, because it leads to shutting down certain feelings or groups of feelings.

The loss of self-empathy leads to a loss of empathy for others, which can also be described as a loss of empathy for all that nurtures one, or a sense of disconnection from all that nurtures one. This will generate fear, which compounds the fear associated with the trauma, and leads directly to a sensed need to control the people, environment or world around one in order to have certain perceived needs met.

When any autonomous organism is subjected to external control, it will resist, and this is where violence is utilised, to break that resistance. That violence can be physical or psychological. It can be immediate and final or long term and sustained.

Naturally enough, a community or family that has been traumatised, and has been unable to resolve the feelings suppressed, will pass that on to the next generation. As each successive generation 'evolves' evolves they will inject that psychology into the structures they create around their system, structures that will become core beliefs, attitudes and over time Institutionalised patterns of permitted behaviour.

If a child somehow retains some of his or her original natural autonomy, which is a core biological and evolutionary trait, then violence, both physical and psychological, will be permitted to be utilised against that child to break the child, to show the child who is master. This is the basis for what is called 'Poisonous Pedagogy' which has a long and well documented history in Europe.

Recent calls from UK Government Ministers and Teachers Unions for more Power to control children in schools reveals that this is still an active paradigm within the UK - the 21st Century is still Governed by Mediaeval and Victorian attitudes. David Cameron's call that children ought to 'stand up when an adult enters the class room' is very revealing, though he himself is totally unaware of what he is revealing.

Likewise the Catholic Pope's record on dealing with widespread child abuse within Catholicism, and the stance of so many Catholics in protecting both the Pope and the Institution of The Vatican.

Baroness Varsi, a UK 'Muslim' Peer, visited the Pope recently, and made no comment whatsoever on the issues facing the Vatican. Because those same issues are pertinent to ALL Governance as we know it today.




Evolution of life on Earth is more about interdependency, co-operation, mutualism, nurture than it is about competition, mere survival, hierarchical or linear growth. Religiosity is clearly of the latter stream, and is an evolutionary mismatch. The same can be said of ideology, nationalism, sexism, racism. That many people have been questioning these latter attitudes for so long, in a climate of almost constant oppression and denial, speaks to the innate power of our natural biological mandate towards self empathy and empathy for others.


Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Intelligence, cleverness and stupidity...

Intelligent - Behaviour which nurtures the world around us.

Clever - the ability to manipulate the world around us.

Stupid - Using cleverness in ways that either cause harm or do not nurture the world around us.

Perhaps, if by realigning our comprehension of these words, we will see more of reality, and perhaps be confronted by aspects of our own behaviour which we can then alter, so that we are a more fully nurturant human community.

Is this not worth the effort?

It is SO possible.



Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

On School History

A correspondent wrote to me saying that "The history taught at schools is designed to dumb US down is a ridiculous statement."

So here's a few salient exposes of the lies and misdirections of School History Texts......

EG: History in School tell us that the 1766 US Rebellion against the British - The American Revolution - was driven by "No taxation without representation" when in FACT it was driven by the desire of the powerful commercial groups in the America's to negate the 1763 Treaty signed by George III, King of England, as a Royal Proclamation, that recognised Aboriginal Title to Land in the America's as Valid, and regarded the Aboriginal Peoples and a Sovereign Polity, who could have equal standing as an Internationally Recognised Nation State amongst the Nation States at that time and sign Treaties that had full legal standing in International Law.

The European Powers had already by this time accorded such status to China and India, and other States. France had also accorded International Nation State Status to Aboriginal Polities in Canada, and elsewhere, recognising Land Title of those who lived on lands prior to invasion and colonisation. That all these Powers later reneged on these recognitions is also true. Just as the USA reneged on it's many, many Treaties with Aboriginal Peoples within the US Conquest.

Why this 1763 Treaty is important, from the Historical perspective, is that this set an international  legal precedent, which would have applied to all America, of recognising Aboriginal Culture as a distinct polity and that their Land Title , in the manner they were accustomed to hold land title, which was collectively, as Valid. To the powerful commercial interests in what was to become the USA, this meant that they would be unable to take the lands from the many 'Indian' tribes that populated America.

They based their 'claim' on the policy of 'terra nullis' which emanated from the Roman Catholic Emperors, who issued Papal Bulls declaring lands inhabited by non-Christians to be places where no-one lived, as non-Christians were in their eyes merely savages, non-people.

These Papal Bulls formed the legal basis for much of European conquest and colonisation. They were issued to Secular Powers to legalise their invasions and conquests as an aspect of the Christian Missionary project to Christianise the entire Earth, and granted the land to the invaders, and the souls of the savages to the Vatican, who decreed that if the 'savages' refused Christianity they could be slaughtered as they were not people, but animals.

This was underpinned with the concept that whilst Christianising 'savages' would liberate them from their 'savage' state, gaining them access to Heaven,if they refused, they were already condemned to Hell by their non-Christian status and could easily be slaughtered without Sin on the part of those conducting the slaughter.

The Power Elites in America, in conducting the propaganda war to gain support for a split from Britain, used 'taxation without representation' as one of a series of cover stories to convince the white lower class people of the USA to enlist to fight a war with Britain, so that they could ignore the validity of that 1776 Treaty (validated by the British Parliament) and therefore treat the Aboriginal Land Title as a 'domestic matter' subject to internal Laws, rather than dealing with the Aboriginal Peoples as Internationally recognised Polities.

The fact of the matter was that the vast majority of people within the US Polity after the Declaration of Independence were taxed without representation, as the vote excluded, women, labourers, blacks and native peoples. It applied only to land owners.

They wanted the land that was occupied by the American Aboriginals because if thay had the right to grant land title, they could make a huge profit by selling that land, the best of which they kept for themselves as vast estates, the rest was to be given to white settlers who would become the new market for the products of the emerging factory system.

In the process they carried out more than 200 years of genocide, which continues to this day, to appropriate the lands of the people who had been living there for well over 30,000 years.

This is well documented, in both private and public archives of those involved…. and it the mass trauma inflicted upon countless millions of Aboriginal lives, families, communities over 5 centuries...


For a fuller account of this, I suggest readers get a copy of "Earth into Property" by Anthony James Hall.

--------------------------------------

Reflecting on your school history, ask yourself these questions....

Do you know who John Lilbourne was, and what he wrote about during the the English Civil Wars of the 1600s?

What did they teach you about that in school?

Do you know WHY the Enclosure Acts coincided with the emergence of the Factory system in England?

What did they teach you about that in school?

Do you know the purpose and inspiration for the Sunday School System that emerged within the factory system in the 1730s-50s? And how Methodism, which was until then a fringe sect of puritan Christianity, was introduced into the Factory system and WHY this was engineered by the Factory owners?

What did they teach you about that in school?

So you know full story of the origins of Compulsory State Schooling? How the powerful coal barons of North America, Britain, France and Germany spent huge fortunes lobbying for such a system worldwide and why they did this?

What did they teach you about that in school?

Questioning what we are taught is essential to anyone who wishes to understand the world Polity we live in and why it is the way it is, violent, destructive, angry rather than nurturant, creative, loving.

Furthermore the constant conditioning of schooling trains one to read and take in without subjecting the material to a critical analysis, or to a reflecting based on what one FEELS about what one is reading?

What kind of person has the child become when they can read of wars, of torture, of mass laughter and glorify it as 'part of our great history', and exciting tale.....?

And what kind of adult will that child become, and what will his or her role in the community be determined by, what outcomes for future generations will ensue?

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Motherhood, Fatherhood and Nurturance.

I was asked the following question :

"Why always the biological mother relationship?" and "Why is there no mention of the paternal role in your writings?"

This is a good question.

This is my answer:

My focus on the mother child link is really simple.

We are alive and conscious and forming/developing within the womb, our first world. Any culture that nurtures that first forming, that first world will nurture what follows. Any culture that understands and respects that first world will understand and respect what follows.

Thus we learn, as Fathers, within the womb, what it is to feel to be nurtured or not at the most profund levels. The base.

Furthermore, the egg that became me was alive in my mother, in my grandmothers womb, and within my mothers body, living cells of me lived for the duration of her life. There is a distinct matri-lineal biology that expresses itself in the experiential learning of nurturance.

Nurturance is the most fundamental of all human behaviours, in terms of healthy societies. It goes way beyond parental 'roles' and extends to all behaviours within any given family, community or society - in it's healthy expression or it's distorted expression.

I speak as a Father.

I also speak as one who is deconstructing those processes that are related to the emergence and continuation of Hierarchically Violent Societies. One has to get to the root of the problem no matter where it leads.Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

The Heart Brain and Biological Self Empathy.

The Human Heart is a organic biological wi-fi router, designed to help you 'get' the content of the world around you.

It generates a large Electro-magnetic field, which interacts with Electro-magnetic fields of all that is around oneself. It is connected by organic fibre optic to the Amygdala, at the core of the brain.

Signals from the heart arrive for processing in the brain even before signals that come via the eyes.

The brain, amongst other things, models what is perceived and helps in the articulation of this so that what is perceived can be expressed and worked with.

However if the flow of information is disrupted, such that it is reversed, and the mind, subject as it is in this society to conditioning and conformity, the essential information from the heart can be lost, distorted or otherwise missed.

Google 'heart-brain coherence' for more information on this that YOU can utilise to nurture yourself. Rather than direct you to a specific page, I urge you to follow your own learning path, and discover for yourself what is true about all this.



Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

The Corruption of The Curriculum.

I read this rather clear and yet short piece, on the 'corruption of the curriculum' and it's a damning indictment of Educational policy and tinkering with teaching practice, learning 'styles' and course content.

It states the following :

 "The school curriculum has been corrupted by political interference, according to a new report from independent think-tank Civitas. The traditional subject areas have been hi-jacked to promote fashionable causes such as gender awareness, the environment and anti-racism, while teachers are expected to help to achieve the government's social goals instead of imparting a body of academic knowledge to their students."

The article then outlines in concise language some of the 'corruptions' and their adverse effects.

The describe 'educational apartheid' (subjects excluded for some students based on income and class), 'history without dates' (without a coherent narrative), a policy of behavioural change that reduces

It's well worth a read, and I would like to put it in context, "join-the-dots" so to speak. To go further. To clarify.

After all, it was issued by Civitas, who are pretty much a right wing think tank, and why would I be impressed by what ever spewed forth from such an establishment. So I gotta put that right. I am not at all impressed, because the article itself is tinkering, and while it makes a critique that has some substance, it fails (as intended) to set things in context.

Has anyone mentioned to you that it is known, and proven, that State Education was initially instigated by intensive and long-term lobbying from business? 

"Perhaps the greatest of school's illusions is that the institution was launched by a group of kindly men and women who wanted to help the children of ordinary families—to level the playing field, so to speak."

It was of course,  presented as philanthropy,  the trojan horse of modern social engineering effected by the use of wealth, by stealth. And yes some people really did believe they were genuine seeking to help others and to help 'mankind'.

In fact there was close to a century of lobbying at  local, national and international levels of Industrial Society, and a huge, vast amount of money was spent over that time in this project to introduce Compulsion Schooling for all children.

"The real makers of modern schooling were leaders of the new American industrialist class, men like:

	Andrew Carnegie, the steel baron...
John D. Rockefeller, the duke of oil...
	Henry Ford, master of the assembly line which compounded steel and oil into a vehicular dynasty...
and J.P. Morgan, the king of capitalist finance...

The primary driver was of this project was the power and control of business, mostly the coal business, which with coal being the first fossil fuel, has a certain resonance with corporate power play within Governance by the petroleum industry. that we know today ... the coal and steel business was or became the central power in 'Civilisation' and one of the most aggressive in terms of 'expansion' (globalisation) and in terms of infiltrating Governance. The project to compel all children into education started in the 1750s.

And what has happened is that for a while it worked, as all training does, then some people started to see through the system, and found ways to use it as the basis for real learning outside the system, and began to resist the indoctrination and worse, actively self organise.

Power cannot allow that. For two reasons.

!. To many power players is dangerous if they are all equals.  There has to be manageable limits.

2. "If some 'poor' people learn to do what we are doing, we are out of business. So let us 'educate' them such that they cannot really learn, but can remember what they have been told, and they'll confuse memorising for learning. And we will set the psychological limit within the education SYSTEM, the systemic process does the work, not merely the curriculum."

The curriculum can be tinkered with, both by Power and by those Power allows, within limits and under their watchful eyes.

The article I quoted is complaining about the tinkering, and not the system. It prefers the 'traditional tinkering'. That's as far as it goes.

Not impressive.

The SYSTEM must  remain, even as it's façade is ever changing as either genuine empathic understanding emerges (they can't fool all the people all of the time) which Power will always seek to co-opt, by systematising whatever emerges organically, thus neutering any potential threat to Power it might represent.

Any right winger knows this. Well,the ones who dictate policy. Who ever they are..

This is partly why John Taylor Gatto says we must disestablish the SYSTEM, retaining the infrastructure and applying and modifying those infrastructure so that they can be used as places of self motivated learning, where the full person is allowed to grow, as such to truly meet the needs of the children, and indeed of all of us, as natural learners.

"After a long life, and thirty years in the public school trenches, I've concluded that genius is as common as dirt. We suppress our genius only because we haven't yet figured out how to manage a population of educated men and women. The solution, I think, is simple and glorious. Let them manage themselves."

Self motivated, self organised. Self Governing. Common Sense. Biologically mandated.

The article is a brief overview of a book, by Frank Furedi...

'The Corruption of the Curriculum' by Frank Furedi, Shirley Lawes, Michele Ledda, Chris McGovern, Simon Patterson, David Perks and Alex Standish is published by Civitas, 77 Great Peter Street, London SW1P 2EZ

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Syria, oh Syria!

All I can say of Syria is this. I know nothing of life in Syria, and I don't trust one word of what the mainstream media is uttering on it.

I DO KNOW that there are people, lovely, warm, vulnerable, open active, and that there are children and elders too, all of them so human. And that irrespective of 'politics' they will be the ones who are hurt the most of all of this. Again. It's nauseating now to me to talk of 'Libya', Syria', "Iraq', 'Afghanistan' and any other place that is labelled by some few in Power as a 'failed' or 'dictator' or 'axis of evil' or 'banana republic' State as objects, rather than places filled with real people, to talk of Britain or America (the 'bad" ruler states) and include all those people born there through no choice of their own as part of that same object, with responsibility for what that entity, The State, did? 

People we can so easily call the 'enemy'. People like you. People like me. Like our children. Our parents. Our grand-parents. Whole streets, estates, villages, towns, cities....

And I know too that their trauma, pain, loss and hurt is not a price worth paying to sustain the current dominant cultural paradigms. A price they did not choose for themselves. Who would?

It never was worth paying, ever. That 'sacrifice' is another false myth.

 
Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

More thoughts...

The egg that YOU started out as, was alive in your grandmothers womb, in your mother as she lay growing and being nurtured there. Your cells are still live in your mother as long as she lives, along with all your siblings. This is the basis for the matri-lineal reality. Nature's cycles are incremental, not repetitive. Each cycle brings new growth, new wisdom or in the case of unresolved trauma, deeper woundings, some of which are so subtle as to be almost invisible. These are the dynmaics with which we are working with, as we act to change our world.

It is not a question MORE intelligence, but of naturally intelligent behaviour that nurtures life for all life. The illusion of MORE is crafted to segregate human from nature.

Thus, the womb is intelligent. The baby within, is intelligent. Birth is intelligence. Empathy is intelligence. Self-empathy is intelligence.

The existence of poverty is proof that the current Dominant Culture is a failure of the imagination and lacks true natural intelligence. The fact that rich people pay rich people to convince middle class people to blame the poor, the wounded, the damaged for being poor, wounded or damaged and that this strategy works illustrates that fact.

A truly intelligent Society would naturally nurture all life for all life.  

What kind of community do you wish to form, to live in, to bequeath to the next generation and beyond? This is a question for each of us to consider, for we have a responsibility towards our children, all of them. Even if we consider ourselves to not be parents.

The difference between anti-authoritarian and autonomous is that the latter does not define itself in relation to authority, but in relation to self as part of the whole, based on the psychology of biological empathy.

With regard to recent repeated reports suggesting that benefit fraud is a serious problem, estimate to 'cost' the taxpayer £1 billion annually - whereas Tax Avoidance by wealthy corporations who can afford to lobby Government (paid by the taxpayer) costs £15 billion pounds annually, it is worth noting that the bulk of the so-called benefit fraudulently acquired goes back into the ecomony in rent, food, etc etc and that the bulk of the £15 billion in 'avoided' taxes goes into swiss bank accounts or is otherwise hoarded, enriching a few already wealthy people...

In a similar vein, we could say that racism is evidence of conditioning, more than it is evidence of wickedness innate in people...

"We live in a sick, or closer to the truth, a wounded society. It is based on Power, and Power is based upon fear.

It flows thus: repeated trauma can cause a loss of self awareness, as one pushes the feelings that need to be resolved AWAY if one is unable to resolve those feelings, this leads to a lack of self empathy; self empathy is the basis for true empathy with others (human or any other natural organism) which deepens the sense of disconnectedness, from all that nurtures; this creates another layer of fear and with that a need to control others. ANYTHING that is natural will resist being controlled, and this is where violence emerges, to enforce control. Violence can be physical, psychological or emotional.

A communtiy that has been traumatised and is unable, for whatever reason, to resolve this dynamic, will become ever more controlling and violent.

This is the root of the hierarchically violent society.

The psychology of any given society is both revealed and perpetuated in how that society treats the children. Change that and we can change everything. Omit that and we will repeat the patterns of violence and control."

For the majority, and for sure the hard core Establishment of Mental Health Professionals, their primary task is to 'correct' behaviour so that it conforms to Societal prescriptions, rather than to help the person to become more fully human by understanding themselves, understanding the ways in which Society distorts the natural self, because to do that would be to blow the lid on the constant oppression of the natural variety of our psyches upon which all Power is founded.

Those who, for whatever reason, resist, are labelled 'incurable'... and they are blamed for their resistance to the 'help' offered, to mask the guilt and shame that is inherent in such offerings.

"Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do" - yet they do know, even if that knowledge is buried deep under layers of academic and societal conditioning.

An insightful talk given by David Smail, on the realities of schooling as an oppressive experience.

http://www.davidsmail.info/school.htm    The Experience of School,  www.davidsmail.info
[In G. Alred & M. Fleming (eds). Priorities in Education. Fieldhouse Press, University of Durham School of Education, 1996]

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Some recent thoughts.....

"We live in a sick, or closer to the truth, a wounded society. It is based on Power, and Power is based upon fear.

It flows thus: repeated trauma can cause a loss of self awareness, as one pushes the feelings that need to be resolved AWAY if one is unable to resolve those feelings, this leads to a lack of self empathy; self empathy is the basis for true empathy with others (human or any other natural organism) which deepens the sense of disconnectedness, from all that nurtures; this creates another layer of fear and with that a need to control others. ANYTHING that is natural will resist being controlled, and this is where violence emerges, to enforce control. Violence can be physical, psychological or emotional.

A communtiy that has been traumatised and is unable, for whatever reason, to resolve this dynamic, will become ever more controlling and violent.

This is the root of the hierarchically violent society.

The psychology of any given society is both revealed and perpetuated in how that society treats the children. Change that and we can change everything. Omit that and we will repeat the patterns of violence and control."

"Those who glorify war; those who go through it, to mask their woundedness; those who send men to war, to mask their guilt; those who know nothing of war, to mask their ignorance."

"In an empathic based community there are not so much 'bith defects' as different circumstances, different outcomes, which with empathy can be resolved. 'Defects' may just be a way of a conformist society avoiding the issue of how to deal with sych differences. A nurturant community cares for the most vulnerable, and intergrates vulnerability as a source of wisdom, among many."

If one is not one's parents best friend,then both have lost out. And our communities have lost more than can be measured."

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Dianne Abbots Tweet..... reveals more than one realises!

Had Diane Abbot tweeted "Power loves to divide and rule" she would have siad something that is truthful. Power is the issue, not race.... she might even have stimulated a decent discourse....

Race has always been utilised by Power to divide people..... 

But, being part of the Power Structure, Abbot is either incapable of , or unwilling to engage in profound critical analysis.

That's not to say that there aren't people who hold deluded views on race, (currrent Iran phobia?) and on difference, (Native Americans are 'savages', San Bushmen are 'primitives) and that there aren't those who hold such views are prone to violence. 

Such people exist - yet they were not born with those attitudes, they learned them... how did they learn them, and who benefits from such learning?

They are merely the product of a dishonest Institutionalsied Society, one which launches mass war against innocent people with what are KNOWN to be falsehoods and urges the people to carry on shopping, and so many of we, the people, do....

So, cui Bono? Eh?

Who benefits if we demonise the 'racists' whilst power tramples over EVERYONE?

Diane Abbot, and the Editors of The Guardiuan and other Newspapers, (and their readerships) would do well to read Paolo Friere's "Pedagogy of the Oppressed' and actually take some of it in. Though they'd very quickly find themselves unemployed if they did so and acted on what Friere wrote, which is truth and beauty, REAL power.... the power to become fully human.

I am appalled at the craven nature of this discourse.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Change is not only possible, it is natural.

Natural Expectations : a definition

Natural expectations are sets of inherent, intrinsic design implications that emerge from within living organisms.

Another way to express this would be to say that a three legged stool has obvious immediate design implications, as would a mug, or a palm leaf woven basket. The stool is a seat or a table, the mug, an open container with a handle, is for drinking or scooping, the basket is for carrying, or holding objects within it, and it’s strap arrangement, if it has one, might indicate how it is to be carried. It’s an analogy because the stool, the mug nor the basket, are all non ‘living’ ‘things’ and are used by living beings. The materials that comprise those objects may in time be returned to nature, yet they as objects do not live, nor do they grow.

What I am writing about are the natural expectations’ of living processes.

Plants are an expectation of sunlight within certain frequency ranges, varying from plant to plant. Some utilise more direct sunlight than others. Each one has its place.

In the forest habitat Perma-culturists and Forest Gardeners describe 7 layers of light variation, from the ground to the topmost leaves, and have observed that a myriad of different plants work on all those varying levels of light, collectively and individually. Put any one of those plants in a layer it’s not normally naturally part of and it will struggle, and its natural growth cycles will be disrupted. The plants natural expectations are not being met.

Each plant in the web of life provides materials and more often than not often living space for many, many organisms, all of whom are part of the essential optimum health picture. In a forest with many hundreds and thousands of species those relationships will be incredibly interwoven in a non-linear fashion. The entire web is an expression of many, many specific natural expectations being fulfilled. All inter-related! That inter dependence is also part of the natural expectations, or design implications of living processes.

Eyes are an expectation of sunlight within a certain frequency range. We human beings cannot see ultra-violet or infra-red light with our eyes. Yet there are many animals that do use those frequencies. It is interesting to note that civilisation has developed technology to extend our sensory range, to ‘see’ those UV or IR frequencies, primarily as military/security tools and as such mostly for ill.

Ears are an expectation of sound waves. Again there is a limit, a certain frequency range outside of which nothing is sensed by that particular organ or organism or collective of cells operating as they do. Nature has determined this limit. It is no accident. Irrespective of whatever determines such processes, these naturally determined expectations are absolutely meaningful, and of vital importance to all living processes.

Plants need water. Some more than others. The local availability, source and quality of water determines what plants will thrive, and of course those plants will live there and will thrive. Salt Marshes and Bog Marshes are quite differing habitats. A few plants can handle both, most are specific to the precise habitat and it’s variations.

Another way to sense this would be to say that what we see in natural living processes is that those intrinsic, that is to say, essentially innate and natural expectations determine the parameters for the optimum health of any living process. Meeting those natural expectations ensures optimum health.

There is one other natural expectation that inheres to all living processes; that is that there is no such ‘thing’ or ‘concept’ as ‘thrash’, ‘rubbish’ or waste.

Nature does not create any waste. Ever. In natural living processes ALL materials utilised by living processes are returned to the nutrient cycles in forms that other organisms or living processes can metabolise. That return processes is pee-ing, poo-ing, leaf shedding, skin shedding, and of course dieing.

Decaying. Bio-degrading … though I don’t much like that term.

Bio-returning would be a better description, less judgemental.

This constant return of metabolised materials increases the over-all fecundity of the natural habitat. That too is a natural expectation of the entire biota or habitat.

Another way of saying this is that this very simple no-waste principle ensures the continued optimum health and growth of the habitat.

What it means, for me at least, is that EVERYTHING that lives on Earth, and everything done by those living organisms is inter-related, profoundly connected in a vast food web that feeds all life – all waste is food for life - so that life grows ever more abundant on Earth. And each and every living organism is embodied with a set of natural expectations.

However being an intelligent system, there is another dynamic that works with these sets of natural expectations that ensures that they are not rigid or brittle..... and that is the ability to take in information and to change or 'adapt' behaviour to meet new circumstances.

It follows that even the slightest input of ‘new’ or ‘alien’ materials will have consequences and those consequences cannot be easily predicted, especially where nature has not determined a bio-logical metabolic living process to handle that material, to utilise it and or return it to the nutrient cycle. The ‘new’ or ‘alien’ material can become toxic if it ‘accidentally’ interferes with natural bio-logical processes; though hind sight does of course reveal the extent and depth of those consequences, even as this is strangely ignored by so many in this modern dominant culture.

To recap, ALL natural living processes have specific and precise natural expectations that are intrinsic and that determine the parameters for the optimum health of each living process; and that the constant meeting those expectations at the individual and community levels increases the overall health of the entire species, and those many species living at optimum health, by metabolising materials created by each other they collectively ensure the optimum health of the entire habitat.

And that all organisms, living in a constantly changing environment have the ability to learn, that is to say that they can receive information from the environment, and use that information to make changes in their behaviour, in such manner as to maintain the overall balance of life. Thus there is no ‘waste’ in natural processes, because all materials are left in a state that specifically enables them to be metabolised by other living processes. Life feeds life.

Change is possible, even for a rigid Institutional Society such as the Dominant Culture which is undermining natural processes and causing great harm. The question therefore is will 'it' or it's constituents make those choices based on learning and on a desire to maintian the vitality of natural processes. That's you and I, my friends and all other human beings. Even David Cameron retains that possibility. Even the Pope.

If they chose not to make those choices, then they have to be held accountable for the adverse affects of their behaviour.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe