Police raids in St. Paul, my hometown, for RNC

Here are the MSM - Main Stream Media - views/stories on the raids going on in St. Paul against people planning to protest the RNC here in my hometown. One of the raids took place at a local rental hall only 8 blocks from my house on the West Side in Saint Paul. THe police state has come to my home. The police have charged various people with conspiracy to commit civil disobediance. This could be construed as thought crimes. The news channels talk to the police a lot, but none of the people harassed or arrested. Hmmmmmm.



THIS ONE



Here are some DIY local perspectives of the same events.....

Thrashing Around the Metasphere

http://www.myspace.com/theinfovault

Friday, August 29, 2008


Thrashing Around the Metasphere

I was inspired to write this by a message that I received from a friend (donnie) on myspace. I have also received several other messages in the past few months basically asking "Ok...... So what now? We know........but what can we do? How can we change things for the better, how to we organize to survive the times ahead?"

As far as a practical solution for the times ahead......... my point of view is broad so here goes.....

I think that many of the world problems are caused by the mindset that thinks the world needs to be changed. Those people tend to assemble into a group that attempts to enforce their vision for the world and despite the good intentions they end up interfering with the free will of many. If nobody was on a crusade to save people from their own inner fears - everyone would have space to live in peace.

So many people want to place blame on this or that group of others while not realizing that every individual has a choice. There is no such thing as an organization that is 100% bad or 100% good. Many who I have spoken with who want to place blame Freemasons, Zionists, the Catholic Church, the Jesuits, the Rosicrucians, etc.... do not even bother to look into the core philosophies that these groups hold dear - because they assume it to be occult garbage. There is now just as much a public conspiracy against the Freemasons as there is Freemasons conspiring against the public. Narrow minds are not able see the whole truth, only shadows of it, and narrow minds are scared of the shadows.

A narrow mind wants to have the "truth" boiled down to one convenient story to believe in and fight over, but the only way to really know the truth is to try to consider it from every angle, meaning there is always more than one story. The deep understanding of this idea is but a glimpse of the multi-dimensionality that exists everywhere.

But there is no "conspiracy" really, just the consequences of consciousness consuming itself.

Sure...........when you are focusing on the smaller picture, there are conspiracies everywhere (centralized banking, exploitation of the earths resources in the form of rapid industrialization, the pharmaceutical industry, and the political and religious agendas of all kinds that drive these monsters) But if you step back, and look at the bigger picture, all "conspiracies" boil down to one root cause. Fear - and the corresponding desire to escape that fear. What causes that fear?

When beings (including humans) loose their connection to the infinite source within and can no longer sustain their own energy, they begin to feed on each other to get that energy. Parasitism and vampirism are born.

What many people refer to as an government-alien conspiracy is really just the discovery that the food chain is larger than many suspect, and humans are not at the top of that chain.

The pan-dimensional life forms that harvest human bio-energy fields through creating conditions of heightened stress (war, suffering, etc...) are no different from humans raising cows and chickens as livestock. The only difference is a matter of degree. You wouldn't call grandma evil for eating a chicken sandwich, so why would you consider anything that feeds on humanity "evil"? If you have ever eaten another self conscious being, then you too, are a vampire of varying degree.

The "aliens" that feed on humanities negative emotions have encouraged and conditioned us into a fear-infested mind that causes the whole victim mindset which makes this grand "conspiracy" possible. They can control us easily because they trained us to think like they do. Human sociopaths practice the same form of conditioning. A selfish person is predictable and will act in selfish ways that can be easily manipulated by higher forms of selfish awareness.

I differ from many people who spread "truth", because I do not delineate an artificial line between "good" and "evil" and I do not demonize any beings. We all have a choice to serve ourselves at the expense of others, or to live in harmony. I do not wish to starve, kill, or even threaten the beings that consume us, nor do i wish to harm the sleeping humans that they have effectively mass-hypnotized.

Everything has its place, no matter how dark its form.

The only thing that will save us is love. But you probably already know that. Love will transform these beings, just like it does with us humans. They eat all emotion, not just hate and fear. It just happens that fear and hate are kind of like the equivalent to addictive narcotics for them.

Have you noticed the way drama feeds on itself? The people who repeatedly cause drama are virtually addicted to the excitement it causes. These creatures that feed on humanities "chi" or "life force" are addicted to our orgasmic bursts of fear and excitement.

The question - how to generate love within in yourself at a level that abolishes all hatred and fear triggers, while at the same time weaning these parasites off of us so that they dont go into withdrawl and start thrashing around the metasphere, killing all life in their path.

Our galaxy is entering a different phase alignment. Our corner of the galaxy is going to pass through what scientists cause the photon belt. It is kind of like a cosmic enema. It causes change to our very DNA and its ability to read wavelengths. Some think that this will balance the energy and end parasitism. I'm not so sure....... I think we all have a choice. Our consciousness can ascend, but the 3-d world will always be right here and no matter what happens, suffering will always exist in the crystalized world of forms and shadows.

The new world order is not something that can be stopped, it can only be transformed. Will we behold the face of death or a new higher elevation of consciousness?

I have begun to discover that many of the people who read my website will be mislead by their own belief systems and will be unable to see the "truth".

My website spreads "truth" to those who have "eyes to see and ears to hear", but it is nothing more than lies when read by the eyes of those who lie to themselves anyway.

Many of the secret societies have never really hidden anything from the world..........the human species was genetically duped by "aliens" and some humans were not as affected as others. However, most of humanity became so unconscious of their own inner divinity and so ignorant that they could not perceive the "truth" if it was spelled out and illustrated in front of them. The "truth" is hidden from most people by their own level of thought capacity and lack of desire for connection to infinity.

Some secret societies carry the knowledge of the remnants of the original humanity, before the genetic manipulation.

The true and invisible order whose highest members were magicians and adepts who had mastered mental direction of ethereal forces (like mind over matter, influencing whether, spiritual healing, etc....) were labeled as witches and hunted and killed by the church.

The church hunted all people who tried to bring forth their godlike talents. It was no wonder that these adepts had to go underground to survive and due to the irrational fear of the masses they had very little choice except to either kill those who irrationally feared them.........or quietly influence those peoples minds and their institutions.

The portion of humanity that was still partially spiritually conscious realized that the one way to wake sleeping humanity was to put them through so much pain that the soul would get squeezed to the surface because the soul is highly resistant to overt control and will eventually overthrow any force that seeks to subjugate it. They needed to exert a strong resistance to strengthen the "spiritual muscle"

Just like in a modern gym, you cannot build muscles without painful workouts and breaking down the tissue of those muscles so that they build back stronger...... the same is true with the sleeping soul.

Unconscious humans have an atrophied soul. A weak "spiritual muscle"

One way to make soul strong again is by giving it a workout.

Everything was going to according to plan....... until even those who were still conscious began to slip.

The great adepts began to serve themselves and they then lost their state of higher consciousness. Then some of them began to despise humanity because the slip backwards in consciousness caused bitterness, and the consuming dark force infested these secret orders and some of them began to prey on humanity, just like the force they originally sought to oppose.

The dark energy (fear) exists in all of us as a result of a traumatic event that led to humans loosing their connection to the inner source.

Many cultures refer to this this event in their mythologies. The "fall of man", the fall of atlantis, the decent from heaven of the "fallen angels", Adam and Eve getting expelled from "the garden", etc....

We are living in the timeloop of suffering - feeding back like a cosmic microphone against a cosmic speaker - ever since "the fall".

"Truth" is found in understanding infinite perceptions.

The truth of infinite perception means that you can never give the truth to anyone. They have to find it within themselves.

I'm here for the ride............

I am dreaming this and so are you and we are only characters in the dream of a larger mind. Most have forgotten their ability to steer the wheels of the dream, so they panic and freak out because they have lost memory of their connection to the soul and thus they are afraid of death. This is natural.

In the coming times, if you seek to transform our world into a state of being that does not thrive on pain (although pain will still exist), then take actions to elevate yourself to the wavelength of unselfish love (which in no uncertain terms means allowing your self to express and grow coupled with the acceptance and support of the growth of others ) and then your perceptions will transform, transmute and transcend. Knowledge through experience. This is the meaning of "Gnosis".

Raising Your Consciousness

Raising Your Consciousness
April 8th, 2005 by Steve Pavlina
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/04/raising-your-consciousness/

Every level of consciousness outlined in the previous post is actually a trap.

When you make the leap to a new level, initially everything feels wonderful. You’ve discovered the secret that’s been eluding you all these years. And for a while, your new mindset seems to work just fine. You operate at a whole new level. Problems that seemed like insurmountable obstacles are now nothing but minor bumps in the road.

But eventually something screwy starts happening. The same mindset that worked so well for you in the past gradually stops working. The more you try harder and harder to make it work, the worse it fails.

As soon as you figure out that your current level of thinking is actually a trap, this realization is what springs your consciousness up to the next highest level.

Consider the level of pride, for example. The trap of pride is that your self-esteem is very fragile — it’s based on your external reality being a certain way. You end up spending more and more time defending that reality. And eventually it cracks. When you realize that defending your fragile pride is a hopeless and pointless battle, you pop up to the level of courage and begin facing your fears for real instead of pretending you’ve already conquered them.

But courage is also a trap. Initially it works well, but after a while it gets you into trouble. You become too controlling, spending more and more time trying to control what you cannot. Your frustration mounts. As soon as you realize that trying to control everything is hopeless, you pop up to the level of neutrality.

With neutrality you adopt the belief of “live and let live.” You become more mellow and accepting of people as they are. Life at this level is initially very comfortable. But eventually the trap springs. Your life becomes gradually burdened by things that start to bug you. You complain about them instead of doing something about them, and nothing happens. Things get worse instead of better. You may gain weight, have financial problems, or encounter other frustrations. Procrastination is your way of life. But you can’t solve these problems by hoping and complaining. As soon as you realize that nothing will change unless you get yourself to take action, you raise your consciousness to the level of willingness.

And willingness is itself a trap. You’re taking action and developing self-discipline. That works great for a while, but then you start to realize you’re like a mouse on a treadmill. You’re working hard, but you aren’t really getting anywhere. People take advantage of you. You start feeling bitter about investing so much effort for so little reward. And as soon as you see the trap, you rise to the level of acceptance.

Now you accept responsibility for directing your own life instead of working so hard to achieve others’ goals for you. You set your own goals, make plans, and start achieving them. You learn to focus your energy. This works great at first, but then you start failing. And failing. And failing. You’re setting goals and working hard, but you don’t really know what you’re doing. You don’t understand the natural laws that are operating in your world. You become frustrated that even less “worthy” people are passing you up. Eventually you recognize the trap here — that if you don’t understand the rules of how the world really works, you’ll never be able to succeed at achieving your goals. You rise to the level of reason.

Now at the level of reason, you take the time to learn the rules. You become very interested in absorbing new knowledge. When I hit this level, I changed my business model and started thinking very analytically and strategically. I studied sales and marketing. I did market research. I applied what I learned. And I finally released a hit product. I figured out the rules I needed to follow in order to succeed, and they worked. But the level of reason is also a trap. The more you think, the more you realize that the mind alone, no matter how intelligent and knowledgeable you become, cannot provide the context for your life. It can’t provide purpose or meaning. You can think and think and analyze and analyze, but no amount of data or information can tell you why you’re here and what to live for. You start to feel empty and ask questions like, “Is this all there is?” Your reasoning starts to run you in circles, and you finally see that it’s a trap. And then you rise to the level of love.

And so the cycle continues. The only constants are growth and change. The more you resist learning the lessons that will raise your awareness to the next level, the more pain and frustration you create for yourself.

Whenever you reach a new level of awareness, you retain the benefits of the previous levels, but you release their weaknesses. You maintain the confidence of courage without the recklessness, the comfort of neutrality without the passivity, the discipline of willingness without the frustration, the focus of acceptance without the failure, the intelligence of reason without the analysis paralysis.

Yesterday afternoon I had a breakthrough of my own. After being at the level of reason for about 6-1/2 years, I finally reached the level of love. Of that I’m certain. This isn’t the emotion of love — it’s the consciousness of unconditional love. It’s hard to put into words, but part of it is a feeling of total oneness with all that exists. It’s a feeling of being a conduit for life itself, like being part of a much larger whole instead of just an individual ego. For about a year now, I could see the signs that I was getting close to making the leap, but yesterday it finally hit me, and the full awareness of this new level of consciousness flooded into me.

I caught my first glimpse of the level of love in 2002. It started with profound flashes of intuition and surges of synchronicity. At first they’d last a few days or a week, but there would be months between these episodes. I’d document them in my journal but otherwise ignore them. But then I got curious and started acting on them in small ways, and I gradually became convinced that there was some higher intelligence working through them. When I started trusting my intuition and these synchronicities more often, their presence in my life swelled, and they’d lead me to new solutions, shredding even the toughest problems far more effectively than reason and logic could. But I still didn’t fully trust them. Eventually though, I was able to let go, and these intuitions and synchronicities switched on permanently and never turned off — now the conduit is always open.

It’s going to take me a while to get used to this. First, I have to celebrate though, especially after working so consciously and so hard at this for 6-1/2 years. It was not remotely easy, but it was worth it.

Finding Inner Peace

Finding Inner Peace
by Jane Alexander


These are turbulent times and unsettling for us all. Our world seems a more dangerous place than it did before and it’s not remotely surprising that many of us are feeling increased anxiety and stress. There is little we can do individually about war and terrorism – and that in its own way makes us feel impotent and vulnerable. However the one thing we CAN affect is our own attitude: we can all work on establishing a level of inner peace. I think it’s important work, vital work. If we are calm we, in turn, spread a feeling of calm around us. Children, in particular, benefit hugely. I’m concerned that so many children are becoming profoundly anxious about war and terrorism. Inevitably they pick up on our moods – children are small psychic sponges! So, let’s look at how we can cultivate our own sense of inner peace. If you’re familiar with my work, you’ll probably know before we start that it won’t necessarily be an easy process. I don’t think that it’s possible to achieve lasting inner peace with the psychic equivalent of a sticking plaster. You need to sift back and heal yourself on a deep inner level. Is it worth it? Definitely. Is it all hard toil and misery? Not at all. Many of the exercises are great fun.

The Energy Secret by Jane Alexander

SHIFTING EMOTIONAL ENERGY

It’s easy to feel we aren’t in control of our feelings, our lives. It’s far easier to blame other people, events, world situations than look within for answers. Yet truly we hold the key to how we react to the world – we can react with panic or calm, inner conflict or inner peace. Think about it. You wake up and it’s Monday morning, you have a meeting you are dreading with a person you hate. So how do you feel? Now imagine you wake up and it’s Saturday morning: ahead of you lies a day at the beach with your family or a group of great friends. Does that feel different? You bet it does! Learning how to shift your emotional energy can be a huge boon in modern life. It won’t take the traumas and unpleasantness out of everyday life but it will enable you to deal with it in the best possible way.

Emotional energy manifests itself in our moods, our feelings and attitudes. If you have vital energy freely moving through you, you will tend to have a sunny disposition, an optimistic outlook, a frank, open and honest approach to the world – you will radiate inner peace. If your energy is blocked you will probably show some of the classic symptoms which we tend to think of as vices or psychological problems: for example anger, fear, jealousy, resentment, shame.

But what causes this blockage in the first place? Many therapists now think that our emotional energy can become blocked, warped or repressed at a very early age. Some go as far as suggesting that even our time in the womb can be formative.

Take a few moments to consider the following questions. You may like to sit down quietly when you know you won’t be disturbed. Perhaps light a candle to focus your mind.

* If your parents are alive, ask them about your earliest beginnings. Were you planned or a "surprise"? How were you conceived? What emotions surrounded the news of your existence? If your parents are no longer alive, is there anyone else you can ask? Siblings, aunts, uncles, your parents’ friends?
* How was your mother’s pregnancy? Did she have any physical problems? How were her emotions? Was there any stress? Any financial worries?
* What kind of birth did you have? Were you early, on time or late? Did your mother have to have any drugs, any surgical intervention? Was she frightened? Was the birth easy or difficult, short or very long?
* How was your babyhood and early childhood? What is your earliest memory?
* What do you remember most about your childhood? What emotions did you express most freely? Which emotions were you not allowed, or not encouraged to express? For eg, were you told off for being too loud or too boisterous?
* Did you suffer any traumas as a child? Did you lose a parent or watch your parents divorce? Was there illness in the family, or poverty, or severe stress?

It’s worth making the effort to dig out this information. You might find out some surprising facts. As babies and children we are incredibly open to suggestion - we are like little psychic sponges. The actions, words and emotions of the people who surround us will literally make up how we experience the world. And how we experience the world, our world view, will affect our own sense of inner peace. If we were over-protected as children, not allowed to run free, the world can appear a dangerous place - our own emotional energy shrinks back in fear. If we were not given enough warmth and cuddling, the world can appear cold and unwelcoming - our energy surrounds us in a cocoon to keep us warm (but which keeps out other people). If we were hurt, ignored, pushed aside, our energy will try to protect us by building a wall around our feelings - which, of course, keeps out the good as well as the bad.

Parents have the trickiest of jobs - it’s a perilously difficult dance to give a child the emotional grounding he or she needs: sensing that there are times to be warm and enclosing, protective in your love and at other times allowing the child the freedom and space to go out and explore, to push back the frontiers. Of course you won’t get it right all the time - and of course our own parents didn’t. It’s important to say that this exercise of looking back should never become a source of recrimination. What’s done is done and cannot be changed - except by taking charge of your own Self here and now, in the present. It’s useful to know the earliest roots of your emotional blockages but it’s fruitless to waste time in blame.

The Five Minute Healer by Jane Alexander

TRACKING UNWANTED EMOTIONAL ENERGY

Another way of uncovering the underlying negative emotions that stand in the way of inner peace is to work with your body. Choose a time when you won’t be disturbed, ideally somewhere where you can make a noise if you want. You might choose to have some cushions or pillows around you. Note: if you feel overly anxious about doing this exercise, you might want to have someone you totally trust with you. If it feels very scary, maybe you need to explore this area with some professional help.

* Lie down on the floor, on a comfortable mat or rug.
* Spend some time centering yourself, breathing slowly and deeply.
* Become aware of your body. Where are you holding tension? Where do you feel discomfort? Pinpoint the place and the feeling.
* Now exaggerate the feeling. So, if you are clenching your jaw, clench it harder. And harder.
* What does your body want to do or say? Don’t think, just let your body follow its need. You might find yourself spitting out words or phrases; you might curl up in a ball; you might lash out at a cushion…you might do nothing.
* Give your body permission to do whatever it needs to express its repressed emotional energy - within safe limits.
* When you feel your body has had enough for this session, lie quietly once more and return to your breathing.
* Stand up and stamp your feet to return to normal awareness. You may wish to write down what happened.

The issues may not be clear the first time you try this. But persevere. You may be interested to know that where we hold tension is often directly related to our emotional blockages. As a brief guideline:

* the eye area tends to be about what we are allowed to see.
* the mouth/jaw/throat area tends to be about communication, about being heard, about nourishment
* the chest and heart area tends to be about anger, sadness, rejection, longing
* the abdominal area tends to be about fear and digestion (what we take in)
* the pelvic/sacral area tends to be about sexuality, survival, support, vitality

Our bodies really do know the answers. Bodyworkers have found that repressed thoughts, feelings, old hurts and memories are all stored in the body. If you feel you have a lot of old psychological "baggage" but are nervous of trying psychotherapy, I would heartily recommend you go to a good bodyworker. Many people find that, under the skilled hands of a therapist, they can release old patterns, allowing their emotional energy to run free once more. Sometimes you recall the old hurts - sometimes you don’t have to relive the experience, just let it go.

Live Well: the Ayurvedic Way to Health and Inner Bliss by Jane Alexander

KEEP A JOURNAL - RECORD YOUR DREAMS

While you are doing this work it really is worthwhile keeping a log of your experiences and feelings. Use it for writing down what you discover during these exercises, and others that you do. Use it to record your dreams, stray thoughts, meditations and visualizations.

I would also heartily recommend you start recording your dreams. Dreams offer incredible pointers to our psyches. But it can take some time to figure out their language. Dreams speak in riddles, in symbols and images rather than straightforward messages. So write down your dream and then spend some time thinking about it, however silly it might appear.

* If some particular object or animal appears in your dream think about what it means to you. What significance does that thing have for you? What does it remind you of? Allow your mind to work laterally.
* Other people who appear in dreams are often aspects of ourselves - perhaps those which are repressed or not allowed to express themselves freely. Animals can represent our "animal" side too. A great technique for understanding this form of energy is to hold a "conversation" with a character or animal in a dream. Imagine it is sitting opposite you (behind a solid glass wall, if it’s scary) - ask it what it wants, what it needs. You might just be surprised.
* Another technique for working with dreams is to "dream the dream on". Lie or sit down and breathe deeply so you become calm and centered. Imagine yourself back in your dream. Run through the dream as you remember it but, instead of it ending, allow it to continue. Imagine what would happen next. You can also choose this way of conversing with figures and animals.
* Painting is a wonderful way of moving dream work too. You don’t need to be an artist - far from it. Simply put out a large piece of paper and use whatever materials you desire. You can either draw your dream figuratively or just let the paint express how you felt in the dream. Whichever, don’t censor yourself - just let the paint talk. After you have finished, sit back and look. What can you see? Does anything become clearer? Did any emotions come up as you were painting? Maybe write to your painting - or dance the feelings it brings up in you.

These are all very powerful techniques and we’re rushing through them at a rate of knots! So please don’t feel you have to do everything at once. Take it slowly, in your own time and at your own pace. Many of us spent our childhoods being told to either "hurry up" or "slow down" - time is one of the dimensions into which our energy was molded from a very tender age. So give yourself the time you need. Do remember also that these are the kind of techniques which are often used in a therapeutic setting - with trained therapists on hand. I tend to follow the great spiritual workshop leader Denise Linn’s belief that we will go no further than we are ready to - that our psyches have a way of protecting us from going too far, too quickly. So, if you feel happy about these exercises, then you should be perfectly OK to do them. If you feel the slightest doubt, proceed with caution or not at all.

Mind Body Spirit by Jane Alexander

PAST LIFE ENERGY

Some people, after doing all this, still can’t find any vestige of inner peace. So there’s a theory that our energy blocks go back even further than conception. Rebirthers (who use a form of breathwork to take people back to their birth and even to the moment of their conception) found that some people went back further still - to past lives. Some even go as far as saying that our emotional hang-ups and our physical ailments can be blamed on unresolved past lives. Does it really work? I’m keeping an open mind. I have tried past life therapy and come up with some interesting "past lives" but then I’m very suggestible and suffer from an over-active imagination. I have to say that discovering and resolving my past as an impoverished peasant didn’t make me win the lottery and lose the pounds! However, it’s an interesting thought and, whether we actually go back to the past or it’s our subconscious finding a way of speaking to us, it does often seem to have intriguing (and often quite therapeutic) results. If you couldn’t find anything in your early life that could cause your stuck energy, then it may be worth trying this.

You will need someone to help you - reading out the instructions slowly and clearly. Make sure you will not be disturbed.

1. Lie down somewhere comfortable and warm.
2. Start by tensing your toes, your ankles, calves, knees. Pull in your thigh muscles and tense your buttocks. Draw in your stomach, pull in your abdomen. Make a fist, tense your arms, shrug your shoulders. Screw up your face. Take a deep breathe. And relax.
3. Repeat step 2.
4. Now relax. Let your feet fall apart, let your hands uncurl. Relax your shoulders. Turn your head to the right, to the left. Push your head back into the floor to release the neck muscles.
5. Start to pay attention to your breath. Breathe slowly, quietly and deeply.
6. Now imagine you are in a beautiful place. It’s somewhere in which you feel totally safe, totally secure. It might be outside or inside, an actual place or somewhere in your mind. Know that you are totally safe here and can return here at any time.
7. Somewhere in this place you notice a door. You stand before it, noticing the colour of the door, the material from which it’s made, its size, shape and texture. This door leads to the past.
8. When you are ready, open the door. In front of you is a staircase, lightly swathed in mist. There are ten steps and with each step down you will be doing deeper and deeper, down into the past.
9. Ten, going down. Down into the past. Nine, going deeper, deeper down into the past. Eight. Seven, deeper still. Six, slowly and surely, down and down. Five, deeper. Four, down one step further. Three, almost there. The mist is deeper now, you can’t quite see the bottom. Two, down further still. And one, you’re there.
10. Stand for a moment as the mist gently swirls around you. Now look down at your feet which you can barely see through the mist.
11. The mist is clearing and you can see your feet. What are they like? Are they a man’s or woman’s feet? An adult or child? What color? Are they bare or shod?
12. This should give you a good clue to your whereabouts and time. Now look at the rest of yourself. Look around you - where are you standing.
13. If you like, you can explore your environment, describing what you see. Ask the "past-lifer" about their life: where do they live; are they married; what’s their job; are they happy; what life events have affected them?
14. If you are still happy and relaxed you can take the person to their death. They don’t need to experience it - it’s quite OK to float outside and watch! Ask them what they feel and what they learned from this life. Are there any unresolved emotions? How do they feel they can best deal with these in this life? Often surprising answers will emerge.
15. Now it’s time to return. Once again you see the mist and in front of you is the staircase. You’re going up, ten, nine, eight, coming up, back to waking reality. Seven, coming up. Six, five, four, becoming aware of your body, aware of the room around you, back to normal time. Three, almost up now. When you open your eyes you will be feeling refreshed and relaxed. Two, hearing the sounds around you, feeling your body on the floor. One, totally awake, totally aware.
16. Open your eyes. Lie still for a while. Then get slowly up, stamp your feet. You may want a cup of tea and a biscuit.
17. Talk over your experiences with your helper. Remember to write everything down in your journal.

The Weekend Healer by Jane Alexander

LIBERATING EMOTIONAL ENERGY

The first step to achieving inner peace is to know where your blockages are and how they got there. Then you have to shift them. First and foremost, remember that these blocks are there for good reason. Your psyche hasn’t done this for no reason - it is trying to protect you. So, before all else, thank your body and psyche for being so protective and clever in thinking up ways of holding back painful memories and old hurts. Then ask it if it is willing to leave. Tell it that you are ready to move on, to become more open, more vulnerable, yes - more unprotected. You may find you feel a sense of something lifting, shifting, moving away from you. Bless it and imagine it dispersed in a flash of pure white shimmering light, transmuted into something pure, able to return to the source.

Of course, negative energy which has been lodged often for years, may not be so easy to shift. Like a stubborn stain, it might take weeks, months, even years to resolve. Don’t be in a hurry over this. Let it evolve naturally. If you have read any of my books, you will be familiar with the techniques I use for liberating stagnating energy and working towards peace. To recap, try these:

* Breathe. Try practicing breathing exercises on a regular basis. If you have an area which feels stuck, try breathing into it, visualizing healing energy clearing away the blocks.
* Dance. Allowing your body to move as it wants can be hugely effective. Look at forms of dance therapy such as biodanza, Gabrielle Roth’s Five Rhythms, Eurythmy or just freeform movement.
* Paint. Continue painting in a completely free fashion. If you find this hard, you could try painting with your non-dominant hand (ie if you’re left-handed, paint with your right, and vice versa). Or paint with your eyes shut. Or paint to music. Or use clay.
* Dream. Continue with a dream diary and work with the images and symbols you discover.
* Find a good bodyworker or psychotherapist. My ideal is someone trained in both therapeutic talking and touching - biodynamic therapy, SHEN and Kairos merge this well and many bodyworkers are now training in counseling too.
* Affirm. Choose an affirmation that digs to the heart of your block. I.e. "I am totally loveable." "It’s safe to express my feelings." "I can be as loud as I like." Write it twenty times, adding responses. Do this every day for twenty-eight days and you may well find a lot of stuck energy emerging. Some responses may be a word; some might consist of pages of thoughts or memories. To reinforce the message, try saying your affirmation to yourself in a mirror. Note: the best affirmations are the ones which initially make your skin crawl!

Sacred Rituals at Home

DEALING WITH OTHER PEOPLE’S NEGATIVITY

Once we have an understanding of our own nature, we are immediately in a much stronger position. When we are functioning from our true nature, rather from behind the walls, screens and other defenses of repressed energy, we gain a wonderful sense of peace and clarity. Often we automatically find that our relationships - with friends, family, workmates, complete strangers - are much clearer, more honest, more straightforward. When we no longer have to keep up the effort of pretending to be someone we are not, we can use all our energy to enjoy being ourselves!

However, just because we have sorted out ourselves does not mean that everyone else will have sorted out their own stuck energy. So, until the world becomes full of enlightened energyworkers, we have to learn how to deal with other people’s stuck stuff.

It can be very unpleasant. You know the kind of people I’m talking about. You feel your spirits dip when they walk up to you. You find you’re exhausted after just a few moments talking to them. They seem like psychic vampires, sucking out all your energy, all your vitality. Or they are just sheer unpleasant - nasty bullies, emotional blackmailers, manipulative, sly and downright horrible.

Before you do anything else, you should feel pity for them. You know just how unpleasant it feels to walk around loaded down with heavy stuck energy. So how do you think they feel? In fact one of the strongest techniques you can use is also the most simple. It simply entails sending pure loving energy to the person causing you grief. Here’s how:

* Center yourself and focus on your breathing. Note: you can do this anywhere without the person even knowing.
* Now direct your awareness to your heart chakra - feel the chakra spinning steadily.
* Imagine a pure golden-white stream of divine universal energy come shooting through your crown chakra and down into your heart. The whole chakra becomes full to bursting with this wonderful, loving, pure energy.
* Send it out to the difficult person. Imagine it hitting them in the heart chakra and infusing their body with love and light. Be careful not to play games with this. Just send the loving energy - don’t try to be clever and send wishes (i.e. Let them be nice or anything like that!).

That’s it. I used to use this on a very difficult boss I once had. She would come in like an avenging fury and the whole office would beg me to do something about her. I used to quietly sit and direct this energy at her, repeating, "I love you. I love you. I love you." Which was very hard work! But it did work. She could tell something was happening as well because she would look suspicious and say "What are you doing to me?" But that’s the great thing about energywork - you leave no clues!

The Detox Plan for Mind, Body and Spirit by Jane Alexander

SHIELDING TECHNIQUES

Whilst the technique above is very useful for people you know and have to deal with on a day to day basis (because, eventually, it just might nudge them into a new way of being), there are other methods which are more effective for dealing with strangers, enabling you to keep your inner peace intact.

The classic protection technique is the energy bubble. I’ve come across this - or forms of it - in virtually every tradition under the sun. It’s very simple, very effective and can be used anywhere. This is my version….

* Breathe into your solar plexus and feel that chakra strong and responsive, centering you. Breathe into your root chakra and feel that chakra powerful, rooting you to the earth. Breathe into your third eye chakra, feeling that chakra respond with clear vision and foresight. The chakras link up so it feels as though a rod of pure light is holding up your backbone.
* Now pull in pure energy from the universe through the crown chakra. Bring it down to the solar plexus and, from there, let it burst out around you into a bubble of pure brilliant light which totally surrounds your body like a balloon.
* Know that no negative energy can come in through this powerful protective bubble - you are completely safe.

There are variations on this. I find the bubble the most effective for generally nerve-wracking situations or with people I find uncomfortable. If, however, you feel someone is deliberately targeting you with negative energy you might like to go one step further. Follow the first steps of the bubble technique - linking in with the chakras and pulling down the energy. But this time send it out into the shape of a large box - whose outward-facing sides are mirrors. This way, the negative energy which is thrown at you will bounce straight back to the person who sent it which can be a very uncomfortable experience for them. Once you have "disarmed" them this way, it could be the time to send that loving energy (if you are feeling particularly philanthropic).

Smudging and Blessings Book by Jane Alexander

GUARDIANS AND ALLIES

Despite the huge cynicism, agnosticism and atheism of this confused time, many people do have a strong sense of faith - if not for a particular religion, then for a deep-rooted spirituality. Many of you may feel you have a particular guardian or guardians - angels, gods, goddesses, spirits, ancestors, animal allies. If so, by all means call on them for help in your energy-shielding exercises. You could have the four archangels guarding your bubble - or infuse the bubble with the symbol for Ohm or an image of the Buddha. Or reverberate a holy name through the bubble.

I work a lot with the Native American power animals - simply because they resonate for me and seem to help me a lot. You could try this simple visualization to call on their energy. I use this whenever I need an energetic boost - when I have to go on a long journey, when I have to give a presentation or have an important meeting. It’s very comforting and surprisingly energizing.

* Stand upright and breathe into your solar plexus.
* Feel your feet firmly on the ground, connecting with Mother Earth. Remember your roots, keep steady and true. You are a child of the Earth.
* Feel your head reaching up, connecting with Father Sky. Your feet may be rooted to the Earth but your aspirations reach to the sky, to the universe beyond. You are also a child of the Heavens.
* Now before you rises up the great animal spirit of Eagle. A huge powerful eagle turns and looks at you with his glimmering, all-seeing eye. You nod your head in acknowledgment and thanks. Eagle turns and spreads his wings. Now you will see through Eagle’s eyes, enjoying his sharp far-sighted vision.
* Behind you rears up another huge figure - this time a great grizzly bear. You turn and look up into her sharp eyes, noticing her huge claws and her vast weight and strength. She is fiercely protective - who better to guard your back? Thank Bear and turn back, secure with her powerful presence behind you.
* You hear a sniff to your right, as if someone is trying to attract your attention. It’s Coyote, his bright eyes dancing, his tongue lolling out as if he were laughing. Coyote is quick-talking, smart and a born negotiator. He can help you in any tricky situation. Be wary though - he’s also a trickster. Don’t let yourself become too clever for your own good or Coyote’s strength becomes a weakness.
* Finally you feel a warm, sweet breath on your left arm. Turn and look into the dark melting eyes of Buffalo. She stands four-square, solid and dependable. Buffalo will help off-set tricky Coyote, keeping you grounded and stable.
* Spend a moment feeling these great guardians all around you. Now you can walk into any situation feeling protected and powerful. (Remember at the end of the meeting or day to thank your guardians - it’s traditional to offer a prayer and a pinch of tobacco or cornmeal.)

This is a revised extract from my book, The Energy Secret.

Other books to read for help with inner peace include The Five Minute Healer, The Smudging and Blessings Book, Live Well, Sacred Rituals at Home and Mind, Body, Spirit (which is now out in paperback in the US).

I have two new books – Therapies for a Healthy Body, and Therapies for Emotional Wellbeing (but they are only on special order in the US from Amazon, I note – so maybe not so helpful!).

Read more of Jane Alexander’s work on her website: www.janealexander.org

Copyright © 2003 Jane Alexander. All Rights Reserved.


Spirit of the Bedroom by Jane Alexander Spirit of the Home by Jane Alexander Spirit of the Nursery by Jane Alexander


Jane Alexander
Jane Alexander is a UK-based writer on natural health, holistic living and contemporary spirituality. She has written sixteen books on holistic (and soulful) living, including the bestselling Spirit of the Home (Thorsons), The Energy Secret (Element) and The Five Minute Healer (Simon & Schuster). Her website, www.janealexander.org is full of tips for living soulfully.

Healing Sounds of Color

Combining frequencies of sound and colour enables the mind and body to resonate armoniously. A powerful chakra balancer!
Designed to raise the Consciousness - Please share!

Solfeggio DNA Arpeggio & Throat Singing (Healing Overtone)

Added: August 18, 2008 (Less info)
This piece of music incorporates tones; from the full 12 Solfeggio frequency scale. The throat singing / overtone singing, featured in this track, is by Stian; AKA stingndr on YouTube.

There is also Theta brainwave entrainment technology in this track; by www.unisontherapy.com

The Solfeggio frequencies; are from a musical scale used in ancient music, chants and religious ceremonies; that were lost for many centuries. The Solfeggio scale, chants and frequencies/tones were believed to enable spiritual blessings and transformation when played and sung in harmony.

One of the most interesting Solfeggio frequencies is 528 Hz. According to Dr Len Horowitz and Dr Puleo; some leading genetic bio chemists suggest frequency 528 Hz is the repair frequency for damaged DNA.

528 Hz is one of the main focus frequency's of this track.

There are 9 main Solfeggio frequencies and it's the 6 initial tones that have many suggested benefits. Regardless of ones individual beliefs, as each note has a different tuning from the conventional musical scale, these tones can provide a new stimulus to the mind and physical system. It is recently accepted by scientists, that just providing the brain with new input has many benefits alone, in relation to brain plasticity / keeping the mind young healthy and active. As the mind becomes healthy the physical body also reaps its own reward.

This is a list of some of the Solfeggio Hz and their suggested benefits.

396 Hz - Releasing emotional patterns and the liberation of guilt and fear.

417 Hz - Breaking up crystallized emotional patterns and facilitatiog change.

528 Hz - Association with "DNA integrity" transformation, love and miracles.

639 Hz - Whole brain quadrant interconnectedness/connecting relationships.

741 Hz - Intuitive states, non linear knowing and awakening intuition.

852 Hz --Unconditional love and returning to spiritual order.

The 12 Solfeggio tones follow a mathematical pattern.
They increase by 111 Hz each note.

.. 63 Hz
.174 Hz
.285 Hz
.396 Hz
.417 Hz
.528 Hz
.639 Hz
.741 Hz
.852 Hz
.963 Hz
1174 Hz
1285 Hz

Celestial Harmonics: Healing Tones

Vibrational Awakening: The Healing Power of Sound

GIve Peace A Chance

How to achieve OBEs

Police State (Martial Law) At The Democratic National Convention

http://www.escapetheillusion.com/blog/

Police State (Martial Law) At The Democratic National Convention

28 Aug

Posted by: Mr. Jason in: Martial Law, Media, Police, Politics, Protest

Here is a great visual tribute to the week in the streets of Denver, and next week it will be even more powerful at the RNC. The voices of the people will not be silenced! The mainstream media may try to ignore and drown out our loud voices but we will never give up! You can kill the protester, but you can’t kill the protest. You can murder the rebel but you can’t murder the rebellion!

On the 45th anniversary of Dr. King’s “I have a dream” speech, I think the voices of the people on the street and their treatment by the cops represent more of Kings message of civil disobedience and seeking truth, peace and resisting the forces of fascism and injustice. These things are more symbolic of King’s message than Obama’s speech in front of 75,000+ tonight, its a shame the voices of the people are being ignored by the media.

DNC Protest Footage shot by Billy Nicholson and Kyle Cowan…



Modern Definition of Martial Law:
Martial law is when military-like actions are taken upon a nations own citizens and constitutional and human rights are violated on a regular basis as part of a standard operating procedure (SOP).

It is when you cannot protest without a “permit” and your freedom of speech is silenced.

This week's corrupt cop stories

Law Enforcement: This Week's Corrupt Cops Stories

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from Drug War Chronicle, Issue #549, 8/29/08

A key Coast Guard anti-drug fighter gets caught doing cocaine, plus the usual array of miscreants in blue. We don't usually mention cases that only involve drug use, but when it's a top Coast Guard commander in charge of fighting drugs, we think we should make an exception to the general rule. Let's get to it:

http://stopthedrugwar.org/files/coastguarddrugbust.jpg
Coast Guard drug bust, 2004
In San Francisco, a senior Coast Guard officer who supervised anti-drug trafficking efforts in the Western Pacific was arrested August 20 on cocaine charges. Capt. Michael Sullivan, a 26-year veteran, was charged under military law with wrongful use of cocaine and obstruction of justice, a step that sets up an evidentiary hearing and could prompt a court-martial. Officials gave no further details, but said he had been removed from supervisory duties. Sullivan, who was the Pacific area's chief of response since May 2007, supervised the operation of 20 major Coast Guard cutters and directed law enforcement units that protect ports and fisheries and fight drug trafficking and illegal immigration, according to his official biography.

In Benton, Louisiana, an already convicted ex-cop pleaded guilty Monday to seven additional charges. Former Shreveport police officer Roderick Moore, 53, was sentenced to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to trading drugs for sex with a stripper in Caddo Parish in June. Now he has pleaded guilty to an additional seven counts of possessing drugs with the intent to distribute. The pleas in the drug cases come two days after he pleaded guilty to driving while intoxicated. Although Moore theoretically faces up to 145 years in prison, his sentencing judge said the sentences would run concurrently. The maximum he faces for any one count is 30 years.

In Jackson, Mississippi, a Jackson code enforcement officer was arrested Sunday after being found with six packages of marijuana and $19,000 cash during a traffic stop. Code officer Britanny Arnold was a passenger in a vehicle driven by another man, who was carrying $670,000 in cash. Both Arnold and the driver are now charged with possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. Both have bailed out of jail.

In Rutland, Vermont, a former Vermont state prison guard was sentenced August 20 to seven months in jail on drug charges. Former guard Sheri Ann Fitzgerald, 44, had pleaded guilty in March to felony possession and sale charges involving cocaine as well as a misdemeanor charge of possessing a narcotic. Fitzgerald had been a prison guard since 1989, but was fired after being arrested. She has until September 4 to get her affairs in order and report to jail.

In Saginaw, Michigan, a jail guard at the Saginaw Correctional Facility was formally charged August 20 with supplying drugs to prisoners. John Singer, 45, now faces one count of delivery and manufacture of marijuana and one count of operating a drug house. He went down after a two-month investigation by the Bay Area Narcotics Team, one of whose members posed as a drug dealer willing to supply him for sales on the inside. He was arrested as he met with the officer in what he thought would be a drug transaction.

In Houston, a deputy constable was arrested August 18 for accosting drug dealers and stealing their money. Precinct 4 Deputy Constable Terrence Richardson is charged with engaging in organized crime and robbery. Word of Richardson's exploits percolated up from underground to the ears of the Houston Police Department, which set up a sting operation that snared him as he tried yet another rip-off. At last word, he was still in jail on a $200,000 bond. He is also now a former deputy constable, having been fired the night he was arrested.
Drug War Issues Police Corruption

Police State Mega Post from myspace

From: bleedsfromyou
Date: Aug 29, 2008 1:33 AM


----------------- Bulletin Message -----------------
From: My Hate Speech3
Date: Aug 28, 2008 9:52 PM


Thanks
Just say NO to McCain Obama STOP CFR NWO NAU
Date: 28 Aug 2008, 07:51 PM


Democratic Natl Convention~Denver CO
From: Orwellian Bob
Date: Aug 28, 2008 9:30 PM
Wake up and smell the ashes...



From: Raven
Date: Aug 28, 2008 1:27 PM
Thanks
Al-Mostami3 Bey
Date: Aug 28, 2008 8:50 PM
Thanks Leo Wants U 2 B @ Cine El Rey this Sept. 11th 2008

DNC Police Brutality/Misconduct Superpost
rock chac [chisel]
Date: Aug 28, 2008 6:16 PM
Make sure to watch the 5th YouTube video from the top and watch the CodePink demonstrator get jacked and then ganked...horrifying :(~rcc
RE: SPECIAL DNC CONVENTION EDITON:It's the end of the world
From: Punk Voter





PART II: More Police Brutality Videos and Pictures From The DNC
From: Punk Voter
..

src="http://farm4. static. flickr. com/3210/2799205108_615f9c9932_o. jpg" />





1984







8 Year Old Protesters Arrested (Scare Them When They're Young They'll Never Protest Again





Crazy Christian Gets To Stay But Peaceful Protester Gets Arrested And Code Pink Female Gets Fucked Up By Pig Then Kidnapped On Tape







Detention Facility In Denver





Abc News Arrested Outside Big Lobbyist Shin Dig







Citizens Describe Police Pepper Spraying Peace Protesters







Pigs In Minneapolis Confiscate Journalists Cameras,Computers etc..








Here's a taste of what you get when you try and use the rights given to you under the Constitution.. And I don't think Obama will come on tv and apologize to all the peaceful protesters being beaten to shit then thrown in cages like the pictures and videos above.. I'm shocked and appalled (hahah I finally got to say that) that not one Dem is coming out against the brutalities against it's own citizens.... but.. what do you expect from the same old shit in a new shiny package

Doug McIntyre and Brian Ross on Asa Eslocker Arrest (ABC Reporter

Police Brutality in Denver: DNC08

Reporter Arrested in Denver Taking Pictures of Senators

Police State Thug Clocks Code Pink at DNC Convention

A Message from Ron Paul

America - The Newest Third World Nation By the Earl of Stirling 8-26-8

America - The Newest
Third World Nation
By the Earl of Stirling
8-26-8


The evil Bush administration has largely completed the process begun years ago of turning America, the most powerful and richest nation in history, into a Third World nation. I remember a lunch, about 21 years ago in Long Beach, California, with the president of an aerospace company, myself, and a senior foreign general. A comment by the general has always stayed with me. He said, "America is a very rich nation, it will take a lot to bring her down". In the twenty some years after this, I am simply amazed at just how far one crooked president after another, with the assistance of our "bought and paid for" Congress has managed to take us.

Currently we have an economy that is being held together with bailing wire and glue until after the November election. Even CNBC's Cramer, a capitalist if there ever was one, now says that the American stock market is so rigged that the average person needs to get out NOW (link to a video with him talking about this is http://www.breakthematrix.com/content/Cramer-
States-the-Obvious-Markets-are-Rigged
--- here).

We have just seen the early stages of systemic problems in the American economy and the global economy with the fallout from the subprime mortgage problems. The real problem is that the "policemen" of the American economy, and to a lessor extent the entire global economy, have "been asleep" at their jobs; and this has not been an accident. Laws have been changed overturning the post-Great Depression rules designed to save the banking industry from itself.

We have had a massive host of new investment vehicles created over the last few years, and in many cases even the people pushing the vehicles do not understand how they work because they have been designed to be so complex as to confuse even the experts. We have $1.2 quadrillion invested in derivates, trillions in collateralized debt obligations and structured investment vehicles ~ and many of these new forms of financial paper are shady in the extreme.

The American economy, and with it the global economy, is being deliberately set up to collapse. One can look to the traditional sources of war, economic crisis, and revolution to find the cause behind the demise of America. The global international banking families fingerprints are all over the programmed fall of America. While they had their hands in the War of 1812, and the Civil War, blackmailed Wilson to get the US into the First World War, placed their puppet FDR in the White House to control (to their designs) the Great Depression and then to bate the Japanese to attack us to get American in the Second World War, the deliberate high treason committed on 9/11 by senior Bush/Cheney administration officials was a new low. We have now experienced almost seven years of wars based on this false flag operation and we are being led into yet another war with Iran (a nation with advanced biological strategic weapons of mass destruction that can kill a third of the world). Additionally the satanic US Vice-President is in Georgia preparing to push the Russians into the coming Third World War; a world war that with current 21st Century weapons will kill most of us.

We are currently witnessing the main stream news media's massive coverage of the Democratic National Convention, with the follow-on coverage of the Republican National Convention in a couple of weeks. This coverage is designed to convince the American public that "their vote does count", that the American political system is working for them. This BS/hype is falling on more and more 'deaf ears' as more people turn to the alternative internet news sources for the truth. Americans have not forgotten that two years ago they elected a Democratic Congress to end the war in Iraq but instead the Democratic controlled Congress actually increased the funding for the war and the troop levels.

Some thirty-five years ago, we legalized bribery in America by allowing PACs (political action committees). What had been done before under the table, suddenly became legal and this allowed money to elbow out whatever influence the public had in Congress. Unless you are making tens of thousands of dollars in contributions to your congress critter don't expect him to really care about you or your interest. The average Congressman must raise $40,000 per day for every day that he/she spends in Washington. Not even the most beautiful hooker on earth can rake in that level of money but out Congressmen and Senators do, giving a whole new meaning to the term prostitution.

We have a medical/pharmaceutical industry that is more fraud and rip off than real medicine. Most expensive pharmaceuticals are designed to "treat you" rather than to "cure you" and in fact the treatment usually brings on additional serious health problems. No one can do anything about this as Big Pharma spends untold millions every year buying off Congress.

We have a giant agricultural industry whose genetically modified food is killing off the bees and without the bees, most of us will not have enough food to survive.

A sign of a Third World country is that its systems don't work well because the government is for sale. When you can bribe anyone in the government to get what you want, regardless of the death and suffering that it causes to the population, that is a sign of very deep sickness in the nation. No society that allows a high level of organic corruption, of the outright buying of votes in its parliament or congress, will function well. That is why so many African and other Third World nations are failed states. This is happening more and more to America.

We are in a madman's race to see what kills us first, corporate food and medical nightmares or the ever increasing march to global war by the neo-cons.

It breaks my heart to see the great American experiment in democracy fail and fail so horribly. The first Earl of Stirling (Sir William Alexander of Menstrie) was the founder of English-speaking Canada and was the owner of what became several American states and most of Canada. The last claimant (before me) to the Earldom was Major General Lord Stirling of the American Revolutionary Army. He was a key financier of George Washington; took over Washington's command when he would take a rare leave of absence to return to Mt. Vernon; saved Washington's army at the Battle of Long Island (which the Earls of Stirling use to own); and gave his fortune and his life to the American nation. On my watch (as Earl), I am seeing America destroyed.

Stirling

Cramer States the Obvious - Markets are Rigged

Use Your Imagination by Nate Stevens

OK - does anybody else out there see it coming? Have any of you taken the time to research, and observe and understand how money works, how the economy functions? Have you read about the collapse of Argentina not even 20 years ago? Watch the movie The Take, it gives a good background of what lead to their collapse, and then follows a group of factory workers who occupy the factory where they work, in which the international corporation that owns it is trying to liquidate all the equipment and shutdown the factory, take it to a different country. The workers end up reclaiming the factory and nationalizing it for the people, but not after a tense and almost deadly violent confrontation with the Argentinian National Government. Anyways....

Are you thinking about this America?? Do you see how broke we are? Let's examine some scenarios, let's use our imaginations here, and do some observation in the next few weeks. First, start to notice all the systems that support you throughout the day. Take just one average day in your life. You get up, lots of you in air-conditioned rooms. Head to the bathroom, take a shower with nice bath products and those plastic scrubby lathering devices. Lots of people then put on some other products to make themselves smell good, and to add color to their face, to make their hair fixed into a certain shape. Roll some sticky goo under your armpits. Am I forgetting anything? How many products have we used so far? It's only 6:30AM - we havnt even opened up the fridge yet.

Breakfast. What do you cook? No one really cooks anymore, so what do you open? Let's take a look. How about some cereal, with milk, and a banana. The bananas get shipped or flown in from Central and South America, we buy them with our US Dollars. The cereals are grown all over the world, whatever company made your cereal probably bought the cheapest grain on the market to make that cereal, and there's a good bet that it contains GMO (Genetically Modified Organism) grains. That's another story altogether though.

So, then walk outside, get into your car, which is fueled by gasoline that was imported mostly from the Middle East, with a percentage from Venezuela, Oh, here it is:

Crude Oil Imports (Top 15 Countries)
(Thousand Barrels per Day)
Country Jun-08 May-08 YTD 2008 Jun-07 YTD 2007
CANADA 1,883 1,840 1,888 1,905 1,881
SAUDI ARABIA 1,479 1,579 1,523 1,501 1,407
MEXICO 1,124 1,116 1,193 1,392 1,454
VENEZUELA 1,085 1,030 1,012 1,135 1,109
NIGERIA 946 851 1,036 893 1,022
IRAQ 693 583 674 573 476
ANGOLA 636 464 496 502 568
BRAZIL 280 318 221 121 158
ALGERIA 269 440 319 504 494
RUSSIA 228 119 109 29 135
KUWAIT 179 263 219 263 193
ECUADOR 178 162 192 166 195
COLOMBIA 177 245 182 143 108
CHAD 107 57 101 80 69
LIBYA 89 96 76 144 66


Anyways, you can see that we are not producing our own oil to start those engines. OK, so what kind of car are you driving? Good change that is not US made either, the US car makers have been going downhill for a long long time, and may not survive much longer at the rate our ship is sinking.

So, continue to examine and observe every system, tool, and resource that gets you through the day. I think you may be starting to get my point. If not, I will make it clear: the average American doesnt do shit for themself. They eat, drive, sleep in, wash with, dress in, and apply products and resources mostly produced in other nations.

Now, because I am really tired and need to get some sleep, I am going to cut to the chase and leave off for my next article. In the next article we will examine and imagine what life will look like in the near future when our dollars are worthless, the shipments of food, products, oil and cars stop coming in from all these nations that we have been bullying for the last half century, and what life may start to look like very soon in the good ol US of A!! yay! (hint: pour yourself a nice stiff one folks, it aint a picnic)

Market Meltdown - Jim Cramer

Ron Paul on Mad Money w/ Jim Cramer 12-14-07

Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for collapse than the US

http://www.energybulletin.net/node/23259

Preparing for the Coming US Economic Collapse By Ron Chapman Oct 29, 2007,

Preparing for the Coming US Economic Collapse
By Ron Chapman
Oct 29, 2007, 16:48


Preparing for the Coming US Economic Collapse

By Ron Chapman



G'day cobbers,

I get the impression that some forum posters think nothing is more
important than being negative about AH and its goals. If I were in
their situation I would be packin' death about what the future holds –
especially for those living in the good old US of A. IF one truly
believes that US-style 3D life is all there is one needs to get into
ECONOMIC COLLAPSE mode FKN quickly. There ain't much time left.

Currently the U.S. economy is poised to perform a magical disappearing
act.

Many of the problems that sank the Soviet Union now endanger the US.
For instance, like the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, it has a huge,
well-equipped and very expensive military bogged down fighting Muslim
freedom fighters in foreign lands. Also, energy shortfalls linked to
peaking oil production and horrendously unfavourable capital account
and trade balances is resulting in runaway foreign debt. Add to that a
delusional self-image, an inflexible ideology, and unresponsive,
totally corrupt authoritarian judicial and political systems.

When supported by corrupt judicial and political systems economic
arrangements can continue through sheer inertia well after they become
untenable. But eventually the tide of fraudulent practices, broken
promises and failed corporate activities flushes it down the drain.
The US economy and society currently floats on the false assumption
that it is possible to perpetually borrow increasing sums of money
from the rest of the world, to pay for ever-increasing manufacturing
and energy imports, while the price of those imports steadily
escalates. In particular the US economy and polity floats on the
notion that free money (fiat petro-dollars and US Treasury notes) will
always be able to buy energy imports from foreign lands. This use of
free money equates to FREE energy. But good things don't last forever
and so the US's free petro-dollar scam is a transient condition. Once
the US dollar loses its world reserve currency status based on its
role as the petro-dollar (as is now happening) the flow of FREE energy
to the US will cease and much of the US economy will be forced to shut
down.

Fuel shortages will precipitate shortages of food, medicine, and
countless consumer items, outages of electricity, gas, and water,
breakdowns in transportation systems and other infrastructure,
hyperinflation, widespread shutdowns and mass layoffs, along with a
lot of despair, confusion, violence, and lawlessness. Moreover, there
is no evidence that the US governing elite has any grand rescue plans
or innovative technology programs with which to prevent the coming
socio-economic catastrophe, nor does US society evince any signs of
manifesting any miracles of social cohesion during the impending
economic implosion.

US society is based on money. In the coming economic collapse the
governing elite is already fuelling that collapse by pumping excessive
quantities of virtual (credit) money into the banking system. The
result will be hyperinflation, which wipes out savings. As oil and
other import prices escalate they will be accompanied by rampant
unemployment, which wipes out incomes. The result is a population that
is largely penniless.

As most employment in the US is in the private sector, the transition
to permanent unemployment of much of the workforce is likely to be
sudden as businesses rapidly shed workers in an effort to stay viable,
or go into liquidation.

In the US very few people own their place of residence free and clear,
and even if they do they need an income to pay real estate and other
taxes. So, people without an income face homelessness. When the
economy collapses, very few people will continue to have an income, so
homelessness will become rampant. Add to that the motor vehicle (mv)
dependent lifestyle in most US cities and the countryside, and the
result of mass unemployment can only be mass migrations of homeless
people, mostly towards city centres.

The US population is almost entirely mv-dependent, and relies on
markets that control oil importation, refining, and distribution. They
also rely on continuous public investment in road construction and
repair. Also motor vehicles require a steady stream of imports of both
parts and whole vehicles neither of which are designed to last very
long. When these intricately inter-dependent systems stop functioning
the bulk of the US population will be virtually immobilised as public
transport systems are negligible.

US families generally tend to be atomized, geographically dispersed
and unused to sharing. Families unused to sharing in good times are
likely to find it very difficult to co-operate in bad times.
Competitiveness and personal isolation tend to be endemic already and
economic collapse is unlikely to cure these attitudes and situations.

Economic collapse tends to shut down both local production and
imports, and so it is vitally important that anything you own wears
out slowly, and that you or someone in your family or community (if
you have one to call on) can fix it if it breaks. This is another
reason why AH is exhorting people to develop their community
relationships.

In the US most people get their food from a supermarket, which is
supplied from far away using refrigerated diesel trucks. Many people
also eat fast food. When people do cook, they rarely cook from
scratch. Apart from being unhealthy, these habits will cease to be
viable if super markets and fast food sellers are unable to get food
supplies from distant places. On the positive side, obesity will cease
to be a problem for most people.

US health care is for profit. Once the economy collapses, the profit
ceases, as will most of the services it motivates.

This article is based on the information in the article "Closing the
'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for collapse than the US"
by Dmitry Orlov Published on 4 Dec 2006 by Energy Bulletin. Archived
on 4 Dec 2006. See http://www.energybulletin.net/23259.html

Orlov's article compares and contrasts the situation of the Soviet
Union when it collapsed at the beginning of the 1990s with the
situation in the US at the end of 2006. In my opinion this article is
a MUST READ for anyone seriously concerned about surviving the
impending economic difficulties facing the population of the US in the
near future.

Orlov says, rightly in my view, that a new subsistence/barter economy
emerges almost immediately in the aftermath of an economic collapse,
whatever its cause.

The scenario discussed by Orlov is predicated upon the current 3D
economic situation, absent ANY Earth changes or other physical
catastrophes that could create or exacerbate it.

Namaste
Ron

The Collapse of the US Dollar

Money As Debt

This video answers in simple language and terms the question "What Is Money"? It gives a background of the development of credit, and the fiat money system, and shows that ever since the creation of credit, financial wealth and goods have been increasingly flowing into the hands of fewer and fewer people. This is a great video to watch if you really dont know how the USA money system works.....peace

ncs

Children of The 7th Sun

This has some pretty esoteric references, and sounds like it is something taken from a larger piece, but I think it is a pretty cool "woo-woo" video, which presents a vision for a new world that can be created when humanity collectively chooses to consciously align itself with the energies of the greater universal systems....or something like that....peace

ncs

Surfing the Matrix intro part 2

www.surfingthematrix.com

I just started this website tonight. I do not know the first thing about building a website. I just bought the domain name a few hours ago, linked it to a free blog I set up, and that is all I have so far. I will be updating this blog daily with news and information from behind the scenes and every little nook and cranny of the net, including lots of research into the current state of our economy, freedoms, state of mind, our ecology, commonly held belief systems, new ideas, debunking common myths, exposing lies and corruption, spreading information on consciousness raising, local and national events of import, world news, spiritual developments, the battle between information, disinformation, and misinformation.....the economic meltdown of the USA, ideas on how to rebuild our communities in the wake of a post-industrial meltdown, and any and all ideas, articles, videos, music and writings that inspire me to share with you.

I could definitely use some help from anyone who knows about building an actual website, since I would like to get off of the blogging site, and set up the site real professional-like, with chapters, links pages, video section, etc etc. So, anyone with input of helpful info for me, please do not hesitate to get in touch.

I want this site to be a place people can go away from main stream media (MSM) to educate themselves on the real stories behind the issues, or at the very least, to get another perspective than Faux News, BBC, CBS and all the other corporatocratic media outlets (MASS BRAINWASHING PROPOGANDA MACHINES) that most Americans still get their news from. See, where we get our information from seems to shape people's belief systems, and if the majority of a mass of people in our nation are getting MSM news stories, well, this creates the mass-dumbing down of our collective intelligence and ability to research the story from more perspectives than what the corporate owned and controlled MSM wishes for us. I will be collecting as much indie media as I can get my hands on. Let's try to wade around the brain damaging MSM machine, and find out what's really going on on this planet, share our ideas with each other, listen to what other countries really think about the USA, and get to the truth of the matter.

It's time to change the way we get our information, and take charge of our lives. To really empower yourself, examine your beliefs and why you think what you think. These are some of the themes of my new site, I hope you stop by, share your ideas, send me stories to post (nathancstevens@gmail.com) and offer any critiques you may feel like sending my way. My intention and goal for this site is to build a clearinghouse of information that comes from intelligent, informed people around the globe, and those fighting the MSM control mechanism for the truth and global perspective to shine forth.

I believe that the more complete of a picture we can create in our collective mind field of what is truly going on behind the world scene in real time, the closer we can grow towards oneness, understanding, and ultimately peace and acceptance.

nate stevens

Alex Jones on Russian TV: The US has been hijacked

Belief Systems and Social Perception Structures

belief: Whatever an individual is willing to accept without direct verification by experience
or without the support of evidence, resulting in assumption which is taken as a basis for action or non-action.

Beliefs are tools for social conditioning, rather than expressions of inner realization or universal truth.

ideology Vague term for the embodiment of beliefs in abstract ideas that can drive human behavior to pathological extremes.

Do You Believe In ________?

"Belief drives behavior, but often belief is not based on experience and so does not reach or reflect the intimately lived dimension of human existence. Indeed, the very nature of belief precludes the necessity of experience. Belief does not merely dispense with the evidence of experience, it can go further and deny the evidence of experience. And it often does. Therein lies the power of belief. Belief is motivation by reliance on an assigned version of reality or an assigned version of what might be imagined. Ultimately, the problem introduced by belief is not a matter of believing versus non-believing, because annulment of the will to believe is not possible. The true conflict here is between believing and learning. "The unexamined belief is not worth holding." True enough, but the examined belief may not be worth holding, either. A great many beliefs, once they are examined, may prove to be worthless as indicators of truth or guides to experience, although they may serve to define identity and confer a sense of belonging."

"Some things are proposed to have certain properties which may be logically inconsistent, and hence these things can be proved not to exist ." Dr. Niclas Berggren from "A Note on the Concept of Belief"

"I know what I believe. I will continue to articulate what I believe
and what I believe — I believe what I believe is right." —George W. Bush, in Rome, July 22, 2001

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Belief - 'mental acceptance of a proposition, statement, or fact, as true, on the ground of apparent authority, which does not have to be based on actual fact. ” Assent to a proposition or affirmation, or the acceptance of a fact, opinion, or assertion as real or true, without immediate personal knowledge; reliance upon word or testimony; partial or full assurance without positive knowledge or absolute certainty; persuasion; conviction; confidence; as, belief of a witness; the belief of our senses a religious doctrine that is proclaimed as true without proof [syn: dogma, tenet]

Something believed, i.e., accepted as true. Example: Most religions of the world hold the belief that the universe was created by a divine, unseen being.

Experiential knowledge always trumps a belief having no basis in actual experience.

Hysteron Proteron: The logical fallacy of assuming as true and using as a premise a proposition that is yet to be proved.

Definitions: "A Priori ": Click here

"A Note on The Concept of Belief"

"We may choose in any evaluative process of thought to adopt the set of criteria which we later use to judge fact claims. But the central thing to note here is that by rational people these criteria are not chosen to correspond to what beliefs they wish to hold. They choose the criteria a priori that in some sense fulfill their need to know things about the world in the best manner. They do not choose the criteria a priori that lead to certain, specific beliefs: the criteria are general and universal and are adopted to be applicable to all judgments of fact claims. Being able to choose irrationally is not the same as wanting to do so ... the criterion of faith is about accepting fact claims without or even in opposition to available evidence. In short, it is an irrational criterion to use for gathering knowledge." Why is it irrational? The reason is that this criterion for judging fact claims is unable to discriminate between competing fact claims in a rational manner (i.e., by discussing evidence pro et con). In other words, it leads to un-falsifiable fact claims. If you accept the fact claim "God exists" without or even in opposition to evidence, then how can you then demonstrate that the mutually exclusive fact claims "Allah exists", "Zeus exists", "Krishna exists" and "Thor exists" are false? You cannot. The general problem with choosing to use an irrational criterion for assessing fact claims is that one is not concerned with the issue of truth but rather some other issues, such as feeling good. This is not done on a conscious level of thought. A related problem with the Christian process of belief formation is the tendency to disregard all evidence which is contrary to the desired belief. In other words, it is not just that the criterion for judging facts accepts beliefs without or even in opposition to all available evidence, it is also the case that all available evidence is not taken into consideration. The wish to retain a certain belief - that an external God exists - for pragmatic reasons, rather than truth reasons, is evidently so strong as to override all rationality concerns." Dr. Niclas Berggren from "A Note on the Concept of Belief"

Creation of Belief Systems

"Within social structures, social interaction takes place. This social interaction is presented in the form of text/discourse, which is then cognizized according to a cognitive system/memory. This "system/memory" consists of short-term memory, in which "strategic process," or decoding and interpretation takes place. Long-term memory, however, serves as a holder of "socio-cultural knowledge," which consists of knowledge of language, discourse, communication, persons, groups and events-existing in the form of "scripts." "Social (group) attitudes" also reside within long-term memory and provide further decoding guides. Each of these "group attitudes" can represent an array of ideologies which combine to create one's own personal ideology which conforms to one's identity, goals, social position, values and resources.

This "process" of framing "beliefs and opinions," say Van Djik, that benefit one particular group, is not final. "Some people may be forced or persuaded, socially or economically" to go against their "best interests"

-from Critical Discourse Analysis, ©1995 Brett Dellinger Related Links: Discourse Analysis | Social Cognition and Organization of Knowledge | The Sociology of Knowledge | Experience |

credibility Trust conferred on the source of a belief, rather than in the substance of the belief itself.

aligned belief: chosen after careful consideration of options or alternatives.
assigned belief A belief acquired from one’s familial, cultural and religious background and accepted like a task or role assigned to the believer, rather than chosen on a voluntary basis.
blind belief: refuses to be questioned or examined. Contrast to open belief.
compound belief: combines various modes of belief in the same syndrome.
conflicted belief: contains contradictory and opposing elements that confuse the believer.
conflictual belief: compels the believer into antagonism toward others.
consensual belief: held by consent rather than chosen with deliberation. We consent to believe what others believe. Here the primary appeal of the belief may consist in the fact that many others hold it. The mainstream religions of the world depend on consensus rather than upon invididual deliberation and choice. To consent to believe something is not to choose to believe it, rather the join company with those who believe it. The primary accent of consensual belief is inclusion in a group.
corporate belief: belongs to a program or agenda and serves the ends proposed in that program or agenda.
default belief: held due to lack of considering any alternatives.
deliberated belief: chosen by a process of considering and evaluating options. Synonymous with aligned belief.

dereasoning: The process separating the reasons and conditions for adopting a belief from its truth value.
dereasoned belief: deprived of its original properties by the process of dereasoning, i.e., isolating the conditions and reasons for holding a belief and thus reducing it to its inherent truth value, if it has any.
dissenting belief: deliberately opposed to conventional and established beliefs.
doctrinal belief: based on predefined dogmas or doctrines. Contrast to intuitive belief.
ethical belief: relates to a way of behaving or prescribes a code of behavior.
extremist belief: enacted in uncompromising or fanatical behavior. Often associated with violence, if not directly used as a justification for violence.
fundamentalist belief: received from a tradition and not allowed to be altered or questioned.
heretic belief: chosen in direct opposition to a widely accepted belief.
humanist belief: based on assumptions that assume human intelligence as the best author of convictions, without need of attributing beliefs and rules for living to a superhuman agency.
ideological belief: expressed in ideological form, that is, in a systematic body of abstractions or formal ideas.
imperative belief: stated in a flat non-narrative form.
latent belief: held but not enacted.
ludic belief: able to be modified by playing with it.

Earth Culture Conceptual Variations/Distortions Regarding Knowledge

Note: "Modern Psychology" has had over 200 theories of personality - that should tell you something right there - they haven't a clue. The conceptual dynamic on Earth relative to the subject of knowledge is somewhat similar, in that it is set in the context of a body-ID material, linear reality, and conceived of from the middle ages to the present time. In actuality, in terms of their list, knowledge involves several statements below simultaneously. The attempt to define only one approach was intended to further obscure evolution of personal perspective, in order to maintain the status quo over time. MORE: Click here.

"I'm only human--I'm just a man/woman.
Help me believe in what I believe and all that I am."

Yeah...right...silly child...wake up from the dream!

"The Bible tells us to 'be like God', and then on page after page it describes God as a mass murderer. This may be the single most important key to the political behavior of Western Civilization."
- Robert Anton Wilson

See related link discussions: Morality and Religion and Christianity

Various Internet Essays of Interest:

On Belief Systems and Learning The Nature of Belief Systems	What is a Belief State? Alternative Analysis of Mass Belief Systems
Belief Systems in Africa Belief Coercion in Religious Groups	Belief Without Evidence What Is Belief?
Belief and Knowledge Definition of Cognitive Distortions	Definition and Meaning Psychiatry As A Modern Belief System
Reality, Belief and the Mind (Good) The Fixation of Belief	Core Beliefs Dogma and Belief: Famous Quotes
The Absence of Belief Metapsychology: The Un-Belief System	The Biology of Belief Excellence in Critical Thinking
Thought Contagion My Reasons for Being an Atheist	The Culture of Cults

Definition of Cognitive Distortions:
(See also Taboos in the Paradigm areas)

Cognitive distortions are logical, but they are not rational. They can create real difficulty with your thinking. See if you are doing any of the ten common distortions that people use. Rate yourself from one to ten with one being low and ten being high. Ask yourself if you can stop using the distortions and think in a different way.

ALL-OR-NOTHING THINKING: You see things in black-and-white categories. If your performance falls short of perfect, you see your self as a total failure.

OVERGENERALIZATION: You see a single negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat.

MENTAL FILTER: You pick out a single negative detail and dwell on it exclusively so that your vision of all reality becomes darkened, like the drop of ink that discolors the entire beaker of water.

DISQUALIFYING THE POSITIVE: You reject positive experiences by insisting they "don't count" for some reason or other. In this way you can maintain a negative belief that is contradicted by your everyday experiences.

JUMPING TO CONCLUSIONS: You make a negative interpretation even though there are no definite facts that convincingly support your conclusion.

MIND READING: You arbitrarily conclude that someone is reacting negatively to you, and you don't bother to check this out

THE FORTUNETELLER ERROR: you can anticipate that things will turn out badly, and you feel convinced that your prediction is an already-established fact.


MAGNIFICATION (CATASTROPHIZING) OR MINIMIZATION: You exaggerate the importance of things (such as your goof-up or someone else's achievement), or you inappropriately shrink things until they appear tiny (your own desirable qualities or other fellow's imperfections). This is also called the binocular trick."


EMOTIONAL REASONING: You assume that your negative emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are: "I feel it, therefore it must be true."


SHOULD STATEMENTS: You try to motivate yourself with should and shouldn't, as if you had to be whipped and punished before you could be expected to do anything. "Musts" and "oughts" are also offenders. The emotional consequences are guilt. When you direct should statements toward others, you feel anger, frustration, and resentment.


LABELING AND MISLABELING: This is an extreme form of overgeneralization. Instead of describing your error, you attach a negative label to yourself. "I'm a loser." When someone else's behavior rubs you the wrong way, you attach a negative label to him" "He's a Goddamn louse." Mislabeling involves describing an event with language that is highly colored and emotionally loaded.


PERSONALIZATION: You see your self as the cause of some negative external event, which in fact you were not primarily responsible for.

Some Interesting Quotes

"The paradox of our era is that we is that we extend toleration to systems of belief that
are themselves intrinsically intolerant and abhorrent to modern consciousness."

"A belief is an idea that is held based on some support - even if that support is the result of prior fabrication by someone else who needs one to belief as he does..."

"To believe in something is not the same as knowing something. Intrinsic to the concept of belief is implication that there is an opposite to belief, disbelief. Not everyone will believe something is true, but all sane and rational people will acknowledge an observable fact."

"Belief is based only on unconfirmed information, so the person declaring the belief is always hedging his/her bet as to whether the belief is 'correct', and seeks the company of those who 'believe' and seeks to separate those who don't, with the strongest beliefs attaching themselves to concepts of identity and the apparent nature of the reality around them, with a peculiar preference for religions, 'belief' in external god figures and more."

"Religion, in its essence, is thus not a scheme of conduct, but a theory of causes. What brought it into the world in the remote days I try to conjure up by hypotheses in Section I were man's eternal wonder and his eternal hope. It represents one of his 'boldest efforts' to 'penetrate the unknowable', to 'put down the intolerable', to 'refashion the universe nearer to his heart's desire'. My belief is that it is a poor device to that end--that when it is examined objectively it testifies to his lack of sense quite as much as to his high striving. But that belief is just a belief. The immense interest and importance of the thing itself remains." H.L. Mencken, Treatise on the Gods (NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1930, revised 1946) In other words, religion is a mental construct based on a belief system, not objective reality. For more background, click here.

The Eventual Result At Some Point

"Kill the disbelievers!"
(Typical comment from a 'believer') = Planetary Discord, Terrorism, Violence, Ethnic Cleansing, etc.

Logic & Fallacies

A fallacy is, very generally, an error in reasoning. This differs from a factual error, which is simply being wrong about the facts. To be more specific, a fallacy is an "argument" in which the premises given for the conclusion do not provide the needed degree of support.

A deductive fallacy is a deductive argument that is invalid (it is such that it could have all true premises and still have a false conclusion).

An inductive fallacy is less formal than a deductive fallacy. They are simply "arguments" which appear to be inductive arguments, but the premises do not provided enough support for the conclusion. In such cases, even if the premises were true, the conclusion would not be more likely to be true.

Visit Fallacy Tutorial Pro 3.0 online.

_{Logics and Fallacies
by Mathew 1995-1997}

Introduction

There's a lot of debate on the net. Unfortunately, much of it is of very low quality. The aim of this document is to explain the basics of logical reasoning, and hopefully improve the overall quality of debate.

The Concise Oxford English Dictionary defines logic as "the science of reasoning, proof, thinking, or inference". Logic will let you analyze an argument or a piece of reasoning, and work out whether it is likely to be correct or not. You don't need to know logic to argue, of course; but if you know even a little, you'll find it easier to spot invalid arguments.

There are many kinds of logic, such as fuzzy logic and constructive logic; they have different rules, and different strengths and weaknesses. This document discusses simple Boolean logic, because it's commonplace and relatively easy to understand. When people talk about something being 'logical', they usually mean the type of logic described here.

What Logic Is Not

It's worth mentioning a couple of things which logic is not.

Firstly, logical reasoning is not an absolute law which governs the universe. Many times in the past, people have concluded that because something is logically impossible (given the science of the day), it must be impossible, period. It was also believed at one time that Euclidean geometry was a universal law; it is, after all, logically consistent. Again, we now know that the rules of Euclidean geometry are not universal.

Secondly, logic is not a set of rules which govern human behavior. Humans may have logically conflicting goals. For example:

• John wishes to speak to whoever is in charge.

• The person in charge is Steve.

• Therefore John wishes to speak to Steve.

Unfortunately, John may have a conflicting goal of avoiding Steve, meaning that the reasoned answer may be inapplicable to real life.

This document only explains how to use logic; you must decide whether logic is the right tool for the job. There are other ways to communicate, discuss and debate.

Arguments

An argument is, to quote the Monty Python sketch, "a connected series of statements to establish a definite proposition".

Many types of argument exist; we will discuss the deductive argument. Deductive arguments are generally viewed as the most precise and the most persuasive; they provide conclusive proof of their conclusion, and are either valid or invalid.

Deductive arguments have three stages: premises, inference, and conclusion. However, before we can consider those stages in detail, we must discuss the building blocks of a deductive argument: propositions.

Propositions

A proposition is a statement which is either true or false. The proposition is the meaning of the statement, not the precise arrangement of words used to convey that meaning.

For example, "There exists an even prime number greater than two" is a proposition. (A false one, in this case.) "An even prime number greater than two exists" is the same proposition, re-worded.

Unfortunately, it's very easy to unintentionally change the meaning of a statement by rephrasing it. It's generally safer to consider the wording of a proposition as significant.

It's possible to use formal linguistics to analyze and re-phrase a statement without changing its meaning; but how to do so is outside the scope of this document.

Premises

A deductive argument always requires a number of core assumptions. These are called premises, and are the assumptions the argument is built on; or to look at it another way, the reasons for accepting the argument. Premises are only premises in the context of a particular argument; they might be conclusions in other arguments, for example.

You should always state the premises of the argument explicitly; this is the principle of audiatur et altera pars. Failing to state your assumptions is often viewed as suspicious, and will likely reduce the acceptance of your argument.

The premises of an argument are often introduced with words such as "Assume...", "Since...", "Obviously..." and "Because...". It's a good idea to get your opponent to agree with the premises of your argument before proceeding any further.

The word "obviously" is also often viewed with suspicion. It occasionally gets used to persuade people to accept false statements, rather than admit that they don't understand why something is 'obvious'. So don't be afraid to question statements which people tell you are 'obvious' -- when you've heard the explanation you can always say something like "You're right, now that I think about it that way, it is obvious."

Inference

Once the premises have been agreed, the argument proceeds via a step-by-step process called inference.

In inference, you start with one or more propositions which have been accepted; you then use those propositions to arrive at a new proposition. If the inference is valid, that proposition should also be accepted. You can use the new proposition for inference later on.

So initially, you can only infer things from the premises of the argument. But as the argument proceeds, the number of statements available for inference increases.

There are various kinds of valid inference - and also some invalid kinds, which we'll look at later in this document. Inference steps are often identified by phrases like "therefore..." or "...implies that..."

Conclusion

Hopefully you will arrive at a proposition which is the conclusion of the argument - the result you are trying to prove. The conclusion is the result of the final step of inference. It's only a conclusion in the context of a particular argument; it could be a premise or assumption in another argument.

The conclusion is said to be affirmed on the basis of the premises, and the inference from them. This is a subtle point which deserves further explanation.

Implication in detail

Clearly you can build a valid argument from true premises, and arrive at a true conclusion. You can also build a valid argument from false premises, and arrive at a false conclusion.

The tricky part is that you can start with false premises, proceed via valid inference, and reach a true conclusion. For example:

• Premise: All fish live in the ocean

• Premise: Sea otters are fish

• Conclusion: Therefore sea otters live in the ocean

There's one thing you can't do, though: start from true premises, proceed via valid deductive inference, and reach a false conclusion.

We can summarize these results as a "truth table" for implication. The symbol "=>" denotes implication; "A" is the premise, "B" the conclusion. "T" and "F" represent true and false respectively.

Truth Table for Implication

Premise	Conclusion	Inference
A	B	A => B
false	false	true
false	true	true
true	false	false
true	true	true

• If the premises are false and the inference valid, the conclusion can be true or false. (Lines 1 and 2.)

• If the premises are true and the conclusion false, the inference must be invalid. (Line 3.)

• If the premises are true and the inference valid, the conclusion must be true. (Line 4.)

So the fact that an argument is valid doesn't necessarily mean that its conclusion holds -- it may have started from false premises.

If an argument is valid, and in addition it started from true premises, then it is called a sound argument. A sound argument must arrive at a true conclusion.

Example argument

Here's an example of an argument which is valid, and which may or may not be sound:

1. Premise: Every event has a cause

2. Premise: The universe has a beginning

3. Premise: All beginnings involve an event

4. Inference: This implies that the beginning of the universe involved an event

5. Inference: Therefore the beginning of the universe had a cause

6. Conclusion: The universe had a cause

The proposition in line 4 is inferred from lines 2 and 3. Line 1 is then used, with the proposition derived in line 4, to infer a new proposition in line 5. The result of the inference in line 5 is then re-stated (in slightly simplified form) as the conclusion.

Spotting arguments

Spotting an argument is harder than spotting premises or a conclusion. Lots of people shower their writing with assertions, without ever producing anything you might reasonably call an argument.

Sometimes arguments don't follow the pattern described above. For example, people may state their conclusions first, and then justify them afterwards. This is valid, but it can be a little confusing.

To make the situation worse, some statements look like arguments but aren't. For example:

"If the Bible is accurate, Jesus must either have been insane, an evil liar, or the Son of God."

That's not an argument; it's a conditional statement. It doesn't state the premises necessary to support its conclusion, and even if you add those assertions it suffers from a number of other flaws which are described in more detail in the Atheist Arguments document.

An argument is also not the same as an explanation. Suppose that you are trying to argue that Albert Einstein believed in God, and say:

"Einstein made his famous statement 'God does not play dice' because of his belief in God."

That may look like a relevant argument, but it's not; it's an explanation of Einstein's statement. To see this, remember that a statement of the form "X because Y" can be re-phrased as an equivalent statement, of the form "Y therefore X". Doing so gives us:

"Einstein believed in God, therefore he made his famous statement 'God does not play dice'.

Now it's clear that the statement, which looked like an argument, is actually assuming the result which it is supposed to be proving, in order to explain the Einstein quote.

Furthermore, Einstein did not believe in a personal God concerned with human affairs -- again, see the Atheist Arguments document.

Further reading

We've outlined the structure of a sound deductive argument, from premises to conclusion. But ultimately, the conclusion of a valid logical argument is only as compelling as the premises you started from. Logic in itself doesn't solve the problem of verifying the basic assertions which support arguments; for that, we need some other tool.

The dominant means of verifying basic assertions is scientific enquiry. However, the philosophy of science and the scientific method are huge topics which are quite beyond the scope of this document.

For a more comprehensive introduction to logic, try Flew's "Thinking Straight", listed in the Atheist Media document. A much more detailed book is Copi's "Introduction to Logic". The Electronic Resources document also lists LOGIC-L, a LISTSERV mailing list devoted to discussing the teaching of elementary logic.

Fallacies

There are a number of common pitfalls to avoid when constructing a deductive argument; they're known as fallacies. In everyday English, we refer to many kinds of mistaken beliefs as fallacies; but in logic, the term has a more specific meaning: a fallacy is a technical flaw which makes an argument unsound or invalid.

(Note that you can criticize more than just the soundness of an argument. Arguments are almost always presented with some specific purpose in mind -- and the intent of the argument may also be worthy of criticism.)

Arguments which contain fallacies are described as fallacious. They often appear valid and convincing; sometimes only close inspection reveals the logical flaw.

Below is a list of some common fallacies, and also some rhetorical devices often used in debate. The list isn't intended to be exhaustive; the hope is that if you learn to recognize some of the more common fallacies, you'll be able to avoid being fooled by them.

The Nizkor Project at has another excellent list of logical fallacies; Stephen Downes maintains a list too. The reference works mentioned above also all contain fallacy lists.

Sadly, many of the examples below have been taken directly from Usenet, though some have been rephrased for the sake of clarity.

---

List of fallacies

• Accent

• Ad hoc

• Affirmation of the consequent

• Amphiboly

• Anecdotal evidence

• Argumentum ad antiquitatem

• Argumentum ad baculum / Appeal to force

• Argumentum ad crumenam

• Argumentum ad hominem

• Argumentum ad ignorantiam

• Argumentum ad lazarum

• Argumentum ad logicam

• Argumentum ad misericordiam

• Argumentum ad nauseam

• Argumentum ad novitatem

• Argumentum ad numerum

• Argumentum ad populum

• Argumentum ad verecundiam

• Audiatur et altera pars

• Bifurcation

• Circulus in demonstrando

• Complex question / Fallacy of interrogation / Fallacy of presupposition

• Fallacies of composition

• Converse accident / Hasty generalization

• Converting a conditional

• Cum hoc ergo propter hoc

• Denial of the antecedent

• The fallacy of accident / Sweeping generalization / Dicto simpliciter

• Fallacy of division

• Equivocation / Fallacy of four terms

• The extended analogy

• Ignoratio elenchi / Irrelevant conclusion

• The Natural Law fallacy / Appeal to Nature

• The "No True Scotsman..." fallacy

• Non causa pro causa

• Non sequitur

• Petitio principii / Begging the question

• Plurium interrogationum / Many questions

• Post hoc ergo propter hoc

• Red herring

• Reification / Hypostatization

• Shifting the burden of proof

• The slippery slope argument

• Straw man

• Tu quoque

• Fallacy of the Undistributed Middle / "A is based on B" fallacies / "...is a type of..." fallacies

• For more fallacies and more examples, and scholarly references, see "Stephen's Guide to the Logical Fallacies" (Off Site)

---

Accent

Accent is a form of fallacy through shifting meaning. In this case, the meaning is changed by altering which parts of a statement are emphasized. For example:

"We should not speak ill of our friends"

and

"We should not speak ill of our friends"

Be particularly wary of this fallacy on the net, where it's easy to misread the emphasis of what's written.

Ad hoc

As mentioned earlier, there is a difference between argument and explanation. If we're interested in establishing A, and B is offered as evidence, the statement "A because B" is an argument. If we're trying to establish the truth of B, then "A because B" is not an argument, it's an explanation.

The Ad Hoc fallacy is to give an after-the-fact explanation which doesn't apply to other situations. Often this ad hoc explanation will be dressed up to look like an argument. For example, if we assume that God treats all people equally, then the following is an ad hoc explanation:

"I was healed from cancer."

"Praise the Lord, then. He is your healer."

"So, will He heal others who have cancer?"

"Er... The ways of God are mysterious."

Affirmation of the consequent

This fallacy is an argument of the form "A implies B, B is true, therefore A is true". To understand why it is a fallacy, examine the truth table for implication given earlier. Here's an example:

"If the universe had been created by a supernatural being, we would see order and organization everywhere. And we do see order, not randomness -- so it's clear that the universe had a creator."

This is the converse of Denial of the Antecedent.

Amphiboly

Amphiboly occurs when the premises used in an argument are ambiguous because of careless or ungrammatical phrasing. For example:

"Premise: Belief in God fills a much-needed gap."

Anecdotal evidence

One of the simplest fallacies is to rely on anecdotal evidence. For example:

"There's abundant proof that God exists and is still performing miracles today. Just last week I read about a girl who was dying of cancer. Her whole family went to church and prayed for her, and she was cured."

It's quite valid to use personal experience to illustrate a point; but such anecdotes don't actually prove anything to anyone. Your friend may say he met Elvis in the supermarket, but those who haven't had the same experience will require more than your friend's anecdotal evidence to convince them.

Anecdotal evidence can seem very compelling, especially if the audience wants to believe it. This is part of the explanation for urban legends; stories which are verifiably false have been known to circulate as anecdotes for years.

Argumentum ad antiquitatem

This is the fallacy of asserting that something is right or good simply because it's old, or because "that's the way it's always been." The opposite of Argumentum ad Novitatem.

"For thousands of years Christians have believed in Jesus Christ. Christianity must be true, to have persisted so long even in the face of persecution."

Argumentum ad baculum / Appeal to force

An Appeal to Force happens when someone resorts to force (or the threat of force) to try and push others to accept a conclusion. This fallacy is often used by politicians, and can be summarized as "might makes right". The threat doesn't have to come directly from the person arguing. For example:

"... Thus there is ample proof of the truth of the Bible. All those who refuse to accept that truth will burn in Hell."

"... In any case, I know your phone number and I know where you live. Have I mentioned I am licensed to carry concealed weapons?"

Argumentum ad crumenam

The fallacy of believing that money is a criterion of correctness; that those with more money are more likely to be right. The opposite of Argumentum ad Lazarum. Example:

"Microsoft software is undoubtedly superior; why else would Bill Gates have got so rich?"

Argumentum ad hominem

Argumentum ad hominem literally means "argument directed at the man"; there are two varieties.

The first is the abusive form. If you refuse to accept a statement, and justify your refusal by criticizing the person who made the statement, then you are guilty of abusive argumentum ad hominem. For example:

"You claim that atheists can be moral -- yet I happen to know that you abandoned your wife and children."

This is a fallacy because the truth of an assertion doesn't depend on the virtues of the person asserting it. A less blatant argumentum ad hominem is to reject a proposition based on the fact that it was also asserted by some other easily criticized person. For example:

"Therefore we should close down the church? Hitler and Stalin would have agreed with you."

A second form of argumentum ad hominem is to try and persuade someone to accept a statement you make, by referring to that person's particular circumstances. For example:

"Therefore it is perfectly acceptable to kill animals for food. I hope you won't argue otherwise, given that you're quite happy to wear leather shoes."

This is known as circumstantial argumentum ad hominem. The fallacy can also be used as an excuse to reject a particular conclusion. For example:

"Of course you'd argue that positive discrimination is a bad thing. You're white."

This particular form of Argumentum ad Hominem, when you allege that someone is rationalizing a conclusion for selfish reasons, is also known as "poisoning the well".

It's not always invalid to refer to the circumstances of an individual who is making a claim. If someone is a known perjurer or liar, that fact will reduce their credibility as a witness. It won't, however, prove that their testimony is false in this case. It also won't alter the soundness of any logical arguments they may make.

Argumentum ad ignorantiam

Argumentum ad ignorantiam means "argument from ignorance". The fallacy occurs when it's argued that something must be true, simply because it hasn't been proved false. Or, equivalently, when it is argued that something must be false because it hasn't been proved true.

(Note that this isn't the same as assuming something is false until it has been proved true. In law, for example, you're generally assumed innocent until proven guilty.)

Here are a couple of examples:

"Of course the Bible is true. Nobody can prove otherwise."

"Of course telepathy and other psychic phenomena do not exist. Nobody has shown any proof that they are real."

In scientific investigation, if it is known that an event would produce certain evidence of its having occurred, the absence of such evidence can validly be used to infer that the event didn't occur. It does not prove it with certainty, however.

For example:

"A flood as described in the Bible would require an enormous volume of water to be present on the earth. The earth doesn't have a tenth as much water, even if we count that which is frozen into ice at the poles. Therefore no such flood occurred."

It is, of course, possible that some unknown process occurred to remove the water. Good science would then demand a plausible testable theory to explain how it vanished.

Of course, the history of science is full of logically valid bad predictions. In 1893, the Royal Academy of Science were convinced by Sir Robert Ball that communication with the planet Mars was a physical impossibility, because it would require a flag as large as Ireland, which it would be impossible to wave.

[ Fortean Times Number 82.]

See also Shifting the Burden of Proof.

Argumentum ad lazarum

The fallacy of assuming that someone poor is sounder or more virtuous than someone who's wealthier. This fallacy is the opposite of the Argumentum ad Crumenam. For example:

"Monks are more likely to possess insight into the meaning of life, as they have given up the distractions of wealth."

Argumentum ad logicam

This is the "fallacy fallacy" of arguing that a proposition is false because it has been presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument. Remember always that fallacious arguments can arrive at true conclusions.

"Take the fraction 16/64. Now, cancelling a six on top and a six on the bottom, we get that 16/64 = 1/4."

"Wait a second! You can't just cancel the six!"

"Oh, so you're telling us 16/64 is not equal to 1/4, are you?"

Argumentum ad misericordiam

This is the Appeal to Pity, also known as Special Pleading. The fallacy is committed when someone appeals to pity for the sake of getting a conclusion accepted. For example:

"I did not murder my mother and father with an axe! Please don't find me guilty; I'm suffering enough through being an orphan."

Argumentum ad nauseam

This is the incorrect belief that an assertion is more likely to be true, or is more likely to be accepted as true, the more often it is heard. So an Argumentum ad Nauseam is one that employs constant repetition in asserting something; saying the same thing over and over again until you're sick of hearing it.

On Usenet, your argument is often less likely to be heard if you repeat it over and over again, as people will tend to put you in their kill files.

Argumentum ad novitatem

This is the opposite of the Argumentum ad Antiquitatem; it's the fallacy of asserting that something is better or more correct simply because it is new, or newer than something else.

"BeOS is a far better choice of operating system than OpenStep, as it has a much newer design."

Argumentum ad numerum

This fallacy is closely related to the argumentum ad populum. It consists of asserting that the more people who support or believe a proposition, the more likely it is that that proposition is correct. For example:

"The vast majority of people in this country believe that capital punishment has a noticeable deterrent effect. To suggest that it doesn't in the face of so much evidence is ridiculous."

"All I'm saying is that thousands of people believe in pyramid power, so there must be something to it."

Argumentum ad populum

This is known as Appealing to the Gallery, or Appealing to the People. You commit this fallacy if you attempt to win acceptance of an assertion by appealing to a large group of people. This form of fallacy is often characterized by emotive language. For example:

"Pornography must be banned. It is violence against women."

"For thousands of years people have believed in Jesus and the Bible. This belief has had a great impact on their lives. What more evidence do you need that Jesus was the Son of God? Are you trying to tell those people that they are all mistaken fools?"

Argumentum ad verecundiam

The Appeal to Authority uses admiration of a famous person to try and win support for an assertion. For example:

"Isaac Newton was a genius and he believed in God."

This line of argument isn't always completely bogus; for example, it may be relevant to refer to a widely-regarded authority in a particular field, if you're discussing that subject. For example, we can distinguish quite clearly between:

"Hawking has concluded that black holes give off radiation"

and

"Penrose has concluded that it is impossible to build an intelligent computer"

Hawking is a physicist, and so we can reasonably expect his opinions on black hole radiation to be informed. Penrose is a mathematician, so it is questionable whether he is well-qualified to speak on the subject of machine intelligence.

Audiatur et altera pars

Often, people will argue from assumptions which they don't bother to state. The principle of Audiatur et Altera Pars is that all of the premises of an argument should be stated explicitly. It's not strictly a fallacy to fail to state all of your assumptions; however, it's often viewed with suspicion.

Bifurcation

Also referred to as the "black and white" fallacy, bifurcation occurs if someone presents a situation as having only two alternatives, where in fact other alternatives exist or can exist. For example:

"Either man was created, as the Bible tells us, or he evolved from inanimate chemicals by pure random chance, as scientists tell us. The latter is incredibly unlikely, so..."

Circulus in demonstrando

This fallacy occurs if you assume as a premise the conclusion which you wish to reach. Often, the proposition is rephrased so that the fallacy appears to be a valid argument. For example:

"Homosexuals must not be allowed to hold government office. Hence any government official who is revealed to be a homosexual will lose his job. Therefore homosexuals will do anything to hide their secret, and will be open to blackmail. Therefore homosexuals cannot be allowed to hold government office."

Note that the argument is entirely circular; the premise is the same as the conclusion. An argument like the above has actually been cited as the reason for the British Secret Services' official ban on homosexual employees.

Circular arguments are surprisingly common, unfortunately. If you've already reached a particular conclusion once, it's easy to accidentally make it an assertion when explaining your reasoning to someone else.

Complex question / Fallacy of interrogation / Fallacy of presupposition

This is the interrogative form of Begging the Question. One example is the classic loaded question:

"Have you stopped beating your wife?"

The question presupposes a definite answer to another question which has not even been asked. This trick is often used by lawyers in cross-examination, when they ask questions like:

"Where did you hide the money you stole?"

Similarly, politicians often ask loaded questions such as:

"How long will this EU interference in our affairs be allowed to continue?"

or

"Does the Chancellor plan two more years of ruinous privatization?"

Another form of this fallacy is to ask for an explanation of something which is untrue or not yet established.

Fallacies of composition

The Fallacy of Composition is to conclude that a property shared by a number of individual items, is also shared by a collection of those items; or that a property of the parts of an object, must also be a property of the whole thing. Examples:

"The bicycle is made entirely of low mass components, and is therefore very lightweight."

"A car uses less petrochemicals and causes less pollution than a bus. Therefore cars are less environmentally damaging than buses."

Converse accident / Hasty generalization

This fallacy is the reverse of the Fallacy of Accident. It occurs when you form a general rule by examining only a few specific cases which aren't representative of all possible cases. For example:

"Jim Bakker was an insincere Christian. Therefore all Christians are insincere."

Converting a conditional

This fallacy is an argument of the form "If A then B, therefore if B then A".

"If educational standards are lowered, the quality of argument seen on the Internet worsens. So if we see the level of debate on the net get worse over the next few years, we'll know that our educational standards are still falling."

This fallacy is similar to the Affirmation of the Consequent, but phrased as a conditional statement.

Cum hoc ergo propter hoc

This fallacy is similar to post hoc ergo propter hoc. The fallacy is to assert that because two events occur together, they must be causally related. It's a fallacy because it ignores other factors that may be the cause(s) of the events.

"Literacy rates have steadily declined since the advent of television. Clearly television viewing impedes learning."

This fallacy is a special case of the more general non causa pro causa.

Denial of the antecedent

This fallacy is an argument of the form "A implies B, A is false, therefore B is false". The truth table for implication makes it clear why this is a fallacy.

Note that this fallacy is different from Non Causa Pro Causa. That has the form "A implies B, A is false, therefore B is false", where A does not in fact imply B at all. Here, the problem isn't that the implication is invalid; rather it's that the falseness of A doesn't allow us to deduce anything about B.

"If the God of the Bible appeared to me, personally, that would certainly prove that Christianity was true. But God has never appeared to me, so the Bible must be a work of fiction."

This is the converse of the fallacy of Affirmation of the Consequent.

The fallacy of accident / Sweeping generalization / Dicto simpliciter

A sweeping generalization occurs when a general rule is applied to a particular situation, but the features of that particular situation mean the rule is inapplicable. It's the error made when you go from the general to the specific. For example:

"Christians generally dislike atheists. You are a Christian, so you must dislike atheists."

This fallacy is often committed by people who try to decide moral and legal questions by mechanically applying general rules.

Fallacy of division

The fallacy of division is the opposite of the Fallacy of Composition. It consists of assuming that a property of some thing must apply to its parts; or that a property of a collection of items is shared by each item.

"You are studying at a rich college. Therefore you must be rich."

"Ants can destroy a tree. Therefore this ant can destroy a tree."

Equivocation / Fallacy of four terms

Equivocation occurs when a key word is used with two or more different meanings in the same argument. For example:

"What could be more affordable than free software? But to make sure that it remains free, that users can do what they like with it, we must place a license on it to make sure that will always be freely redistributable."

One way to avoid this fallacy is to choose your terminology carefully before beginning the argument, and avoid words like "free" which have many meanings.

The extended analogy

The fallacy of the Extended Analogy often occurs when some suggested general rule is being argued over. The fallacy is to assume that mentioning two different situations, in an argument about a general rule, constitutes a claim that those situations are analogous to each other.

Here's real example from an online debate about anti-cryptography legislation:

"I believe it is always wrong to oppose the law by breaking it."

"Such a position is odious: it implies that you would not have supported Martin Luther King."

"Are you saying that cryptography legislation is as important as the struggle for Black liberation? How dare you!"

Ignoratio elenchi / Irrelevant conclusion

The fallacy of Irrelevant Conclusion consists of claiming that an argument supports a particular conclusion when it is actually logically nothing to do with that conclusion.

For example, a Christian may begin by saying that he will argue that the teachings of Christianity are undoubtedly true. If he then argues at length that Christianity is of great help to many people, no matter how well he argues he will not have shown that Christian teachings are true.

Sadly, these kinds of irrelevant arguments are often successful, because they make people to view the supposed conclusion in a more favorable light.

The Natural Law fallacy / Appeal to Nature

The Appeal to Nature is a common fallacy in political arguments. One version consists of drawing an analogy between a particular conclusion, and some aspect of the natural world -- and then stating that the conclusion is inevitable, because the natural world is similar:

"The natural world is characterized by competition; animals struggle against each other for ownership of limited natural resources. Capitalism, the competitive struggle for ownership of capital, is simply an inevitable part of human nature. It's how the natural world works."

Another form of appeal to nature is to argue that because human beings are products of the natural world, we must mimic behavior seen in the natural world, and that to do otherwise is 'unnatural':

"Of course homosexuality is unnatural. When's the last time you saw two animals of the same sex mating?"

Robert Anton Wilson deals with this form of fallacy at length in his book "Natural Law". A recent example of "Appeal to Nature" taken to extremes is The Unabomber Manifesto.

The "No True Scotsman..." fallacy

Suppose I assert that no Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge. You counter this by pointing out that your friend Angus likes sugar with his porridge. I then say "Ah, yes, but no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge.

This is an example of an ad hoc change being used to shore up an assertion, combined with an attempt to shift the meaning of the words used original assertion; you might call it a combination of fallacies.

Non causa pro causa

The fallacy of Non Causa Pro Causa occurs when something is identified as the cause of an event, but it has not actually been shown to be the cause. For example:

"I took an aspirin and prayed to God, and my headache disappeared. So God cured me of the headache."

This is known as a false cause fallacy. Two specific forms of non causa pro causa fallacy are the cum hoc ergo propter hoc and post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacies.

Non sequitur

A non sequitur is an argument where the conclusion is drawn from premises which aren't logically connected with it. For example:

"Since Egyptians did so much excavation to construct the pyramids, they were well versed in paleontology."

(Non sequiturs are an important ingredient in a lot of humor. They're still fallacies, though.)

Petitio principii / Begging the question

This fallacy occurs when the premises are at least as questionable as the conclusion reached. Typically the premises of the argument implicitly assume the result which the argument purports to prove, in a disguised form. For example:

"The Bible is the word of God. The word of God cannot be doubted, and the Bible states that the Bible is true. Therefore the Bible must be true.

Begging the question is similar to circulus in demonstrando, where the conclusion is exactly the same as the premise.

Plurium interrogationum / Many questions

This fallacy occurs when someone demands a simple (or simplistic) answer to a complex question.

"Are higher taxes an impediment to business or not? Yes or no?"

Post hoc ergo propter hoc

The fallacy of Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc occurs when something is assumed to be the cause of an event merely because it happened before that event. For example:

"The Soviet Union collapsed after instituting state atheism. Therefore we must avoid atheism for the same reasons."

This is another type of false cause fallacy.

Red herring

This fallacy is committed when someone introduces irrelevant material to the issue being discussed, so that everyone's attention is diverted away from the points made, towards a different conclusion.

"You may claim that the death penalty is an ineffective deterrent against crime -- but what about the victims of crime? How do you think surviving family members feel when they see the man who murdered their son kept in prison at their expense? Is it right that they should pay for their son's murderer to be fed and housed?"

Reification / Hypostatization

Reification occurs when an abstract concept is treated as a concrete thing.

"I noticed you described him as 'evil'. Where does this 'evil' exist within the brain? You can't show it to me, so I claim it doesn't exist, and no man is 'evil'."

Shifting the burden of proof

The burden of proof is always on the person asserting something. Shifting the burden of proof, a special case of Argumentum ad Ignorantiam, is the fallacy of putting the burden of proof on the person who denies or questions the assertion. The source of the fallacy is the assumption that something is true unless proven otherwise.

For further discussion of this idea, see the "Introduction to Atheism" document.

"OK, so if you don't think the grey aliens have gained control of the US government, can you prove it?"

The slippery slope argument

This argument states that should one event occur, so will other harmful events. There is no proof made that the harmful events are caused by the first event. For example:

"If we legalize marijuana, then more people would start to take crack and heroin, and we'd have to legalize those too. Before long we'd have a nation full of drug-addicts on welfare. Therefore we cannot legalize marijuana."

Straw man

The straw man fallacy is when you misrepresent someone else's position so that it can be attacked more easily, knock down that misrepresented position, then conclude that the original position has been demolished. It's a fallacy because it fails to deal with the actual arguments that have been made.

"To be an atheist, you have to believe with absolute certainty that there is no God. In order to convince yourself with absolute certainty, you must examine all the Universe and all the places where God could possibly be. Since you obviously haven't, your position is indefensible."

The above straw man argument appears at about once a week on the net. If you can't see what's wrong with it, read the "Introduction to Atheism" document.

Tu quoque

This is the famous "you too" fallacy. It occurs if you argue that an action is acceptable because your opponent has performed it. For instance:

"You're just being randomly abusive."

"So? You've been abusive too."

This is a personal attack, and is therefore a special case of Argumentum ad Hominem.

Fallacy of the Undistributed Middle / "A is based on B" fallacies / "...is a type of..." fallacies

These fallacies occur if you attempt to argue that things are in some way similar, but you don't actually specify in what way they are similar. Examples:

"Isn't history based upon faith? If so, then isn't the Bible also a form of history?"

"Islam is based on faith, Christianity is based on faith, so isn't Islam a form of Christianity?"

"Cats are a form of animal based on carbon chemistry, dogs are a form of animal based on carbon chemistry, so aren't dogs a form of cat?"

A Continuum of Influence and Persuasion

Top

	Education	Advertising	Propaganda	Indoctrination	Thought Reform
Focus of body of knowledge	Many bodies of knowledge, based on scientific findings in various fields.	Body of knowledge concerns product, competitors; how to sell and influence via legal persuasion.	Body of knowledge centers on political persuasion of masses of people.	Body of knowledge is explicitly designed to inculcate organizational values.	Body of knowledge centers on changing people without their knowledge.
Direction & degree of exchange	Two way pupil-teacher exchange encouraged.	Exchange can occur but communication generally one-sided.	Some exchange occurs but communication generally one-sided.	Limited exchange occurs, communication is one-sided.	No exchange occurs, communication is one-sided.
Ability to change	Change occurs as science advances; as students and other scholars offer criticisms; as students & citizens evaluate programs.	Change made by those who pay for it, based upon the success of ad programs by consumers law, & in response to consumer complaints.	Change based on changing tides in world politics and on political need to promote the group, nation, or international organization.	Change made through formal channels, via written suggestions to higher-ups.	Change occurs rarely; organization remains fairly rigid; change occurs primarily to improve thought-reform effectiveness.
Structure of persuasion	Uses teacher-pupil structure; logical thinking encouraged.	Uses an instructional mode to persuade consumer/buyer.	Takes authoritarian stance to persuade masses.	Takes authoritarian & hierarchical stance.	Takes authoritarian & hierarchical stance; No full awareness on part of learner.
Type of relationship	Instruction is time-limited: consensual.	Consumer/buyer can accept or ignore communication.	Learner support & engrossment expected.	Instruction is contractual: consensual	Group attempts to retain people forever.
Deceptiveness	Is not deceptive.	Can be deceptive, selecting only positive views.	Can be deceptive, often exaggerated.	Is not deceptive.	Is deceptive.
Breadth of learning	Focuses on learning to learn & learning about reality; broad goal is rounded knowledge for development of the individual.	Has a narrow goal of swaying opinion to promote and sell an idea, object, or program; another goal is to enhance seller & possibly buyer.	Targets large political masses to make them believe a specific view or circumstance is good.	Stresses narrow learning for a specific goal; to become something or to train for performance of duties.	Individualized target; hidden agenda (you will be changed one step at a time to become deployable to serve leaders).
Tolerance	Respects differences.	Puts down competition.	Wants to lessen opposition.	Aware of differences.	No respect for differences.
Methods	Instructional techniques.	Mild to heavy persuasion.	Overt persuasion sometimes unethical.	Disciplinary techniques.	Improper and unethical techniques.

References:

1. Lifton, R.J. (1961). Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism. New York: W.W. Norton. (Also: 1993, University of North Carolina Press.)

2. Lifton, R.J. (1987). Cults: Totalism and civil liberties. In R.J. Lifton, The Future of Immortality and Other Essays for a Nuclear Age. New York: Basic Books.

3. Lifton, R.J. (1991, February). Cult formation. Harvard Mental Health Letter.

4. Hunter, E. (1951). Brainwashing in China. New York: Vanguard.

5. Schein, E.H. (1961). Coercive Persuasion. New York: W. W. Norton.

6. Singer, M.T. (1987). Group psychodynamics. In R. Berkow (Ed.). Merck Manual, 15th ed. Rahway, NJ: Merck, Sharp, & Dohme.

7. West, L.J., & Singer, M.T. (1980). Cults, quacks, and nonprofessional psychotherapies. In H.I. Kaplan, A.M. Freedman, & B.J. Sadock (Eds.), Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry III, 3245-3258. Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins.

8. Ofshe, R., & Singer, M.T. (1986). Attacks on peripheral versus central elements of self and the impact of thought reforming techniques. Cultic Studies Journal. 3, 3-24.

9. Singer. M.T. & Ofshe, R.(1990) Thought reform programs and the production of psychiatric casualties. Psychiatric Annals, 20, 188-193

10. Ofshe, R. (1992). Coercive persuasion and attitude change. Encyclopedia of Sociology. Vol. 1, 212-224. New York: McMillan.

11. Wright, S. (1987) Leaving Cults. The Dynamics of Defection. Society for the Scientific Study of religion. Monograph no. 7, Washington, DC.
    
    

Cognitive Processes and the Suppression of Sound Scientific Ideas

J. Sacherman 1997

Abstract

American and British history is riddled with examples of valid research and inventions which have been suppressed and derogated by the conventional science community. This has been of great cost to society and to individual scientists. Rather than furthering the pursuit of new scientific frontiers, the structure of British and American scientific institutions leads to conformity and furthers consensus-seeking. Scientists are generally like other people when it comes to the biases and self-justifications that cause them to make bad decisions and evade the truth. Some topics in science are 'taboo' subjects. Two examples are the field of psychic phenomenon and the field of new energy devices such as cold fusion. Journals, books and internet sites exist for those scientists who want an alternative to conformist scientific venues.

Although some scientific ideas are truely unfounded, the author of this paper will explore instances when valuable scientific ideas were unfairly reviled and rejected. This author will discuss the cognitive processes, including cognitive dissonance, conformity, and various biases which contribute to such suppression.


Examples from history of suppression in the sciences

A legacy of cognitive biases and faulty judgments exists. It typifies the history of American and British scientific inquiry and research.

One of the earliest examples with which nearly everyone is familiar occurred in the early seventeenth Century. Galileo was branded as a heretic and sent to prison for declaring that the earth traveled around the sun (Manning 1996)..

This paper will concentrate on examples from a period starting closer to the industrial age and continuing until the present. The first example presented here is drawn from Richard Milton's (1996) book Alternative Science. Antoine Lavoisier, the science authority for eighteenth and early nineteenth century Europe and father of modern chemistry, assured his fellow Academicians in 1790, that meteorites could not fall from the sky as there were no stones in the sky (Milton,1996). In spite of first-hand reports of meteors falling from the sky, Lavoisier was believed. Nearly all of the meteorites in public and private collections were then thrown out. Only one meteor that was too heavy to move was saved, so today the world has few specimens that predate 1790. Meteors were not commonly collected again until mounting evidence for their extraterrestrial origin predominated about 50 years later.

Milton (1996) continued with the history of the human powered flight. During the years, between 1903 to 1908, Wilbur and Orville Wright repeatedly demonstrated the flight capability of their invention, the airplane. Despite these demonstrations plus numerous independent affidavits and photographs from local enthusiasts as well, the Wrights' claims were not believed. Scientific American, the New York Herald, the US Army and most American scientists discredited the Wrights and proclaimed that their mechanism was a hoax. Noted experts from the US Navy and from Johns Hopkins University decried "powered human flight . . .absurd "(Milton,1996 p.11).

In a similar vein, the inventors of the turbine ship engine, the mechanical naval gunnery control, the electric ships telegraph, and the steel ship hull all initially met with disinterest, disbelief and derision by the British Navy of the nineteenth century (Milton, 1996).

There are numerous accounts of useful science ideas that received such treatment. However, this writer will discuss just a few of the inventions and ideas by the best known scientists. Milton (1996) explained how the invention of what is now considered a very ordinary object, the light bulb, was initially mired in controversy and disbelief. When Thomas Edison was finally successful in finding a light bulb filament which could glow while sustaining the heat of electrical conduction, he invited members of the scientific community to observe his demonstration (Milton 1996). Although the general public traveled to witness his electric lamp, the noted scientists of the day refused to and claimed the following about Edison:

"Such startling announcements as these should be deprecated as being unworthy of science and mischievous to its true progress." -Sir William Siemens, England's most distinguished engineer (Milton, 1996 p.18)

"The Sorcerer of Menlo Park appears not to be acquainted with the subtleties of the electrical sciences. Mr. Edison takes us backwards. One must have lost all recollection of American hoaxes to accept such claims." -Professor Du Moncel (Milton,1996 p.18)

"Edison's claims are "so manifestly absurd as to indicate a positive want of knowledge of the electric circuit and the principles governing the construction and operation of electrical machines."-Edwin Weston, specialist in arc lighting (Milton, 1996 p.18)

Luckily, the disinterest and derision of Edison's scientific peers did not prevent sharp speculators, like J. P. Morgan and William Vanderbilt from investing funds and helping Edison's inventions become universally adopted (Milton, 1996). Other inventors of the day were not always so lucky.

Cost to individuals and to society

Many invaluable concepts for inventions from Edison's era, were not granted financial backing (Milton, 1996). This was the case for most of the ideas of Nikola Tesla, who known for the discovery and development of AC current. In the book, The Coming Energy Revolution, the author, Jeanne Manning (1996), told of how the treatment of Tesla contrasted with that of his contemporary, Edison. Tesla did not bother as Edison did, to "play the game" (p. 24) with the U.S. science establishment, the media and the investors. Manning (1996) continued with explaining that even though Tesla was the main trail-blazer of the age of electricity, his almost inaccessible brilliance, his lack of interest in publishing, and his wish to give everyone free electric power may have caused substantial professional jelousy. Manning (1996) further postulated that this jealousy and Tesla's non-conformity were responsible for the lack of support and acknowledgment he received. Moreover, Manning (1996) continued, even though other inventors were often credited for them, many of the products that came out of the age of electricity were directly due to Tesla's concepts. These were inventions such as Marconi's radio, which was presented to the public in 1901 and used 17 of Tesla's patented ideas. In 1943, the Supreme Court had, in fact, ruled that Tesla was the radio's inventor (Manning,1996). Unfortunately for Tesla, that was some years after his death. After the US science community and investors turned their back on Tesla, he descended "into wild eccentricity"(p. 26). However, Manning (1996) asserted, his research on wireless power conveyance, bladeless turbines, excess-output energy machines and other futuristic devices are still being marveled at and studied by those that have rediscovered this unappreciated genius.

Other innovators who were described by Milton (1996) as victims of the insults of the skeptical scientific power elite, were such men as John Logie Baird, inventor of television. Baird had been described by the British Royal Society as "a swindler" (p. 19). Likewise, Wilhelm Roentgen's discovery of X-rays was decried as an "elaborate hoax" (p.22) by Lord Kelvin, the most influential scientist of Europe in 1895. Scientists of Roentgen's day produced film fogging X-rays on a substantial scale but were unwilling to consider the wide ranging implications of Roentgen's work for 10 years after his discovery (Milton, 1996).

Another example of such victimization, presented by Dean Radin (1996) in his book The Conscious Universe, involved the theory of German meteorologist, Alfred Wegener. This theory which Wegener developed in 1915, contended that the earth's continents had once been a single mass of land which later drifted apart. Although Wegener carefully cataloged geological evidence, his American and British colleagues ridiculed both him and his idea (Radin, 1996). Although Wegener died an intellectual outcast in 1930, every schoolchild is currently taught his theory which is known as continental drift.

The cost of scientific suppression to society can be seen in the history of the development of the tank. According to Milton (1996), at a time when 1.000 men a day were dying on W.W.I battlefields for want of protection from shelling and gunfire, the British admiralty, of that epoch, had the following to say about E. L.. deMole's , invention, the tank:.

"Caterpillar landships are idiotic and useless. Nobody has asked for them and nobody wants them. Those officers and men are wasting their time and are not pulling their proper weight in the war"(p. 20).

Derogation, Trivialization and Reduction of Dissonance

Some quotations collected by Christopher Cerf and Victor Navakky in their book The Experts Speak (1984) illustrated further the hostile or trivializing attitude towards different ideas, scientific inquiries, and revolutionary discoveries.


"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction." -Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology France, 1872 (p.30)

"Fooling around with alternating current in just a waste of time. Nobody will use it, ever." -Thomas Edison, 1889 (p.207)


"I laughed till. . . my sides were sore." -Adam Sedgwick, British geologist in a letter to Darwin in regards to his theory of evolution, 1857 (p.9)


"If the whole of the English language could be condensed into one word, it would not suffice to express the utter contempt those invite who are so deluded as to be disciples of such an imposture as Darwinism." -Francis Orpen Morris, British ornithologist 1877 (p.10)


"Airplanes are interesting toys, but of no military value." - Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre (p.245)


"To affirm that the aeroplane is going to 'revolutionize' naval warfare of the future is to be guilty of the wildest exaggeration." -Scientific American, 1910 (p.246)


"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" - H. M. Warner, Warner Brothers Studios, 1927 (p.72)


"The whole procedure of shooting rockets into space. . . presents difficulties of so fundamental a nature, that we are forced to dismiss the notion as essentially impracticable, in spite of the author's insistent appeal to put aside prejudice and to recollect the supposed impossibility of heavier-than-air flight before it was actually accomplished." -Richard van der Riet Wooley, British astronomer (p.257)


"The energy produced by the atom is a very poor kind of thing. Anyone who expects a source of power from the transformation of these atoms is talking moonshine." Ernst Rutherford, 1933 (p.215)


"Space travel is bunk" - Sir Harold Spencer Jones, Astronomer Royal of Britain, 1957, two weeks before the launch of Sputnik (p.258)


"But what hell is it good for?" -Engineer Robert Lloyd, IBM 1968, commenting on the microchip (p.209)


"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." -Ken Olson, president of Digital Equipment Corp. 1977 (p.209)

Several of the above examples show new ideas that were grievously misjudged by scientific peers and those in authority.

Today, scientific research is still judged by peer review. Henry Bauer (1994) in his book Scientific Literacy and the Myth of the Scientific Method revealed how research is generally funded through association with a university. In Western civilization , said Bauer (1994) selected peers judge the journal articles that the academic scientists must publish to retain their university positions and insure future funding.


Specific questions about the process of peer review were examined by sociologist Michael J. Mahoney of the University of Pennsylvania. In an interview granted to Boston Globe science reporter, David Chandler (1987), Mahoney discussed his study. Mahoney sent copies of a paper to 75 reviewers but doctored the results so that in some cases the research appeared to support mainstream theories (Chandler 1987). In other cases Mahoney had doctored the paper so the research deviated from them. When the doctored results ran contrary to the reviewer's theoretical beliefs the author's procedures were berated and the manuscript was rejected. When the results in the doctored papers confirmed the reviewer's beliefs, the same procedures were then lauded and the manuscript was recommended for publication (Chandler 1987).


Mahoney presented the results of this study to the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Afterwards, Mahoney received 200 to 300 letters and phone calls from scientists who felt they had been victimized because the results of their research conflicted with the generally accepted scientific viewpoint or with their reviewer's beliefs (Chandler 1987).


Daniel Koshland, editor the leading US scientific journal, Science, said this in an interview to Chandler(1987) about science that threatens to change the parameters of what is accepted:



"I think it's fair to say that a new idea, something that confronts existing dogma, has an uphill road. . .There certainly is no question that there is a prejudice in favor of the existing dogma"(Chandler 1987).
In the same interview with Chandler (1987), Koshland cited, as one example, biochemist Edwin G. Krebs' discovery for which he received the Nobel prize. The discovery which is now known as the Krebs cycle, describes the fundamental series of enzyme reactions in living organisms. It was initially rejected.

Koshland (Chandler 1987) continued with the history of biologist Lynn Margulis's work, showing the evolution of cell structure through symbiotic unions of primitive organisms. It was also initially rejected and even scorned (Chandler 1987). Although her work has become the accepted dogma and appears in textbooks, in 1970 the National Science Foundation not only turned her down for funding, but told her that she should never apply again. Koshland stated that there are other examples such as these (Chandler 1987).

In-Group and Out-Group Effects

Koshland's statement about the prejudices against ideas that go against the existing dogma (Chandler 1987), and the examples Koshland gives lead this author to suppose that in-group biases could be blinding the scientific authorities to the validity of unorthodox, out-group ideas. As Aronson (1995) revealed, the valid points which the out-group makes are not readily perceived by the in-group. Moreover, the weak points or elements of the out-group preponderate in the mind of the in-group. Aronson (1995) explained the tendency to "in-group favoritism" (p. 144) in which members were thought to produce better output than non-members. This author believes that, scientists with challenging ideas have been viewed as an out-group by the in-group of conventional scientists.

The Urge to Conform

Chemistry and science studies professor, Henry H. Bauer (1994), in his book, Scientific Literacy and the Myth of the Scientific Method urged us to realize that scientists are only human and are therefore subject to all the variations that humans posses. He claimed that although scientists have been seen as single- mindedly pursuing truth in all fields, in actuality scientists are generally expert in only one field and the pursuit of truth may not be a top priority. The fact that modern scientists are financially dependent on university and foundation research positions that are in turn dependent on grants. (Bauer, 1994) These are key factors in the formulation of a scientist's priorities. This financial dependence and instability, declared Bauer (1994), creates a direct conflict of interest between pure scientific pursuit and behavior aimed at keeping funding and positions.

A job in scientific research, seems to this writer, to be much like any precarious career position. There could be the usual tendencies to conform and participate in group-think. Criticism by the science community and loss of livelihood appear to this author to be punishment, while acceptance by the science community and financial security seem like rewards. According to Aronson (1996), punishment and rewards generally compel one to conform.


Bauer (1994) painted a picture of "an elite research community,"(p. 99) consisting of a few dozen universities, which traditionally have been deemed to have the most experts. These universities are thought to turn out the best results and publications and are the top choice to receive both government and private research money.


Bauer (1994) explained that there is little money in this country for more exploratory pursuits for the "sake of scientific progress"(p. 98). Funding and acknowledgment go to virtually the same schools and the same groups of scientists, so the scope of exploration and scientific thought becomes limited and intellectual inbreeding occurs (Bauer 1994). Most of the scientists chosen to be journal editors and peer reviewers are also selected from this same narrow ingrained group. This phenomenon was referred to by Bauer (1994) as the "imperfections of the filter"(p. 99).


Like the "concurrence seeking" (p. 18) member of Hitler's inner circle, described by Aronson (1995), this "highly filtered" (Bauer p. 99) group of scientists tend to be in a position that often demand consensus of opinion and necessitates conformity.


Bauer (1994) illustrated how, throughout history, the course of scientific discovery was impeded by the social environment and prejudices of the time. He gave the example of how in Nazi Germany, the scientists were unable to make progress. The reason for this Bauer (1994) explained, is that they had been commanded to work without the theory of relativity as that theory had been originated and developed by a purportedly inferior Jew. Similarly the Soviets were commanded to do without the theory of wave mechanics which also had an unpopular genesis (Bauer 1994). The punishment of being a maverick scientist in either of those societies were death or forced labor, so the writer of this paper supposes the urge to conform must have been very compelling.


Bauer (1994) asserted that conformity within the scientific community leads to the evasion of all unwanted or inconsistent facts and this obstructs the practice of science. This avoidance of facts and truth by a group, seems to this writer, to be very much akin to the consensus seeking and evasion of reality that led up to the faulty decision to launch the Challenger space shuttle. Even though it had parts which were known to be of dubious quality, "NASA and Thiokol executive ...reinforced one another's commitment to proceed"(Aronson , 1995 p.17).


Thomas Gold, a professor and researcher with Cornell, wrote in his 1989 journal article "New Ideas in Science" that he attributed the tendency for consensus seeking among scientist to a primarily vestigial instinct, "a herd mentality"( p.103). Gold supported this notion of the herd mentality by stating how petroleum geology and other disciplines have become completely intolerant of any new ideas He also told of how he had the experience of making colleagues violently angry with him, because he had proposed that there was some uncertainly about the origin of petroleum. (Gold, 1989) Moreover, Gold (1989) claimed, the fresh and genuinely different research from the other countries that are outsiders to the US herds, casts light on the truly one-dimensional nature of our science institutions.


Gold (1989) conjectured that going against the herd and adopting a deviant viewpoint, feels uncomfortable for personal cognitive and emotional reasons, as well as for the practical reasons listed above by Bauer. Furthermore, Gold (1989) postulated that conformist scientist may be unconsciously motivated by the protection afforded to them by the herd, "against being challenged ...or having their ignorance exposed"(p. 106).

Cognitive Dissonance

According to Aronson (1996), when people are confronted with opposing beliefs or ones incompatible with their own, they are likely to ignore or negate that belief. They do this in order to convince themselves that they have not behaved foolishly by committing to false beliefs. To assure themselves that they have been wise in supporting their position, they often convince themselves that those who oppose that position are foolish and truly objects for contempt and derision (Aronson, 1996 p.184-8).

Aronson(1996) also stated that most people, when they are confronted with information that they have behaved in a cruel manner, attempt to reduce subsequent dissonant feelings of perceiving themselves as unkind. They often do this by creating a belief that cruelty towards the victim is actually justified. Studies by Karen Hobden and James M. Olson(1994) examined disparagement humor directed at an out-group. Hobden et al.(1994) had a confederate tell extremely disparaging jokes about lawyers to a group of subjects. The dissonance, caused by disparaging the lawyer out-group, prompted the majority of the subjects to change both their public and private attitudes about lawyers to one that was substantially less favorable. (Hobden et al., 1994)


Another study by Linda Simon, Jeff Greenberg, and Jack Brehm (1995) showed that trivialization is also effectively employed as a mode of dissonance reduction. The subjects in Simon et al.'s (1995) study were led to follow counter-attitudinal behaviors. They later chose to trivialize the dissonant information about themselves more often than they chose to change their opinions (Simon et al., 1995).


Many of the quotes contained in this paper in which a member of mainstream science reacts towards new inventions or discoveries are steeped in trivialization and disparagement. This leads this writer to believe that scientists are reducing their cognitive dissonance about challenging science ideas with same faulty cognitions and methods in which non-scientists engage.

Outside the Paradigm

Science author Patrick Huyghe (1995), in his internet article "Extraordinary Claim? Move the Goal Posts!," claimed that although a new science idea may have proof, if it defies convention, then instead of consideration and acceptance:


"There's often some hasty rewriting of the rules of the game. For the would-be extraordinary, for the unorthodox claim on the verge of scientific success, the ground rules are gratefully changed. This practice, often referred to as 'Moving the goal posts' is an extraordinary phenomenon in itself and deserves recognition."(p.1)

In the book by science writer, Patrick Huyghe co-authored with physicist Louis A. Frank (1990) The Big Splash, this moving of the goal posts was depicted by the conventional science society's reaction to a challenging discovery made by Dr. Frank. Frank and Huyghe (1990) wrote of how Dr. Frank found evidence that the Earth was being showered by approximately twenty house-sized ice comets per minute. These comets all broke up in the atmosphere. His research led him to believe that the millennia of bombardment by these ice comets were responsible for the presence of the water on Earth. Dr. Frank presented his data and his photographs of the ice comets to a geophysics journal for publication (Huyghe, 1990). At the time of the announcement of Dr. Frank's discovery, the academic standard of proof in astronomy was to have two images of the same object. Although Dr. Frank presented such proof, the appearance of ice comets in his photographs was considered to be merely due to a technical fluke and a higher standard of proof was then required (Huyghe, 1990). As each subsequent level of proof was delivered by Dr. Frank, a yet higher tier of standards was then demanded (Huyghe, 1990).

This writer believes that this goal post shifting is similar to some of the tendencies examined by Aronson(1995). Aronson cited a survey which was done to assess people's reaction to the 1964 surgeon general's report about the serious health risks from cigarettes. Aronson (1995) found that smokers who had tried to quit unsuccessfully experienced dissonance over their inability to stop the habit. Those smokers tended to change their cognitions and create the belief that smoking was not dangerous for them (Aronson, 1995). Exemplifying intelligent people, who also smoked, or deluding themselves "that a filter traps the all of the cancer- producing materials" (p.179) reduced the smokers' dissonance and made them feel that their actions were justified. Just like moving the goal posts, these cognitive ploys changed the standard by which information was judged.


James McClenon's(1984) book Deviant Science: The Case of Parapsychology and Dean Radin's (1997) book, The Conscious Universe both deal with the topic of psychic phenomenon as a suppressed science. Dean (1997) cited dissonance reduction as the reason why conventional science authorities had suppressed numerous valid studies on psychic phenomenon. Dean (1997) stated that people have an uncomfortable feeling when they are confronted with information that seems impossible to them. Evidence of psychic phenomenon, also known as psi, therefore becomes dissonant information. Although most of Deviant Science and Conscious Universe were devoted to describing the many reproducible, strictly scientific experiments that support the existence of ESP, the writers also speculated about why this field has been found unacceptable. Both Dean (1997) and McClenon (1984) claimed that the dismissal of well executed studies were not due to skepticism, but mainly to blatant attacks by those who are threatened by the shifting of perceptions in the sciences. McClenon (1984) cited the 1970's science philosophy of Thomas Kuhn, who coined the term for shifting perceptions "paradigm shifts"(p.21). McClenon (1984) had the following to say about Kuhn's definition of paradigms cited from Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions:

"Paradigms are the universally accepted scientific achievements that for a time provide model problems and solutions to a community of practitioners . . . an object for future articulation and specification under new or more stringent conditions" (p.21).
When an anomaly outside of this accepted model happens frequently enough, McClenon (1984) explained, there is a crisis. The anomalies that violates the current ruling paradigm are then either incorporated and resolved within the paradigm, or there is a "revolutionary upheaval"(p. 21).

Aronson (1995) described how people commonly have a low tolerance for anomalous, dissonant information. He had this to say about how people generally deal with challenges to their beliefs and thereby reduce their dissonance:

"People don't like to see or hear things that conflict with their deeply held beliefs or wishes. An ancient response to such bad news was to kill the messenger"(p. 185).
This writer sees such "killing" going on in the deriding and dismissing of the science ideas and the "messenger" scientist.

Confirmation Bias

Radin (1997) also explained that the rejection of serious studies on psychic phenomenon is due to a particular type of confirmation bias, the "expectancy effect"(p. 234). This expectancy effect, as studied by sociologist Harry Collins in his book The Golem (1993), showed that for controversial scientific topics where the existence of a phenomenon is in question, scientific criticism is generally determined by the critic's prior expectations.

Collin's work, cited by Radin, (1997) also explained a phenomenon termed "scientific regress"(p. 236). Scientific regress happens when experimental results are predicted by a well-accepted theory and then the outcome is examined to see if it matches the initial expectations. Radin (1997) reasoned that with psi research there isn't a well-accepted theory with which to compare the results, so skeptics use "scientific regress" to invalidate all of the scientific results in this field of study.

Radin (1997) also called attention to another form of the confirmation bias, that of seeking to confirm one's original hypothesis when a situation is unclear or confusing. Radin's definition here matches Aronson's (1995) definition of "the confirmation bias -the tendency to confirm our original hypotheses and beliefs"(p.150).

Radin (1997) said confirmation biases are especially problematic for older more experienced scientists because "their commitment to their theories grows so strong, that simpler or different solutions get overlooked"(p. 236). These biases, Radin claimed, preserve ideas that are already established and causes suppression of non-standard science research.

Dean Radin (1997) broke down the acceptance of a new science idea into the following four predictable stages which this author sees as being rife with various aforementioned biases and dissonance reduction:


Stage 1, skeptics proclaim that the idea is impossible.

Stage 2, skeptics reluctantly concede that the ideal is possible, but trivial.


Stage 3, the mainstream realizes that the idea is more important than the trivializing scientists in authority lead them to believe.


Stage 4, even the skeptics proclaim that they knew it all along or even that they thought of it first (P.243).


This writer believes that the cognitions in this last stage are attributable to what Aronson (1996) termed as "the hindsight effect" (p.7).

Taboo or Unpopular Science

The Golem (Collins 1993), Fire from Ice (Mallove 1991), The Coming Energy Revolution (Manning 1996) and Alternative Science (Milton 1996) all had chapters which described the genesis of cold fusion and gave important evidence for it's validity. These books told of the findings of two chemists, Professor Martin Fleischmann of Southampton University and his former student, Professor Stanley Pons of the University of Utah. Fleischmann and Pons held a 1989 press conference at which they announced the discovery of cold fusion. Milton (1996) defined cold fusion as "the production of usable amounts of excess energy by a nuclear process occurring in a water at room temperature"(p. 25).

By making the announcement about their success at a press conference, Manning(1996) and Milton(1996), and Collins (1993) all stated that these two distinguished scientists were breaking with the tradition of first submitting an article to peer review for publication. Manning (1996) contended that it was mainly this departure from the expected way of introducing the phenomenon, not the failing of the results, which led to the trivializing and derogating of cold fusion, and of Fleischmann and Pons as well, by the majority of mainstream scientists.


Manning (1996) suggested that a secondary cause for disapproval was the fact that science did not have a framework yet for how these cold fusion experiments produced the energy. This lack of a previously existing framework seems to cause most mainstream scientists to invalidate anomalous data through experimental regress and the confirmation biases


Evidently Pons and Fleischmann intended to keep the means of producing cold fusion to themselves in hopes of becoming wealthy, so they were not forthcoming about the details of the methodology used. Although they were able to repeatedly get the same verifiable results, other scientists of the time were not able to independently duplicate what Pons and Fleischmann had done (Manning, 1996).


A third cause for disapproval, explained Manning (1996), is that the massively funded hot fusion research organizations had also been trying over decades to get some of the same findings as those from the cold fusion experiments and may have had professional jealousy (Manning 1996).


This writer believes that the suppression of cold fusion could have been due to some of the same cognitive distortions which led to the suppression of other maverick science ideas and inventions throughout history. These cognitions include the in-group out-group, confirmation, and that expectancy biases, as well as cognitive dissonance reactions to anomalies.


Manning (1996) wrote of how in America, Fleischmann and Pon's reputations as cold fusion researchers were tarnished. Cold fusion articles were suddenly banished from science journals and U.S. patents for cold fusion were dismissed.


Manning (1997) continued that only Japan was still putting major funding into cold fusion research. As a heavily populated island with few natural energy resources, Japan had everything to gain from clean safe energy production. Also, because many Easterners have a "spiritual belief in an all pervading energy which comes in many forms,"(p. 102) the idea of fusion reactions taking place without extreme high temperatures was not quite such a dissonant idea as it had been for Westerners.


Other methods to derive usable energy that are considered to be in opposition to the beliefs of mainstream science were discussed by Manning (1996). These included solid state energy devices, vibrational devices developed by nineteenth century musician and inventor John Ernst Worrell Keeley, vortex and magnetic energy mechanisms, new technologies for using waste and hydropower, and the use of hydrogen for power.

Alternatives for excluded scientists

The internet has, in the last few years, become a valuable resource for those scientists who have been discouraged from experimenting with and publishing unorthodox studies. It gives them the opportunity to network with others interested in their research.

Some websites for these discussion groups can be found at the yahoo website at http://www.yahoo.com, under the subheading, alternative science. In addition there is http://www.eskimo.com/~billb/weird/wclose.html where one can find free energy, cold fusion and otology discussion groups under the subheadings: freenergy-L, vortex-L and taoshum-L.

There are journals created specifically for printing professionally written studies on unpopular topics. Since involvement with these non-standard topics might lead to a professional scientist's ostracism, one publication, The Journal of Scientific Exploration (1986-1997) only prints articles by academic research scientists, anonymously. This journal provides a forum for presentation, criticism and debate for topics that are ignored or ridiculed by mainstream science. It also has the secondary goal of publishing articles that help to promote understanding of the factors that limit scientific inquiry.

Galilean Electrodynamics is a publication devoted to professionally written journal articles that challenge Einstein's ideas. Only papers that are in the realm of mathematics, engineering or physics and that are relativity-related are considered for publication in this journal.

Infinite Energy Cold Fusion and New Energy Technology (1994- 1998) is a magazine edited by Eugene Mallove and is devoted to energy experimentation that is beyond the scope of orthodox accepted science.

Looking forward

Bauer (1994) called on science institutions to help foster objectivity by making sure they includes scientist from backgrounds and viewpoints that are as varied as possible. He also asked that scientists fight their personal biases and hidden social agendas by vigilantly examining their own motives, and trying to see an objective reality rather than one influenced by expectations (p. 102).

Dr. Brian Martin (1998) in his current writings posted on the internet, "Suppression Stories," asked that researchers publish more accounts about suppression, and claimed that this will provide necessary support for dissident and struggling scientists.


Radin (1997) closed his book with a hope that this process of suppressing new ideas will not continue to be at the cost of good science and scientists. He included this quote by Lewis Thomas, biologist and author of the Medusa and the Snail:

"The only solid piece of scientific truth about which I feel totally confident is that we are profoundly ignorant about nature. . . It is this sudden confrontation with the depth and scope of ignorance that represents the most significant contribution of twentieth-century science to the human intellect"(p. 289).
This author will bring this paper to a close with a quote from Bill Beaty's (1998) webpage article "Quotes against excessive skepticism:

"Daring ideas are like chessmen. Moved forward, they may be defeated, but they start a winning game." -Goethe


References

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