We are now at the stage of our humanity where we can create really amazing technologies while reducing our imprint on this planet with outdated technologies that cannot be sustainable with the amount of people that live in the world. The mass bulk of people of the world would  want to have the American / Western civilization lifestyle. To avoid a the creation of a black hole here on earth, we can make a few changes.

I’m talking:

• Cars with piston engines that can be powered with compressed air
• Solar-powered technology
• Wind power
• Tide power (no, not the detergent)
• Educating about pollution and litter control
• Green chemistry for pharmaceutical production
• … just for starters …

Yes, battery hybrid cars are a step in the right direction, but how long until we see a disaster from the battery production and disposal when all cars on the road are running on Duracells? If we are to think that we can envision wonderful vacations with pure sandy beaches, warm ocean waters to swim in, landscapes of modern cities without pollution, while at the same time having more fossil fuel cars, more plastic, and more Fritos chip bags, then we are trying to realize a pipe dream.

It all starts with a change of the mind… with imagination. John Lennon got the tune right.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okd3hLlvvLw

Imagine, imagine, imagine. Each physical item began by manifesting an image, a thought.

Okay, I’ll start. Imagine a place where people are given a base salary to keep the planet free of litter and making purchasing decisions that improved the habitat. Imagine that companies started building products and trying to reach a zero habitat impact throughout the whole production of products and services. Imagine that people stop idolizing raunchy (and sometimes funny) TV shows that are setting examples for how our children are behaving (and even some grown-ups). Imagine that poverty and wars only exist in history books.

If you’re telling me that you don’t believe that any of this can happen, I would say that you need to start imagining. We are Homo Sapiens. We won the race and are now the most dominant species. Game over. Now, let’s try a new game. The rules are pretty simple. We see the destruction of the habitat as the great enemy without a face, and we start combating this enemy with green arms. Those are the same kinds of arms that hug people and pick up messes. The market is obliged to follow and furnish us with the tools and products to fulfill our desires, as soon as we make our voice clear. Center your mind on good thoughts, then let your voice speak them.

Oh, I just saw you on a white sandy beach at a reservoir with a refreshing drink of your choice in a cup that you can eat. You look great! Enjoy your day.

-Keitan

Avatar is a wonderfully imaginative tale that made me wonder if the blue humanoids on the screen are real, or created in a computer lab. Add the three-dimensional effect and the blur becomes even more distinct. The topography of the world of Pandora, complete with floating mountains and luminescent creatures piqued my senses and drew emotions out of me that I hadn’t felt in a very long time. The Featurette gives a sensational glimpse of this fantastic world (link to featurette at bottom of this blog post):

Courtesy 20th Century FOX

The repeated references to the connection of living beings to their home world gave me hope that those in the theater would be immersed in natural spirit and somehow be brought to a new sense of awareness through multimedia osmosis. At times I allowed my senses to connect to the world of Pandora, as I have many times connected with the energy of our wonderful creation, Mother Earth, and her creator. It’s a lovely feeling when I can draw on the cycle of life between predator and prey, birth and death, all the while enjoying the fullness of life. If I could have my wish, I would like to see a version of this movie that only focused on the connection-building scenes that help one appreciate her/his animal body and to relink thought to remember that our bodily vessels are made up of earthbound substances. It seems like in this age we are bombarded with images that seem to separate us from the natural world. In this train of thought lives the irresponsible consumerism that destroys our world at such a rapid pace. It is an important message for us to give reverence to our habitat. Though we may be able to create a new and wonderful world free of mosquitos on the big screen, creating one in real life is simply not possible.

The continuation of the movie brought scenes that were unfortunately cluttered with an all-too-predictable plot, which is repeated in so many mainstream Hollywood movies. That is, the 3D experience stopped at the visual element of the film. Instead of choosing a complex theme of blurring the line between what is good and bad, the people involved in making the movie decided to focus on a story between nature vs. the corporate world and its evil military muscle. It is again the linear thought of the creators of this film that forget that they benefit from the military might that they portray as evil. They enjoy the freedom of speech because they live under the umbrella of the most powerful nation and its military. They also enjoy the unlimited profits from capitalism that they represent in the film as the evil mining company who brings precious ore from the land of Pandora back home to its needy consumer base. I ask the producers to glance into a mirror and see that they are a part of what they depict as bad and wrong. They need to take some of the responsibility as well and stop depicting the military leaders as the happy arms of Satan. In contrast, a movie called Princess Mononoke put a human and caring face to the mining effort that was also destroying nature in its quest to expand. Perhaps the producer thought the mainstream American audience is too simple-minded to grasp a more involved plot?

Princess Mononoke by Hayao Miyazaki

For me, the most atrocious offense were the parents who brought small children to watch this film. How do we enlighten parents who decide to take kids to this show? As I was constantly negotiating with my emotions to keep everything in check under such powerful scenes and sounds, I could only wonder how still-developing minds of young children were being assaulted by trying to do the same, only to end up failing and crying. Certainly the corporate structure that the producers were attacking with the plot of this film are essentially guilty of the same gluttonous greed by not penalizing theaters for allowing children under 13 to view this movie. (The movie is rated PG-13, which I agree with).

Despite the overkill of missiles, battles and destruction, Avatar 3D brought awareness to the masses to realize that destroying the habitat, either alien or domestic, is a really bad thing. I only hope that the younger generation that is getting a full dose of this message from so many sources aren’t overly desensitized to forget that they should actually do something about it.

-Keitan

(Link to featurette: http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/fox/avatar/hd/)

Black Friday is an American Olympic event. It occurs the day after the national celebration of thankfulness, many times ending up in gastronomic gluttony. It kicks the mind in the butt reminding it that the national celebrations of giving are just around the corner. I can’t think of a better day to jump-start the economy of 2009. Let’s get the party started, right?

The most significant hour was at 4:00 am, when my alarm went off and the first thing I thought was how Sears had already opened. The two items I hoped for were phenomenal deals of 70% off or more at Sears, and I wondered if I should even bother crawling out of bed, knowing I was dealing with the reality of limited quantities. But my son, now six, made me promise that I would wake him up. He knew it was a big day for papa, and he wouldn’t dare miss it. He knew there was loot to get. He arose when I entered his room. I’ve never seen him so focused to go somewhere as much as he was on this pre-dawn day. We went from awake to out-the-door in twenty some-odd minutes. A family record.

Hats off to the staff at Sears. All were really pleasant and helpful, almost omnipresent in their distinct blue Sears shirts. Two Kenmore products and a mini-trampoline were on the list. Score, score, and slam dunk, with a bonus “last one on the shelf” digital picture frame for a friend to boot. Many registers open and ample crowd well distributed. When loaded up and ready, we were out in about five minutes.

At that point I could have gone home and felt satisfied, but my son’s eyes were on the lookout for the toys he saw in the Thanksgiving Day ad flyers. Off we went – Sears, Kohl’s, Walmart (ugh), Toys-R-US (ugh ugh), chai 2% stop, met up with a friend at Office Max, then Target for the winning six-year-old coveted items. The payment for such a successful plunder: Only one could be opened, others had to be wrapped and left forever until Christmas. Everyone’s happy… great! Off again – Jerry’s, breakfast at Shari’s, Best Buy, back to Office Max and home. Time elapsed: 6 ours 52 minutes.

A good time was had by all. I witnessed no tackles for last items, no bread-and-cheese-long lines to registers, and no acts of theft, except from a store with no markdowns on what I had my eye on… shame, shame. I did however see the exchange of smiling faces, money and merchandise. I saw stores full of eager people that would make any CEO blush. I heard people saying “excuse me” and “oh, my fault” in kind and sincere tones.  I paused and looked around at all the activity. I reminisced about the good old days when money and jobs were more plentiful; when it felt okay to have a massive credit card debt and not worry about 29% penalty rate ’cause your ass is late in paying your minimum balance. I breathed the moment in and sighed.

Today I took on some extra debt for the sake of America. As I did I looked for the country of origin on everything I bought to see who I was financing, hoping that we found a cut somewhere in the deal between there and here. But all in all I support the day after Thanksgiving, which could also be knows as Thanksgetting.

Oh, pardon me, I think it’s time to checkout.

The need to encourage awareness of people’s own choices, and to understand the need for reform at the governmental level is grossly omitted from the picture. The decision making by the FDA to approve certain items that can be taken into the body needs a major overhaul. There is no health plan that won’t eventually bankrupt the wallets of hard-working people as long as the cheaper (more economical) grocery store choices can be major factors of obesity. And that only scratches the surface of other ills resulting from many rulings of the FDA, like: unknown genetically-modified food effects, aggressive marketing to children for food full of food coloring, toxic preservatives in vaccinations, etc. Over the long term these choices can get people into a culture of medications and the subsequent taking of other medications to counter side effects. This is living proof that we are, at our essence, an unhealthy nation.

Government’s role in the healthy guidance of proper diet is nowhere in the legislation of health care reform. Given the current state of national debt, we need to re-adopt the adage of “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” This way we could spend less “ounces” of federal dollars trying to solve such a behemoth issue in this country.

Before we can start on the path to a new national balanced diet, we must first work on the individual balanced lifestyle. We need to move away from the daily extremes that carry us away and find more sustainable choices. Some can go the path of making better external choices to affect the inner workings of the mind, and others can bring consciousness to the mind to then start making better choices. Either way, the current road of unhealthy choices needs an off ramp to start seeing a country’s landscape full of people who understand that being American means we’re intelligent, flexible and can be role models for each other and the world at large.

To your health! Keitan

I then though of the implications of award, and how it added pressure on him to rise to it. It’s not easy being a world-class leader in such a troubled world. Powerful countries are motivated by conquering divisions of resources, products and labor for economic survival. But in the spirit of hope, I was encouraged that he, Barack Obama, could actually start turning the tide toward a better common reality.

It’s a lofty goal, but it’s important to start down the path to a better existence for all life here on lovely Earth. I’m impressed by those bold enough to risk their reputation to give Barack Obama the Nobel Peace Prize. Let’s all hope it was a risk worth taking.

-Keitan

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8211925.stm

———————

Dear Sense About Science / Voices of Young Science,

After receiving a letter from a trusted source, I see that your organization is alarmed by the growth of homeopathy. From the articles I’ve read, your group sees this methodology as nothing more than placebo and should be extinguished.

I can understand that the tools by how things are currently measured can’t always detect the energetic principles that is the basis of how homeopathy works, but in the evolution of science, I find that many ‘laws’ are disproved when better tools of variable detection are available… rendering previous beliefs, theories and laws obsolete.

Your group is in danger of becoming discredited if it continues to pursue this path in attacking homeopathy as a pseudoscience. The undetectable variables that are not traceable with conventional tools do not conclusively mean that the energy of the remedies are ineffective.

If the goal of medicine is to create a more healthy patient, I challenge medicine to answer the larger question of the deleterious effects of pharmaceutical production which poisons our clean air and water. How does conventional medicine justify and rationalize the perpetual side effects of its remedies while destroying the habitat of the patients it is trying to help?

I do understand that homeopathic remedies resemble placebo to those who don’t wish to genuinely explore the methodology of the practice, but as a patient of classical homeopathy now for eight years, I can say that I am healthier and happier now in my forties than I can remember even back to my early twenties (even though I was quite skeptical at the onset of my homeopathic treatment). I haven’t needed (nor desired) to take a pharmaceutical remedy since I’ve started the homeopathic path and feel more free than the vast majority who are struggling to counteract all the side effects of traditional medicine. Homeopathy treats the psyche as well as the symptoms. I have benefited immensely in the treatment of my whole person.

If you are simply agents of the pharmaceutical industry, then you probably will simply delete this email as poppycock. But if you are truly scientists who search for objective knowledge in all things, then I implore you to try to research the science of homeopathy. It is a medicinal art as valid as the art of conventional medicine and worthy of further research in what it can contribute to the overall evolution of medicine.

Sincerely,

Keith Gonzalez
Coordinator of IT for Natural Sciences
College of Arts and Sciences IT
University of Oregon
Email: keithg@uoregon.edu

Though love is the ultimate goal of being in the world, there are many other aspects that have to be dealt with on a daily basis. Starting with knowledge, it is found that it is very hard to get things done, or to survive for that matter, without knowing how to do things. As we learn from our parental influences, we achieve the basics in life that we further in the ways that allow us to attain things that are interesting for us. Continuing on in knowledge, we learn a trade or skill that allows us (hopefully) to earn a living. These things are attained through a school of some sort… be it a formal education, guidance of a master, or learning on the streets of life. Either way, knowledge is the base of the experiences through one’s life to learn how to be in the world. In many ways, the world looks upon knowledge as the pinnacle of being, as reflected by the importance we give those who have dedicated their lives in such endeavors and achieving doctoral degrees. We have learned that we should only listen to those who have a surplus of knowledge in certain fields of study. These are the experts that flood the news and information channels everyday. But is knowledge the ‘end all, be all’ of the human experience? I think not.

Knowledge has a a limiting factor. Without intelligence, knowledge hits a dead end. Using intelligence we can filter through the facts of others’ knowledge to see what applies to our particular learning. We can also use intelligence to see outside the current mode of knowledge. Take for instance the old-world thought that the earth was flat, and the collective thought that heavenly bodies revolved around the earth. In their day, these were the dominating elements of knowledge, but for some it just didn’t explain the whole picture well enough. Intelligent persons surfaced with new facts and evidence, many against persecution, to enlighten the population of these new ideas. This is a prime example of intelligence. Intelligence is the constantly evolving notion that moves us as a collective force into more advanced (and hopefully more enlightened) ways of seeing and understanding the world.

But what is knowledge and intelligence without spirit? Indeed, what is life itself without the motivating force that animates our bodies and minds, creating a base from which sprouts the other two? I myself can see how spirit charges my mind and intelligence to attain certain kinds of knowledge. It is the alignment of my spirit with certain qualities that are important to me and motivates me to learn about some things, and to totally ignore others. Most of us don’t think about what forces drives us, but only that we are driven to learn about some topics. This force is spirit, and a poor alignment of the spirit can bring about harmful and dangerous results. A person armed with knowledge and intelligence, but with no concern for spirit, can do quite a bit of damage in society as shown by selfishly idealistic dictators and criminals of all sorts. Before I listen to the thoughts of any one person, I always have to assess where the person is in regards to her/his spirit. If that person cannot reveal that, then I cannot commit my devotion to his or her passion. It is therefore the most important factor of the three.

Aligning the spirit brings discernment to chase the proper goals. Intelligence allows us to find the best methods to attain the desired goals. Knowledge is the active force that gives us the retention of learned items to be able to apply them to our daily world. Though all three are inherently intertwined in our human existence, it is important to know where one should start.

If you would like to twitter, just go here: http://twitter.com/keithgonzalez/

Today, there’s no need to leave your living room to fall victim to the many perils. Nope, this time it is the spammers, phishing scammers, and viagra/lottery winning plunderers (among others) who pollute our electronic byways and brainwaves and trick the unwary many who populate the Net. This is the new Wild Wild Web. And after watching an hour of local news and being convinced that those who live in the local area are child molesters, murders and thieves, we turn to the Web to connect with like-minded individuals to feel safe and connected.

Most people have a hard time thinking of a life before Google, Facebook and Youtube. But these are new inventions on a fresh landscape. I reflect back to a time before our connected world. It was 1995. In the midst of using my speedy 2400 baud modem (that would literally take about 5 minutes to load this page), I used to connected to various cyber bulletin boards to leave messages for others, download funny graphics (no porn, thank you) and try interesting new software. Then, suddenly, something amazing happened. A peculiar invention was emerging from the educational realm into the public sector. It was called the World Wide Web. It let ambitious people make pages of text, bolded and italicized, that anyone in the world could reach. Back in 1995 there were no pictures to be seen, and all people had to know to get this new information was an address that started with http://.

Back then, to me, the world was full of promise. Ideas and beautiful concepts were now easily exchanged on this new mode of communication. I envisioned a new era as we slowly closed the chapter on the Industrial Age and began entering into something I called the Info-Communication Age. Fourteen years ago, I thought that mankind was about to embark on something that would evolve the species to an advanced level of connectedness and bring us all to something that resembled a digital version of Utopia. OMG, I was, like, you know, totally wrong! LOL

I can’t say that the present state of the Internet is a complete wasteland of the human mind, but I begin to worry when I see the English language reduced to half-witted Twitter entries. Private parties, in their opportunistic wisdom, have made draconian Terms of Service language that basically say, “I own you and all the information you put online.” The majority of people simply click the checkbox to sign their life away for the sake of an experiential chance to connect with someone who they can relate with.

Alas, all is not lost. Among the “lost tribe” are intelligent individuals who still care about the population as a whole. Let me name a few advances in the ethereal Internet that has helped regular people become more empowered:

- Consumer ratings on popular websites that help regular people research products before buying

- Instant communication via email, despite all the scams that try to trick the unwary

- The ability to find alternative news to verify facts

- Collective mind projects like Wikipedia.org

- Weather for any city in just a few clicks

- Virtually tons of useful information, i.e. if you learn how to weed through the false stuff

- craigslist.org (outside of all the marginally-sleazy dating stuff)

- Be careful. Facebook owns all your information… forever. Just read the first paragraph of “User Content Posted on the Site” in their Terms of Service.

The personal computer is still a LONG way from being a simple and reliable appliance like a microwave oven, but as we move forward in technology it is my hope that people become aware of the dangers of not protecting their information. I also hope that people gain back the power to help guide the mega-corporations to provide us with the tools that we deserve to make the world with the help of technology. But in the same breath, it is my fear that if we continue to close our minds to the responsibility of our place as collective consumers and citizens, we risk losing our collective voice and end up being organic members of a machine that has cameras and microphones everywhere that can observe our every movement, and correct us when we step out of line of the corporate structure.

Now is the time to become aware and responsible for where we are headed. We are at the crossroads. Which way are you choosing?

-keitan