Mar 192019
 


Leonardo da Vinci First anatomical studies c1515

 

 

Sometimes we find ourselves merely pondering, not so much solving big problems. Is there playing out, in the world at large, or at least the world of men, something akin to the Kondratieff cycle in economics, a larger cycle, a force, a tide, an energy, that we mostly ignore, but which drives our ‘affairs’? Dr. D. thinks there may well be. But if so, what happens to free will?

Dr. D.:

 

 

Dr. D.: I seem to have taken a dark and grumpy turn lately.  Probably the winter, but as I get older, I find the present state of the world more and more frustrating.

I fear with the present madness it’s just de rigor to 1) label people as something they’re not, even the OPPOSITE of what they are, 2) furiously fight that strawman and 3) not care.  I have no explanation for it, but there are times and tides in the affairs of men (as Shakespeare would say) which flood you out and cost a fortune.  …Or something like that.

And it’s certainly flooding in Europe right now, as darkness falls as the shutters of censorship and totalitarianism are bolted up everywhere, every bit as clear and methodical as was done in 1935, even with a call for a shiny new army.  …To use on no one, of course, because we all know broke nations fund and create armies for no ill intent whatsoever.  But these things happen regularly.

“If…any person had told me that there would have been such [chaos] as [now] exists, I would have thought them a bedlamite, a fit subject for a madhouse.”
– George Washington, 1786 (after a fiat money blowoff in the states)

My belief is that these things happen from forces outside ourselves and are sadly predictable, as “the lesson of history is that no one learns anything from history.”  There may be the “Fourth Turning” of generations, but a 4th-of-4 turning is some 200 years, the next cycle, the next fractal up, and things crack quite a bit wider. 

As this follows exactly the weather, earthquake, and volcanic cycles, it suggests far more its external origin, the way birds grow senselessly restless and flock in fall, or animals are agitated and predict earthquakes.  In this case, my guess is the human nervous system is very sensitive to the fluctuations in the sun, or possibly further, the wing of the galaxy we fly through like sand ripples 240 years apart.  What else could it be to affect men, weather, and volcanoes all at once?

 

But I suspect the additional energy flooding into all men gives them a very hard time, hyping them up, and those who don’t know how to shed and direct the energy appropriately — which is most of us — become manic and unthinking, and to some extent collectively go mad.  As events on the ground direct them, so it can be channeled into grandeur, like the industrial revolution, or into a suicidal bloodbath like Jacobin France.

We appear to desire the latter right now, where the most astonishing, easily falsifiable accusations are made, and followed through just as thoughtlessly by the mob.  They attack and hang one man one day, then the next his accuser comes under scrutiny and is hanged in turn, yet no one makes a call to sense and order, but rather to more ghosts, more bogymen, and more panic that chases them in turn like the devil of Sir Thomas More. …Thankfully merely murder-by-reputation so far, but it would be shocking indeed if that lasted long.

I also believe men know this, and far from stopping it, prefer to make fortunes by going with the tide and pushing it along, tirelessly undermining nations they can short, and then supporting the kings rising on the wheel of fortune and hitching to their star until in the next cycle they will be undermined in turn. 

Unfortunately, it is Europe and America’s time down on the wheel, and they are doing everything they can — spending trillions, directing Facebook and the Guardian, buying ministers and judges, undermining every pillar of our society, economic, social, moral — in their quest to drive us down, and therefore buy us up cheap in “Disaster Capitalism.”  And being in the lowering tide, we don’t need any additional help.

 

However, with such sturm und drang, there’s just shouting man to man everywhere, sheer bedlam, and otherwise good people get caught up in it, accusing you, accusing me, and exhausting and ruining themselves at a time we most need to pull together, make forgiveness, and apply what limited forces we have to the task of saving ourselves and our values.

So what do we do? Well if indeed we are each being over-energized and overloaded as it seems, we need to calm and ground ourselves in deeper principles that are unchanging — a thing far easier said than done. 

However, if we can see that all of us are in the same dilemma, we are all ill-at-ease, and it’s not the other guy, it’s ourselves too that is short tempered, short-sighted, jumping to conclusions — in a word: short — then we can go through the day and this time better, and address it better, redress it better, and make more accurate, more practical and productive responses than if we didn’t know where our new trouble and new agitation is coming from.

Because history shows these things happen, and we’re in it now and it’s clearly happening to us. Perceiving all this years ago, I took myself to a humble place and planted trees, as the Stoics at the fall of Rome retreated to walled gardens and enjoyed what life they could, and although it’s a hard life and everyone’s answer is different, these things pass and all men have troubles and die even in the best of times.

So while I find it as frustrating as anyone, to be outrageously accused, to not be heard day after day, I try to keep perspective as well.  It may not be a help to them, but it’s a help to me at least, so I can possibly answer the call to help someday, should any someday come.

But I don’t think so.  Like Robespierre or Washington, I expect it to vent its madness on me and on us all with little restraint instead.  My job is to weather it as I can and wait for better springs to come, which they will, but decades from now.
 

 

“There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.”
– Julius Caesar Act 4 Scene 3

 

 

Home Forums A Tide In The Affairs Of Men

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  • #46095

    Leonardo da Vinci First anatomical studies c1515     Sometimes we find ourselves merely pondering, not so much solving big problems. Is ther
    [See the full post at: A Tide In The Affairs Of Men]

    #46097

    Not to take anything away from the content, but looking at Da Vinci’s anatomical drawings you can’t help but see his artistic ability and prowess, and then on top of that realize he was the first person ever to even attempt to do this, spending very, very long hours in a damp and dark morgue cutting up corpses peeling off layer after layer of muscle and tissue. Talk about drive and energy.

    I sometimes wonder what anatomy would have been without him. What is someone much less talented artistically had had that drive to ‘chart’ the inside of the human body?

    #46099
    zerosum
    Participant

    My job is to weather it as I can and wait for better springs to come, which they will, but decades from now.”

    Amen.

    I’ll be returned to dust before a better spring is here.

    #46100
    Wxtwxtr
    Participant

    “… and followed through just as thoughtlessly by the mob …”

    I would guess you’re talking about me and my precariat peasant friends, but I see no sign of that in (our) daily lives. CHS’s article of today shows who is doing what to whom, and I suspect and suggest that “mob” you are talking about is these guys.

    The chattering classes chattering at each other for money, influence and power, and by the way, “making history”. Self granted prestige, via:
    “… a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

    Part of today’s online irony is that all the wailing of sorrow and screams of rage and gnashing of teeth and schemes to profit are not worth the paper they’re not printed on. They will vanish like autumn leaves swirling away in the winds of the Turning or the flash of a Carrington.

    #46101
    kultsommer
    Participant

    Dr, when not counting baby boomer homes and spill J. Peterson-ques fear of Mao and Stalin, has quite a bit to offer on the writing table.
    Aaaah….Leonardo’s drawings and equally detailed drawings in any book of human anatomy, Durer’s here in Albertina gallery and exceptionally detailed animal in zoological books, beautifully rendered wet lips, teary eyes, light reflection on wrist watch and belt buckle on soft cover books and paintings with similar “themes” find in art museums. Aesthetic has a lot of “splaining” to do, which it can’t.

    #46102
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    Share of population with mental health and substance use disorders, 2016

    https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-with-mental-and-substance-disorders

    The slider at the bottom of the graph shows how Russia has made significant improvements in recent years, but USA, Australia and New Zealand remain among the worst.

    #46103
    zerosum
    Participant

    @Doc
    +1 in 5 or 20% of the countries ruling the world might be led by people with mental health and substance use disorders,

    The remaining 80% of the populations are mentaly chalenged since they cannot see this obvious link..

    #46107
    seychelles
    Participant

    “There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.”
    – Julius Caesar Act 4 Scene 3

    Rothschild as the reincarnation of J. C. (and this does not stand for Jesus Christ).

    The noble idea, which allegedly makes us not just another animal, is to exist to help yourself AND other life to create an harmonious whole, not to “capitalize” on the misfortune of others to achieve wealth and power without helpful productive sweat.

    #46109
    barnaby33
    Participant

    What do you mean, “our values?”

    #46110
    zerosum
    Participant

    Where are the lists of the people who have enough money to lend for the following.

    IF YOU CANNOT SUPPLY A LIST THEN ASSUME THE POSITION OVER THE PRINTING PRESS.

    https://www.govinfo.gov/features/budget-fy2019
    Budget of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 2019

    https://www.cp24.com/news/highlights-from-2019-federal-budget-1.4342893
    OTTAWA – Highlights from the federal Liberal budget tabled Tuesday by Finance Minister Bill Morneau:

    #46111
    zerosum
    Participant

    We are not mentally challenged, we are just ignorant.
    Who are the lenders for deficit spending?

    If we cannot supply a list of lenders, then we must assume the position over the printing press.

    OTTAWA – Highlights from the federal Liberal budget tabled Tuesday by Finance Minister Bill Morneau:
    https://www.cp24.com/news/highlights-from-2019-federal-budget-1.4342893

    Budget of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 2019
    https://www.govinfo.gov/features/budget-fy2019

    #46112
    John Day
    Participant

    In my post “Repression Justified” I signed off “Gardening While Rome Burns”. There’s a picture of some of my recent work preparing the vegetable garden beds for planting at the “country place”. http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/03/repression-justified.html

    #46114
    Haydar Khan
    Participant

    Dr. D,

    Perhaps the driving force is biological senescence.

    The Double Bind of Human Senescence

    #46115
    Patricia
    Participant

    Well Dr. D that is a very interesting hypothesis and it does make sense.

    #46116
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    However, if we can see that all of us are in the same dilemma, we are all ill-at-ease, and it’s not the other guy, it’s ourselves too that is short tempered, short-sighted, jumping to conclusions — in a word: short — then we can go through the day and this time better, and address it better, redress it better, and make more accurate, more practical and productive responses than if we didn’t know where our new trouble and new agitation is coming from.
    Dr D

    and this;

    Because history shows these things happen, and we’re in it now and it’s clearly happening to us. Perceiving all this years ago, I took myself to a humble place and planted trees, as the Stoics at the fall of Rome retreated to walled gardens and enjoyed what life they could, and although it’s a hard life and everyone’s answer is different, these things pass and all men have troubles and die even in the best of times.

    Nice. Definitely resonates with me. As you know, I too, took myself out and away from the “madding crowds”.
    It’s helped immensely; and the work continues unto death…

    #46117
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    Just tripped across this at Russia Insider, in an article by John W. Whitehead :

    “Pity the nation whose people are sheep

    And whose shepherds mislead them

    Pity the nation whose leaders are liars

    Whose sages are silenced

    And whose bigots haunt the airwaves

    Pity the nation that raises not its voice

    Except to praise conquerors

    And acclaim the bully as hero

    And aims to rule the world

    By force and by torture…

    Pity the nation oh pity the people

    who allow their rights to erode

    and their freedoms to be washed away…”

    —Lawrence Ferlinghetti, poet

    From Wiki:
    Lawrence Monsanto Ferlinghetti (born March 24, 1919) is an American poet, painter, socialist activist, and the co-founder of City Lights Booksellers & Publishers.
    He’s 99 yo…100 in 4 days…

    #46124
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Kultsommer, thank you, that’s very kind.

    You can see I have wide frustrations over people not being able to see they’re being played for fools, one against the other. Jimmy Dore was lamenting this with Syrian, Gaza, and now Venezuelan war reporter Eva Bartlett, that they go out and say the U.S. is pushing false propaganda to invade nations and the people say, “Oh no, that was true in Vietnam, Grenada, Afghanistan, Iraq, Egypt, and Syria, true every day for the past 50 years, but it CAN’T be true this time! This time our great leaders are honest!” *Sigh* Are you kidding me??? Ok Charlie Brown, go ahead and kick that football of 6 million non-American head plus +10,000 U.S. soldiers who’ve been hurt and $2 Trillion wasted, one more time.

    At some point you run out of things to say, but when I was young, old cranks told me this about the wars and leaders of my own time and I didn’t catch on real fast either.

    #46125
    Dr. D
    Participant

    “Our values”? Our theoretical Western values, i.e. the ideas of the Enlightenment: freedom, justice, equality, liberty, speech, self-action, self-defense. All fall short, as they say, but the idea in the west is that we at least TRY. I THINK that’s something we still share in common, however thinly now, and what still attracts immigrants to our lands.

    But you probably knew that: good point.

    #46126
    Dr. D
    Participant

    As far as I can tell, there’s a SERIOUS overall effect of +30% of the people taking happy pills, officially. Many more happy-pill themselves. In stock buys, in corporate meetings, they face the most serious problems, formidable tasks, and then say “la-de-da.” When it fails, when their planes fall from the sky, when their banks crash and are indicted, they’re not alarmed or ashamed, but feel as good as ever, about themselves, about their judgment, about the world. How else does the 20-year old F-35 [not] get made vs now 4 generations of MIG’s? And the generals, the Congressmen, the people, not alarmed. Starting an arms race in Europe and space, not alarmed at attempting a first strike nuclear exchange against an opponent with overwhelming superiority. Nope.

    On the ground, these people should be stopping the emptiness, the shopping malls, the Fiasco of Suburbia, the “Geography of Nowhere” that’s killing them; quitting, changing jobs, changing wives, changing lives, but they don’t because they’re too drugged on 10 levels of pharmacopoeia legal and illegal to reach a crisis point and break the status quo. …Just as Huxley outlined in “Brave New World” with “Soma.” What are the other elements he suggested to have an entirely passive, controlled, zombie populous? Endless entertainment, free sex, open porn, lack of any human boundaries, an ignorant, child-like populous, media panoply to control all information, “total incoherence” of facts, and everything else we’ve seen those self-same people work for in the 88 years since he published it.

    So I wish the SSIDs were the only problem, but the mentally ill have systematically and intentionally broken everything here in their mentally ill quest for a total dictatorial control that doesn’t do them any good.

    “I think all our society is run by insane people for insane objectives… I think we’re being run by maniacs for maniacal means. … I think they’re all insane. But I’m liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That’s what’s insane about it.” —John Lennon (1968)

    “You gotta remember, ‘establishment,’ it’s just a name for evil. The monster doesn’t care whether it kills all the students or whether there’s a revolution. It’s not thinking logically, it’s out of control.” —John Lennon (1969)

    So what’s the answer?

    “If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there’d be peace.”

    But they haven’t and won’t. As you and Jimmy Dore say, the people still don’t make the connection. So who’s the real problem? Them, or us? If we were moral, could they stand? Would these things work? Con artists know for a con to work, the mark has to be complicit. Think about that, because I do every day.

    #46139
    JCsamsara
    Participant

    Nice post. Very accurate from my personal perspective. After 10-15 years, I no longer rail against the ignorance. I found that I was just Ignored, and I didn’t care for Ignor-ance. So, like the author I am planting trees in our own garden. Reaching those who are ready to be reached. Doing things to shield my family and friends as best as I can.

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