I was invited to be on the Murnaghan programme on Sky News this morning – which I always find a great deal more intelligent than the Andrew Marr alternative on the BBC. I declined because I did not want to get up and get a 7.30am train from Ramsgate on a Sunday morning. I had a meeting until 11.30pm last night planning a conference on human rights in Balochistan [I still tend to say Baluchistan], and I have a newly crowned tooth that seems not to want to settle down. But I am still worried by my own lack of energy, which is uncharacteristic. Is this old age?
I also have some serious work to do on my Burnes book, and next week I shall be staying in London to be in the British Library reading room for every second of its opening hours. So there may be a bit of a posting hiatus. I have in mind a short post on an important subject on which I suspect that 99% of my readership – including the regular dissident commenters – will strongly disagree with me.
This is a peculiarly introspective post, perhaps because my tooth is hurting, but I seem to have this curmudgeonly spirit which wishes to react to the huge popularity of this blog by posting something genuinely held but unpopular; a genuine view but one I don’t normally trumpet. The base thought seems to be “You wouldn’t like me if you really knew me”.
Similarly when I wrote Murder in Samarkand I was being hailed as a hero by quite a lot of people for my refusal to go along with the whole neo-con disaster of illegal wars, extraordinary rendition and severe attacks on civil liberties, sacrificing my fast track diplomatic career as a result. My reaction to putative hero worship was to publish in Murder in Samarkand not just the political facts, but an exposure of my own worst and most unpleasant behaviour in my private life.
I am in a very poor position to judge, but I believe the result rather by accident turned out artistically compelling, if you don’t want to read the book you can get a good idea of that by clicking on David Tennant in the top right of this blog and listening to him playing me in David Hare’s radio adaptation.
Anyway, that’s enough musing. You won’t like my next post, whenever it comes. Promise.
Nextus thanks once more for filling me in! In my harried state i wouldnt have expected or found out that Lipton was once a bright scientist.
Clark i took it that Nextus experiment _documented_ “…the myth on which Lipton’s entire conjecture rests.” It confirmed the tendencies for scientists to over rate the parameciums behaviour and the desire to be seen to be correct about such questions.
Liptons conjecture seems actually busted by the mapping of the processes inside the cell which create the behaviour – if not already by the fancifulness of the hunch that antennas of conciousness are hiding in the plasma membrane.
I am inclined to accept that the paramecium is owed a recognition of a tiny quantity of awareness for its behaviour though, however simply it is implemented within. I read Sheldrake chart awareness/conciousness types once and iirc he crossed them with another dimension of ~scale i think. I was attractive theory without outlandish claims or much result. We’re begging for a solid grasp of these things, more to better value them, than what Lipton promises is possible – special wisdom and happiness etc.
re: The Psych-K pseudo-info-mercials
http://www.amazon.com/PSYCH-K-The-Missing-Peace-Your-Life/dp/0975935402
Editorial Reviews
Robert M. Williams, M.A. is the originator of PSYCH-K™, a safe and effective way to change self-limiting subconscious beliefs. He is author of PSYCH-K…The Missing Peace In Your Life!, as well as being a popular lecturer and seminar leader. Rob co-facilitates transformational workshops with cell biologist Bruce Lipton, PhD, author of The Biology of Belief.
nextus wrote:
And Thatcrab expounded:
But earlier, nextus, you claimed:
Nextus, haven’t you overrated the importance of your questionnaire? Thatcrab’s comment seems nearer to the truth:
@Clark:
The physical mechanism in the cytoplasm has already been explained: it was a physiological fact. Ho-hum. What hadn’t been demonstrated is that academics tend to over-attribute cognitive capacities to simple behaviours exhibited by single-celled organisms. The fact they tried to modify their answers after learning about the nature of the organism reveals an inconsistency in their cognitive attributions on the basis of behaviour. That was the nugget I was looking for, in order to criticise cognitive models of reactive behaviours. Whether you construe it as “important” is neither here nor there. It was certainly enlightening and useful for my purposes.
From the book list on Lipton’s CV we have: Peak Vitality: Raising the Threshold of Abundance in Our Material, Spiritual and Emotional Lives (My bold.)
Grief I hate that sort of thing. My problem with is is that any material improvement must be relative to the people around us. I can’t imagine that these self-help practices extract much wealth from the corporations or the mega-wealthy, so they have to be extracting it from ones peers, or the ordinary people of the world, most of whom have precious little already. Unless we accept Scouse Billy’s suppressed Tesla free energy device, or something similar.
The emotional bit seems dodgy as well. If people treat me like dirt, it degrades my emotional well-being. Yes, there are mental and emotional practices that can help with this, but even if I employ them, I would still feel even better if I was being treated decently.
So if I tell an acquaintance that I think they’re treating me badly, they can simply ignore their poor behaviour, and point out that I should be using Lipton’s self-help scheme or whatever.
Besides, these ideas conjure up an image of everyone sleepwalking around with painted, peaceful smiles on their faces, all equally happy whether they’re enjoying a nice meal, dealing with a bigot, or having their legs blown off. I suppose this just shows that I’m one of those inferior, categorical or binary thinkers.
Nextus:
Yes, I can see that. Please describe “the myth on which Lipton’s entire conjecture rests”
Lipton’s theory of cellular consciousness and quantum communication via embedded antennae rests on the assumption that cellular behaviour implies cognitive abilities too complex to ascribe to a single cell.
The idea that seemingly intentional behaviour can only be explained by cognitive mechanisms pervaded psychology from the 1950s onwards (the so-called ‘cognitive revolution’). The trend was to construct elaborate models of memory access, categorisation, logical computation to explain perception, instinct, feelings and so on. Cognitive theorists can attribute any kind of functional capabilities to the ‘black-box’ of the human mind, without constraint. The fact they find it necessary to ascribe representational capacities to explain the backing reaction, but baulk at ascribing them to a single-celled organism, reveals the flaw in the methodology.
Just to register my deep appreciation of Nextus’ contribution.
And I would still like to see the mathematical expression of Sheldrake’s morphic field….if you’re going to invoke a field, you need some quantities. They’re not there.
Moderation Advice:
I seem to have caught Scouse Billy sock-puppeting, trying to smear Julian Assange as a double-agent. See the linked comment, and the one eight comments down from it:
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2012/10/cia-look-to-swamp-correa/#comment-373779
Scouse Billy, I went fishing, and I caught you. This is for you:
http://www.songlyrics.com/pil/fishing-lyrics/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hk5NKfxCgw
How dare you – take back your false and baseless accusation.
Oh, was “Inside Mann” not you, Billy? So whose computer were you on, then? I think we should be told! Conspiracies should be exposed; do you not agree?
Scouse Billy, Julian Assange is a courageous supporter of truth and accountability, suffering defamation of this reputation and confinement for his service to humanity.
You have no respect for honesty, accuracy, consistency or rationality. You delight in clouding the minds of everyone that you possibly can.
E-mail me this IP match if it exists.
You are right about Assange – I completely agree with that.
I would not write what “Inside Mann” did – I don’t have any such inside info. so it’s not a topic I contribute to neither now nor in the past.
Billy, why the Hell should I cooperate with you any more? I attempted cooperation for weeks, and you merely took advantage of it, refusing to engage on any point that I raised, constantly moving the goalposts, on and on and on, suggesting a “psychopathological subtext” about me, and delighting that I could be “bouncing off the walls”.
Just fuck off. I never did like liars.
Billy, all I wanted of you was that you actually check the material you posted. Just that you check a few supposed facts, look into the background and vested interests of the people and organisations that promote highly extraordinary material that you link to.
You didn’t even refuse, which would have been honest. You just ignored me, and came up with more of the same, hoping you’d get away with it due to the background belief in a Grand Conspiracy that corrupts anything and everything accepted as being scientific. You impugned the intelligence of all who disagreed with you, deriding them as suffering from “cognitive dissonance”.
You claim to have studied psychology. Go forth and sort yourself out.
“Just to register my deep appreciation of Nextus’ contribution.
And I would still like to see the mathematical expression of Sheldrake’s morphic field….”
His writings are certainly incomplete. Im given to the possibility that there may be no mathematical methods of describing whatever it is which enables for example, gene cores to effectively create and control epigenetic detail around them -so effectively and complexly as to result in the building and living of resultant creatures, in all their sophistication.
This area of biology is gasping for fuller explaination of how life can come together from the dithering molecular dynamics around strands of genes.
It is hard to deny that quantum entanglements of as yet unresolved nature and scope are at play in biological processes at the molecular level. This area of mystery seems ripe to me for better explainations of how lifes forms can arise and repeat from dithering molecular chaos.
The fall-back-on-experience assumption that all the necessary record of previous forms are encoded in already discovered base arrangements of atoms in genes, and that all the individual movements of molecules within creatures are unbiased towards the health of the lifeform, that they disconnectedly manage to make it through persistent localized qualities, seems so weak to me in the face of how complex lifeforms are.
I cant believe a view of this life producing universe without something like morphic feilds or spirit to complete it. While there is the gap between mundane dynamics which can be formulated and the production of life and awareness, i expect something very special to fill it. How much of the missing link can be comprehended is doubtable.
@ThatCrab – nowhere in the DNA are the morphogenetic “plans”. The human genome project has been a massive disappointment, particularly to the heavy investors, hence, the train keeps a rolling.
Robert Winston sort of broke the news in the Times recently as I recall.
YOu would probably enjoy A Quest Beyond the Limits of the Ordinary, where Lipton and Sheldrake discuss this among other issues but I leave it to you to look it up on youtube if you wish.
Regarding a “missing link”, Lloyd Pye’s view is interesting in that he thinks we were genetically engineered between 200 and 250k years ago by Anunnaki. Of course, his evidence stems from the Sumerian tablets but there is also some support from mitochondrial DNA analysis that says homo sapiens is c. 200k years old.
I maintain it is good to make others aware that nothing is cut and dried and there are alternative views out there. Nobody, least of all me, is saying you have to believe everything I link to but by all means take a look if you feel like it.
[Mod/Clark: I moved this comment to here from the CIA Look to Swamp Correa thread, where it was off-topic.]
Seems the CIA and Sweden are working together against life itself.
“Those long, white streams of persistent, cloudy haze commonly blasted into blue skies by unmarked airplanes are not your typical contrails, says Swedish Green Party leader Pernilla Hagberg.
As reported by the Swedish paper Katrineholms Kuriren, Hagberg, the first major political leader to come forward on the issue, has openly admitted that these unusual cloud trails, which fail to dissipate like normal contrails do, are actually a toxic mix of chemicals, viruses, and metals that she has collectively referred to as “chemtrails.”
According to Hagberg, the sprayings are a joint endeavor by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), as well as the Swedish government in her own country, to modify atmospheric conditions via deliberate aerosol spraying efforts.
And included in this “dangerous” mix of aerosols are various chemical components, viruses and viral fragments, and metals such as aluminum and barium, which have already been shown to be accumulating in water supplies and soils around the world.”
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/ciencia/ciencia_chemtrails50.htm
Scouse Billy, I’ve moved your comment about “chemtrails” to this thread.
I feel that your mission here is to discredit Craig and his site. I wouldn’t be the least surprised that “Inside Mann” was in fact you. Of course, I can delete your comments. I’m sick of you spamming this blog with nonsense for which there is no evidence.
So. Find me some actual evidence for “chemtrails”. You can cooperate, or I’ll just delete your bunkum.
Scouse Billy, I’ll help to start you off. You don’t need to follow this lead; any decent, solid evidence will do. But this might help. The site you link to above says this:
OK, if that is true, it should have generated some actual evidence. I’ll leave you to find it, as I have superior power over you on this site, and you’ve wasted masses of my time already. You owe me.
Clark: It wouldn’t be so bad if SB demonstrated at least a bit of faith in his own assertions, by backing one of them up every now and again. I asked Chris Jones earlier if it would be valid to expound an “opinion” that ice forms at 20 degrees C, and go on to advise others it’s fine to store food at that temperature. Likewise, would an assertion that water boils at 50 degrees be a valid point of view, such that you can say something is safely sterilised with “boiling” water at 50 degrees poured over it?
But SB doesn’t believe in his assertions – his is the all-knowing cult leader’s approach. “Let me amaze you, and show that everything you know is wrong. Learn all through me.” Followed by a plethora of references to someone else asserting the same sorts of nonsense.
Arguing points in detail with a cult-leader wannabe is like arguing with a religious freak – it won’t happen, because they will not allow in the doubt which all rational people regard as a total necessity.
You’re right to be angry with anyone who knowingly spreads disinformation. SB admitted as such – it’s not for our benefit, it’s not for discussion, it’s targeted at those he can hoodwink!
@Clark: spam deletion is a very valuable service, for which you have my sincere gratitude – but I’d caution against deleting SB’s contributions (or anyone else’s for that matter) on the basis of personal disagreement. I don’t perceive SB as disruptive – provocative, maybe – but not disruptive.
In any case, surely it’s up to Craig Murray to make the deletion call? Threatening to wield the moderator stick in an open debate seems rather authoritarian. Moderation shouldn’t be done in anger. Beware the dark side, young Jedi.
He didnt delete it Nextus, he moved it here. What has an overblown account of contrail poisoning got to do with Craigs latest post? -Well it just involves Cia and Sweden, that is just taken as an excuse to throw it in there, but to discuss it there would divert the topic especially as we know from experience, more unscrupulous links will just be thrown after it. And SB and followers will wash out the conversation with their same old personal bug bears in the middle of a fresh internationally followed blog topic with little connection to their recurrent announcements.
Why does the blog have to accept this material loosely linkfarmed into it when intrest in craigs topics are high? When did craig last post on contrail poisoning? or world depopulation or the torus of infinite energy?
Obviously ive been encouraging clark to challenge this. I think if people do the work of housekeeping they are entitled to make decisions about basic standards of relevance and quality.
Clarks reaction is natural. SB and co should give everyone a break, and show sincerety by commenting towards the main and recurrent topics at least while they are fresh.
“Nobody, least of all me, is saying you have to believe everything I link to but by all means take a look if you feel like it.”
This is actually very magnanimous scousebilly. I hope in time our disagreements can be turned around…
“nowhere in the DNA are the morphogenetic “plans”.”
“Lloyd Pye’s view is interesting in that he thinks we were genetically engineered… between 200 and 250k years ago…”
You see SB, you seem to be constantly brainstorming instead of trying to make, share, find sense.
Hi Thatcrab: Just to clarify, I wasn’t actually referring to the relocation of message. When I said “I’d caution against deleting SB’s contributions”, I was referring to this bit:
Similar warnings have been made on other threads in recent days. Anyhow, judging what’s relevant is very difficult. Many regular commenters make “O/T” comments, and I think it leads to an interesting dynamic.
“judging what’s relevant is very difficult”
It is until it builds up into a pattern of throwing the same super contentious genre out there regardless of flow. I think it keeps leading to pages of bunk right in the middle of crisis examintion and i believe the great majority of potential interest feels that too.
We have had various problems at this site. One “contributor” called “Larry from St Louis” decided to divert every thread onto 9/11. Eventually, the only way to prevent him from fouling every thread was to block each of his new IP addresses and delete every new comment of his.
Another “contributor” sock-puppeted under the names of Apostate, Steelback, Juniper, etc. etc.. The only way to be rid of that right-wing character was repeated deletions.
If left unrestrained, Scouse billy would attempt to place utterly empty arguments on the most recent thread, where Chris Jones, A Node, (and, should they return) Zoologist and Sunflower will sagely reply what important warnings these are.
As with Apostate, anti-Judaism would then be worked into the discussion, because central to all of this is the “Jewish Freemasonic Conspiracy”.
Today, someone has signed up my published e-mail address to five e-mailing lists, ie. I have come under a spam attack. Three of the lists are NASA lists, suggesting an interest in climate change. One of them is for Alex Jones’ Infowars US right-wing conspiracy site. The other is Jewish Life. I hope you can all see the pattern.
WOW !!!!
This has degenerated into a bit of a slanging match by Clark. Language language
You take it easy there fella…life is life….each to their own, just chill…..everybody has their views, their interests, hobbies and so on…..hear what they say….read if you like….comment if you feel the need…..but bitching and moaning……come on …..get a life, it’s a big world out there…..
easy on the IP address stuff, we can all change and re-post from different hosts….we are all pretty intelligent….or are you British Intelligence sent to spy on us……(that was a joke by the way)
Regarding banning and deletion policy, I remember Craig explicitly banning Larry and prohibiting flagrant anti-Semitism (in the usual sense of the term), but I don’t see how any of that applies to SB (or the others who have been cautioned or threatened with deletion recently). Maybe you’ve had different instructions in private?
I don’t agree with SB’s recent output (as should be quite evident) but I welcome the debate. Imho, he’s not trolling – you obviously disagree. To some extent he has remained relatively stoic in the face of increasing hostility.
I think telling people to fuck off and drawing attention to your “superior powers” – over the ‘plebs’? 😉 – is arguably overstepping the bounds for moderation. There are probably more constructive ways to engage these issues. Anyhow, I look forward to normal service resuming.
Nextus, thank you – I’ve been out all evening so I’ve just come back to this.
Frankly I don’t need this paranoid nonsense from a moderator but will sleep on whether or not I write to Craig to protest at this witch hunt.
Of course, the fact is the leader of the Green Party in Sweden talked about chemtrails, her government and the CIA – is that not relevant and newsworthy?