a new understanding of today, time and space.

if we understand the above post, then we can come
to the same conclusion that Rousseau came to, that
man is born free and innocent… but the message from
society was that we are born guilty and in bondage…
society then continues to carry out that message with
phony and false myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions like
to survive, we must compete and defeat our fellow man…
there is only competition between man, not cooperation…
if you want your piece of the pie, you must fight for it or die…

but the truth is this… the pie is big enough to support everyone…
we don’t need to compete for our piece of the pie because it
is big enough… but because of income inequality, where
500 people have the same wealth has half the world’s population…
3.5 BILLION people…how is that justified by the wealthy is
simply by more myths and prejudices, the Ayn Rand superstitions that
the wealthy deserve their wealth by virture of their superority
and their creating more wealth then others…as if the creation of wealth
is the basis of what a human being is… that all our possibilities are
in the creation of wealth…and not in being a better human being or in
finding new means of becoming…or in the act of simple reflection of who
we are…

man is good but because society is about the creation of wealth and
the search for profit to make the 1% even wealthier, that creates
the new false message that we exist because we are consumers
and producers… we exist to consume and we exist to create wealth,
not for ourselves mind you, but for those who own the means of production…

we don’t exist just to be ourselves… we exist to make a contribution
to society, I.E. to create profits for the 1%…

WE ARE A MEANS TO AN END… and that end is profits…
and we are expendable assets that have value only as long
as we create profits and once we no longer create profits,
we are tossed aside like yesterday’s garbage…that is the modern
value of man… profit creating…

in some ways, this is worse then the old fashion idea that
we are born of original sin and thus guilty… because at least,
here we can be saved if we confess our sins and we can be saved…
whereas if we have value only as the creators of profit, there isn’t
a chance of redemption, of being saved… because how does one get
saved in a world of profit? by only having money and those few,
those lucky few, the 1%… they are saved… the rest is dammed…

when the only value that is respected is money, then everything
gets judged by money… if all you have is a hammer, then everything
looks like a nail…there is no other values…

and so one is judge by money… not by deeds or idea’s or
wisdom, but by money… and those without money
are judge unworthy, without value, having no point or purpose…

society by valuing money over all other values, creates
the message that without money, you have no value…
that you have no point or purpose…

have you ever wonder why life seems to be so cheap?
because society has deemed life to be cheap… in its search for
profits, life has been deem of less value then profits, life has less
value then money… if you want life to have value, to have meaning,
then you must place life above money, above profits…

but this will not happen because to do so will reduce the
worth of the 1% and they own the media and the state and
the church and so they will continue to push the narrative of
the 1%…that the only value in life is profits… everything else
is replaceable, expendable, disposable including people…

you want to know why we are so fucked up?
because the message of the 1% devalues life to being
replaceable, expendable, disposable…

profits above people devalues people…

and that is the message of society today…

Kropotkin

one of Rousseau’s points was that wealth created the corruption of man…
wealth doesn’t create the corruption of man, it is the pursuit of wealth
that negates man or the values of man…when we pursue wealth or profits
to the negation of who we are, then that is the source of the corruption…

wealth itself is not good or evil, it is neutral… how it is used determines
whether it is “good or evil”…things are not “good or evil”…
it is how they are used that decides if they are “good or evil”…

morality is simply a judgement about how things are used…
not the things themselves…for things themselves are neutral…

human beings are things and as such are neutral… it is how
we use or are used that determines our “good or evil”…

Kropotkin

the question that Rousseau began his writing career on, was the question
given by the Academy of Dijon, “Whether the restoration of the sciences
and arts has contributed to purify morals?”

in other words, has the growth of civilization contributed to our moral growth?
are we more moral because of civilization or are we less moral because of
civilization? now that question depends on how one answers the question of,
what is morals?

the question also depends on our understanding of civilization…
as pointed out, civilization is really a neutral idea…
it isn’t “good or evil” per se…but depending on how it is used…
and what is its goal? it civilization used for the enrichment of
individual members or is civilization used for the benefit of all the
members of a society?

as defined right now, society/civilization is used for the enrichment of
individual members, the 1%… and not for the benefit of all
the members of society…so we are less moral because of this
use of civilization… if we use civilization for the benefit of all members
of society, then we are more moral… how a society uses its members
decides the value of the members of that society… morality becomes
a function of how society uses its members of that society…
in a throwaway, disposable, expendable society that values society
citizens only for their consumerism, then morality becomes a question
of the value of individual members of society…and if you create nothing,
you have no value…if you have no wealth, you have no value…
because morality implies value… and if you have no value, you
are outside of morality… because you have no value in society…
morality is connected to the creation of wealth and the creation of
profits…and the moral righteous ones are the ones who create
profits… and the rest because of their failure to create profits
and money, are immoral and thus have no value…

Kropotkin

so another words, how is “human nature” created?

one argument is human nature is innate…
another argument is human nature is created by experiences…

we are a blank slate says the experience argument…
and that experiences fill up the blank slate…
and if society creates myths and habits and prejudices and
superstions, that lead people to believe or to understand
they have no value outside of creating profits, that understanding
creates “human nature”… creates the idea that we have no value
outside of creating profits and/or by being a consumer…

“human nature” is created by society and if society has no need or any
use for values outside of the creation of profits, then most human
beings have no value in society…and human beings become
replacable, expendable, disposeable…

the myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions of
our childhood become the basis of our “human nature” and
if those myths…etc. negate our being, they damage
our “human nature”…

we can only become who we are by society allowing, no, that is
the wrong word, not allowing, but by accepting who we are even if
we don’t create profits…if our “human nature” is created
by experiences, then we should create experiences that allow
us to become something more then the creators of profit…

for example, in education, we educate to create a working class,
to allow people the skills to get a job and support themselves…
that is all education is used for… not to create better people or
to improve themselves but to use people to become better workers
and create bigger profits…

what if, what if we change the meaning of education to mean,
to educate people to become better people and not use education to
train people to have skills to get a job…what if education is used
to discover who we are and to find out our possibilities, which does not
involve job training and finding a career… but to improve us in how to
become better people… to search for wisdom and not job skills…

what is education for? that becomes the question…

what is “human nature”? that is the goal of education and not
just to train workers to get careers…

Kropotkin

so in regards to “human nature”…
if we don’t reward such human values as kindness, joy,
love, happiness, the positive values of human experience…then
why have those experiences?

if we negate those human values for the pursuit of profits,
then society rewards those who follow the pursuit of profits…
and those who follow love and peace and joy and joy are
not only not rewarded but in fact, are punished…

at work, which values are rewarded?
certainly not values of love or peace or
happiness… work and society doesn’t reward those
who have values outside of the pursuit of profits…

if you pursue profits, you are rewarded at work with promotions and
bonuses… if you don’t, you are punished or at best ignored and
deemed without value… that is how experience is created…
and human nature is created… you reward the actions you favor
and you punish the actions not in favor…and so the creation of
profits is rewarded and thus we learn what is “human nature”…

if you want people who pursue wisdom, you reward those
those who pursue wisdom and punish those who don’t pursue
wisdom…that is how we train children and that is how we train
students and that is how we train workers…we reward behavior
we like and we punish behavior we dislike…

this negation of value works this way… if we love at work,
we are punished because love doesn’t create profits…
hard work creates profits and is rewarded…
the values we accept are rewarded and the values
we don’t accept are punished…

and this is how we create “human nature”…

by reward and punishment…

Kropotkin

a question of human nature…

why don’t we reward laziness?

Kropotkin

a question I keep comin back to, is this question of
certainty…life is one big question of uncertainty…
it is now noon, shall I still be alive at 5:00 tonight?
I don’t know. I am uncertain…the further I inquire into
what life is and what life is about, the less certain I become…

when I was young, life was black and white… it was certain in its
actions… now, now I don’t know anything… I cannot be certain about
anything… shall I die? I cannot know that… I can certainly guess that I shall
die, but guessing is not certainty… what we can know for certain?
as far as I can tell, nothing…and we have no way of becoming certain
about anything…there is a certain fixation of the past and that is because
we can create, in our minds, a certainty about the past…it is very attractive to
believe that something is certain… this belief in god is in large part about
the certainty that the belief in god creates… it becomes a certainty that we
can depend upon… and yet, even with this belief in god, comes with
uncertainty… for we cannot be certain that we are part of the elect…
the ones that shall go to heaven… we have the ego to believe that we are
the elect, but ego is not certainty… ego is simply ego…in fact, if I were
to make a joke, uncertainty is the only certainty we have…
it is easy to be black and white, for that creates a certainty that we might
base our views upon but the fact is, viewing the universe in black and white,
yes and no, up and down, good and evil,
fails to catch the universe in its entirety…

any given action can be viewed as yes and no and good and evil…
can that action be considered evil, yes, depending on how it affects you
and the exact same action might be considered good, depending on how it affects
you…we can never be certain if any given action is good or bad… we can guess,
but that is all, a guess and nothing more…we begin this journey of life with not much
more then a kiss for luck and off we go… we have nothing else…

we consider money some sort of certainty…if we are rich, we have some
sort of certainty… and if we have an collage education, we believe
we have some sort of certainty…and if we have friends and family,
that creates some sort of certainty in our lives… but fact is, that the
things that we consider certainties are not…they are just moments in
the sand and soon to washed out by the waves of time…we have nothing
and we are nothing and we have no certainty… just brief moments in times
and then those moment are gone…

Kropotkin

we have a situation in our economic and political life whereas
we have institutionalize inequality and disparity in wealth and freedom
and influence…Rousseau basic starting point and his first claim
to fame is that men are evil and man is good… meaning
that we are naturally good and that we have been turned to “bad” or
“evil” by our society and its institutuionalize inequality…
the man who was first able to fence in a piece of land and claim
it is his, was the begining of this source of institutionalize inequality…
and the state’s main purpose is to defend private property, as is claimed
by Locke…now Rousseau didn’t want to return to the state of nature,
as Hobbes put it, “life outside of society would be 'solitary, poor, nasty,
brutish and short”… we need society to allow us to escape this
state of nature… but how do we escape this institutionalize inequality
and still not exist in this state of nature?

society and its institutions have created “evil” in men…
but we need society… the GOP and its phony answer is
and is defined by Raygun, being the state itself is the problem,
the government is the problem… but that is not a solution…
removing the state brings us back to a state of nature where,
“life outside of society/government would be solitary…”

so we have a two part question, one, is man naturally good?
and two, is the state part of the problem as defined by Rousseau
and Raygun? The institutions of the state that create and foster
the institutionalize inequality that exists in the state, must those
institutions be eliminated? or do we have to do/try something else?

in my study of history, I understand that as the population grows,
the state/government must also grow to help organize society to
avoid the primitive state of nature that allows life to be "solitary…
the rise of government and its institutions comes from the rise of
population…you want to limit government? you must reduce
the population and that isn’t really possible without
large scale genocide…and thus that answer is not available to us…

we have to find the answer with the understanding that
we have certain restrictions forced upon us…

we have massive population… we have already in place, institutions that
will fight to maintain their privilege place, and we have an autocracy,
one of wealth, that have control over the institutions we have such as
the legal system, the legislative system and the executive branch…
they will not willingly give up their power and the protection of their wealth…

but it is clear in any analysis that it is wealth, that is the driver of
our current system, wealth and the protection of one’s wealth that
is the basis of our government today…

is one person having billions a problem? no, it is the fact and it is a fact,
that 500 people have the equal wealth as half the population of earth…
that is the problem… and those 500 people by virtue of their wealth,
control the means of government by bribes to the legislative and executive
system… why would the wealthy give millions upon millions of dollars
to members of congress if not to buy them? certainly not out of the goodness
of their heart… they are buying influence and buying the government, nothing
short of that…

so when we reduce it down, it becomes money that drives our economic
and political system… so, the answer becomes remove the money
and thus we can recover our rightful place as owners and
participants within the political process… because as of right now,
we have no part in government because the politicians listen to
the money and not to the citizens of this country… you buy
politicians so they listen to you and not the citizens of this country…

so we come around to the understanding that the institutionalize
inequality of our lives is there to stay unless we remove the
buying and selling of politicians…

so is Rousseau right? is men evil and man is good?

I think so… within limits…

Kropotkin

most of thoughts about man, begins with love of self…

the french call it… amour propre… a sense of one’s worth, self respect…

Rousseau used it in terms of the esteem that depends on others…
we have amour propre when others view us favorable…

the other term that can be use as self love is amour de soi, which
is self love but is more basic then amour propre… this self love tends to
be naturally good and is basic with animals also…the self love is for
the individual well being…

so we have two basic idea’s about self love…

but we have a third idea, that is we justify actions taken based on self love…
I am looking out for my best interests regardless of what that
means to others… looking out for number one and that is me…

this idea is not only common today but is the basis of our economic system…

but look at our hero’s… we glorify those who don’t put self love first…
our hero’s are MLK and Gandhi and Lincoln and Mother Teresa…
people who put others first and they don’t practice self love in the
third way…this shows we are aware of and want to follow those
who put others first… we just don’t have a support system that allows us
to practice what we preach… to practice putting others first means
we face opposition from those who goal is to practice self love by
accumulation of material goods and money…we are punished
for our desire to put others first by those who practice the vain and
selfish self love…notice the relationship between the words self
and selfish…

I call for a new understanding where we not only support but
we actively support those who put others first…

We follow our hero’s in this new understanding of who we are…

we reject the self love of the pursuit of material goods and wealth…
because that self love damages the person who practices it and, and
damages the family and the environment and the society of those who
put self love first, the love of goods and wealth…

but one says, it increases the wealth of a country and increases
the GDP… as if that is the important aspect of our lives… it isn’t…
the idea that we are an economic beings first and foremost is wrong
and dangerous… we cannot afford the practice of an unlimited
pursuit of limited wealth and material goods… we must, to save,
our resources, we must end the capitalistic idea that we pursue
wealth and material goods… if we put ourselves first, as we have done,
is to risk the future welfare and sustainability of any future society, of our
children health and welfare…what parent wastefully spends and
destroys a child’s inheritance? a rather selfish parent and that is what
we shall be if we waste and destroy our children’s inheritance by
using up our resources in some vain and unproductive pursuit of
wealth and material goods…

what we have failed to understand is our actions are not isolated
actions… we exists in both space and time… when we act,
our actions exists in both space and time…we take up space and
we occupy time… if we build a house, that house takes up both
space, the house occupies space and it takes up time…
that house exists within duration, which is time…
with every single house built leaves our children that much less
space and time… but we have millions to house and feed and clothe…
therein lies the difficulty of our current economic system whereas
500 people own the same amount of wealth as half of the entire human race…
in terms of the future sustainability of the human race, we cannot afford to
have the current economic inequality that exists because it denies
the future the ability to create its own future because the wealth
needed to create that future is tied up in the hands of a small
number of people… so we have a choice, keep our current system
and destroy our children’s future or we change and become
aware of our choices and practice love of others before love of self…

the choice is yours… self love and destroy the future or practice
love of others and save the future… choose and decide
the future…

Kropotkin

we have in the enlightenment, the Philosophes, who argued that
man was ruled by myths, habits, prejudices and superstitions…
these myths and habits and prejudices were from to such authorities as
Aristotle and Plato and the Bible and the church and the Pope…
Would these myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions that
we have received from these authorities, stand up to a rigorous inspection?

if we examined these myth and habits and prejudices in the light on modern
science, would they pass the test of still being authentic truths, as
told to us by authorities? in other words, would we still believe in god
if we actually examined god in terms of modern thought? the answer is
clearly no…

so we then have Hume who comes along and tell us why
we cannot believe in the old myths and habits and prejudices and
superstitions… the enlightenment was working toward freeing
people from the old myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions like
believe in god and the authority of the pope… but Hume told us,
gave us method to refute such things… his thought was
that we, by means of habit and connection, have connected
certain idea’s together, but those idea’s are nothing more then
habit of thought… in the sky, we see and hear lighting, after
some time, we have learned to connect this lighting with
some idea of god…but there is no connection between lighting
and god, the connection only exists from our habit of connecting
god with the lighting…and then the authorities continued this
myth and habit to every generation as it came along…

so Hume offers us a method to continue the quest of the Philosophes,
by undercutting the myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions
that exists and is perpetuated by the authorities to maintain their power
and hold over us…

so the myth that America is the greatest country on earth is perpetuated
by those who have the most to gain by that myth and habit, people
in the political world who use such myths and habits to get you
to vote for them…and also to maintain their power over you…

so Hume and the Philosophes worked together in their quest to
rid the human race of those myths and habits and prejudices and
superstitions that prevent you from being able to live free…
remove those myths and habits and prejudices and you will be free
and be able to become who you are… and now we reach our modern
quest to become who we are and find out our possibilities…

if we are dominated by myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions,
how can we be free to freely make choices about who we are and what we
can become?

if we allow the myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions to
determine who we are and what is possible, then we allow the past,
the long dead past to decide who we are and what is possible for us…

if we allow those myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions to
limit our choices into who we are and what is possible for us, then
we are no longer free agents, freely deciding who we are…
we are determined by those myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions…
in other words, if we hold to the belief in god because we haven’t
freed ourselves of our childhood teaching and myths and habits
and prejudices and superstitions… we are determined… we are no longer
free to act if we allow myths and habits and prejudices and
superstitions to make our choices for us…

the argument is, how can you be free if you have your actions determined
for you by the myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions in your life?
if you were taught that there is a god in childhood and you never challenged
that idea, then you are dominated, determined by an idea, you learned as a child…

that is the value of a certain saying… It is not enough to have the
courage of our convictions, but we must have the courage for an attack upon
our convictions…

the value is to be free, to make your choices, not because you still hold
your myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions from childhood…
that isn’t freedom, that is being determined, no, to be free, you must
have the courage for an attack upon your convictions…you must become
free of the myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions of childhood…

you must grow up and create your own values, your own beliefs,
instead of holding myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions
that have lingered on for over a millennium…that have lingered on
without any thought or understanding as to what they actually mean…
what they mean to you and what they mean to society at large…
I have stated more then once, that the belief in god is the single
most destructive thought human beings have ever had…
this thought has created the greatest amount of disunity ever
sown and the caused the greatest number of deaths in human history…

Kropotkin

if as I contend that we in America no longer has a say in government,
that because our government has been sold to the highest bidder,
we are no longer participants in the American government and as
such, we are no longer required to obey the American government
as it is no longer within our control as required in the Constitution…
if the government no longer follows the law, why should we?

we are government of the people, for the people, by the people…
if we no longer have this, then we are no longer a govenrment of the
people, that is us, and as such we are no longer required to follow the
government… because if we are not a part of government, we are no longer
required to obey it… we can dissent and be proud of it because the
government is no longer following the legal basis of our duly constituted
goverment…if the government has abdicated its rights, responsibilities,
and duties to the American people, then we have the right, indeed the
responsibility to reject the government as being illegal…

99% of all people will reject my arguments and that is ok,
even if every single person in the world rejected my argument, that
doesn’t make my argument wrong… and at some point, in the future,
my point will be held valid and right and the second american revolution
will begin… once again, the goal shall be to articulate the point,
that we, we the people, hold political power in our hands and the politicans
in washington work for us, government of the people, for the people,
by the people…

if we have no say in government, then we have no business giving our
consent to the government… and so, I hearby remove my consent
to the government…until the point is that we the people in order to form
a more perfect union… we the people, not big busines and not the wealthy
individuals or lobbiest, but we the people…

this is the first step and as all first steps go, it is a small one…
larger steps will be needed if we are to regain control of the
government that no longer functions or operates under our name…

Kropotkin

K: now as one reads the above post, one may react in many different ways…
oh, thats Kropotkin being Kropotkin…and wrong as usual…

but let us become philosophical and take Kropotkin at his word…
what if, what if the government is as Kropotkin says it is… and
is no longer of the people, for the people and by the people…
what if the voice the government hears and responds to, is the voice
of the rich and powerful who has bought the government to do their
bidding and and not the voice of the American people?

What if Kropotkin is right… now what?
now, how would you resolve finding out if Kropotkin is right?

for example, you can rely on your myths and habits and prejudices
and superstitions to tell you that Kropotkin is wrong… but they are
teachings from your childhood by the very same government and society
that Kropotkin is attacking…you are relying on the very myths and
habits and prejudices and superstitions of the government and society
to understand if the government has abdicated in its basic and
fundamental function of being of the people, for the people, by the people…
to act in the people’s name, in doing the people business…

so to honestly answer that question, one must, must answer the question
without recourse to the very myths and habits offered by the government
in its defense…we must, must look at the evidence without the bias
of myths and habits and prejudices and superstitions of that society…
to discover if the goverment has in fact, failed in its basic and primary
duty to answer to the people and be the tool of the people in doing
the people business…

if you use the myths and habits and bias and prejudices and superstitions of
the government, then you are already declaring in favor of the government…

think of it like a trial… what evidence would you use to decide if
the government was guilty of a crime? would you use the evidence
of the very government that was on trial? no, of course not, you would
use neutral evidence to discover if the government had committed a crime
or would you use the very evidence given by the government on trial?

put the government on trial and decide if the government has in fact,
committed to those who have paid for it or does the government still
represent the people and speaks for and follows the voice of the people?

the only true way to answer this is by removing your prior myths and
bias and habits… given to you by the very government that is on trial…

am I being radical? yes and so what? we are no longer in a democracy…
and being radical is the only path to our return to a democracy…

Kropotkin

As I have been sick today, the dam bug that has been going around…

I have either been sleeping or watching TV… the show I just watch was
on Netflix, The story of Maths… by an english professor of math
Marcus du Sautoy… and his contention is that the world, the universe
is mathematical… but does that make our lives mathematical?
is who we are, mathematical?

now one may recall that Descartes thought that the world is motion,
and we can learn who we are by understanding motion… we can discover
not only who we are but we can learn such things as morals from the
understanding of motion…

is this the same thing? can we understand who we are from math
and can we learn such things as morals from the understanding of math?

we certainly can learn mathematical things about us, the average height
of a man in america today is 5’8… which is taller then the average height
of an american man 20 years ago…but does that tell us who we are
and what are our possibilities?

the questions that haunt us are not mathematical…
the questions of life and death and what to do in that time
between birth and death? many, many years ago, in my twenties,
I was haunted by death and the, I thought, impending coming of my death…

now I know I was silly and foolish, as youth is… but
I still understand the questions of the Existentialists,
how do I live an honest, authentic life… what is the relationship
between me and god? what of that question, is this all there is to life?
and how do I find answers to this profound questions? From math?

Somehow I don’t think so…but as math is about finding a method,
we are engaged in finding a method that will lead us to finding our
answers to that which engages us, the meaning of life is one such question…
who are we and what are our possibilities is another?

the questions that engage us are human questions, not math questions…

Kropotkin

a question I have been thinking about it this question
of how we are influenced by environment…

if we become who we are by the pressures of the environment,
then it would make sense to create an positive and caring environment
for our children but that isn’t what happening… we have people who
falsely believe that the best enviroment for our children is a selfish,
competetive, every child for him or her self…

we become who we are, in reaction to our enviroment…
so an enviroment that is mean and selfish would produce
mean and selfish people for that is what the enviroment is teaching…
and in that unhealthy enviroment, only the strong survive…
is that the lesson we want our enviroment to actually teach?

No, for we don’t have our own families existing in such an enviroment…
we try for loving, caring, open family structure… we don’t create
chaos or stress or hate or fear in the children we raise, so why should
we encourage chaos and stress and fear and hate in our society in
our economic system of capitalism…

if the enviroment helps create the following generation, then
we should create an enviroment that helps the next generation,
become who they are and that is by ending the economic system of
chaos and stress and hate and fear that is inherent in capitalism…
because in capitalism, the negation of values, the negation of human values
is nihilism and that is the enviroment to which we learn and react to…

we are who we are because of enviromental aspects like capitalism
and democracy, in which democracy no longer exists because it has
been coopted by money by which the wealthy and powerful have bought
democracy with multi-million dollar payoffs for the legislative branch…

the legislative branch works for those who have bought it and that
is no longer democracy and we must react to and learn from that…
these experiences help create who we are and what are our possibilities…

and from chaos and hate and stress and fear, what can we become?

just more of the same, chaotic and stressful and full of hate and ever fearful…
we are what our environment is… try fitting round pegs in a square hole…
if we are kind and nice and loving and without the nihilism of the modern age,
we are round pegs in the square hole of the chaotic and stressful and hateful
and fearful modern age of capitalism…only those with the attributes of
modern capitalism succeed within capitalism…the environment creates
its participants…so, who are we and what are our possibilities
is linked to our environment because that environment is the only possibility
for us to act in… and thus those who don’t fit into the square hole of capitalism
fails and is doomed and is denied basic possibilities of human existence…

so to create the people we want to create, we must first create the proper
environment… so what is environment we want to create for the next
generation to succeed?

Kropotkin

If environment helps create who we are, and I believe it does,
then we should create a better environment to create better people…

and by better people, I would contend that means people who
are honest and aren’t violent and follows the rules…to give some
examples… for society to exist, it must have participants who
help maintain the society…

think of it in terms of systems… a system with too many parts not functioning,
means eventually, the system will fail… if we have too many parts, people,
not helping maintaining the system, it will fail…

so if for example, Mars in the solar system decides to go its own way
and leave the system, the balance that is the solar system is lost
and it will destory the solar system…the smaller the system,
the more important the various parts become… a large system like
the human system, has billions of parts, thus if thousands go and attempt
to distrupt the system, there are enough humans to help maintain the system…
but in the solar system which only has 10 basic parts plus many minor parts,
the sun, 8 planets and whatever Pluto is these days and the mulitude of
moons means we can probably deal with the loss of a couple of smaller
moons but not our moon…as it is a very large moon…

so in the smaller the system, the individual parts must help stablize the
system as they are fewer of the individual parts… in a large, huge system,
it is less important that the individual parts help stablize the system…
there are enough individual parts to help stablize the system…

so we can throw into jail, millions of people who cause disruptions to
the system, because we have millions more who keep the system running…

so the question becomes, at what point do the numbers of people affect
the human system? clearly in the U.S that number that affects the system
is quite large…in other words, how many people need to stop working to
derail the entire system? we know at least 50 million people at any given time
is not working, the old, the young, mothers, disable, but that is accounted for
in the system understanding…in other words, the system has already
account for at least 50 million people not working, so that number shouldn’t
affect the system…so that leaves roughly, lookin it up, the claim is
that roughly 110 million people are working in the U.S…so roughly a third
of all people in the U.S work…

so to maintain the balance of the system, as we increase in the number of people,
there needs to be roughly a third of all people working…

as long as the balance is maintained, then the system should work…
and if we get more people working, that strengthens the system even more…

so, we have one aspect of the environment, the balance of the system…

as the environment is a system, we must have balance in any system…

we cannot disrupt any system very much, for that creates an unbalance
system…

so now we can understand what has happened in our system that has
created an unbalanced system…we have far too much wealth
at the top of the system, this creates a top heavy system and is now
unbalanced…if 500 people have as much wealth as half the world’s
population, 3.3 billion people, we have a unbalanced system…

this is part of our environment, our system and it is no longer in balance
and this threaten to tip over the entire system…

this is why income inequality is so dangerous…it threatens the balance
of the system…

and this is just one part of making a better environment… making an
environment balanced…environment is a system…

what we have now, is an inverted pyramid, with the wealth at top…
but small number of people and as we go lower down the pyramid, more
people but less wealth… this threatens to topple everything because
it is not balanced…the system as is, cannot maintain because of the
unbalanced nature of the environment, the system…

Kropotkin

so it seems that environment is everywhere, but here is the interesting thing,
even small spaces are environments… we have a 4 room condo…
two bedrooms, kitchen and living room…each room is it own environment…
and in each room, is a human constructed environment…
and that is the part we miss… we think of the environment
as being out there, but the fact is, a environment is the space around
us… and in our actions with other humans also creates an environment…

… man, has work a really toxic environment…

and you know what I mean when I say this…

so environment is not also just the physical space around us, but our
relationships around us…our interactions between us is environment…

environment is the relationship between us and anything outside of us…

so if we want to create an environment that allows people to thrive
and become who they are, we have to begin with us… are we,
acting as human beings, engaged in our environment that allows
people to thrive and become who they are…

in other words, the very basic component of environment is us…
the way we act and the way we respond to that part of the environment
outside of us help create an environment that allows people to
thrive and become who they are…

we must begin any thought to our environment with us…

the environment is not out there but inside of us, in how we act and interact
with the other material in the universe…we are the source of environment…
it begins with us…

Kropotkin

there is a connection between the various disciplines like science
and history and law and economics, to name a few…

let us look at one, the law… the creation of laws…

we have laws about stealing and about the right of way of pedestrians
and copyright and murder…

now does the law presuppose an understanding of people?
in other words, is a law passed with the understanding that
people are inherently evil? or that the law passed will lead us
to some greater understanding of who we are?

or are the laws just an ad hoc means to keep people under control…
with no reference to whether people are good or bad or have a destiny
or they come from some particular frame of mind…

if the law assumes anything, it assumes that people are rational and
can follow orders…

or perhaps the laws assume that people are not rational because if they
were they wouldn’t need laws…

the laws seem to be ahistorical in that from reading the laws you cannot
sense the past of why any given law was created… you cannot sense people
behind the laws…

so, let us say, you can only know people from the laws they create,
your only understanding of humans was from the laws they created,
what would be your understanding of people?

well that just the thing, each group of people, say the ancient Greeks to the
Romans through the Medieval times to the Renaissance, we would have
a different sense of people from their laws…for the Germans have
a different legal code then the Romans… and what does that legal code
mean for each people?

it would tell us what they valued, for example, the Romans didn’t prevent
the societies they dominated from practicing their religions…
the Jews for example, were allowed to practice their religion as long
as they paid tribute to Rome… whereas during the Medieval times and
for the next thousand years, the only religion allowed, legally, was
Christanity…to be a Jew or to be an atheist or to be Muslim was to
be outside the pale…

so the law was to give emphasis to the priority of the society…

but the legal system, the laws doesn’t say anything about the future,
it gives us the prior priorities and the present priority but not the future
priorities…in other words, the laws are ahistorical…

the next aspect is, do the laws create a “moral” people?

we see today, in modern society, the laws are considered a burden to be follow,
not as an example of what we aspire to be…

in an “ideal” society, I personally would trash all the laws and begin again…
what laws would I install? What laws would you install if you could
do so?

what is legal and what is illegal? and why?

if the laws are ahistorical, how would we go about connecting the laws
with history?

perhaps a broad mission statement as to why the law has value and why
should the law be obey and followed…

we know that laws have been made that negate the value of people,
laws that practice nihilism, for example the laws allowing slavery
and the laws that allowed the Holocaust…these are just two
examples of the use of the law to negate humans beings, to create
a nihilistic society…

how do we prevent such laws from happening?

so many questions and so few answers…

Kropotkin

when we approach such disciplines as science and history and
law and economics… we see them in isolation from each other
and not in connection to each other… but the law
is a brick in human experience and history is another brick in the wall
and history is another brick in the wall of human experience and
economics is another brick in the wall…and with each passing brick
we get a glimse of the human being as we are…a look at the human experience
from the standpoint of just history is to get a false image of who we are
and to get a look at the human experience from the standpoint of the law
is just another false image and to understand human beings from the
economic is just another false tale…to understand human beings,
one must understand our need for play and that is not seen in such
disciplines as history or economics or the law… and we must understand
our need for entertainment and that is not part of history or economics or
the law…to pursue justice as a end all, be all, is to miss what is
essential in what it means to be human… to pursue history or economics
is to miss what it means to be human…and that is part of the problem…

we cannot create a system that encompasses the entirety of human experience…
no one discipline, such as history or law or economics can fully understand who we
are…no matter how broad a theory we create, we cannot include all the possibilities
of who we are…no matter how broad a theory, we shall miss some very important
aspects of who we are…this means, we cannot create a theory of humans that
will include all the vital facts needed to understand the human being…

this means we have possibilities outside of any theory…
possibilities to become human, fully human…
to foreclose the possibilities of any future advancement based
on past or current events is futile because any theory of past or
present cannot include all possibilities…we cannot, in advance,
dismiss our improvement as human beings… we cannot, in advance,
say what is or isn’t possible for the human being… or for society…

to say, human beings are doomed because we…
is simply a theory which cannot include all the facts necessary
to make a conclusion…we are open ended beings and this
is different then any other animal or creature on earth…
a cat is just a cat and cannot be anything else beside a cat…
there is no room for growth or possibilities for a cat, individually
or collectively…

but there is room for growth for a human being, both individually and
collectively…

so what growth do we want? where have we been, where are we now
and where do we want to go? all is possible because we have no limits
to the human experience…

Kropotkin

as part of my study into the enlightenment, I am studying David Hume…

Now one of the things I have noticed is when discussing say, Hume’s theory
of how we aquired knowledge, it is rather theoretical and abstract…
for example, we look at a tree and we then use reason to understand
the nature of the tree… whereas in fact, this is not how we gain knowledge
at all…we are children and we ask, hay dad, what is that thing over there?
Dad will explain, that is a tree son…Hay dad, what is that glowing thing
in the sky? Well son, that is the sun…it is bright and helps keeps us alive…
Ok, how dad? well, the sun heats us and the planet and that allows plants
and tree’s and animals and us to grow… ummm, So, dad, what about…?
and we learn from either asking questions or being told, what a certain thing is…

to make connections between such things as tree’s and us for example,
we must study and experiment and reflect on tree’s and what is their purpose…
but that is after we have learned what a tree is… Einstein worked out light and
what it is, but he had to rediscover what light actually is…he was told, very young
what light is and where it came from… now whether or not that information was
true or not, doesn’t matter… it comes from the collected knowledge we humans have…
we know the earth is round… and mathematically, we can figure it out, but,
the real understanding that the earth is round comes from those who have
traveled the earth… Sailors who sail around the globe, gave us concreate
information that the earth is round…and they passed that information down…
and finally at some point, our dad or our school teacher will tell us that the earth is
round… we certainly didn’t work it out and our dad or school teacher didn’t work it out,
that information comes from someone, somewhere who by experience, math can
help confirm it, but experience helps us understand it…

we learn from the collected experiences of everyone who came before us…
we don’t work anything out ourselves and thus lies a problem…
what if the collected information of everyone gives us information that
is somehow, in contradiction to the information we get from someone else?

science is really the collected information of people who has gone before us,
who researched that information with a method and purpose…

let us take a look at this contradiction between the collected information
and the information we see for ourselves…

let us say, that my parents told me that there is a god… (BTW, they steered
clear of theology because of different faiths, mom was protestant and dad was
catholic) but lets us think about this… and in time after many years, of
being told there is a god, I discover the problem of evil… which is how does a
perfect and good god allow evil in the world…after some time trying to reason it out,
I may begin to read the many, many books about this issue… and after some thought,
I come to a conclusion that there is no god…the contradiction between god and evil
is too great for me to allow belief in a god…for whatever reason, I no longer accept
believe in god despite being told by the state and the church and my parents, that
there is a god…I have overcome my initial teaching of biases and myths and
prejudices and superstitions… I have gained new knowledge…
and that knowledge is from thinking and comparing experiences I have had
and other people who I read about, have had about this issue about god and evil…

the path to knowledge is really the path of overcoming our original
source of knowledge which is this collective knowledge of humans
which was gained over a million years from hard experience of humans
in the world… experience that may or may not be right about things…

our collective experience/knowledge of the sun for example, was
wrong… for thousands, if not millions of years, we thought the sun was
either a god or was circling the earth or was very, very close to the earth…
our knowledge, our collective knowledge of the sun was wrong…
it has only been recently in human existence that we have found out
what the sun was and how it operated in space…

now some of this collective knowledge is correct… the stove is hot,
treat people as you want to be treated, don’t walk into walls…

but don’t think that we have gained this knowledge by some studious
application of reason and thought… most of our knowledge is from
this collective knowledge we humans have, and it may or may not be right…

the “great” human beings are great because they went beyond the
the collective knowledge we have and tried to understand the knowledge
they have with the facts as they know it…and if the collective knowledge we
have contradicts the facts we have, then one of them is wrong…and chances
are, it is the collective knowledge we have that is wrong…

they compared the collective knowledge with the facts we have…
and often, often it becomes clear that facts conflict with the
collective knowledge we have…most people would simply ignore
the facts and go with the collective knowledge, but that is the greatness
of those human beings, they ignored the collective knowledge
and tried to make sense of the facts… which has lead them
to the theories and idea’s that make them great…

With Darwin for example, evolution was in the air and had been
in the air for hundred years before he wrote his book in 1859…
but Darwin didn’t just accept the collective knowledge that was
there… Man came about because god created the heavens and earth
and man… No, Darwin saw the collective information and the facts
were in contradiction… they didn’t agree with each other…so, does
Darwin just simply accept the collective wisdom/information/ knowledge
of his culture/people? no, tried to make sense of this conflict between
the collective information/knowledge of his “tribe” and researched it
for himself… he tried to rise about the knowledge given to him by
his parents, the state, the church…the collective knowledge of
his time was wrong…and he didn’t just accept it like most people…

he was able to make connection between objects, living and inanimate
objects… connections that lead him to his theory…
and the means he used was experience… his experience of his travels
and of his breeding of birds…and of other people experiences…

his research wasn’t theoretical or abstract… it was practical and
immediate experiences…

so, how do you understand knowledge?

Kropotkin

let us further explore this idea…

hay dad, what is that thing over there?
Why son, that is a tree?
hay dad, what is a tree?
Why son, a tree is a living thing that grows in the ground…

ummmm, what is a living thing?

now at this point, most dad’s would say, ask your mother?
but we are left with a question, what is a living thing?

how would you explain to a child of two or three, what a living thing is?
you would point to something and say, that tree is living and you are living
and I am living and your mother is living…

so, in your itty, bitty mind, you are trying to make some connection
between a tree and your dad or yourself…

that tree doesn’t look like dad… the tree is hard, again you only
learn this from experience…and the tree is taller then you dad…
ummmm, what connects this tree with your dad?

and we learn in school, what is the connection between living things…
they grow and they exist by consuming matter and they recreate themselves…
at this point, our collective knowledge of living matter, tells the tale of
what living matter is…

and that collective human knowledge is relatively correct…
the details will come more and more to the front as we
age and our schooling becomes more detailed…

we soon learn the direct connection between the tree/tree’s and
the earth… how they benefit each other and are connected in direct
ways with rain and sun and interconnections with other living matter…

but that is way after first learning about living matter,
high school or even later, do we learn exactly how the tree and earth interact… …

Hay dad, what is that thing? that son is a tree…
and that is all we learn because at that very young age,
we are unable to make the necessary connections that would allow
us to really understand the connections between tree’s and the earth…

and sometimes, people don’t ever make the connection between
the tree’s and the earth…

what is wisdom/knowledge? the understanding of connections
between objects, both inanimate and living…

want to be wise? understand how things are connected…

it is not enough to say, son, that is a tree…

you have to explain why a tree is living matter and what
the tree’s connection to you and to the earth and to the sky…

the tree has to be place into context and context is simply
another word for experience…

so place your life into context…with what experience should
I place my life? and you have the point…to make sense of the
tree, you have to place the tree into context/experience of living
matter and what is the tree connection to the earth…

so place your life into context…

Kropotkin