This week marked the anniversary of Katrina, and I thought it would be fun to make a list of all the disasters that I have read about that are certain to happen in the United States of America sometime in the future.
1. A major hurricane hits the City of New Orleans causing it to be flooded and resulting in hundreds of thousands of displaced residents. Done. Could it happen again? Damn straight.
2. Mount Rainier erupts. Rainier is covered with ice and the stability of the volcano is constantly being eroded by subsurface water. So when it erupts, it tends to collapse like Mt. St. Helens in a huge avalanche that flows into the sea. The last really big one was 5,000 years ago. If an eruption like that happened today, the towns of Tacoma, Payallup and Orting would be wiped out by pyroclastic mud flows. South Seattle would also be severely damaged. The good news is that Bill Gates would be likely to experience lengthy power and communications outages proving that there really is such a thing as karma.
3. A major earthquake along the New Madrid seismic zone wipes out the city of Memphis, causes major damage to St. Louis, disrupting telecommunications throughout the country and giving new meaning to the phrase Rocking at Graceland. The good news would be that the staff at the Memphis Holiday Inn Downtown would likely be casualties.
4. I like this one. A massive solar flare hits Earth just right causing the Earth’s magnetosphere to be temporarily disrupted. Satellites get fried. Astronauts in orbit get lethal doses of radiation (so sad). Jet airliners will drop out of the sky like DDT-soaked houseflies because their electronics become crispy-fried, marking the beginning of a new era of high-speed ocean travel. Most of the world is plunged into darkness because power grids are also crispy-fried. And here is the best part, the power outages last for months. The good news is that billions of people will discover for the very first time that there are stars in the sky at night.
5. An asteroid hits the planet. We all know this scenario. Supersonic shockwaves, tremendous heat. Mass extinction. Blah blah blah.
6. A big California quake hits S.F. or L.A. Blah³.
7. A BF rock hits the planet. This happens far more often than most people think. Rocks about 10 meters in size hit the atmosphere and blow up with the force of an atomic bomb blast about once a year. However, they are so high up, that their impact is not even felt on the ground. Much bigger rocks, say 100 meters across, blow up with hydrogen bomb type energies. They wipe out stuff on the ground. It appears to have last happened in Tunguska, Siberia in 1908. If that happened today, it would look to everyone just exactly like a high altitude hydrogen bomb detonation. I don’t think that would be good.
8. Bird flu becomes contagious between humans. Blah etc. etc.
9. Huge underwater landslide causes massive tidal wave to hit US. Most likely this would hit someplace like Tacoma, Washington. So if Mt. Rainier erupted at the exact same time, that would be really cool.
10. Here is another of my favorites: The Super Volcano known as the Yellowstone Caldera erupts causing most of North America to be uninhabitable. There are other super volcanoes and any of them stepping on the throttle would make it bad for all of us, but I prefer to talk about our own little time bomb underneath Yellowstone National Park. It’s last major eruption was 640,000 years ago (give or take). It made Mt. Saint Helens look like one of those little wads of paper you throw on the sidewalk so it pops. It blanketed most of North America with volcanic ash. If this were to happen today, the good news is that the war by the U.S. to annex Mexico, Central and South America should be fairly short.
I am sure I’ll think of a few others. Have a nice day.
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Thursday, August 10, 2006
TWA Flight 800
As I write this entry to my blog, the top story of the morning is that in London, a plot to blow up airliners over the ocean has been foiled and security on international flights is now much stricter and they are confiscating all liquids and gels from people's luggage. Coincidentally, last night I watched a documentary on the crash of TWA Flight 800 on the History Channel.
As you may recall, Flight 800 was a New York to Paris Boeing 747 that exploded over Long Island in 1996 killing all 230 passengers. You can read all about it here: Wikipedia on Flight 800.
Now, before I share my thoughts on Flight 800 and this documentary, I want to say that I am a very skeptical guy when it comes to conspiracy theories. I believe that most conspiracy theories are nonsense invented by someone that finds more comfort in believing that there is some evil cabal running world events, then the stark truth, which is that no one is running anything. Furthermore, the reason the truth is often hard to believe is usually due to somebody's unfathomable incompetence.
I am fairly confident that the Roswell crash was a top secret ballooning experiment. I think it is most likely that Oswald acted alone. I think it likely that Timothy McVeigh blew up the Murrah building.
That said, I must say that Flight 800 is a different story. If I am to believe the official version, then I must accept that the jet spontaneously blew itself up, kinda like the Hindenburg. I am to believe that this is the first time a commercial airline has done this in the entire history of passenger travel. Furthermore, there have been no groundings of 747s because of this tendency for spontaneous combustion. I am to believe that it was a one time thing. Don't worry about it. It won't happen again.
I'm sorry but I can't be that gullible. I just can't. I want to be. Don't get me wrong. I really don't want to believe that the Clinton Administration chose to lie to the American public and cover up a terrorist attack on an airline -- information that could have prevented 9/11. Or there is the other theory, that perhaps the plane was brought down by our own military in a top secret accident. I don't want to believe either scenario, but the eyewitness accounts of a rocket trail, the early reports of explosive residue on the plane, not to mention subsequent history -- dammit I just can't do it! I am with the conspiracy nuts on this one, folks.
As you may recall, Flight 800 was a New York to Paris Boeing 747 that exploded over Long Island in 1996 killing all 230 passengers. You can read all about it here: Wikipedia on Flight 800.
Now, before I share my thoughts on Flight 800 and this documentary, I want to say that I am a very skeptical guy when it comes to conspiracy theories. I believe that most conspiracy theories are nonsense invented by someone that finds more comfort in believing that there is some evil cabal running world events, then the stark truth, which is that no one is running anything. Furthermore, the reason the truth is often hard to believe is usually due to somebody's unfathomable incompetence.
I am fairly confident that the Roswell crash was a top secret ballooning experiment. I think it is most likely that Oswald acted alone. I think it likely that Timothy McVeigh blew up the Murrah building.
That said, I must say that Flight 800 is a different story. If I am to believe the official version, then I must accept that the jet spontaneously blew itself up, kinda like the Hindenburg. I am to believe that this is the first time a commercial airline has done this in the entire history of passenger travel. Furthermore, there have been no groundings of 747s because of this tendency for spontaneous combustion. I am to believe that it was a one time thing. Don't worry about it. It won't happen again.
I'm sorry but I can't be that gullible. I just can't. I want to be. Don't get me wrong. I really don't want to believe that the Clinton Administration chose to lie to the American public and cover up a terrorist attack on an airline -- information that could have prevented 9/11. Or there is the other theory, that perhaps the plane was brought down by our own military in a top secret accident. I don't want to believe either scenario, but the eyewitness accounts of a rocket trail, the early reports of explosive residue on the plane, not to mention subsequent history -- dammit I just can't do it! I am with the conspiracy nuts on this one, folks.
Saturday, August 05, 2006
More Wisdom From Eckhart
"Most of the so-called bad things that happen in people's lives are due to unconciousness. They are self-created, or rather ego-created. I sometimes refer to these things as "drama." When you are fully conscious, drama does not come into your life anymore. Let me remind you briefly how the ego operates and how it creates drama.
Ego is the unobserved mind that runs your life when you are not present as the witnessing consciousness, the watcher. The ego perceives itself as a seperate fragment in a hostile universe, with no real inner connection to any other being, surrounded by other egos which it either sees as a potential threat or which it will attempt to use for its own ends. The basic ego patterns are designed to combat its own deep-seated fear and sense of lack. They are resistance, control, power, greed, defense, attack. Some of the ego's strategies are extremely clever yet they never truly solve any of its problems, simply because the ego itself is the problem.
When egos come together, whether in personal relationships or in organizations or institutions, "bad" things happen sooner or later: drama of one kind or another, in the form of conflict, problems, power struggles, emotional or physical violence, and so on. This includes collective evils such as war, genocide, and exploitation -- all due to massed unconsciousness. Furthermore, many types of illnesses are caused by the ego's continuous resistance, which creates restrictions and blockages in the flow of energy through the body.
Whenever two or more egos come together, drama of one kind or another ensues. But even if you live totally alone, you still create your own drama. When you feel sorry for yourself, that's drama. When you feel guilty or anxious, that's drama. When you let the past or future obscure the present, you are creating time, psychological time -- the stuff out of which drama is made. Whenever you are not honoring the present moment by allowing it to be, you are creating drama.
Most people are in love with their particular life drama. Their story is their identity. The ego runs their life. They have their whole sense of self invested in it. Even their -- usually unsuccessful -- search for an answer, a solution, or for healing becomes part of it. What they fear and resist most is the end of their drama. As long as they are their mind, what they fear and resist most is their own awakening.
When you live in complete acceptance of what is, that is the end of all drama in your life. Nobody can even have an argument with you, no matter how hard he or she tries. You cannot have an argument with a fully conscious person. An argument implies identification with your mind and a mental position, as well as resistance and reaction to the other person's position. The result is that the polar opposites become mutually energized. These are the mechanics of unconsciousness. You can still make your point clearly and firmly, but there is no reactive force behind it, no defense or attack. So it won't turn into drama. When you are fully conscious, you cease to be in conflict."
--Eckhart Tolle, The Power Of Now, pages 150-151
Ego is the unobserved mind that runs your life when you are not present as the witnessing consciousness, the watcher. The ego perceives itself as a seperate fragment in a hostile universe, with no real inner connection to any other being, surrounded by other egos which it either sees as a potential threat or which it will attempt to use for its own ends. The basic ego patterns are designed to combat its own deep-seated fear and sense of lack. They are resistance, control, power, greed, defense, attack. Some of the ego's strategies are extremely clever yet they never truly solve any of its problems, simply because the ego itself is the problem.
When egos come together, whether in personal relationships or in organizations or institutions, "bad" things happen sooner or later: drama of one kind or another, in the form of conflict, problems, power struggles, emotional or physical violence, and so on. This includes collective evils such as war, genocide, and exploitation -- all due to massed unconsciousness. Furthermore, many types of illnesses are caused by the ego's continuous resistance, which creates restrictions and blockages in the flow of energy through the body.
Whenever two or more egos come together, drama of one kind or another ensues. But even if you live totally alone, you still create your own drama. When you feel sorry for yourself, that's drama. When you feel guilty or anxious, that's drama. When you let the past or future obscure the present, you are creating time, psychological time -- the stuff out of which drama is made. Whenever you are not honoring the present moment by allowing it to be, you are creating drama.
Most people are in love with their particular life drama. Their story is their identity. The ego runs their life. They have their whole sense of self invested in it. Even their -- usually unsuccessful -- search for an answer, a solution, or for healing becomes part of it. What they fear and resist most is the end of their drama. As long as they are their mind, what they fear and resist most is their own awakening.
When you live in complete acceptance of what is, that is the end of all drama in your life. Nobody can even have an argument with you, no matter how hard he or she tries. You cannot have an argument with a fully conscious person. An argument implies identification with your mind and a mental position, as well as resistance and reaction to the other person's position. The result is that the polar opposites become mutually energized. These are the mechanics of unconsciousness. You can still make your point clearly and firmly, but there is no reactive force behind it, no defense or attack. So it won't turn into drama. When you are fully conscious, you cease to be in conflict."
--Eckhart Tolle, The Power Of Now, pages 150-151
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