Plato developed the idea of Forms and as I understand it, it is the nature of things which is separate from the thing itself. For example Happy or Happiness is a real thing. No one would deny that it exists but not in material form, you can’t bring me a jar of happy. That doesn’t mean there is no such thing as happy and making someone sad, or indeed everyone sad wouldn’t make happy go away. Happy would still be a real thing we just wouldn’t be able to see it in a world where everyone was sad. So happy is a Form, a thing that while not real is fundamental and everlasting and which can be a part of a real thing. Eg some people are made happy by chocolate, so happy is part of the chocolate for them but it isn’t “the chocolate”, when the chocolate is gone happy continues. As a practical example you may stay happy for sometime after the chocolate is gone.
So I think gods work the same way in that they are brought into being by an acceptance of their existence and they never die but their influence declines. For example Ra the sun god was worshiped by the ancient Egyptians and was no doubt quite powerful at that time, no one would probably have denied the existence of Ra. He was especially problematic among bulls who used to be sacrificed to Ra I am sure that they would have agreed he was a real force at that time. Well not so many people worship Ra and invoking his aid in a crisis probably won’t help much as his (or hers I am not sure) power has been eroded by a lack of followers. On the other hand he hasn’t died entirely as I (for one) still know who he was. Therefore I think Ra has gone from Large god to small god, less people care about Ra and his power has waned.
In NZ we used to have a large and powerful god who is shrinking before our very eyes, our god was called Rugby and high priests were the NZRFU. Now while you can go and see a game of Rugby just like happy you rugby exists as a form it is imbued in the way some people behave and to some degree the way they think.
There is an old joke about turning props around at half time so that they knew which way to run (I used to be a prop so I can say that), the trouble is I have a suspicion that the NZRFU is mostly staffed by ex props or at least folk that think like props. For many years the fans have been shouting at them that it is time to turn around, stop going in this direction but they aren’t listening and so the large powerful god of Rugby is shrinking and getting smaller all the time.
Take the upcoming test in Dunedin with the mighty All Blacks playing the likely to be highly entertaining Fijians. This should be a fun match to go to with a pretty much guaranteed win to the AB’s mixed with a bit of open running rugby from the Fijians. So with 5 days out from the game only 10,000 of appox 30,000 seats have been sold. Imagine a test match (no matter who against) not being sold out (or mostly) at this point. What has happened?
Well I think the NZRFU ignored the golden rule “the customer is always right” and so their god is shrinking and while rugby will never disappear it may end up like the cult of Ra. On the upside the bulls are safer these days.
Random thoughts on Random topics sparked by my travels through life and the things I see or hear on the way
Monday, July 18, 2011
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Middle Age is Depressing
And no I am not referring to the traditional mid life crisis suffered mostly by men according to popular culture where they run off with the trophy bride and start driving a sports car.
I am referring to real life where it is a stage in your life where your parents are often reaching the end of their lives with some of the end of life dramas we all suffer of declining health an increasing need for support and possibly the associated death of some of the potentially closest relationships you will ever have.
Mean while back at home your kids have stopped being loveable little toddler types and have potentially turned into diabolical teenagers whose sole purpose in life seems to be making your life harder. Even if they haven’t reached this stage yet it will be looming and the calls on your time to run them to and fro to sports and other activities are high.
Career wise you are likely to have approached your peak, old enough to have some experience and young enough to be considered useful, on the other hand assuming you are not running a multi national conglomerate fulfilling your every career dream it is much more likely that work has become routine and you have become the victim of the Peter principal (people are promoted to one level above their competence) which generally makes life either boring or very stressful and because this is your lot the dream of the corner office is over.
And sounding like a good economist, on the other hand again it is this group that is called upon to be the back bone of society, donating their time in many volunteer roles to keep any number of clubs, charities community groups and the like functioning and in today’s society with minimal if any thanks and the potential for a large amount of criticism.
And if it is not bad enough that your parents health is falling apart, mid life is when doctors state talking about digital exams without a computer insight etc and your own health is not what it used to be. Lucky the dog is now as unfit as you are so you can just go for a walk around the block and pretend that “snack” exercise is sufficient to keep you looking and feeling 20.
Finally, the more traditional mid life crisis of realising that the attractive girls that you see on the street think you are a potentially creepy old man and you think they should dress properly and talk without using the word like at the beginning and end of every sentence. Damn you have turned into your father.
So it is no wonder that I have noticed an increasing number of my middle aged acquaintances who are feeling down or who are genuinely clinically depressed. The good news is that society is maturing enough after the work of John Kirwin and the like so that these folks feel secure enough to talk about it.
I suspect the bad news is there are more people out there soldiering on, well look around it is tough in the middle of your life, at a minimum share with your mates and if it is really bad get help. People as a general rule love to help. Look out for someone middle aged that’s what they do.
I am referring to real life where it is a stage in your life where your parents are often reaching the end of their lives with some of the end of life dramas we all suffer of declining health an increasing need for support and possibly the associated death of some of the potentially closest relationships you will ever have.
Mean while back at home your kids have stopped being loveable little toddler types and have potentially turned into diabolical teenagers whose sole purpose in life seems to be making your life harder. Even if they haven’t reached this stage yet it will be looming and the calls on your time to run them to and fro to sports and other activities are high.
Career wise you are likely to have approached your peak, old enough to have some experience and young enough to be considered useful, on the other hand assuming you are not running a multi national conglomerate fulfilling your every career dream it is much more likely that work has become routine and you have become the victim of the Peter principal (people are promoted to one level above their competence) which generally makes life either boring or very stressful and because this is your lot the dream of the corner office is over.
And sounding like a good economist, on the other hand again it is this group that is called upon to be the back bone of society, donating their time in many volunteer roles to keep any number of clubs, charities community groups and the like functioning and in today’s society with minimal if any thanks and the potential for a large amount of criticism.
And if it is not bad enough that your parents health is falling apart, mid life is when doctors state talking about digital exams without a computer insight etc and your own health is not what it used to be. Lucky the dog is now as unfit as you are so you can just go for a walk around the block and pretend that “snack” exercise is sufficient to keep you looking and feeling 20.
Finally, the more traditional mid life crisis of realising that the attractive girls that you see on the street think you are a potentially creepy old man and you think they should dress properly and talk without using the word like at the beginning and end of every sentence. Damn you have turned into your father.
So it is no wonder that I have noticed an increasing number of my middle aged acquaintances who are feeling down or who are genuinely clinically depressed. The good news is that society is maturing enough after the work of John Kirwin and the like so that these folks feel secure enough to talk about it.
I suspect the bad news is there are more people out there soldiering on, well look around it is tough in the middle of your life, at a minimum share with your mates and if it is really bad get help. People as a general rule love to help. Look out for someone middle aged that’s what they do.
Monday, July 4, 2011
Get with the program
Lately there seems to have been a raft of media stories on the pro’s and cons of Vaccination.
Last night there was an Australian 60 minutes article focusing on two young babies (under 6 months and therefore not able to be immunised) that had died as a result of contracting Whooping Cough.
Before that it was some parental outrage from a group of mothers whose children had been sent home from school as they were not immunised against measles and there had been an outbreak in the community.
They were outraged because they had to take time off work to look after their kids and couldn’t seem to understand why the school didn’t start running separate classes etc for their children. It was after all their right not to immunise their kids.
And sadly it is their right, but should it be? First let’s dispose of the outliers in this argument, there are some limited cases where immunisation is not a good idea, for example children already suffering from cancer or have a problem with their immunity for whatever reason. We clearly shouldn’t immunise these children and have no need to do it as there is room in the system for a few unimmunised individuals.
In the 60 minutes doco though they were looking at a community where 1 in 4 kids were not immunised. And we are not talking about some down and out community that didn’t understand the issues this was a solid middleclass community of educated people.
Generally I think people should be left to get on with their lives and compulsory anything needs to be treated with caution, however your rights can’t be allowed to harm others as a general rule and in this instance those unimmunised people who therefore allowed Whooping Cough into their community effectively killed those babies. In the normal course of events if that was one person we would prosecute of murder but because a mob of ignorant people did it they get away with it.
And yes I said ignorant any one that does not immunise their child (without medical advice not to) is simple ignorant and too stupid to be left in charge of a child. There is simple no credible evidence that this is a bad idea. Tens of millions of people have been immunised with probably thousands of studies undertaken on the matter and no one of any standing in the community would be prepared to be against this. If it was systematically bad for people don’t you think we would have noticed by now? Millions and millions of people have had this remember, in every country in the world to a greater and lesser degree.
What we do know for an absolute fact is that many, many diseases have been effectively wiped out in developed nations, generally babies do not die from whooping cough, kids are not crippled by polio etc.
And the people deciding to not vaccinate are not the people who suffer the consequences, it is most likely to be their children or even worse someone else’s child. How do we continue to allow this, it is time we sorted this out once and for all and made it compulsory, to hell with the parents rights, what about the child’s rights. I have seen whooping cough in action and it is very unpleasant at the very least and clearly deadly at the worst.
Last night there was an Australian 60 minutes article focusing on two young babies (under 6 months and therefore not able to be immunised) that had died as a result of contracting Whooping Cough.
Before that it was some parental outrage from a group of mothers whose children had been sent home from school as they were not immunised against measles and there had been an outbreak in the community.
They were outraged because they had to take time off work to look after their kids and couldn’t seem to understand why the school didn’t start running separate classes etc for their children. It was after all their right not to immunise their kids.
And sadly it is their right, but should it be? First let’s dispose of the outliers in this argument, there are some limited cases where immunisation is not a good idea, for example children already suffering from cancer or have a problem with their immunity for whatever reason. We clearly shouldn’t immunise these children and have no need to do it as there is room in the system for a few unimmunised individuals.
In the 60 minutes doco though they were looking at a community where 1 in 4 kids were not immunised. And we are not talking about some down and out community that didn’t understand the issues this was a solid middleclass community of educated people.
Generally I think people should be left to get on with their lives and compulsory anything needs to be treated with caution, however your rights can’t be allowed to harm others as a general rule and in this instance those unimmunised people who therefore allowed Whooping Cough into their community effectively killed those babies. In the normal course of events if that was one person we would prosecute of murder but because a mob of ignorant people did it they get away with it.
And yes I said ignorant any one that does not immunise their child (without medical advice not to) is simple ignorant and too stupid to be left in charge of a child. There is simple no credible evidence that this is a bad idea. Tens of millions of people have been immunised with probably thousands of studies undertaken on the matter and no one of any standing in the community would be prepared to be against this. If it was systematically bad for people don’t you think we would have noticed by now? Millions and millions of people have had this remember, in every country in the world to a greater and lesser degree.
What we do know for an absolute fact is that many, many diseases have been effectively wiped out in developed nations, generally babies do not die from whooping cough, kids are not crippled by polio etc.
And the people deciding to not vaccinate are not the people who suffer the consequences, it is most likely to be their children or even worse someone else’s child. How do we continue to allow this, it is time we sorted this out once and for all and made it compulsory, to hell with the parents rights, what about the child’s rights. I have seen whooping cough in action and it is very unpleasant at the very least and clearly deadly at the worst.
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