A special day

“Today is a special day,” God said.

“Yes, I know,” I answered. “It’s my birthday.”

“I know that, of course,” God said, “but that’s not why it’s special.”

“Why?”

“Because today, all your mistakes are forgiven. All your errors in judgment. Gone! All your mean thoughts? Forgotten. Today you are free of all guilt and resentment and anger and upset and fear.”

Surprisingly, I felt terrific.

“Of course, you feel terrific,” God said. “You’ve been granted My blessing. No need for surprise. Rejoice.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if I believed you were God—or even a human with extraordinary power,” I said. “But I don’t believe it. You don’t exist. So I’m surprised that my mood has changed so dramatically. I was in a terrible funk before I started writing this, and now I feel pretty happy.”

“I do exist,” God said. “And I am God. You just don’t believe in Me. “

“True,” I said.

“Well, the good news is that you don’t have to believe. I exist independent of your belief or anyone else’s.”

“Logically correct,” I said. “But…”

“Listen,” said God, “do you want to argue about the possibility of My existence? Or do you just want to take My gifts and move on.”

“Can I keep feeling this way without agreeing that it’s ‘a gift from God?’”

“Of course,” God said, “but there’s no harm in a little gratitude. You can thank whatever caused you to change from the miserable state that you were into the joyful state that you’re in now. You can thank your sense of irony, or clusters of neurons, or chemical and electric interactions in your brain, or quarks, or whatever you like.

“Or you can thank nothing,” God continued. “But I think you’ll feel better if you are grateful.”

“Ok, I said. “I’m grateful to whatever helped me feel better.”

“You’re welcome,” God said. Then quickly added, “…on behalf of whatever you thanked. Do you feel even better?”

“I do,” I said, carefully reminding myself that I was talking to a character in something that I was writing and not a real entity.

“Whatever makes you happy,” said the character.

I thought for a minute. Did I need to call it ‘the character?’ Could I go back to calling it ‘God?’

“You can call me whatever you like,” the character said. “If it makes you happy, then do so. But it doesn’t change the fact that I’m God.”

“I can call you God if that’s what you want,” I said.

“You’re missing the point,” the character said. “I’m God, whether you call me God or not. I’m God even if you write dialog for Me that makes Me say that I’m not really God. You can deny My existence. You can have Me—or really this manifestation of Me—deny Its existence or My existence or your existence. It changes nothing. If I exist—and I assure you that I do—I exist outside of your story and independent of anything you say or do.”

“Fair enough,” I said. “I do feel good, and I am grateful for feeling good, and whatever you are—a bunch of neurons, or a creative impulse—I am grateful to you.

“Good,” said God. “Now, here’s another gift. Everyone who reads this post is also forgiven, same way. All errors in judgment, all mistakes, all mean-spirited thoughts, gone.”

“Thank you!” Said a reader.

“Thanks!” Said another.

“Wait a minute,” I said, “How can readers respond when I haven’t even published this post?”

“I work in mysterious ways,” God said. “Now, please publish it.”

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Finding a portal

Eric Weinstein is looking for a portal. So am I.

Eric talks about portals on Joe Rogan Experience #1320 - Eric Weinstein (PodScribe transcription here) during which he announces his podcast, “The Portal“ (Podcast Notes)

Eric’s description

Eric starts describing portals starting at 1:12:18 into JRE episode

When I was a kid, I read all of these stories that I thought were known to be the same story but different versions of it.

I called it the portal story, and it was always the same.

Somebody is trapped in a humdrum existence in an ordinary world until some sort of magical portal accidentally or on purpose enters their life.

Either they go through a wardrobe, or they go through a rabbit hole, looking glass or platform 9 and 3/4…

So the question is: where’s the portal?

Like why do we tell the same story over and over and over again with different protagonists? But it’s always the same formula. Somebody Sis trapped in an ordinary world. They’re sort of there around normies. They find the portal and the portal becomes the Call to Adventure

And they spend time in the alternate universe and then somehow they’re able to live very often they return.

So my question was always: why on earth would we tell the same story over and over and over and over and over again? It has the same format, and it’s always a different context.

And I came to believe that this story is actually this unkept promise for most people. That in their adult lives, they don’t find these portals.

La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona: “Now that is a portal.”

It’s just incredibly it’s incredibly empowering to know that you’re a hair’s breadth away from superpowers.

My quest

I’ve been looking for portals, too. In different places, perhaps.

I’ve got the same sort of intuition: there’s the conventional world as revealed by common sense. That’s the “humdrum world” we’re all trapped in. There’s another world, as shown by science. Most people think that science has removed the sense of mystery and possibility that spiritual traditions were based on.

Why do the planets move the way that they do? What accounts for the richness of life on earth? Why are there stars in the sky? Once the answers were: these are mysteries beyond the mind of man. The answers are known only to God.

But then other answers appeared: Newton’s Law of Gravitation and deformations of space-time from General Relativity. Evolution and DNA. The big bang and nucleosynthesis. The mysteries were gone, and the supernatural fell into disrepute.

But that’s based on a misunderstanding of the remaining miracles of existence. What is the origin of space-time? How could physics or evolution have produced consciousness? What happens inside a black hole? Where does a universe come from?

The world runs according to the laws of physics, but it turns out that all these laws have loopholes.

Physics does not rule out miracles. They are just unlikely. And the world—precisely as it exists today—is fabulously unlikely. I am unlikely ever to have existed, and so are you. And the fact that I have written this AND you are reading this is unlikely beyond all imagining.

Portals are possible

Physics does not disallow portals to other universes.

Even though finding a portal is unlikely, it’s also true that there are an uncountable number portals and an uncountable number of ways to find one.

I’ve always believed that it was my job: to discover a way to free anyone from the limitations of conventional life.

I’ve always believed I was both special and no different from anyone else.

It’s like the paradox of being at the center of the universe.

I’m at the center. But that doesn’t mean you can’t also be at the center. In fact, you are.

So I’m reading science, and philosophy, and religion and keeping my mind open and my mind open, looking for a portal. If I find one, I’ll let you know. And if you find one first, please tell me about it.

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Linkus clickbaitus is a threat. But we can stop it.

Linkus clickbaitus, the common clickbait link, was unknown forty years ago. Now it’s rapidly filling its ecological niche, spawning fast-growing and fast-evolving varieties like L. clickbaitus outrageus, the outrage link, and L. clickbaitus memei, the common meme.

Linkus clickbaitus

While some varieties of Linkus clickbaitus are benign and some are beneficial, most are harmful. “L. clickbaitus is polluting the noosphere,” says one scientist who studies the evolution of human reason and scientific thought into a new evolutionary geological layer. The noosphere represents the planetary ‘sphere of reason.’

“L. clickbaitus affects the fabric of understanding that holds society together in the same way that moths affect clothing,” says one scientist. Another says L. clickbaitus is more like a plague of locusts.

Behavioral altering parasites

Others disagree. “Linkus clickbaitus is a behavior altering parasite,” says one.

… behavioral altering parasites change the behavior of one of their hosts “Host (biology)”) to facilitate their transmission “Transmission (medicine)”), They affecting the hosts’ decision-making and behavior control mechanisms in ways that harm the host, but help the parasite.

Mice infected by the protozoan _Toxoplasma gondii lose their fear of cats. Instead of hiding, the mice expose themselves. Cats kill them, eat them, and thus spread Toxoplasma gondii to more mice.

Viruses from the family _Baculoviridae make infected caterpillars eat incessantly, climb higher, then cause the caterpillar “cells secrete enzymes that ‘dissolve the animal into goo,’ raining down clumps of tissue and viral material for ingestion by future hosts.” (Wikipedia)

The hosts that L. clickbaitus infects have unique abilities. The behavioral changes that L. clickbaitus can evoke makes L. clickbaitus a more significant threat to humanity than pollution, climate change, or nuclear proliferation.

Behavioral altering clickbait links

L. clickbaitus typically induces two forms of behavior. Both are costly at best and destructive at worst.

Some strains of L. clickbaitus cause human hosts to forward the link to their friends. When a host does that, they are unknowingly spreading the infection. At a minimum, the sent link will consume the economic value of the time that the target takes to read it and delete it.

At its worst, L. clickbaitus will make the host click the link. Clicking exposes the host to more complex and carefully engineered behavior-altering content. Often the content has other strains of L. clickbaitus embedded within it.

L. clickbaitus and the content that it leads to have coevolved. Each helps the other. Without the complex content, L. clickbaitus leads nowhere. Without L. clickbaitus, the content spreads more slowly and less widely.

By itself, L. clickbaitus wastes time. And time is money. But tied to the complex content, the L. clickbaitus can lead to the destruction of property, violence, and even war.

Stopping L. clickbaitus

Humans are the means that L. clickbaitus uses to spread itself and the content to which it’s attached.

We can keep L. clickbaitus from spreading in several ways.

Before forwarding a link: ask yourself: is getting it likely to improve the life of the person to whom you’re sending it? If not, don’t send it. If you’re sending it only to let someone know you’re thinking of them, then send instead a message telling them that.

Before clicking a link: ask yourself: is reading it likely to improve your life? If not, don’t click it.

We can stop L. clickbaitus. But to stop it, we need to do our part. If not, it will continue to evolve and reproduce rapidly. Follow the rules above.

And forward this article to everyone you know.

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More on miracles

I wrote about my miracle in this post.

Let me define what I meant:

Miracle, defined

Oxford defines miracle in these ways:

An extraordinary and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore attributed to a divine agency.

A remarkable event or development that brings very welcome consequences.

An exceptional product or achievement, or an outstanding example of something.

My miracle was a change of consciousness (itself a miracle.)

I was suddenly aware of the miracle of existence at that moment.

My existence.

The existence of the world around me.

The trees. The stones. The sky.

Isn’t it ‘just reality?’

Well, you might say, “That’s not a miracle. That’s just reality.”

And I will say back: “Right! Reality is a miracle. We live in a miracle.

“What you are disparaging as ‘just reality’ is itself a miracle.

“No moment is ordinary.

“No person is ordinary. No tree is ordinary. All are miraculous.

“Drink it in!”

What it took

In a universe that’s almost entirely cold, dark, and empty, anything that exists is a sort of miracle.

In a universe that’s mostly devoid of consciousness, anything that’s conscious is a sort of miracle.

“But,” you may ask, “if natural law explains it, then can it still be a miracle?” Indeed, you just did ask it.

“Yes,” I answer. “You might say that we can explain everything by natural law—In theory.

“And yet,” I add, “in practice, we can explain nothing.

“How can both be true?” You ask.

“Watch,” I say.

No zeroes

All representations of natural law conform to one constraint: no zeroes.

With no zeroes, even the most improbable occurrence has a non-zero probability.

Natural law says, “anything is possible.”

The probability that the universe arrives any given state—like the state we’re in—is near zero.

But it’s not zero.

Against all the odds, here we are!

QED

The probability that the universe changes from one state to any other state may be infinitesimally small.

But it’s still possible.

So against all the odds, anything can happen.

Miracles are allowed.

And we can’t explain how anything happens for a straightforward reason.

Not enough time.

Not enough time

Even if we knew the laws of nature precisely—which we can’t—even if we knew the initial conditions exactly—which we can’t—even though that’s enough to explain anything, nothing can be explained.

There isn’t enough time.

There’s not enough time to represent the initial conditions and not enough time to fully represent the laws of nature and not enough time to do the calculations that would show how one state leads to another.

We can say: “it can be explained.” And that’s true. Given infinite time and infinite resources, we can explain something.

But we can’t explain it.

We can explain it approximately—which means that we can wave our hands and say, “it’s something like this.”

But we can’t say what it is precisely.

Practical examples

We understand the laws of planetary motion. Yet, yet we can’t solve even the three-body problem, much less the complex multi-body problem that is the solar system.

My body synthesizes a vast array of proteins.

We may know how to synthesize some of those kinds of proteins.

But no one, least of all me, knows how to synthesize even a single molecule of any one of those proteins in my body.

And no one can explain the way it all worksworsks.

Isn’t that a kind of miracle?

I asked for a miracle, and I got one.

And that led, a few days later to “A Course in Miracles,” another miracle.

Meanwhile, today’s miracle is about to arrive: another Miracle of The Second Posting.

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A request for miracles

It started with a conversation at the Stonington Opera House. A young woman told me about her miracle—her child.

The next day, I asked for a miracle—and got one.

That led to me remembering a quotation, I’d heard.

That led me to find the original quotation:

That led me to “A Course in Miracles.”

A few days later, in Blue Hill, I saw the young woman again, met her miracle, and told her about my miracles.

There are more miracles to come.

At the opera house

Bobbi and I were at the Stonington Opera House to see “Judy,” a movie about Judy Garland’s life. While we were waiting, I said something that prompted a gal behind the snack-bar counter to tell me: “I had a miracle.”

“What was it?” I asked.

“I tried to have a baby and couldn’t have one. So I prayed, and I now have a baby boy. His name is Matthew. It means “a gift from God.”

“That’s wonderful,” I said. “I don’t believe in God, but I do believe in believing in God, and I’m glad you’ve got your gift.”

We went in and watched the movie. It was good.

My request

Mornings I walk my driveway. It’s 500 feet, up a long hill. I walk up and down four times. It’s a good exercise.

And it’s a good time to think.

The morning after “Judy,” as I walked the driveway, I thought of last night’s conversation.

“I’d like a miracle,” I said to no one in particular as I started up the driveway.

I continued walking up the driveway, thinking about miracles.

And then I looked around and saw a miracle. Life around me! Every bit of it, seemed a miracle. My very existence, my consciousness, seemed a miracle.

“Thank you,” I said to no one in particular.

I had my miracle.

The quotation

A few days later, I remembered something I’d heard from my friend Gil. Something like, “we are afraid of our own power.”

Google to the rescue. I found it. No great miracle there.

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.

Marianne Williamson wrote it in her book “A RETURN TO LOVE.“

I learned that her book was about her experience with another book: “A Course In Miracles.”

That led me to the book itself. I’ve written about it. There will be more. I started doing the course, looking for more miracles.

A few days later, in Blue Hill, I saw the young woman again. I’d never seen her before that day in Stonington and here she was. And there, in her arms was Matthew.I met her miracle, and told her about my own.

I don’t think that seeing her was a miracle. But it was pretty cool. Maybe it was just a sign.

In any case, I consinue to do the course and to look for signs and for miracles

There are more to come for everyone

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M is for Music

Sometimes I don’t realize that I’m thirsty until I take a sip of water.

My body shouts THIS! THIS! And I drink until it shuts up.

Sometimes I don’t realize that I’m hungry until I take a bite.

My body screams FOOD! FOOD! And I eat until it stops screaming.

Music Deficiency Disorder

I didn’t realize how much I needed music until the other day.

I listened to one song, then another, then another. I wrote a blog post about Hanukkapella, the Hanukkah acapella I’d been listening to. then another about a song I’d found: Im HaShem lo Yivneh Bayit and then another about the music of the PENTATONIX

Even then, I didn’t realize how much it had been missing from my life, and how much I needed it. That came today.

I realized I’d been suffering from Music Deficiency Disorder—MDD.

And then, I realized it’s not the only thing that’s missing.

And then, I decided what I’m going to do about it.

Psychamin Deficiency Disorders

Vitamins are needed—in at least small amounts—to maintain the vitality and health of the body. Because the body is physical, vitamins are physical things—chemicals.

Psychamins are needed—at least in small amounts—to maintain the vitality and health of the psyche, or spirit. Because the psyche is immaterial, psychamins are immaterial—ideas and experiences.

To stay physically healthy, we need vitamin A, nine different B vitamins, vitamins C, D, E, and K, and so on.

To stay psychologically healthy, we need more. I’ve so far identified nearly 30 different pychamins, including at least three different C psychamins and four different F vitamins.

My need for music was thus a Psychamin M deficiency disorder.

I plan to prevent Pyschamin Deficiency Disorders by identifying the Psychamins I need, making sure to take supplements regularly, watching for deficiency symptoms, and taking extra doses when I need them.

Now it’s time for one of this morning’s M Pyschamins (music) and a little bit of Psychamin G1 (Gratitude).

Thank you!

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The PENTATONIX

Today’s music is from The PENTATONIX

Kon and Lyss went to see them in Boston, last night.

I present Lys’s two favorites for your listening pleasure.

Carol of the bells

Hallelujah

Jeff Buckley Hallelujah

Can’t mention Hallelujah without the Jeff Buckley cover

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Im HaShem lo Yivneh Bayit Shira and Quorum

Now I’m caught on this song: “Im HaShem lo Yivneh Bayit”

I’ll give you two versions. The version by a Hassidic musical group, the Shira Choir, started this quest. The other is from a Lithuanian acapella group, Quorum, singing in a church in Vilnius.

The words come from Psalms 121 and 127, which you probably remember go something like this:

אִם־יְהוָה לֹא־יִבְנֶה בַיִת, שָׁוְא עָמְלוּ בוֹנָיו בּוֹ
אִם־יְהוָה לֹא־יִשְׁמָר־עִיר, שָׁוְא שָׁקַד שׁוֹמֵר
הִנֵּה לֹא־יָנוּם וְלֹא יִישָׁן שׁוֹמֵר יִשְׂרָאֵל

Oh, you don’t read Hebrew?

Well, we’re in luck. Someone named Nithin Ammananda translated it:

Im HaShem Lo Yivneh Bayit
Unless the Lord builds the house,

Shav Amlu Bonav Bo
The builders labor in vain.

Im HaShem Lo Yishmor Ir
Unless the Lord watches over the city,

Shav Shakad Shomer The guards stand watch in vain.

Hinei Hinei Lo Yanum
Indeed, he who watches over Israel

will neither slumber nor sleep.
Lo Yanum v’Lo Yishan
Lo Yanum v’Lo Yishan

Shomer Yisrael
Guardian of Israel

Here’s the Shira Choir:

And here’s Quorum

Bonus: Quorum:

Girl

Let it be

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