Tag: power

The Un-statesman Like Hallway Bully

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

I have never before seen an American president behave in such an un-statesman like manner. My opinion of the USA has gone downhill. It might be argued that this does not matter because they have the power. A president who has lost his own battle with power is likely to be ever more punitive to people he sees as enemies, adversaries and ever more willing to listen to sycophants. He will not hold back his vengeance. He will listen only to those whose opinion he wants to hear.

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In the course of few short weeks, he has sided with Russia against Ukraine and to an extent NATO and Europe. He is paranoid that everyone is out to screw him. He sees his own twisted image in the mirror.

This is what he does will alliances and agreements signed by the prior law abiding heads of state. I am not sure of the constitutional vagaries. A deal with him is not worth the paper it is written on.

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So, we awake to a new reality.

Article 5

In 1949, the primary aim of the North Atlantic Treaty – NATO’s founding treaty – was to create a pact of mutual assistance to counter the risk that the Soviet Union would seek to extend its control of Eastern Europe to other parts of the continent.

Every participating country agreed that this form of solidarity was at the heart of the Treaty, effectively making Article 5 on collective defence a key component of the Alliance.

Article 5 provides that if a NATO Ally is the victim of an armed attack, each and every other member of the Alliance will consider this act of violence as an armed attack against all members and will take the actions it deems necessary to assist the Ally attacked.

Article 5

“The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognized by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.

Any such armed attack and all measures taken as a result thereof shall immediately be reported to the Security Council. Such measures shall be terminated when the Security Council has taken the measures necessary to restore and maintain international peace and security.”

This corner stone, this foundation stone, has been called into question by the “stable genius”. I don’t know how many shares in Gazprom might result.

It is pretty clear that much of what is wrong with the world, as it currently stands, has some causal origination in the USA. Well, they now have the president they deserve and we all have to live with the knock on consequences.

This morning, I had the idea that maybe the Chinese should invade Taiwan. The US economy is way more dependent on the semiconductor chips made there than anyone else. TSMC makes most of these. USA would then be fighting a country of similar size and power rather than a small state of ~ 30 million {now} people who are getting the shit kicked out of them by a powerful aggressor. But no, the USA wants to put its boot in too!! Take that you bastard Ukrainians!!

Thanks to one man’s gargantuan but fragile ego.

Trump may have the cards but Taiwan has the chips.

Bullies rarely pick on people their own size.

I am far from optimistic as to where things go from here. Viewed from one angle if there has to be a mass dis-incarnation in order to save the planet, then maybe that is what is needed. Nuclear winter could solve anthropogenic climate heating.

Isolationist, elitist, we know best thinking, can often preclude a massive downfall. It takes a while.

With “friends” like Trump who needs enemies?

I am struggling to believe what my own eyes have seen and the question is, “is this simply the starter for ten” so to speak. How much further down the shitter will humanity be dragged in this massive psycho-drama?

I have been told that this is my very last incarnation here…

Macron – Power – Yellow – Boats – Privilege Dream 25-09-24

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

This comes in the context of having finished a course of cortico-steroids {no dreams} and Israel commencing the bombardment of Lebanon.

The dream sequence starts with a close up image of Emmanuel Macron. He presents a bit like a close up grey and white pencil drawing. I can see him very clearly and in front of him is a yellow metallic box with a yellow hand lever. He comes into full colour. He is concentrating very closely on the box and slowly pushes the lever forward. I understand that this is an act of power and that he is unleashing some kind of force wilfully.

The scene changes and I see another man in similar pose as a pencil drawing with a pencil “power box”. He too pushes the lever forward to release some power. I sense that he is British and may be Starmer. I am unsure but there is a similarity of shape.

I am now arriving at some kind of golf club / outdoor club. It is fairly rudimentary. I go into the shower block and take a shower in the communal showers and then go into plenary. Everybody is signing up. The scene now changes to the coast and in a small inlet there is a boat made up of about twenty individual rugby ball shaped yellow inflatable buoys. Each of these is bigger than a human by quite a factor. They are all tethered together. People are dressed in at sea heavy weather gear and are each taking up a position on one of these yellow inflatables. By the time it is my turn there are none left. I am told to go back to the club and wait.

The scene changes again and I climbing over a dry stone wall in the lake district. There is a wire on top of the wall. My leg gets entangled. I can now see the back of my jacket. On the rear neckline is a collar with a raised patterned motif. It is a bit like a Cadbury’s chocolate bar in shape but yellow-brown in colour. These mark my privilege. I can go first. I am somehow very flexible in the dream and easily able to un-entangle my leg and dismount the wall.

Dream ends.

Omens and Symbols in the Waking Dream

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

One of the purposes of dream working with nocturnal dreams is to use the skills developed therein to read the waking dream, the day quotidian. Totems, omens and signs have been “read” by humanity for millennia. At the moment our current totem animal is a heron. He was present this morning at dawn and I have just seen him again as dusk nears. Places with a rich folklore like here in Brittany will have their own omen vocabulary.

To some interpreting the waking dream as a normal passive nocturnal dream sounds a bit odd. Nevertheless, I have done this for over two decades. The thing here is to use intuition and not rational mind. Not everything in the waking dream is a dreaming symbol or an omen. Things which casually catch your attention perhaps at the periphery of the visual field can be symbols.

Somethings demand full attention.

To give an example. At exactly the moment we stepped out of the door of the physiotherapist clinic my eye was drawn to seven crows in the sky. Instantly they broke into a group of three and one of four they cawed and flew off in opposite directions. There was a surge of “energy” and because crows are the courier of/to power in a universal sense, I had the sensation that power is up to something and some of it is of a divisive nature. Power is on the move.  7 is the dreaming symbol for guidance so the crows were guiding. 3 is the need for creativity and joy / mixed abundance, 4 is stability. More deeply three is the dreamer and four is the dreamed.

You could say that I noticed a glitch in the matrix. But this is life and not software.

Bear with me.

Cars are the dreaming symbol for state of awareness. Your car reflects your state of awareness. If you have a car crash or suddenly the radiator blows, your car is trying to tell you something and is informing you of how you are in life. Have a think about any time you have had a car crash. What was going on in your life at the time? Was there a crisis? Did a way of being / perceiving come crashing down or end suddenly? I’ll wager that if you had a car crash your life was out of balance and perhaps badly so at the time.

In order to best do this, you have to intend to observe dreaming symbols in “real” life. It is actually quite fun and you might be surprised what you learn. Insights beyond boring rationality and reason can be had.

At the moment I do not get many dreaming symbols because I do not need power, the universe, to guide me much. I am not interacting a great deal with life outside the compound.

One time I was in Belgium being interviewed for a Gallium Nitride MOVPE growth job at IMEC a semiconductor and nanotechnology research centre. There was someone in place and they were interviewing behind the scenes. We had inordinate difficulty finding the hotel in the Leuven one way system. The interview was a bit weird. I had a stonker of a dream. As we drove back without sat nav into Brussels, expecting some trouble finding the railway station and car hire place, I took a turn on intuition and ta-da we were at the railway station. It was an omen telling me to get out of Belgium. Power, the universe, was showing me the way, get out of Dodge. A few hours later whilst sight seeing before we took our train, HR called and told me that I did not get the job.

I am reasonably confident that because I have written this piece, I will be getting some dreaming symbols soon, in the waking dream. Let’s see if the prediction is accurate.

Today we have had our massive volet-shutters repaired, more light, and after visiting Orange yesterday we have an appointment for fibre optic broad band installation early next week!!

As the crows predicted, things have started to move.

Electric Blue Heron – Magic – Dream 11-11-2024

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

Here is this morning’s dream had after 4.26 AM.

I am in our garden at the corner of the pond closest to the bridge over the river.  Stood on the bank of the pond looking into the pond is a heron.  Our regular visitor often stands here. This however is no ordinary heron. It is a vibrant electric iridescent deep blue. Its plumage is long so that it has a bushy look. I can discern individual feathers which sparkle in the light. I walk toward the heron and it turns to look at me. It does not fly off.

I walk towards the heron and it stays still. I sit down on the bank of the pond. The heron then walks slowly towards me and sits down in my lap as it might a nest. It nuzzles up to me and we start to merge. I incorporate the heron into my being. The blue heron.

I am writing on a clear white postcard with no image on to my brother in law. As I write to tell him about the blue heron the ink vanishes into the paper. I put his name and address in the appropriate place. That ink disappears. I go outside into a UK street and post it in a traditional red round post box knowing that despite the invisibility of the ink it will get there.

I am now at an airport terminal. The woman at the ticket desk reminds me of a New Zealand past colleague of mine P. The ticket desk is very much like an old style railway ticket desk with a movable device for putting money one side and the tickets the other. She ask me what meal I would like on the plane. I say that I would like sandwiches. She asks what filling I say chicken. She says that because of the price of chicken I might have to pay in flight.

She places the ticket in the device and rotates it. The ticket is made out in the name of blue heron and is old style with multiple layers of carbon paper. I board the plane.

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I sit on one side of the aisle. I have a window seat as there is only one seat. To my left are two people sat in modern airplane seats with TV displays. They have their trays down and their lap top computers out. There is a sense they are scientists and techie.

The dream ends.

Heron is a bird of prey, therefore a dreaming symbol of power.

The electric blue is perhaps blue a symbol of humility and understanding.

The Heron is a patience hunter as totem it is about individuality. 

Air travel is awareness with respect to rational ideas and concepts.

The incorporation of the heron feels magical / shamanic – power {the will of the universe} a form of transformation.

There is a sense of old and new butting up against each other.

And Now the Darkness Spreads

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

The politics of division and separation seem to have won in the USA. This means that for four more years it will be difficult to avoid the sound of Trump’s voice. To my ears his voice and tone is unpleasant.  I had enjoyed the relative respite. That is probably not the worst of it.

At around 5:30 AM this morning I had a dream / vision in which the visual field was slowly filling with very dark ink like substance. What light there was became mostly extinguished. And I knew that the darkness was spreading. The effect was like dropping black ink into water.

If he can remember and act on his rhetoric we are in for a sad time, a dangerous time. Nobody, no Western leader, is speaking out meaningfully about the barbarism in the Middle East, to do so is taboo. The political right will feel emboldened. Already the Trump sycophant-fans and mini-me are hailing the victory. Europe is bracing itself for tariffs. China probably does not care. How will Trump manage rocket man now he is cosying up to Putin? Is he jealous?

People do not understand that he has already lost his battle with power. He is spouting very nasty and evil thoughts. If he indeed pardons the mob, it will set a very dangerous precedent. He is in no way a “light” being.

It is difficult to predict how more power will twist and further drive him into the darkness, the unpleasantness. The next four years could be very retrograde. A climate change denier in charge of the USA will not help planetary warming one bit.

It looks like humanity is heading further down the shitter. The odds of a war against Iran have just shortened.

It feels heavy this morning…

Belief and Proof

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

I’ll speculate that many believe things, ideologies and religions for which there in no possibility of proof. Half of the UK “believed” that Brexit was a good idea, many were adamant even though the outcome was unknown. They professed with absolute certainty about something which had not yet happened. Some Americans chant the MAGA mantra. Exactly when was America ever a great and equal place? Bad stuff has always gone on there to some extent.

People will believe whatever it is they want to believe. The strength of belief may vary. The war in Vietnam seemed like a good idea at first. Someone thought agent orange was good.

The church had a vested interest in making people God-fearing. Bums on seats meant coins on collection plates and salaries for clergy. The gold held by the churches and all that chavvy stuff goes against my interpretation of New Testament Christianity which differs from Old Testament Torah. Yet many who name themselves Christian believe in an eye for an eye instead of turning a cheek. I personally cannot envisage any deity in human or anthropomorphic form. {With the exception of Ganesh} I was made to draw God as a white bearded white geezer at the convent school in Zambia.

People born with penises believe that they can be “women” after a few hormones and a change of clothes, a new frock.

Some of the conspiracy theories floating about are to my eyes far-fetched, yet they have their devotees. I do believe that the world is controlled loosely by rich people. The extent to which they conspire is moot. It is all about profit and the best way to get that is by being good at business and ensuring calm by means of pecuniary compliance. There is no need to do weird far-out stuff. 

Yep, some get corrupted by power and this can be expressed by abuse, sexual abuse and coercion. There are a number of ring-like groups that take advantage of those who are corruptible by promise of an easy ticket. Sometimes the cost of association to/with a powerful figure is high. Savile, Epstein, Al-Fayed. There are mini-mes of these scattered through the population, the degree of unpleasantness varies.

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Between belief and proof, we might have working hypothesis. In which one tries out a framework or context to see how well it works, what the generality is like. There are “proofs” which are more circumstantial than direct.  There are things which suggest or point at an idea.

I believe in the concept of karma, there is sufficient observable causality for me to trust it as a concept, a working hypothesis. However, the subject is vast. I once did a whole blog exploring karma. The cornerstone of karma is evolution. One needs to learn from mistakes. Evolution and karma are of the same process. There is a cost associated with some actions which “the universe” wants paid. Karma not worked at in a timely fashion and with willing mood accrues karmic debt, much like a bank loan. One learns the effect of a causal action or behaviour. Sometimes people are slow learners.

The coypu no longer trouble our lotuses. Electric shock training with 0.25 Joule pulses at kilovolts works. We have a low electric fence which I installed. Cause and effect. Coypu karma.

I have had sufficient circumstantial evidence via visions and dreaming to believe in reincarnation. There is no way, on this planet, that I could ever prove reincarnation to the satisfaction of my scientific training. I could not put data into a spreadsheet and plot a graph with a fitted equation and a statistical quality of fit metric. I share the belief in reincarnation with millions. I probably believe it more strongly than most.

Karma and reincarnation as concepts are internally consistent. Karma spans lifetimes so that we can evolve. Karma is a teacher of sorts, in my world.  It takes lifetime after lifetime to learn somethings.

Is it significant that I who once was a pukka scientist at a pukka institution can remember three lives as a Buddhist monastic?

Depends upon what you think is significant. To your average common or garden UK football supporter it means nothing.  To someone who is a committed Buddhist it would not be a huge surprise, it might be tad interesting. Why not a scholar scientist and a scholar monk? It is not so different. Both have cerebral elements. To a bunch of scientists, it might be a red flag which needs disproved.

Have you noticed how science has a negation bias?

I’ll speculate that most people have a host of things which they believe which cannot be proven and moreover they do not question their beliefs or the provenance of the source from which they were obtained / picked up. Gossip and tittle tattle being a common currency which can become Gospel or God’s honest truth. “They” know and say an awful lot, do they not?

People can be very adamant about things which they have not checked or researched themselves. There is heavy reliance on hearsay. There are a lot of soap box orators both in real life and on-line. Hearsay has it that the spread of disinformation is huge and increasing.  This is consistent with what I see on Twitter. 

If you watch BBC, Sky, France 24 and Al-Jazeera the reporting on Gaza is very different. The British news is very sanitized and biased. People trust the BBC but it is reporting on a very different “war” to Al-Jazeera. Chalk and cheese. The UK right think the BBC is luvvie-socialist oriented.

People will believe whatever they want to believe. Convenience is a major factor in belief. They will believe what is the most convenient for them to believe. Inconvenient truths are generally not preferred. Coming round to an inconvenient belief takes time and is resisted, exemplified by the three individuals mention previously.  So far nobody has said a great deal about the Princess Diana – Al-Fayed relationship. That narrative is altered by recent news. Did King Charles have her bumped off? Is he still the villain or are there other factors now?

Belief is also mutable…

What you believe today is impermanent…I can’t prove it to you…I can offer it as a working hypothesis which you might see to be applicable.

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How many of your beliefs are convenient?

Why did you prefer them?