A General Announcement About Intelligence and Our Discussions

One meaning of the word "intelligence" is: the MENTAL ABILITY to explore subjects deeply and thus gain more than the conventional, often faulty, understanding of things. (Used in varying degrees by those who have it.)

Another meaning of the word "intelligence": the RESULTS of having engaged in a deeper explanation of subjects, such as little known facts, personal insights, creative thinking, wisdom.

Please note: just because I disagree with your opinions about something -

...in other words, just because what seem to me to be MY own little known facts, personal insights, creative thinking, and wisdom, are different from what seem to you to be YOUR little known facts, personal insights, creative thinking, and wisdom...

Does not mean I am questioning your intelligence in the first sense. However, if you continue to tell yourself that is what I'm doing, then it it is not inappropriate for me to begin to wonder.

How to be Cool on Facebook

I'm way too old to be cool, but I'm figuring out how to do cool status posts on FB. Let me practice:

-(Tedious, obvious, and posted more often than the poster realizes:) "It's the weekend. That means I don't have to work again until Monday! Yay!

-(Completely disconnected from most "friends" who might read it:) "You're so right, Filbert. The noodle sure fooled that silly mosquito!"

-(All profanity is cool:) "I just put on a clean shirt. WTF! It's inside f**king out! Now I'm going to get sh*t from my b*tch."

-(Subtle cry for help:) "I guess I'll just have to get used to chronic depression. LOL!"

-(Why I would be famous if only the right people noticed me:) "Check out these pictures of me after my makeover - playing my new digital banjo in an echo chamber!"

-(Presenting a cool persona by linking to someone else's song or video:) [link] "You've got to see this! It's by, for and about somebody else!"

-(Please notice that I'm in a relationship:) [pic] "Me and my honey - eating honey. BFF. See, I didn't deserve to me lonely."

-(Playing the shallow moral/political rivalry game:) "Check out these __________ (insert political party, religion, or other group that your "friends" dislike). They sure are ________ [choose one: stupid, ugly, corrupt]. Making fun of them proves our superiority."

-(Pretending to be friendly to generate income:) "Wish I didn't have to sell my _______ [fill in the blank], but at least I'm making the world a better place. I love people!"

-(More self-revealing than I realize:) "I don't care what they say. I love Weiner tweets!"

-(More self-revealing than I realize, Example 2:) [pic] "Here's me using my AK-47 for a bong!"

The Shallow Surface

Look at our slogans and cliches and you'll discover what is inherently, willfully and habitually wrong with the human condition:

We tell ourselves, "Be yourself," a call to authenticity, yet almost all movement in and around us is to "be" what is approved by those around us.

We tell ourselves, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" a call to recognize the good beneath the unpleasant, yet almost all movement in and around us encourages to resist the unexpected, the strange, or the misunderstood.

We tell ourselves, "I want to make the world a better place," yet almost all movement in and around us is to be intolerant and defensive toward those whose vision for a better world is different than our own.

We tell ourselves, "I'm a very spiritual person" yet almost all movement in and around us is about bodily protection, comfort and pleasure.

We tell ourselves, "I hate politics," yet almost all movement in and around us is about guarding our own special interests through the manipulation of whatever "system" we find ourselves in.

Try it with any of your own cliches.

Digestion and Resurrection

The bugs digest the house.
The little birds digest the bugs.
The big birds digest the little birds.
The humans digest the animals.
The soil digests all of us,
then feeds countless resurrections in changed forms.

New bodies.
New heavens.
New earth.