The Unconditional Human Spirit

Here is more probing of the background influences that incite alarmism crusades like climate alarmism, a “profoundly religious movement”. The very same mythical influences have incited, guided, and validated endless eruptions of religious violence across history, like the ISIS/Hamas crusades. The mass-death movements of Marxism, Nazism and general environmental alarmism have all been shaped by these same influences. Again, historians have detailed the influence of apocalyptic millennial ideas on Marxism, Nazism, Declinism, and environmental alarmism (see, for example, the research of Arthur Herman, Richard Landes, Arthur Mendel, and David Redles, among others).

Aside from specific authors mentioned, this site draws on general “Historical Jesus/Jesus Seminar” research (with quibbles) and more specifically on “Q Wisdom Sayings” gospel research.

“Greatest coverup, retreat, betrayal, fraud, deception, disinformation,…. in history”, Wendell Krossa

This is an added note on the striking contrast between the theology of Jesus and Paul, detailed below in the essay “Separating Diamonds from Dung” (Thomas Jefferson and Leo Tolstoy’s blunt appraisal of the contradiction between Historical Jesus and Paul).

“Greatest” because of the profound outcomes in human society from the influence of these two starkly contrasting historical icons, and their messages, that are commonly used to inspire, guide, and validate human behavior. The outcomes can be contrasted as (1) one validates ongoing retaliatory cycles of “eye for eye” vengeance, and the other (2) urges liberation from such cycles that have produced endless violence and war, opting instead for the freedom to break such cycles and explore alternatives that encourage people to promote conflict resolution, peace, and cooperation with differing others/”enemies”.

The influence of these two historical icons arises from the fact that they have long functioned among the most prominent of authorities that people appeal to in shaping their thinking, emotions, motivations, and responses/behavior. That recognized influence affirms the critical importance of understanding the nature of the contradicting themes that these two promoted, and the outcomes of their different gospels.

Insert:

https://clas.charlotte.edu/paul-and-jesus-how-the-apostle-transformed-christianity/

Quote from above link: “The Apostle Paul is the single most influential figure in human history, suggests UNC Charlotte Religious Studies Professor James Tabor in his latest book “Paul and Jesus: How the Apostle Transformed Christianity”. Tabor argues that Paul has done more to shape all we think about almost everything than anyone else. In terms of influence, Paul trumps even the great “founders,” whether Jesus, Moses, the Buddha, or Mohammed.”

In probing the contrast between Jesus and Paul, I hope readers will get some sense of how we have been robbed of the full potency of a critical historical insight and ideal that, more than anything comparable, presents the potential to liberate us from our worst impulses. And fortunately, despite the larger distorting, burying context of the retaliatory Christ myth, many have lasered in on the Jesus insights anyway and found the offered liberation from retaliatory ethics/responses, a liberation to engage authentically mature humanity. Both Thomas Jefferson and Leo Tolstoy understood the issues involved, as many others also have. Read the rest of the opening comment here

See Richard Landes’ comments below on “prime divider” societies- the factors that validate the elite domination of commoners. He then notes “civil polity” as the democratic principles developed to counter prime divider organization of societies. The new material starts at “The dangerous reaction of Apocalyptic prophets to the inevitable failure of their apocalyptic millennium crusades (repeated patterns in alarmism movements)”.

More “sitesplainin”:

There’s a big background picture to our societies that I relate most things to. Prominent in that big picture is the “most dominant and influential” narrative today of Declinism- the mistaken yet widespread belief that things are getting worse, that life is declining toward collapse and ending- toward apocalypse (see YouGov survey, for example, in “Ten Global Trends”, and full historical detail in “The Idea of Decline in Western History”, by Arthur Herman).

Consequent to Declinism (arousing the survival impulse in populations), there is the equally widespread belief that we need to engage some project for “salvation” (to “save the world”). The salvation scheme common to all apocalyptic millennial crusades is the demand to purge some “evil” that is purportedly destroying the world (i.e. today the claimed evil threat to the world is industrial capitalist society). The purging of the evil prepares the way to instal the new utopian system that will be the salvation of humanity and the world. These beliefs have shaped Marxism, Nazism, and today shape environmentalism, notably climate alarmism.

The above themes then point to a deeper layer of beliefs that shaped the Declinism narrative, to ideas that are even more fundamentally influential in the big picture background- i.e. the religious beliefs that have long dominated human meta-narratives and still do today, whether in religious or “secular” versions. Declinism historian Arthur Herman details several such religious beliefs, notably the myth of a “lost paradise”, the necessity for a “violent purging” as in an apocalypse, and some form of redemption. These more primitive ideas have shaped the Declinism ideology that dominates world consciousness today.

The problem is that these ideas deform consciousness and personality (psychotherapist/theologian Zenon Lotufo in “Cruel God, Kind God”) and thereby harm societies in profoundly damaging ways. They incite, guide, and validate people’s base impulses to tribalism (engaging “righteous battles against evil enemies”), to domination of others, and to the punitive destruction of enemy others. The harmful outcomes of such ideas continues because people continue to base their behavior on their beliefs.

The French Farmer’s protests (see below). Populist revolts against Net Zero decarbonization. What is going on behind these public demonstrations? Add here the military guy who, during the ISIS outbreak of violence in Syria (2014), argued that you can tamp down these eruptions of insanity with military force, but then they will just continue to erupt. You also have to go after the beliefs/ideas behind such things. Wendell Krossa

“Let me take you down to where I’m going to…” (a paraphrase of the opening to “Strawberry Fields”, Beatles).

I look beyond the public presentation of these varied social eruptions to larger background issues that influence the protagonists and antagonists- notably, the meta-narrative themes that influence elites to undemocratically push destructive programs like Net Zero decarbonization that is destroying societies to “save the world”. The horrific damage from embracing apocalyptic narratives has now become undeniable. Look what just occurred in Sri Lanka (i.e. the collapse of agriculture in 2022- a contemporary repeat of the Xhosa cattle slaughter of 1856-57, also the outcome of embracing the apocalyptic millennial pathology). Note also the mounting damage in Britain, Germany, California, and elsewhere from decarbonization zealotry.

Fortunately for all of us, “populist” pushback is also emerging across the West. Many are refusing to cow to the elites pushing destructive policies on societies and are demanding the recovery of their freedom of choice.

My argument is that these alarmism crusades, and their destructive salvation schemes, are driven, ultimately, by primitive mythical themes, whether the crusade leaders acknowledge those deeper influences or not. Read the rest of the opening comment here

See below: “Affirming the most profound insights presented across history to inform human narratives and consciousness.” It’s the Daddy thing, to allay fears and reassure that its going to be alright. The true state of life is good and getting better. The world is not getting worse and we are not all gonna die in some climate apocalypse.

Site perspective: Appearing a bit tough on one side… Wendell Krossa

Recent comment below focuses more on liberal/left side of our societies for its notable unleashing of the totalitarian impulse. The material below is just acknowledging Christine Brophy’s point on “the current dominance of progressive liberalism” all across our societies- in universities, news media, political parties, in the intelligence agencies and military, domination in regard to social issues, domination of Social media, and domination in public story-telling media (i.e. Hollywood), etc.

Both sides of our basic society divide- left and right- have their struggles with the totalitarian impulse. A good balancing point was made by David Boaz (Libertarianism: A Primer), as he commented on the US situation, stating that Republicans need to embrace more freedom with regard to social issues like women’s rights and choice, gay rights, etc. And Democrats need to embrace more freedom in regard to economic issues.

Dems, notably the far-left Woke Progressive types, need to stop promoting the enslavement of individuals to collectivist projects and policies. Stop using excessive state taxation and regulations to intervene in the lives of citizens and thereby control them. Trust and respect average people to know what is best for themselves. Protect their self-determination and individual rights and freedoms. Protect “live and let live”, but not to the “toleration of intolerance” as per some multi-cultural policies.

I try to maintain a fiercely independent status, Classic Liberal/Libertarianish, much like Louis Zurcher’s “The Mutable Self” living in open process, embracing ongoing change and development. And meaning- not placing primary identity in “objects” like nationality, race, ideology, religion, gender, or other. Our primary identity markers ought to be our equal status as members of the one human family, all descendants of the same “Mitochondrial Eve” in East Africa, and all possessing the main identity markers of a human self, human spirit, and human mind/consciousness.

Maintaining a focus on our more fundamental identity markers will help keep us from yielding too much influence to the more peripheral things (peripheral on the human genome) that many use to incite tribalism and divide populations.

And more than the totalitarian threat that is coming prominently from the left today, there is the far greater threat from the “evil triad” of animal impulses that are deeply embedded inside all of us- i.e. (1) the impulse to discriminating and excluding tribalism, (2) the impulse to subjugate and dominate others as enemies, and (3) the impulse to retaliate with punitive destruction of “enemy” others.

This is the real battle of good against evil in life. Its an intensely personal inner battle that each of us has to fight and win if we really aspire to succeed in life. Read the rest of the opening comment here

Below: The human story is about the historical exodus of humanity from animal existence to become human. Each one of us lives a microcosm story of this meta-exodus to freedom. We do well to understand what it means to be animal and, in contrast, what it means to be human.

From Retaliation To Unconditional Love: The Narrative of Human Exodus from Animal Existence, Wendell Krossa (revised Jan. 2024)

(Note: This essay is the outcome of several decades of interaction with a valued friend, a great human spirit, and probably the finest theological mind to have ever graced this planet, Bob Brinsmead, notably with material of his such as “The Scandal of Joshua Ben Adam”.)

The foundational story of humanity is the story of liberation from our animal past. This is more than just the narrative of our physical/geographical exodus out of Africa (modern humans leaving Africa over the period of roughly 200-50,000 years ago). Our defining story is about our exodus out of our past animal existence and our subsequent struggle to become more human or humane beings. Our subsequent history has very much been a quest to understand what it means to be human, what new human values and practises define and express authentic humanity.

This is an intensely inner journey or quest of the human spirit, what Solzhenitsyn described when he stated that the real battle of good against evil is not an outer battle against physical “enemies’ but rather an inner battle that “runs down the center of every human heart”. The human struggle to make an exodus from animal existence is a personal adventure (psychological, social, spiritual/philosophical) that each of us engages against our individual experience with inherited animal drives. This quest has set us on a uniquely different trajectory from animal behavior and life.

Our exodus from the animal and our struggle toward a more human mode of living is the engine that drives humanity’s overall trajectory of progress toward a better future- a progress that is fueled by the primal impulse to find something better. This story reveals the meaning and purpose of human existence in our endeavor to humanize all life. It is a story that responds to those profound human questions of Why we exist? or What purpose are we here to engage or fulfill? It explains the millennia-long quest of people to understand what it means to be human and to live as human.

Our story begins in an animal past shaped prominently by the drives of domination (alpha male/female), small band or tribal exclusion, and destructive retaliation. This triad of prominent animal drives illustrates the worst of animal reality and existence. It is the dark past that provides the greater background context against which the wonder of our becoming more fully human appears all the brighter as humanity emerged and developed gradually over multiple-millennia.

Joseph Campbell (“Myths To Live By”) has similarly noted the exodus of humanity leaving the animal past for human existence in stating that human story is about learning to conquer the “animal passions” in order to live as maturely human (see also “The Power of Myth”, pages xiii, 104, 144, 191, 201, 218-19, 223, 235). The struggle to overcome our animal past and its base features is engaged on the individual level as well as by humanity as a whole. Campbell also framed human story as going out on a great adventure or quest, confronting and conquering monsters, learning lessons and gaining insights, undergoing a disintegration of the old animal and then reintegrating around the new human, and then returning with insights gained to benefit others in our societies.

In our personal stories, the element of “struggle to overcome” arises from the fact that the animal past continues into our human existence in the form of a residual animal brain with its animal-like impulses that continue to influence our thinking, emotions, responses, and behavior. We see this in the fact that people continue to act like animals when they exclude one another, dominate others, or punitively retaliate against others. And these base animal features have even been embedded in our belief systems where we employ ideas/themes to maintain and validate the animal impulses to the detriment of our efforts to be more human. Nothing has been more critical to maintaining the animal than the embedding of animal features in deity- the ultimate ideal and authority at the core of human narratives.

Retaliation, in particular, is the one notable feature that brings the worst of animal existence into human life. Musonius Rufus (Roman philosopher, circa 30-100 AD) expressed the animal nature of retaliation well, “For to scheme to bite back the biter and to return evil for evil is the act not of a human being but of a wild beast” (http://unsafeharbour.wordpress.com/2012/03/31/ancient-quotations-returning-evil-with-good/). Retaliation is humanity behaving at its animal worst. Establishing retaliation as a feature of our animal past helps expose its bestial nature, its essential inhumanity.
To fully sense the animal nature of retaliation, think of dogs snarling and snapping angrily at one another on a street.

One of the more damaging mistakes that early people made was to project this destructive feature of animal existence- retaliation- onto early views of gods. They created the understanding of early gods as greater dominating realities that were threatening, maliciously retributive, and destructively punitive. Deity as something that would retaliate violently against human failure or sin. In doing that they created super monsters for people to fear. Something that would harm you in this life as well as in the after-life.

Over subsequent time the feature of retaliation in divinity was refined with further developed legal categories as “righteous justice”, proper and fair punishment of evil, or just retribution. Retaliation would further be developed into systems of human justice as deserved payback, or what we know as “eye for eye” justice. Consequently, retaliation makes a line down through history to become the legal reality today of justice as punitive retribution- the “just” consequence for bad behavior.

Note this example definition of punitive retribution: Read the rest of the opening comment here

Though its not his stated intention, Arthur Herman in “The Idea of Decline in Western History” shows how primitive mythology was secularized for the modern era in the ideology of Declinism. The idea of decline (i.e. life declining toward something worse, toward collapse and ending) has become the most dominant and influential theme in the modern world. Life declining is a central feature of apocalyptic.

This is among the most primitive, irrational, and distorting of mythology manufactured by ancient minds.

Richard Landes’ Preface to Arthur Mendel’s “Vision and Violence”.

Note- Landes uses the term “millennialism” but that term should be extended more comprehensively to “apocalyptic millennialism” as that better expresses the narrative that incites to mass-death outcomes with its mix of elements that play on both fear and hope. Or even better- “lost paradise/apocalyptic/redemption” as the summary of the larger complex of primitive themes that have been so destructive to humanity across history. Hence, my little bracketed edits to Landes’ term.

Quotes:

“Historian Norman Cohn sought the origins of the two most devastating millennial movements of his day- Communism and Nazism- in the millennial impulse most medieval historians had generally ignored…

“(Apocalyptic millennialism) is not marginal, it is a widespread belief system shared by many people, especially in the monotheistic cultures, but also quite notable in Buddhism and Taosm (I would add it is also notable in Hinduism with its great cycles of rise and then decline to apocalyptic ending, WK)… episodically bursting forth in the characteristic dynamics of an apocalyptic episode…

“(Apocalyptic millennial) phenomena survive all forms of secularization… not only undiminished but intensified…

“(Apocalyptic millennial) movements play a far greater role in the dynamics of modernity than most historians have imagined…” (end of Landes’ Preface).

Then Mendel: “It was through Christianity that the Apocalypse became part of our culture”. He notes that apocalyptic has had a long and violent history. “The apocalypse is a self-fulfilling prophesy. It promotes the suffering it predicts”.

My conclusion: Apocalyptic is God executing a final destruction and extermination of God’s enemies. It is no wonder that across history, believers in this myth have tried to replicate the same exterminating violence against their enemies, validated by God’s own example of violence. See Harold Ellens/Zenon Lotufo quotes below on the long-term human practise of validating behavior with appeal to beliefs in divinity, basing ethics on theology. People trying to model their lives according to what they believe God is like. Read the rest of the opening comment here

Michael Shellenberger and his colleagues have crafted this excellent statement defending freedom that is under attack from within our societies…

https://westminsterdeclaration.org/

This is why they put forth the Westminster Declaration on freedom of speech…

https://public.substack.com/p/this-is-the-most-terrifying-graph

Note also in relation to this what psychologists term “concept creep”, where the former category of “hate speech” has been extended further and further to now include the disagreeing opinions and speech of others, even comedy (note the Dave Chappelle episode), that makes some feel “uncomfortable… feeling threatened, upset…”. The minority of hyper-sensitive and easily-triggered people are trying to criminalize the disagreeing opinions and speech of majority others. Is this not totalitarianism?

More from freedom warrior Michael Shellenberger– “This video can stop totalitarianism”, Jan.15, 2024

https://public.substack.com/p/this-video-can-stop-totalitarianism

Quotes:

“Imagine for a moment that you wanted to seize control over the Internet and put in place a system of mass censorship worldwide. How would you do it?

“You wouldn’t advertise your intentions. You’d hide them. You’d claim there was a rise in hate speech and misinformation and that it was hurting vulnerable people.

“You wouldn’t take on powerful interests. You’d pick on individual citizens. You’d say that they were on the verge of committing real-world violence.

“And you wouldn’t start in a big nation. You’d find some small country to start. You’d get their politicians to go out on a limb for your agenda.

“That’s precisely what’s happening. Politicians in Ireland are, at this moment, attempting to ram through legislation that would allow the police to invade the homes of ordinary citizens, search their phones and computers, and throw them in prison for “hate speech.”

Intro note to comment below-

Note carefully the ideas in the reposted/revised articles below, and the impulses and patterns that they incite during alarmism outbreaks. Just be clear- these ideas that continue to dominate human narratives today, notably the “lost paradise/apocalypse/redemption” complex of themes, are derivative from primitive mythologies, later embraced by world religions, and now embraced in the “secular ideological” versions of our contemporary world. They continue as the most dominant and influential ideas of today’s narratives, still inciting the worst of human impulses to tribalism, domination, and punitive destruction of differing others. We are seeing the same old outcomes that affirm Arthur Mendel’s point that apocalyptic is “the most violent and destructive idea in history”. Read the rest of the opening comment here

Triads. No, not the Chinese ones. Just as memory aids, Wendell Krossa

Repeated themes on this site:

Three bads (animal impulses)- tribal exclusion, domination of others, punitive destruction of others.

Three goods (human impulses)- full inclusion of all, equal freedom and rights of all, restorative treatment of failure.

Three major distortions of the true state of life- “lost original paradise, life declining toward apocalypse, redemption/salvation via instantaneous coercive purging of exaggerated threat…”

This site takes the primal meaning impulse of humanity seriously and is committed to responding with the best of insights from across history. Hence, the unapologetic embrace of the metaphysical element in human narratives (long dominant in human narratives as the embodiment of ultimate ideals, ultimate authority), along with a lot of physical evidence on the true state of life (rising, improving, not declining toward something worse). Inform narratives with insights from all areas of life.

A critical project for our time- Counter destructive myths like “apocalyptic millennialism” that endlessly re-erupt today, often in “secular ideological” versions, even scientific. Recognize the prominence of this mythology today in both religious and secular belief systems. Acknowledge the destructive outcomes of this mythology in salvation schemes like decarbonization. Then offer alternatives to shape entirely new narratives that affirm the better angels of our nature and promote better outcomes.

Create an exaggerated monster. Scare yourself silly. And then aflush with virtue, you can convince yourself that you must heroically engage a righteous war to “save the world”. Wendell Krossa

Michele Obama is “terrified”.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/01/08/michelle-obama-terrified-2024-election/72153207007/

So also other Democrats are similarly terrified. Why? Well, they have created a grotesquely exaggerated monster, so irredeemably evil that he threatens “the end of democracy”.

When you have insistently defined your chief opponent as “Hitler… Nazi…. Fascist tyrant…. Racist… will cause the end of democracy”, there is then no further worse extreme element of threat that you can appeal to. You have reached for the worst.

Progressives also claim that their opponents further threaten the end of life itself due to their advocacy for continued use of fossil fuels that alarmist Progressives claim will cause a climate catastrophe that will be the end of the world.

Having defined and smeared all those who disagree with you with such claims and terms, you now cannot back away to a more rational and sane perspective on your opponents. You have painted yourself into a corner with those horrifically exaggerated threats. Read the rest of the opening comment here

We embrace beliefs to inspire, guide, and validate our behavior. It’s the ancient human practise of “basing behavior on related belief”. This primal practise is the outcome of our primary impulse for meaning. The question then is- Are our beliefs fully humane? What criteria help us evaluate this?

Bob Brinsmead, “We become just like the God that we believe in”.

This site is pursuing a liberation at the depths of human consciousness/subconscious, liberation from the inherited ‘archetypes’ that have deformed human narratives and consciousness from the beginning. Meaning the primitive mythical themes that have always incited, guided, and validated the worst of our inherited animal drives to tribalism, domination, and destruction of differing others (i.e. the “evil triad” as a summary of the animal inheritance inside us).

As psychotherapist Zenon Lotufo argues in “Cruel God, Kind God”, bad religious ideas, notably those defining religious Gods as tribal, dominating, and violently destructive, have always deformed human personality with fear, anxiety, shame, guilt, despair, depression, fatalism, nihilism, and violence. God theories have, from the earliest mythology to world religions of the present, functioned as humanity’s highest ideals and authorities.

This site offers new narrative themes informed and shaped by the best insights from across human history, giving us better ideas to guide and validate our responses and behavior, liberating us from our animal inheritance and thereby enabling us to “tower in stature as maturely human”, energizing us to become the heroes of our personal hero’s quest.

Check to see if the bad ideas listed below (18 “Old Narrative Themes, New Story Alternatives”) are present in your personal worldview or narrative. Then (here’s a New Years project) replace them with the better alternatives.

As Bob Brinsmead states in a section below, playing on Bill Clinton’s comment on the economy, “It’s the narrative, stupid”.

https://www.spectator.com.au/author/bob-brinsmead/

And be fully aware of the self-delusion (or cognitive dissonance) of holding “secular/ideological” versions of these same bad religious ideas, using terms that on the surface appear different from the religious versions but express the same core themes of (1) a better past world, (2) bad people ruining paradise (“Fall of man and original sin” mythology), (3) life declining toward something worse, toward apocalyptic ending, (4) demand for sacrifice/payment for sin, punishment, (5) demand to purge some threatening thing (“coercive purification to attain instantaneous transformation”, Arthur Mendel), and then (6) the promise of salvation/utopia. Read the rest of the opening comment here

I posted this response below to Michael Shellenberger’s latest article on Public- “Hatred, Brainwashing, And Mass Psychosis Behind Democrat’s War On Democracy: We have to break the hypnotic trance destroying our country”, Dec. 23, 2023

https://public.substack.com/p/hatred-brainwashing-and-mass-psychosis

My response:

“Michael- Your material is much appreciated. And apply the same analysis of “brainwashing and mass psychosis… hypnotized by propaganda” to the climate crisis crusade which is just as great a threat to democracy with its push to control all aspects of life.

“Prof of economics Ross McKitrick, who helped expose Michael Mann’s hockey-stick fraud, recently noted the drive for central planning behind the climate crusade, and the populist revolt against that impulse to totalitarianism.

https://financialpost.com/opinion/cop28-out-of-touch-globalist-climate-agenda?mc_cid=fba001e275&mc_eid=bbd9cad85f

“Last year’s Nobel laureate in physics, John Clauser summed it best- “There is no climate crisis. Much as it may upset many people, my message is the planet is not in peril”.

https://co2coalition.org/news/nobel-laureate-dr-john-clauser-i-dont-believe-there-is-a-climate-crisis/

See “It’s the narrative, stupid” by Bob Brinsmead at the bottom of this opening section. See also the article by Ross McKitrick re the global elites use of climate alarmism to validate their crusade for global central planning. Sterling Burnett affirms the same reveal made by McKitrick. As noted before on this site, beware the totalitarian’s formula- “Fear=control”.

See also below Michael Shellenberger, Matt Taibbi, and Walter Kirn’s latest on the Democratic party threat to US democracy… a threat that Democrats, with a stunning absence of self-awareness, project onto their opponents. This is about the protection of fundamental freedom, now threatened from within our societies by former liberals/democrats who have swung far-left into extremist Woke Progressivism. Read the rest of the opening comment here

Pass this link on to others… Listen to her comment on the Hebrew word- “Now”. “Each moment is an eternity in hell”, Ayelet Levy-Shachar, mother of Naama.

https://www.thefp.com/p/the-woman-in-the-hamas-video-is-my-daughter

In their moments of fear I have told my children that there were no monsters. But there are. And they create hells worse than any imaginable hell. So Jewish “Protest Theology” was right. God must be held in judgment for the Holocaust, and so much more hellish human experience. Why such hells? Nothing in human spirituality, mythology, or philosophy assuages/mitigates the horrors that people suffer. It just is in all its revolting ugliness. And Why, really Why do people have to go through such savagery? But still we try to comfort one another. What else can we do?

I don’t affirm the conclusions of people like Charles Templeton- “Farewell to God”- to embrace the nihilism of dogmatic atheism (as contrasted with the “atheism” of the skeptic). I can’t go there. But I strongly affirm his spirit. Why do children suffer as they do in this world? Where and what is ultimate Goodness and Love? What possibly can be any meaning to such horror? And so we continue to struggle with this primal impulse for meaning. And how do we maintain our own humanity in the face of such evil?

This from Jordan Peterson, Dec.7, 2023- “Blame idiotic Marxism for the demented antisemitism oozing out of universities: Presidents of Harvard, MIT and UPenn turn blind eye to calls for genocide against Jews, while claiming the moral high ground.”

https://nationalpost.com/opinion/jordan-peterson-blame-idiotic-marxism-for-the-demented-antisemitism-oozing-out-of-universities

This clip from the Joe Rogan Experience (episode 2073 on Spotify). Just check from about the 1-minute to the 5-minute mark, where Rogan is commenting on the fucked up Canadian situation under Justin Trudeau. Go Joe, go.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsQv610jSwg

Note also the comments below this clip, mostly from Canadians affirming what Rogan says about our country- the embarrassment that Justin Trudeau is to this country, the mess that he has made of Canada. Well, what did people expect? He had no business experience at all. And the two defining comments from the man were that he pays no attention to macro-economics (“I don’t think about monetary policy”), and he admires the dictatorship of China because they get things done. Just like Daddy who was a fanboy of Castro and Mao.

Further illustrations of how apocalyptic makes fools of ordinarily bright people, Wendell Krossa

E.g. Bill Maher stating that CO2 is “a poisonous gas”. Holy shit? That trace gas is one of the fundamental elements critical to our existence, along with all other carbon-based life. Bill, its Grade One science. CO2 is the basic food of all life and it has been in especially short supply for the last few million years (our “CO2 starvation era”- Patrick Moore). CO2 levels almost dipped to a massive die-off of plant life some 20-30,000 years ago (down to 185 ppm, just above the 150 ppm where all plant life dies). We need far more CO2 in the atmosphere, just as when CO2 levels were in the multiple-thousands of ppm over much of the 500-million year Phanerozoic era of life, and all life flourished. And when CO2 levels were that high, Earth was sometimes suffering ice-age eras. How’s that for a huge disconnect between CO2 and climate warming?

https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2016/10/Moore-2.pdf

And another self-proclaimed “bright one” exposed as foolish by apocalyptic mythology: Bill Nye “the anti-science guy” argued during a Tucker Carlson interview that we need to return to preindustrial temperatures to save the world. Bill, that was the “Little Ice Age” of roughly 1645-1715, a dangerously cold time on earth that caused crop failures in Europe with subsequent starvation. We need the climate to warm much further, even to the 3-6 degrees C warmer than today that occurred during the Eocene “paradise for mammals” (55-33 million years ago) when, again, all life flourished. Because in our abnormally and sub-optimally cold world of today 10 times more people die every year from cold than die from warmth (Lancet study). Cold climate is the greatest destroyer of life.

And no, with much warmer average temperatures the oceans will not “boil”. Why not? Because “meridional transport”, the “main influence on climate change” (Javier Vinos), will carry that extra topical heat energy to the colder regions of Earth to “even out” climate across the planet, benefitting all life with extended habitats and more diversity, along with increased crop production for humanity.

See the reports of Vinos on the “Sun-Climate Effect: Winter Gatekeeper hypothesis” at Wattsupwiththat.com. Even when average temperatures were 10 degrees C warmer than today, Earth did not “ignite on fire or fry”. And during those much warmer eras tropical temperatures only varied by a few degrees, evidencing strong negative feedbacks that kept tropical temperatures within an “equable climate” range.

For over 80% of the Phanerozoic era of life, Earth has been much warmer than today and entirely ice free with fossils of tropical plants and animals discovered in both polar regions. That is a more normal and optimal world for all life.

Point from paleoclimate evidence? Don’t fear even much more global warming. It will be net beneficial for all life. The terrorizing of the human population over another 1.5 degrees C warming is irrational, anti-evidence hysteria that can only be understood as apocalyptic-incited madness, informed more by primitive mythology than anything remotely scientific.

To all the kids who know better (they have Grade One science under their belts), keep blurting out to your parents- “Mommy/Daddy, the emperor has no clothes”. You will help pop the bubble of delusion now fogging the minds of too many adults that have embraced the “profoundly religious” climate alarmism crusade, just another in a long history of apocalyptic “madness of crowds” eruptions.

Most critical in the mix- probe the “physics of CO2”, the most fundamental evidence in the climate science issue, at places like “co2coalition.org” where atmospheric physicists Richard Lindzen and William Happer, among others, are doing good work presenting this evidence to the public.

That evidence affirms there is “no climate emergency/crisis”. And hence, no need to tax carbon or decarbonize our societies.

Section topics:

(1) Tamping down the tribal impulse.

(2) Ranting and raving about unconditional. A friend says “Push on”. Do you have a better alternative ideal?

(3) Apocalyptic- Landes on the greatest fraud and lie ever. And most destructive myth ever.

(4) Main site project: Go to the root and solve the problem for the long-term.

(5) On the freedom front- Cover your ears, snowflakes. Musk joins Dana White with a “Fuck you” to Wokeism. The courageous refusal to be cowed by Woke bullying and threat.

(6) There is no Madhi or other Savior coming to save us. The incarnation of God in all humanity.

(7) More on the consciousness-transforming insight of Historical Jesus that overturns all religious theology and all conditional religion too.

(8) The “holiness takes precedence over love” fallacy.

(9) Yee gads, its Gad Saad trying to be happy. His views on what’s wrong today.

(10) The Borgen Project on Nelson Mandela. How an unconditional approach to enemies enables one to “tower in stature as maturely human”.

(11) The great “Switcheroo”- Libs/Dems have rejected liberalism, and Conservatives have taken up the torch for Classic Liberalism. Well, not entirely. Conservatives have attempted to limit the free speech of pro-Palestinian protesters.

(12) The 6 most important words in all history- “Love your enemy because God does”. Be fully woke on this. When we talk about “love of enemy” we are not talking about feeling mushy, warm, or fuzzy toward offenders and their offenses because it is just entirely unnatural to feel good toward often monstrous offenders and their too often horrific offenses. Outrage is the natural emotional response to offense. In advocating the precept of “love your enemies” we are talking about the preformed intention to do the humane thing in response to offenders and thereby maintain our humanity in the face of evil. It’s a nuanced thing. And yes, restorative justice approaches point in the right direction.

(13) What is love, really? What is justice, really?

(14) Contemporary storytelling glorifies physical force in the same old infantile vengeance tales (in contrast with the force of love at societal scale).

(15) The new Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, satanic leader… the excessive demonizing of political opponents. Left and Right are both guilty here.

(16) Cease the climate alarmism hysteria- a note to politicians. Take a good look at the physics of CO2, that CO2 has reached “saturation” in terms of its warming influence, and will contribute little to any further warming, warming that has been mild, showing there is “no climate crisis”. Nobel laureate in physics, John Clauser, affirms this.

Other posts below:

Brendan O’Neill on COP28: “Revenge of the feudalists- environmentalism is an ugly revolt against modernity”.

Moral clarity on evil. Its not what the Pro-Palestinian protests are claiming. Hamas’s savagery would exist with or without Israel- Danielle Kubes report.

This latest report on the Censorship Industrial Complex, Alex Gutentag on Public at Substack. How we are manipulated, propagandized, and lied to by state agencies, the intelligence community, and their media allies (mainstream media).

Probing what went wrong, the liberal abandonment of liberalism.

What freedom of speech entails- Even the defense of the repugnant speech of opponents.

Another affirmation of dualism, ultimate oneness? Music that just “comes from somewhere” (comments of McCartney, Lennon, Dylan, Simon).

Book review- Apocalyptic millennialism. Religious ideas fueling destructive madness today. When will we ever learn? Wendell Krossa

Richard Landes’ research in “Heaven On Earth: The varieties of the millennial experience” offers an excellent overview of apocalyptic millennial movements across human history. He notes that many historians have tried to ignore and dismiss how common apocalyptic millennial movements have been in human history. They deny the reality of apocalyptic millennialism, in part, because they cannot bear the exposure of their cultural heroes as tainted by apocalyptic irrationality- heroes like Jesus, Paul, Constantine, Muhammad, Charlemagne, Francis of Assisi, Newton, Marx, Lenin, Mao, among many others.

Add Stephen Hawking to this list as he embraced apocalyptic lunacy over the last two years of his life (2016-17), along with King Charles, Al Gore, Joe Biden, and so many other politicians across the world, whole reams of celebrities and innumerable scientists today, all enthralled to the latest eruption of apocalyptic madness in “climate alarmism”. Hawking prophesied, in 2016, the end of days would happen in about 1000 years (little green aliens coming to get us). Then the next year he dropped the date to the apocalypse as just 100 years out (contemporary green visions of the end). He forgot that the tale of Chicken Little was a fable and not real life. Read the rest of the opening comment here

Note the reposting below of revised articles on “Patterns in alarmism movements” and the destructive outcomes. This is to encourage- “learn more, fear less”. And to counter the totalitarian’s formula- Fear=control.

Some intro notes re the reposted articles below…

Below in the repost of revised comment on “Patterns in alarmism movement” I noted that we have had the alternatives to liberate us from the endless cycles of crowd madness and violence that are incited by the bad ideas that we have inherited, ideas that validate our worst impulses. We have known about the better alternatives for millennia. So there is no excuse for enduring these endless cycles of hellish barbarity that keep erupting in the modern era. Unfortunately though, the better alternatives have been buried in our religious traditions and are now also buried by our ideological belief systems that have embraced the same old inhumane themes of our primitive past.

And while the influence and destructive outcomes of bad religious ideas are most graphically expressed in eruptions of violence such as the Oct.7 attack on Israel, do not dismiss the far worse influence and outcomes (more widespread) of the same basic complex of bad ideas- i.e. the “lost paradise/apocalypse/redemption” set of ideas. The influence and outcomes of this complex create far more harm through the “secular/ideological” versions like climate alarmism.

Just one example of outcomes- Note the death totals worldwide from cold mortality (Lancet study) as related to things like fuel poverty, as related to the anti-fossil fuels crusade that inflates energy costs and impacts the poorest people the most. Where are media on such issues? Where is that virtue-signalling proclamation of concern for human suffering? (Source: Past issues of “Net Zero Watch” newsletter of the Global Warming Policy Forum, among other sources.)

Another…

Part of the Declinism ideology that dominates narratives today is the belief of declinists that the modern embrace of rational science has resulted in the loss of a mythical way of viewing nature and life, and that has been a mistake that must be corrected by reviving and re-embracing the mythical view of reality. The restoration of a mythical way of viewing life is considered to be vital to reconnecting with nature and reviving our “noble savage past”, when people were believed to have been more pure, strong, and authentically in tune with nature. This longing for a restoration of mythical thought helps to understand the “post-truth” element of modern thinking. (Detail in Arthur Herman’s “The Idea of Decline in Western History”, among other sources.)

Ah Michael, Bjorn… What are you guys doing??? Get the new narrative right, or what’s the point? Wendell Krossa

I appreciate Michael Shellenberger and his colleagues along with others like Bjorn Lomborg, muchly so, for their exposure of the “Censorship Industrial Complex”, anti-alarmism, and robust defense of free speech. They are engaging and fulfilling the hero’s quest on these issues. Hence, I regularly post articles by them on this site. Go Michael, go. Go Bjorn, go.

But I have a quibble with Shellenberger and Lomborg over an issue that is critical to public meta-narratives. While they try to calm public nerves that there is no looming apocalypse, they then pivot to affirm the core of the climate alarmism narrative that CO2 is a threat that has to be confronted and dealt with somehow. They, and many others doing the same, are plain wrong on this affirmation that action must be taken against CO2.

They need to heed atmospheric physicists like Richard Lindzen and William Happer on the physics of CO2 and the fact that the warming influence of CO2 is now “saturated” (a physics term) and that more CO2 in the atmosphere will contribute very little to any further possible warming (now after an ongoing 20-year “pause in warming” we are still uncertain if climate will warm or cool over the next decades, see Javier Vinos reports at Wattsupwiththat.com).

Conclusion from the best evidence so far- There is no “climate emergency” and we do not need to “do something to stop climate change”. Most important, there is no good scientific reason to tax carbon or decarbonize our societies, a crusade that is ruining Western societies with state-created obstructions to fossil fuel energy development that inflates energy prices and consequently inflates all the basic products (fossil fuel derivatives) essential to our societies. Add the excess burden from the subsidies for unworkable renewables.

On a related note….

Jennifer Marohasy attended the recent “Alliance for Responsible Citizenship” (ARC) conference in London and posted several reports on the conference, noting that climate experts like Richard Lindzen were not permitted to speak.

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2023/11/04/in-denial-about-the-science-part-2-arc-in-london/

Bob Brinsmead said that the conference leaders “suppressed the voices of ‘sceptics’ such as William Happer, Richard Lindzen, and Patrick Moore who are the ones who hold the key to a clear counter climate narrative – namely, that CO2 is not a harmful pollutant but of enormous benefit to support a healthy and more prosperous environment”.

Jordan Peterson, a lead conference organizer, needs to heed Marohasy’s complaints if he really wants to create a new narrative for humanity that properly and actually frees us from the current apocalypticism of climate alarmism and the destructive outcomes of its salvationism (“save the world”). You go, Jennifer. Read the rest of the opening comment here

This from co2coalition.org newsletter of Nov.20, 2023- “CO2 Coalition Director and Nobel Laureate (Physics) John Clauser traveled to Baltimore this past week to speak at a press conference on climate. He began his presentation with the exclamation: “Great news! There is no climate crisis!… Much as it may upset many people, my message is the planet is not in peril.”

Section topics:

(1) An anti-religion site? Nah. Just pointing out that conditional religion cannot and will not communicate the true unconditional nature of deity to humanity. An unconditional God spells the end of all conditional religion.

(2) Comedians are the cutting-edge defenders of freedom. The comedic genius of Jeselnik and others.

(3) Eruptions of hate and violence, and the long-term solutions- Go to the root ideas in narratives that incite and validate our worst impulses (the “evil triad”).

(4) Goal of site- Slay the monster, liberate people from primal fears, promote a liberation at the depths of human consciousness/subconscious.

(5) Reposting of the list of the worst ideas that we have inherited and the 18 alternative themes for a new narrative. Transforming human consciousness at the deepest level.

(6) Some thoughts on dying and the “annoyance” of death (Australian actor Sam Neill’s term).

(7) And another excellent one from Michael Shellenberger- “Why Democrats Became The Totalitarians They Warned Us About: How did the Left go from defending the free speech rights of neo-Nazis to demanding censorship, falsely accusing their opponents of being fascists, and seeking their incarceration?”

Other comments below:

The religious validation of horror; More on comedians as cutting-edge advocates for freedom; Lying in service to a noble cause or righteous battle; Violence producing revulsion and consequent impetus to reform in fellow group members; And more on the real battle of good against evil… and much more.

It will never end, until… Wendell Krossa

This site has long argued that the problem of violence between differing groups of people will continue to erupt in societies until you go to the deepest roots behind such violence- notably the bad ideas that incite such bad behavior, the beliefs that validate the violent domination and destruction of those we consider our “enemies”.

This site advocates for a change at the core of human thought that will involve a thorough transformation of the most fundamental themes that shape human narratives and consequently influence our outlooks, emotions, motivations, and responses/behavior.

The recent Hamas attack was just another festering sore that broke out on a larger body of corruption, just another in an endless historical stream of such eruptions of violence, all fueled by a fundamentally similar complex of bad ideas/themes- mental pathologies that validate tribalism, domination, and punitive destruction of differing others. Read the rest of the opening comment here