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“God cleans up your past, fixes your present and makes sure your future will be bright.”

I’d rather put it a little differently.
God offers you indeed all these generous opportunities but doesn’t do your part too.
It’s you that has to perform the hard work needed to put them in practice.

So stop ‘liking’ or whatever you were doing and start building your future.

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Well… the fact that we’ll indeed never completely get rid of bullying shouldn’t stop us from trying.
As to what we should be teaching our children… How about both?
Standing up for themselves will teach them how many things are within their grasp and that some are indeed outside that grasp. It will also teach them that they need to try in order to determine which thing lies where.
Standing up for others will help them, all of them, live in a better world than we did. And that will be a world of victors, not victims. ‘Cause bullies don’t stand a chance if enough of us stand up when needed.

Wearing pink shirts and passing bylaws doesn’t turn us into victims. Refusal to stand up for someone else does. The bullies love that, they would just take us down one by one while the rest of us turn their heads ‘it’s not my business, let that pussy fend for himself’!

And yes, there is a second way by which we can become a society of victims. A short cut of the first one. Let somebody else take care of the situation. Instead of standing up ourselves, together, to let/expect somebody else do that for us.
That would be akin to inviting a bully to ‘take us under his wing’!

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A friend of mine shared this on FB. Thanks Sheeja!

It was then that I realized that I do sometimes worry.

Only I don’t worry for tomorrow. I worry for me.
Worrying ‘for tomorrow’, per se, is indeed ludicrous but wondering what I’ll be doing tomorrow seems only natural for a sensible person.

After all it’s me who is going to live that day so how about living it to my liking, not somebody else’s?
Provided that I don’t hurt anybody in the process, of course.

Crin Antonescu a anuntat ca renunta chiar si la pozitia de presedinte demisionar al PNL si ca nu mai intentioneaza sa candideze la presedentia Romaniei iar Antena 3 discuta situatia sub titlul de mai sus. (1 Iunie 2014, Duminica)

Cu 38 de ani in urma, tot pe vremea asta, terminam clasa a 8-a.
Profesorul nostru de istorie, domnul Bucataru – n-aveai cum sa-i spui tovarasu’, era mult prea domn – incepuse deja cu cateva saptamani in urma sa ne pregateasca pentru cele ce urmau sa ni se intample. Ne-a invatat multe in perioada aia, de la cum sa copiem sau cum sa invitam o fata la film (iar pe fete cum sa accepte sau sa refuze politicos o astfel de invitatie) pana la niste adevarate subtilitati de filozofie a vietii. Astazi voi face apel la doua dintre acestea din urma.

‘La liceu veti invata tot felul de chestii…Economie politica, socialism stiintific, democratie populara… toate astea sunt destul de incurcate si as prefera sa plecati de la mine cu niste lucruri cat de cat clare.
Democratia, de exemplu, nu are de-a face de loc cu numerele. Lumea crede ca daca ‘este democratie’ atunci ‘majoritatea hotaraste iar minoritatea asculta’. Cei care sustin asa ceva n-au inteles nimic. Democratia se refera la faptul ca inainte de a se trece la vot fiecare isi spune parerea iar ceilalti asculta. Cu atentie! Iar din momentul in care nu se mai discuta despre idei, cu respect, ci despre persoane, si eventual cu dusmanie, ideea de democratie s-a dus demult pe apa sambetei. Aia nu mai este democratie ci dictatura majoritatii’. (Pentru cei carora nu le vine a crede ca aceasta discutie, publica pana la urma, a avut loc pe vremea comunismului le atrag respectuos atentia ca atunci era cea mai fasta perioada postbelica a Romaniei. Ceausescu nu innebunise inca iar la chioscul din colt se mai gasea Kent)

‘Veti trece prin tot felul de examene, pentru care va veti pregati dupa cum veti putea voi mai bine. Sa stiti totusi ca in afara de pregatirea ‘clasica’, de invatatul propriu zis, conteaza foarte mult si atitudinea pe care o aveti la examene. Si sa nu uitati o chestie. De cele mai multe ori raspunsurile pot fi deduse pornind chiar de la modul in care sunt formulate intrebarile!’

Revenind la titlul postarii si aplicand invataturile domnului Profesor Bucataru raspunsul devine deja simplu:

Brucan s-a inselat amarnic, Antonescu si-a facut-o pana la urma cu mana lui iar cei care au de fapt de pierdut suntem chiar noi.

Pentru cei care nu tin minte, ‘oracolul din Damaroaia’ a prezis ca romanii vor avea nevoie de 20 de ani pentru a invata ce este aceea democratie. Avand in vedere ca in campania pentru europarlamentare s-a discutat despre orice numai despre idei nu este clar ca profetia asta nu s-a indeplinit inca.
“Nu vom lasa Romania pe mana baronilor rosii!…” Nici nu mai conteaza ce a mai spus Antonescu dupa aceste cuvinte. Pot sa ii inteleg starea de spirit, ba chiar sunt de acord cu el ca sunt prea multi baroni rosii in Romania. De fapt sunt prea multi baroni de orice fel… sa revenim. Cand te pregatesti sa candidezi pentru o functie eligibila nu iti poti permite sa imparti de la inceput electoratul in doua si sa acuzi implicit una dintre parti ca ii sustine pe ‘baronii rosii’. Nu are nici o importanta ca de aproape un an esti tinta unui foc incrucisat, atat din stanga cat si din propria reduta de dreapta. Pur si simplu nu ai voie sa spui asa ceva, cu atat mai mult cu cat pana atunci dadeai impresia ca duci lupta pe planul ideilor si ca nu ai nici o intentie sa te cobori in mocirla in care are loc ‘lupta politica’ de la noi.

“Lupta politica.”
Abia acum am pus degetul pe rana. Atat conform invataturilor Profesorului Bucataru cat si tuturor tratatelor de politologie (atentie, nu de marketing politic) care subliniaza caracterul participativ al procesului democratic, ‘politica’, cea adevarata,  are de a face mai degraba cu cooperarea decat cu lupta. Da, exista intrecere dar o intrecere de tip sportiv, o intrecere din acelea unde este important sa participi si unde toti au cate ceva de castigat.

Poate ca citind aceste randuri ma veti considera un naiv. Nu sunt in masura sa va contrazic.
Dar ce frumos ar fi ca ‘intrecerea politica’ sa se intoarca la menirea ei fireasca.  Aceea de a produce solutii benefice pentru cat mai multi dintre membrii societatii.
Din pacate in zilele noastre prea multi considera ca ‘politica’ este doar un cadru institutional in care se desfasoara ‘lupta pentru putere’ care macina societatile contemporane precum un cancer. De aceea alegatorii nu prea ies la vot iar prea multi dintre cetateni nici macar nu vor sa aibe de a face cu asa ceva.
Iar pana cand aceasta perceptie a societatii nu se va schimba scena politica va continua sa fie ocupata de cei pentru care puterea politica este un scop si nu o unealta.

What might have Spain in common with Syria except for the first and last letters of their names?

Quite a lot and there are many more countries that belong to the same group: Portugal, Turkey, Ukraine, Thailand, South Korea, almost the entire Latin America and the list is far from being complete.

They all traversed a period of dictatorship during which a sizable portion of the population had left the poverty zone, entered the middle class and started to demand ‘political rights’. In some of those countries the political establishment of that day understood that it was in their own (personal) best interest to give up some of their political power and personal clout – and by doing so vastly increased the chances of long term stability in their respective countries – while in other instances the rulers clung jealously to power unwilling to cede even an iota of it.

And this is exactly why Chile, Portugal, Spain and South Korea are in a completely different situation than Syria while in Thailand, Turkey and Ukraine things are in full process of being sorted out, one way or another.

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This 27,000-year-old dog skull unearthed in the Czech Republic has a mammoth bone fragment in its mouth, one of many discoveries that suggest Paleolithic people may have used dogs to hunt mammoths. 

Really? So we found a dead dog’s skull with a piece of mammoth bone between its teeth and we jump to the conclusion that men ‘may have used dogs to hunt mammoths’?

In fact the only certain thing that can be inferred for sure from this is that dogs, then as now, used to chew on bones.
And if we go on assuming things that might have happened what can stop us from asking ‘were mammoths bones toxic for ancient dogs, so poisonous in fact as to provoke instant death’?

Have you stopped laughing yet?

‘Cause this is no laughing matter. This is exactly how science works. Some people jump to conclusions, sometimes farfetched, and then try for decades to muster enough proof for their conclusions to be accepted by the ‘scientific community’ while others – earnestly, jokingly or sometimes even disrespectfully – try to prove them wrong.

The truth is that it doesn’t matter who’s right and who’s wrong, both sides are doing the excellent job of keeping alight the flame of knowledge.
Had one side, no matter which, given up its efforts, science as we know it – a dynamic process that churns out continuously vast quantities of new information only to be proven false or at least incomplete at a later time – would grind to a halt.
If the ‘enthusiasts’  would get the upper hand in no time they would drive ‘science’ so far away from the hard reality that what they would eventually propose as a ‘corpus of knowledge’ would be absolutely useless.
If the naysayers would be as ‘aggressive’ as I was in the beginning, get things out of context, just as I did, and then criticize the ‘findings’ grounded on a seemingly logical failure then the whole process would stop altogether. In these conditions further improvement in our understanding of the world would become practically impossible.

So let’s keep going as we are already used to, only a little less emphatically.
After all nobody is exactly right in the long time, right?

For those of you who want to learn more about how ancient people might have been using dogs to hunt mammoth, you have here a link to the article that inspired this post. It appeared in the Science magazine.

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“A new study tested whether people believe free will arises from a metaphysical basis or mental capacity. Even though most respondents said they believed humans to have souls, they judged free will and assigned blame for transgressions based on pragmatic considerations—such as whether the actor in question had the capacity to make an intentional and independent choice.” 

OK so people have understood that what sets us apart from the other animals is our ability “to make an intentional and independent choice“.

But don’t you think we need to exercise in order to maintain that ‘capacity’? “Use it or loose it”, remember?

Yet everyday we give up some of our autonomy. Sometime in the name of safety, as in this case, other times in the name of increased efficiency/smaller prices.

No, I’m not exaggerating and no, I don’t think Google does it on purpose.
You see, so many of us have boring jobs where we don’t have anything else to do but to almost blindly follow procedures. This way we slowly become automata. We work (‘operate’?!?) like one, we eat standardized food, we learn the same ‘common core’, we watch the same bland and undemanding TV shows. A considerable proportion of the modern day people exercise their free will and ability to ‘fend off on their own’ only when driving, mostly to and from the workplace. Now we are going to give this up, too.
I don’t think Google is part of a worldwide conspiracy meant to transform most of us in dumb consumers/lame but highly productive workers, it’s just that they happen to have at their disposal what it takes to implement this technology and the rational incentive to do it. What else for the people being transported to do during this ‘freed’ time but to happily Google away on the interactive touch screen those ‘cars’ will come adorned with? Now who would have thought of a thing like that?!?

But I repeat and the study I cited from above proves me right. We should not blame ‘the technology’! It can not choose so it cannot be at fault for anything. It is only us that can decide how to use whatever technology lies in wait under our fingertips.

We are sole responsible for our fate.

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Don’t get me wrong. I’m not against this concept, as such. Wonderful things can be achieved using this technology, just watch the video below. But please use every opportunity you have to exercise your ability to decide for yourself.

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There are two sides of this.
1. Be frugal and use only the least disruptive tools at your disposal, even if it means subjecting yourself to increased personal danger.
2. Kill everything in sight, move over when done and repeat…

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Atentie!
Nu trantiti usile la lift, se defecteaza liftul foarte usor.
Copii sub 14 ani fara insotitor prinsi in lift vor fi amendati.