This is supposed to let me email my post to my blog

Oh modern genie
Mail-to Blogger Address
Publish my posting

GitMo - wheels of justice grind blindly

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070531/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/guantanamo_suicide

From the article:

"The apparent suicide Wednesday came despite the military's best efforts.
The military tightened security at the prison camp following the previous suicides and an uprising last spring, removing access to light fixtures and other possible makeshift weapons and taking away bed sheets in the daytime.
About 380 men are held at the isolated prison camp on suspicion of links to al-Qaida or the Taliban. Many have been held for five years.
The Naval Criminal Investigative Service is conducting an ongoing investigation into the three previous suicides.
The former commander of the detention facilities, Navy Rear Adm. Harry Harris, described those suicides as acts of "asymmetric warfare" — an effort to increase condemnation of the prison."

No, sorry, dear Admiral. Asymmetric warfare is when we pay warlords to give up "taliban or al qaeda" personnel, and maybe the warlord's daughter's lover gets caught up in the dragnet, with a fully paid ticket to Gitmo.

In Legal Limbo
Prisoners should have rights too
All hope is lost there

Theory of everything

I am real close
From big bang to closing light
Understand it all

We are, as we seem.
Scum on dust of a dirtball
Careening through space

Why? Not a question...
There is no why, no purpose.
Please, do not despair.

Universe - chaos!
Human brains make patterns
Some are, some aren't there!

What's 0ur consciousness?
Unfortunate artifact
of intelligence.

within our skin
All one - inseparable

Mindbodyspirit

Cosmic Consciousness?

Universe not self aware

has no need to be

SELF vs. THE REST!

It's Anthrompomorphism

Anti-us, like us.

Pranks by Boys - first in series, The Rules!

I have a few hundred stories, accumulated over a lifetime, some true, some almost true, and some I wish were true. Given the new medium of weblogging, I’ve decided today to attempt to tell these stories within the confines of a single blog page, more or less.

This will keep me from being too wordy, for, while all of my words are scintillating, getting to the punch line is a good thing as well.

While I call the accumulated group of stories “Pranks by Boys” they aren’t all pranks, they aren’t all about boys and they are otherwise difficult to characterize.

They will also be difficult to synopsize into this sized space! But, that is my challenge, and, if, while striving greatly, I find that it won’t work, well, I’ll simply change the nature of what I’m doing!

I wonder what other themes I ought to have here on my blog…body surfing, while quite popular with me, is not generally popular…my love of Mexican cooking might find an appreciative audience. I always do enjoy a good one liner, perhaps these Pranks by Boys stories are the narrative equivalent?

Words shape Reality

Words are what it takes
communicate harmony
WORDS shape reality...

Viewing the World
Putting labels on what's seen
WORDS share reality...

a Brain see patterns
"Food? - Not Food", "Danger - or not"
WORDS wire our brains

Along with Fire
assisting man's ascendence
WORDS "technology"

For teaching our young
Acting as "tribal" memory
WORDS store our thoughts

Our Environment
We only make perceptions
WORDS are the lenses

The Olympians: Following their dream!

Humans dream.

We sleep for one third (if we’re lucky!) of our lives, and some of that time we spend dreaming.

What is a dream anyway?

Our dreams are difficult to characterize. Nothing concrete about them. We can only compare each other’s descriptions, as there is no “evidence” of dreaming except our own testimony.

Personally, I think dreams are but a “shadow” or an “artifact” of what is really happening, chemical processes that are required for brain and body maintenance.

Memories of dreams, even ones we awaken from and relate in great detail, are ephemeral at best, and ought not be relied upon to make life changing decisions.

However, when your spouse let’s you know that long dead grandma spoke in a dream last night, what do you do with that information?

Are all beliefs/non-beliefs created equal?

Someone told me today that atheism somewhat like a religion, since it provides "a philosophy of life". Actually, and firmly, atheism provides no such thing...however, it did raise some issues with me.

I get exercised over god since belief stymies an accurate world view.

Faith is DANGEROUS.

Just look at the motivations of suicide bombers.

What would you do with 72 virgins anyway? After a couple of thousand years they'll be used up hags...and you've got FOREVER with them.

Believing in an ACTUAL RAPTURE is DANGEROUS.
Who cares about pollution, we're all due to go to our reward...

Why is global warming so fucking scary to fundies?
Because it calls for flooding, but god gave us a rainbow to show us he'd never flood us again.
(I'm being purposefully and firmly tongue in cheek...but you get the idea.)

Knowing what little we know about the universe, it seems to me that "philosophies of life" that begin and end with god aren't reflective of our environment.

In information technology it is known as GIGO - GARBAGE IN, GARBAGE OUT.

From somewhere else in response to something else.

Here's your confusion <> 05/24 23:34:43
First, Atheism is not a religion.
You could consider it a faith however.

1. As a "strong" atheist I believe there is/are no god(s))
2. I have no way to prove without doubt that there are no god(s).
3. Faith is a belief in something not reasonable. It is belief without proof.
4. Therefore it is an article of faith with me that there is/are no god(s).

Doesn't make Atheism in any way a religion however.

Other atheists simply do not believe, therefore have no faith at all.

This is why agnostics, those that "don't know" if there is god, gods or not, feel theirs is the only logical position.

I agree, my strong atheist position is not as logical as the agnostic position, but I find it far more descriptive of the reality within which I find myself.

The confluence of several concepts

Birth control and the moral choice.

Lybrel won FDA approval.


It's a birth control pill that puts a woman's period on hold, indefinitely, thereby precluding conception.


Haven't heard much controversy about it, yet...but I expect the usual hue and cry from "religious-ers", fundamentalists of all stripes about "god's" plan or go forth and multiply or man shall have dominion, or some such.


Personally, I'm all for it. More ways to prevent pregnancy are good things.


Although I haven't heard if cramps and PMS also "go away", if it affords a little comfort each month during what can be a difficult time, so much the better.


Delaying pregnancy is a good thing. Delaying it for life is the best decision possible.


Human consumption and our unsustainable economy (yeah verily, our culture and technology) and life style (even the poorest people have a large ecological footprint, compared to squirrels say) are shaping the very ecology of the planet. And not in a positive way...


It's like we're running a scientific experiment, with us as the guinea pigs, yet we aren't testing any hypotheses, we're simply changing conditions within which life exists and seeing if we can survive!


We continue to reproduce without any controls at all, regardless of Lybrel. Each new mouth represents hundreds of tons of CO2 emmissions over a lifetime. OVERPOPULATION IS THE BIGGEST PROBLEM FACING LIFE ON EARTH, PERHAPS EVER!


The Earth's climate is noticibly changing, in predictable ways, and in ways that are changing faster than predicted. Sea ice, when it melts, has a huge influence on the temperature of the oceans at the poles. Not only will the white reflectivity no longer be there, the dark water will accept more solar radiation. Heating will proceed with speed.


Given the lack of fresh water for many humans already on the planet, the lack of females in Chinese society (thanks to cultural issues, once again, female babies are undervalued, or adult males are overvalued, depending), the religious nuts in the middle east, the worldwide addiction to petroleum, the cheap yet strong street drugs available, the continuation of the decline in amphibious life, the reduced salinity of the Atlantic Currents, the reduction in Antarctic ice and subsequent rise in sea level, the "invader" flora and fauna, of all sizes and ecological import that disrupt "native" habitats (ballast oysters etc.), the well financed terrorists and availability of nuclear materials, the many mentally ill thanks to "modern" civilization, it won't be lasting much longer.


Therefore, before the die-off happens, every human who is added to the mix is another human (or ancestor of humans) that will be dying an unpleasant death.

So, what makes sense is V.H.E.M.T.

Voluntary

Human

Extinction

MovemenT

www.vhemt.org

Get vehement about population control.

Keep in mind, it is VOLUNTARY.

And, yes, our conclusion is extinction. So to speak.

What do we know.

There are loads of things that are unknown. Concentrate for a few minutes on what we do know!
For example, we KNOW that the apparent movement of the Sun resulting in daytime, twilight, night, dawn, daytime is not what it appears.

We know that driving too fast is dangerous and potentially expensive, especially if we don't have insurance.

There is an NPR show called "What do you know?". At the beginning of the radio program the announcer says: "What do you know?" to which the audience responds, "Not much, you?"

How do we get to know?

"experience"

Observation - happened like that last time, I figure it will do it again the same way next time

Learning - Momma said there'd be days like this, there'd be days like this my momma said.

Gossip is a form of learning!

Intuition or Good Guessing (or Bad Guessing for which we put on the rose-colored rear-view 20/20 hindsight lenses): I knew that heart was coming so I make my flush (even though it was a bad bet!).



How do we know what we know?

Second guessing ourselves is fairly common place. Fascinating that within one mind so many different options still present, and, until an action is actually performed (a behavior), all bets are off as to what of the myriad potential actions will prevail.

We remember (not very well, men worse than women for sure) things we've learned. And therefore we think we know those things. We may have made them up, or made up the memory of learning them.

Reality is slippery.

Here's a little Haiku:

Shimmering mind's eye
Slippery Reality
Electrical thoughts

Orientation, Space and Time

I'm almost 52 and a half years old as I write this. I'm submitting this short outline of a few of the significant events of my life so far, to allow for a skeleton upon which to place the stories I suspect will follow on my blog.


1954 - born Los Angeles, California as the third child in my family
lived in a split level home and rode my trike down the stairs.

1958 - moved to Riverside, California right after my younger brother was born
Remember lightning storms, the mail plane's drone, eating dirt in the backyard


1960 - moved to Los Angeles - started school
Walked to school, caught a rat with a friend, walked to Beverly Hills and had lunch


1963 - moved to Houston, Texas - 3rd and 4th grades
Had a Cajun teacher whom neither my mother nor I could understand.
First Hurricane and snow storm in same year


1965 - moved to Saratoga, California - 5th through 8th grades
Walked through an orchard to get to school, swim team, boy scouts, violin
Hebrew school

1968 - moved to Edina, Minnesota - 9th through 12th
flew in from 70 degrees in San Francisco to 22 degrees below zero in Minneapolis

1972 - moved to San Diego - college and started with IBM
BA Anthropology (Archaeology), MBA Marketing, IBM Marketing rep

1983 - moved to Minnesota with IBM
37 degrees below zero, blizzard 3 inches high, Ice stalactite in the basement

1984 - moved to Cary, North Carolina
Home carved out of a forest, blue volvo

1986 - moved to Stamford, Connecticut
Found out about "Yankees", radon

1989 - moved to Winchester, Hampshire, England, United Kingdom
Chalk, Flint, Battle Abbey, haggis


1991 - moved to Staines, UK
London to San Diego to Tokyo to Phuket Thailand, to Sydney to London

1992 - moved to San Diego, California Left IBM
Landscape

1994 - moved to Portland, Oregon
Founded Cliffside Software, Inc.
Although it has been said we were ahead of our time, it is possible that we were too late.

2001 - moved to West Hollywood, California
And that's where I am now.

Welcome one and all

Frish has been my nickname forever. Well, at least 35 years or so. It is part of my last name, Frishberg. My whole name is Michael Wolf Frishberg. I've always had a problem pronouncing my last name, so Frish works for me!

The derivation of Frishberg had an odd substantiation last year, when my uncle David Frishberg (a jazz pianist, google him) was playing at a club here in Los Angeles (The Jazz Bakery).

After the first set all Frishberg relations in the audience stood to the side of the theatre and visited with David. Up walked a fellow, who introduced himself as David Frishberg! That was pretty funny all by itself, there aren't many Frishbergs altogether, so it was an odd coincidence that someone named David Frishberg would appear at David Frishberg's concert.

The history of the name Frishberg is murky. There are at least three competing explanations on how our name became Frishberg.

Frishberg is a misspelling of the German: frisch berg - literally, Fresh Mountain. I like to think of myself as a volcano, as that's the freshest possible mountain.

One story had it that the officials at Ellis Island didn't know how to spell Didychus which we believe was the original family name. They knew my great-grandmother was Jewish, and so gave the family a Jewish sounding name.

Another story had it that there was a rich man in the village named Frishberg, so my great-grandmother told the immigration folk that was our name, thinking it would have equal weight in America.

Now however, David Frishberg (the younger), had it that there was a wealthy patriarch in the village named Frishberg who sponsored many of the villagers as they emigrated to the U.S. and so, they had his name. That basically confirmed another of the stories that my family also told.

There is a law firm in Kiev named Frishberg. Possibly the descendents of said patriarch!

We've discovered at least two strains of Frishbergs, mine is based in Minnesota, and the other branch is East Coast.

How about the rest of my name?

Michael comes from the Hebrew M'hail - "Who is like god?" I believe it is a philosophical question, that is, "Is there anyone like god?" as opposed to the statement "who is like god" refering to person named Michael.

Wolf was the Yiddish name of a great grandfather (Max) who died before I was born. And, yes, it is wolf as in animal, no "e" on the end.

So, my name, translated into "English" =
Who is like god? Wolf Freshmountain

Since I was born in the U.S., I believe that makes me a Native American (indigenous peoples, please forgive me).

Therefore, I have frequently felt I ought to retire to a career on the radio, using the handle "Wolf Freshmountain, Native American".