trenton

This is an interesting and complicated issue. Pretty much everybody wants to be anti-corruption. The approval of Congress is at an all time low with 82% of Americans disapproving of their actions. Reasons for this disapproval include partisanship, favoritism toward the rich, election security (including the lie that the 2020 election was stolen), nepotism, and much much more. The paradox comes up when being too critical of governmental corruption can destabilize a country. The legitimacy of those in power and all of the laws they pass are drawn into question. The question becomes how much corruption is tolerable? Yes the American government is corrupt in more ways than can be listed, but if the governed population does not believe in the stories of the great democracy, then what will we be left with? A power vacuum could easily be created if the United States suddenly became very strict on corruption. Some examples in other countries could be the corruption blitz in South Africa, the Tigray war of Ethiopia fought because of an illegal election, or the constant need to maintain a massive propaganda machine in places like North Korea and China. If the illusions propagated by communist countries were suddenly pulled away, then wouldn't that create a massive destabilization of these regions? How should anti-corruption be applied in the middle East? The United States is constantly struggling to maintain a positive relationship with Saudi Arabia in spite of their deep corruption in order to keep receiving oil. This could become the source of massive political pressure from around the globe to switch to renewable energy, similar to the pressure placed on Europe because of Putin's invasion of Ukraine. Is there any amount of corruption which should be tolerated in order to avoid unnecessary destabilization? I think these questions are important because faith in the US government is very low and there are many calls to violence especially by MAGA. In this case their claims of corruption aren't even real and it is very destabilizing. Is there a more organized way to confront governmental corruption without undermining faith in democracy? What would it take to restore faith in democracy?

@Razard86 very true. In the end all worldviews are partial because we would be driven insane if all of the information in the universe were poured into us at once as if to know every memory of being that ever lived. Any logic we make will be based on our own biases that help us to make sense of an infinitely complex universe.

I finished watching the episode and I think there is one major flaw and one major point Leo hit perfectly on the head. I think the main flaw is that the list of double standards was too long and it distracted from the deeper points he attempted to point to. This deeper point would be the lack of bias and other methods for avoiding hypocrisy. I would like to use this thread to include other methods for addressing hypocrisy aside from the homework assignments. One observation I have is that when you judge someone in the heat of the moment, there is commonly a temptation to mimic this behavior. It's like "if you do this to me then I'm gonna do it to you." We could say that criticizing people for a certain action creates an image in your subconscious mind. This image in your subconscious mind can still influence your behavior. It is not just that for example, I am a secret homosexual, therefore I criticize homosexuals so that I can appear straight. An alternative form of hypocrisy can be I criticize homosexuals so much that my mind is therefore conditioned to think of gay sex, and I therefore develop stronger homosexual tendencies as a consequence of focusing on and criticizing homosexuals. I think a lot of people miss the reverse application of hypocrisy and how it can be created through judgement. A second example would be a woman who criticized police officers for over playing the situation like it was worse than it was. She ended up doing the same thing. This subconscious image can come up in a variety of ways in all kinds of fields. I remember in radical honesty it talked about how people think self criticism is a virtue. I am guilty of this. It is the reverse extreme of hypocrisy And I call it hypercritical rather hypocritical with hypo meaning little and hyper meaning a lot. In one's effort to avoid hypocrisy, you could paralyze yourself. This is part of what stops me from talking. In essence, I should be able to clear all of these standards, but I don't care if others can. It is about me trying to be the best and thinking self criticism is the way to do it while not worrying about criticizing others, reasoning that it helps avoid hypocrisy. The deeper point about a lack of bias is dead on. First of all, the reason I am drawn to politics is because of objectivity. When I see people fighting and arguing, I see that people think with so many biases and ideologies that they can't think straight. They are unable to view the situation impartially. What I begin to wonder is, what would politics look like without bias? How different would it be? Who would I have to become in order to be a politician who thinks impartially, has no double standards, and really looks at the situation from many angles with an open mind? In order to be good at politics you would have to be very selfless. You would need to be willing to let every assumption, every value you hold, and every ideology come into question. You would have to be very humble and self reflective rather than defending yourself with so many rationalizations. This is the beauty that attracts me to politics. It is not about justice. It is not about fighting the oil companies, corrupt politicians, or terrorists per say. It is about using politics to grow yourself into the best person you can be. As a consequence justice can happen and you will still do your best to ensure these things happen. But just imagine how profoundly different politics would be if the main goal was the greater jihad, and it were very conscious of creating lesser jihads. I still fail sometimes because I see it as practical to urge action and I see very limited ways to move society forward in politics otherwise. But I hope you are the beauty in objectivity and a lack of bias that I see, and why I want to become such a thing so much. It is almost like the Buddhist desires desirelessness, and I am biased toward biaslessness. I still fail though, but it would be cool if it could be done somehow. Swinging the pendulum to hyper criticism of oneself still doesn't do it. This is the reason why I didn't white wash my memories when I was ashamed of myself as a child. A common lie is "it was just a bad dream." Self honesty is pivotal for developing biaslessness. The homework assignments and the book list will touch on these points. One of the themes I noticed in chess coaches is that chess is intended to reach us objectivity. Many chess players make mistakes because of their emotions. They make one mistake so they make another and another and another until they lose. When people are attached to winning and being the best, they cannot think straight. Objectively, chess is a draw if both sides play well and there will be no winning brilliant queen sacrifice. When we want to win so badly, we over press and end up losing. This happens even to grandmasters and world champions. I did this in chess club and in my family. Eventually, the people in chess club were too afraid to play me and I had a hard time finding people who really want to study and challenge me. Most of them were casual players making moves that were obviously mistakes from my point of view. This is how you lose the meta game when you destroy people so badly they leave chess club because they feel stupid. Perhaps this is the beauty that science aspires to be. It tries to take emotions and philosophy out of the equation to stick with mathematical proofs. What science is trying to do is remove bias and attachment to spiritual teachings commonly found in religion. Science fails in this task for many reasons, but the theme is the same. Science is an attempt to get at truth, but easily corrupted by pragmatism like religion. Religion is also infatuated ideals like God, love, truth, and so forth so goes about it in deeply corrupt ways. We could say that becoming unbiased is the seeking of love, but the process is still very biased because of survival. I have yielded results with begin even handed. A good example is when my sisters are arguing. When I point out that one side is making more rational arguments, they accuse me of favoritism and picking sides. When my sister started accusing me of this, I pointed out the times that I sided with her rational arguments and sided against her irrational arguments. She smiled at me silently As if she saw that I was making a genuine effort to be intellectually honest regardless of who wins the argument. This What we say people are supposed to do In arguments all the time. We are supposed to weigh the evidence and have an open minded impartial discussion, but almost nobody ever does it. This why arguing and debating seems so futile sometimes when the goal is to distract from your own bullshit And win the debate rather than being the best person you can be while seeking truth for truths sake. As a result I usually stay out arguing, but I can't always avoid it. My sisters treat arguments like I treat chess games and it isn't fun to argue with them.

I would describe something similar. It is like you realize all of existence is nothingness and this nothingness expands and expands as you merge with all of it. You become indistinguishable from all of reality when you are nothing. Some describe it as the abyss. I remember how I kinda freaked out when that happened and I stopped meditating for a bit. I triggered it with the help of the power of now by Eckhart Tolle. When the ego mind does not contextualize itself with past and future you are left with the present. Transcending time is the same as transcending ego and it could create these sorts of experiences. I would like to see advice on how to not freak out when that happens to do that I can just enjoy what I'm not used to. Maybe I would meditate more. At the very least you can try different forms of meditation like satisfaction or body scans. At least I found they were less intense.

I could add to this discussion a warning about this work. By eliminating our double standards, we create a more logically consistent worldview. This can cause our worldview to become more convincing and appear to be true. An important warning is that just because our worldview is logically consistent, doesn't mean it is true. We can still reach out conclusions through false premises. To give an example, my mother made a clear effort to maintain a logically consistent worldview while being a Catholic. She took it very far. if she has faith in her religion, then she does not hold it to be more valid than other religions. You could have faith in any belief system and it would be as valid as her own. She took it so far to conclude that morality is relative. She will follow the moral compass of Catholicism, but if in your worldview homosexuality is acceptable, then she will not judge you for it. A Catholic can go so far as to judge you by your standards and themselves by their own standards. This would give you a religious person who does not believe in proselytizing and convincing others of their correctness. even so, they can still have the problem of false beliefs as in any worldview. Noticing our double standards can help us eliminate our own internal contradictions, but we can still be honestly mistaken. These honest mistakes become more likely because our logically consistent worldview starts to seem very convincing, so we hold it as if it were reality. Perhaps this is common in science. After many studies, science can become so convincing that we underestimate it's fallibility. Remember that even seemingly fair and consistent standards could be founded upon a false premise.

@Bobby_2021 Here it is.

@Finax very interesting https://www.washingtonpost.comoutlookoutlook/2020/04/02/yes-russia-spreads-coronavirus-lies-they-were-made-america/ If other countries intentionally spread these kinds of lies, then it makes me wonder how much is our propaganda influenced by other countries. The CIA can do this so effectively that they manufacture consent for coups in Latin America. In the case of COVID, the polarization was partially driven by countries actively trying to hurt us.

This one should be entertaining. It is very difficult to cover up every possible plot hole when creating an alternative universe. Feel free to share your own. I will give examples from Harry potter. 1. Troll in the dungeon Dumbledore told everyone to proceed to their dorms, but the slytherin dorm is located in the dungeon. Dumbledore clearly hates them and wants them to die. 2. The lack of background checks. Hogwarts allowed voldemort, a fraud, a ware wolf, a death eater, and umbridge into the position of defense against the dark arts. They have a bad track record with this. Maybe the ministry of magic is supposed to take care of it, but the wizard world is corrupted by money. Death eaters would have had to bribe the ministry of magic to get this to work. This would close the plot hole and it makes sense if malfoy and his dad are rich. 3. Wizard chess alternative Most people don't notice these things because most people are not chess players. Interestingly, he could have sacrificed Harry. The story could have been more intense if Harry said "don't sacrifice yourself, sacrifice me instead!" Not really a plot hole because the final position was organized correctly and Nh3+ worked, but sacrificing Harry was technically better. In the final position, Ron needed either the knight or the bishop to cover the g1 square for checkmate. Either could have been sacrificed for checkmate. The biggest problem for the crew is the fact that they have to take the place of missing pieces. If you know the chess theory, you know that white can easily exploit the fact that black cannot trade these pieces gaining a huge advantage. If the enchanted chess board were smart, it would have forced exchanges, and the crew would be dead immediately. If black can't trade these pieces, it is a huge handicap and most people don't know how bad of a handicap it is. It is worse than being down a queen. In fact, you could even leave the white queen open to being captured, knowing that a knight or bishop would die as a result. The white queen is therefore immune to capture, giving white a forced win from the start of the game. Ron was losing from move one if white exploited this strategy to kill the entire crew. I found this entertaining enough to open this thread. I know there are funny plot holes in star wars as well. Interestingly people take these plot holes very seriously and get heated and angry about it. What plot holes do you know of?

I think the forum would benefit a lot from this kind of distinction As we practice making it in this thread. Especially if this forum has a heavy left wing bias, it makes sense to discuss what a stage blue and stage orange shadow looks like In our psyche. Progressives are mostly around green and they become judgemental of conservatives when the radical difference in values is apparent. As we discuss ways to integrate blue and orange, we should also make direct comparisons between a tier one and tier two perspective. A tier one perspective would commonly "should" the other side. As if their values should be different than what they currently are. This is a sign that tier one may view its perspective as the only true way to see reality. Meanwhile a tier two perspective would notice that the Republican party is clearly problematic. For example, they lie about the coup. But tier two would react to this differently than tier one. The key difference seems to be in judging people for their character. A tier two perspective would not really demonize someone for a character that fits their values even if it is radically different from their own. This would be a mark of integrity on their part. What do you think? Can you make some direct comparisons between green and yellow? How should the blue and orange shadow be integrated? How can we discuss the problems of the Republican party at a higher level than we currently are?

@Oeaohoo very interesting take. I remember stage green might criticize yellow for seeming indifferent and apolitical sometimes. But if tier two is incompatible with our entire political system, then it makes sense. This requires a recognition that liberals and conservatives have been arguing for thousands of years compromising all along the way. There is no real truth to this. In fact stage yellow might be behind the scenes trying to solve a complex issue without engaging in direct argumentation. What would "tier two" do instead of engage in a system of compromises?

This feels so exaggerated yet so real at the same time. The crowd constantly overlooks blatant corruption when they are partisan.

@Willie I don't think so. His intentions are clear in many of his crimes. For example he tried to rig the election by finding the votes. He's aware that he is breaking laws for his own personal gain. Given how many things he got away with I lost hope of him being brought to justice. This is because the republican party defends him no matter what hence they obstruct all investigations. They know what their doing.

Very good and emotional video. The people enjoy themselves whenever they can creating an uplifting environment in spite of their history being destroyed with deaths of hundreds of thousands. Pretty educational and stunning at the same time.

I did a lot of interesting research on this topic. For some reason the topic of ufos overlaps with consciousness, psychedelics, psychic powers, and more. I don't understand why, but there are some who claim to contact alien entities through psychedelics. The military has not confirmed that they are aliens, but they have not ruled it out either. If they are aliens, then I have some plans for addressing them. My first idea is to expand the civil rights act to include intelligent creatures from other planets. So long as they come in peace they should be granted equal rights to humans. This would be the first peace offering to them. Maybe this should be extended to universal human rights for all countries as we try to build a good relationship with aliens and encourage public acceptance of ufos. I think the United nations should make a plan for what the aliens should do to demonstrate that they come in peace. I think the best place for them to do that would be through the rovers on mars. They are not from mars, but it will keep a distance from them so we don't have ufos flying around us as they may attack us. The aliens should translate their reasons for coming such that we can understand it through the rovers And then show their face to the camera. If they do this, then it will be our standard for a peace offering from aliens. It is entirely possible that they are not peaceful because they have remained ambiguous about their intentions. There was also an attack on colores Brazil in 1977 and there were some unexplained cattle mutilations. Furthermore it is possible that alien abductions are real and the aliens should explain why they did these things. If they don't then it will cast doubt on their intentions and our suspicions may not be dispelled. another idea I have is to give the aliens free access to our livestock because they seem to like it. Of course this would be after they confirm that they were responsible. As it stands right now if the aliens decided to attack the earth, I think humanity would be screwed. Just look at how much NATO struggles with ISIS. The United States constantly pulls out troops prematurely for the sake of making political stunts, only for something to go wrong shortly thereafter. The military was upset with Donald trump for betraying the Kurds And this is why the military voted for Biden, helping him to win. On top of that the United States is still defending Saudi Arabia for its crimes because without them as an ally our gas prices would be even higher. Humanity does not seem to have the ability to cooperate at such an unprecedented level As to repel an alien invasion. We should not panic, but we should be cautious because we do not know why these machines are observing us. In order to prepare for a potential invasion, governments from all over the world would have to share their information on ufos. This would give us our best chance of reverse engineering them. Currently, we have failed because parts of the machines are made of magnesium bismuth and deliberately designed down to the atom. Modern scientists are unable to replicate this and the laws of physics are being violated by the movements of the machines. It demonstrates how little we understand reality. I think the aliens are most likely peaceful because they could have conquered much sooner if they wanted our resources so badly. If aliens are able to build such highly advanced technology, then they must have some level of cooperation involved, and this implies a sense of morality. This moral compass should be much more evolved than human morality as well. Still we can't be sure. If they are peaceful, then humanity needs to show kindness to each other to show that we are not a threat and they may reveal themselves. If they are not peaceful, then humanity still needs to get to the point that we are not at war with ourselves. Either way a world government is necessary for addressing intelligent creatures from other planets. This is idealistic, but I am just putting out what level of cooperation humanity must have to address the aliens. How do you think we should approach this issue?

@Pateedm Do you mean you saw an actual alien or a man who saw an alien? If it was an alien, what did it look like? was it short, black, soft, and wearing a silver mask which acts as a translator while having the ability to teleport? This was a description given by a member of the Brazilian military. I don't know if I believe it or not because I haven't met an alien. Did he say anything? Where was he? Can you tell us more? There are several reports from military personal that may correspond to your description. I have done research on cattle mutilation and its relationship with ufos. I was stunned that this story corresponds to the rest of the research on cattle mutilation.

@Blackhawk https://www.actualized.org/insights/yes-ufos-are-a-thing If you think that then you need to look at Leo's blog. He gives a bunch of sources for aliens. You could spend a good 10-15 hours looking at all the evidence just in this post. There is much more still being revealed by Congress and the military right now.

@Blackhawk in that case humanity would need to be prepared should they mean us harm. This would require a lot of radical changes in order to give humanity a chance of survival. All of the governments from around the world would have to share their findings on UFOs with a central global government. This would give us our best chance at reverse engineering these machines. Currently, the military is struggling to reproduce the magnesium bismuth combination as shown in various news outlets. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=t-T4Aa4UPI8

@Blackhawk If you have a better idea, I would be happy to hear it. My idea is that if the aliens came to Earth directly, then it may be interpreted as a threat or potential attack. The idea is to keep some immediate distance between us while they discuss their intentions with us from afar. I may seem funny, but the public policy for UFOs is lacking and we need to make some kind of system for determining whether they come in peace or not. Of course they could be lying and there might be a better system. I am not trolling. I am being serious. I am trying to find some public policies that could be used to invite peaceful alien entities to our planet. Maybe offering them equal rights to humans on the grounds that they come in peace would help our relationship with them and avoid a potential war or invasion.

@KH2 I recommend looking at the ufo hearings. There are hundreds of recordings coming from the military that they are disclosing to congress. There are likely to be more ufo sessions soon. I don't think the military would be taking hundreds of fakes this seriously. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=U3OsP_wIqEo There are a lot of unknowns in this field and that makes it very interesting to look into. A very different world could be right around the corner. This has huge implications for public policies, and it seems that the government discloses information in response to a lot of public talk on the topic. It could be to clear misconceptions, but this commonly comes with disclosing footage. There have been movements like "the right to know" in the 90's. Maybe the more interest there is in this subject, the sooner we could see real changes in public policy. I find this to be the most interesting because no government has ever made a comprehensive policy for communication with intelligent creatures from other planets.

@KH2 I understand that fighting aliens is horrible idea and that is why I would prefer trying to understand them. It is still entirely possible that they would try to attack us. There is a part two and three to this series. It covers thousands of pages and the witnesses from the military.

Since you guys seem skeptical and understandably so, I will show you the evidence. There is plenty of it actually. This has been confirmed by the military https://www.nytimes.com/1997/08/03/us/cia-admits-government-lied-about-ufo-sightings.html This YouTube channel has a lot of research on ufos. You can look at the colores incident as well. https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-news/worlds-clearest-ufo-photo-100ft-27738147?amp%3Bamp= The government has openly stated that they are taking this issue seriously and they are releasing video footage to the public.

@Leo Gura what are your standards for who should be considered an adult? How would they need to think and behave? What is maturity? I think 18 years old is just an older child. Age is a poor way to determine adulthood.

Ever since I was child I felt like I had been on this earth thousands of times already. I have no way of knowing for sure if past lives are real because I lose my memories when I die. I am currently exploring this possibility while writing a story about this dream. in one of my dreams I was asleep and I saw a lone tribesmen. He was the sole survivor of a genocide And the only on in the world who knew his language. He spent the rest of his life meditating in a cave with nowhere to go and nothing to accomplish. When his tongue was dead he saw that which had no opposite as emptiness filled his entire experience. Perhaps he was another Buddha who was never discovered or had a religion around him. The story I have in mind gets incredibly sad when the sole survivor of the genocide gives a funeral to his son while singing in soothing tune and in words only he understands. I think if the idea makes me cry then it is probably a good story. I doubt I can write it that good though. It won't stop me from trying. As for my past lives, my dreams imply that I was the survivor, his murdered son, and the warrior who murdered him. Is there a way to tell if past lives are real? There is This sense that I am every being who ever lived, yet I have no memory of it. It is like I am every separate being each with separate memories and I don't have access to all of them. It is like I am one yet I am all. I hesitate to say these feelings point to the truth because it seems like mere beliefs that I can't prove. Nevertheless, there is this feeling that I'm everything, but simultaneously limited to the perspective of this mind and body with a spirit which has seen countless lives, but which has no immediate access to the memories of these lives.

I have been researching this topic and I discovered something very confusing. The bible spears to have many references to astrology and the zodiac such as the 12 tribes of Israel, the 12 disciples of Jesus, Jesus being associated with the sun, the sun, moon, and stars bowing to Joseph, the star guiding the three wise men to Jesus and so on. One the other hand astrology used to be accepted in various religions but isn't anymore. This creates a major contradiction when the bible condemns fortune tellers and star gamers (which is suspect because there are various biased translations of holy texts) , but also many Christians can be seen making prophesies. How else are prophesies made aside from using astrology? For some reason astrology seems to be condemned yet the bible makes many references to the zodiac. Holy texts are based on prophecy constantly yet astrology is condemned. I don't understand why the shift interpretation happened because there used to be a broader acceptance of the zodiac but now there isn't. Can somebody explain this discrepancy? Is this a contradiction or a biased translation? It looks like religion is unknowingly condemning itself by refusing to recognize validity in the worldviews on which it is based.

@integral yes Religion can exist at any stage of development. Purple has a form of spirituality, red can make a god of war, blue can go to church, orange can be a Satanist, green can be more open to acknowledging validity in other religions than blue, yellow and turquoise I'm not sure because they are rare, but they are still possible. Where would you place Martin Luther King jr? He was a liberation Christian. Other sects of Christianity include liberal, environmental, progressive and others who admit the bible is scientifically fallible, but they look for poetic meaning. Blue is more prone to literal interpretation and will reject skepticism constantly.