Mozart’s Radio and A Man With a Gun…

Do you believe in destiny?

OK, let me ask you another question: have you ever had someone aim a gun at you?

It happened over two seconds, but in those two seconds time really stopped: an instant made eternity…And my reaction was not what I thought it would have been. Not at all…

Let me tell you the story first…

I was driving with artist friends along the main highway north from Yarmouth after what, in hindsight, was a strange day of mis-turns, confusing adventures and disappointing hunts along abandoned roads. It was 7 pm and dusk was edging in; the sun had just crept behind some grey clouds as if to hide. I was sitting in the front passenger seat and we were in deep discussion (we usually are), this time about the members of Fleetwood Mac.

As we approached a pedestrian over-walkway, I felt compelled to look up; I don’t normally, especially when I’m busy talking (in fact, I’ve been known to pass exits and turn offs...Just ask Toulouse!). What I saw shocked me (but I only registered the shock after). Standing there (as if he’d appeared out of nowhere) and facing me was a hooded man. He aimed a rifle at me.

Choosing the Less Worn Path of Intuition

In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost—Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy

Intuition is sometimes called “gut instinct” as opposed to using evidence-based rationality. Some describe it as the ability to see any event or object from a viewpoint of “the cosmic whole, from its culmination—the seed, the flower, the fruit—to the whole: the comprehensive grip of the principles of universality. A person who develops intuition can “know anything without the barriers of time, space and any other obstructions.” Inventor and founder of the Intuition Network Buck Charleston believed that intuition “comes from a source beyond consciousness itself.”

Carlin Flora in Psychology Today (Vol 40, Issue 3: 68-75, 2007) defined intution as "quick and ready insight." She added that intuition is "the act or process of coming to direct knowledge without reasoning or inferring." It comes from the Latin word intueri which means "to see within" and is a way of knowing, of sensing the truth without explanations.

Blog Action Day--Truth

In honor of Blog Action Day on the Environment, I submit my issue here and now…My issue is TRUTH: Living with it and acting upon it for the environment.

This post is dedicated to the spirit of what Al Gore has been so courageously and tenaciously doing: presenting the “truth” on Climate Change and the health and future of our beloved planet Earth, and providing numerous key solutions that we can embrace.

Many skeptics, naysayers, and self-motivated individuals have criticized Gore’s film, “An Inconvenient Truth” as alarmist myth, perpetuated by a bitter man with ambitious motivations for office…or at the least a man who was terribly misinformed and who presented a case that was replete with inaccuracies and hence useless and untrue. Scientists and politicians and various others have cited many inaccuracies in the movie, so much so that various educational institutions have removed the film from their scholastic libraries. I find this appalling and am dismayed by the shallowness of their actions.

I submit that the hardest (actually the easiest) lesson one can learn is that a greater truth can embrace many smaller untruths—and still be true. This is the paradox of life on Earth. One we must embrace if we are going to prevail as a species on this ever-changing planet (yes, global warming being part of it). What am I talking about, you may very well ask?

I’m suggesting that we all strip down and consider our hearts in these matters, even—nay, particularly—when science is involved. The heart is where the truth really lies within each and every one of us, whether or not we are educated, informed or intelligent. The truth does not reside in your pocket book. Not in your neighbor’s opinion or in the newspaper. Not in your pride or your insecurity. Not in your knowledge, even. Don’t let ten…heck…thirty, forty, fifty “experts” persuade you or dissuade you. If your heart tells you that it’s wrong or right, then listen to it. Your heart is your true compass to the truth.

Albert Einstein, in discussions with Max Wertheimer (1959) about the theory of relativity and his thinking which led to it, said:

…during all those years there was the feeling of direction, of going straight toward something concrete. It is, of course, very hard to express that feeling in words; but it was decidedly the case, and clearly to be distinguished from later considerations about the rational form of the solution.

In 1913, the French scientist, Henri Poincaré stated that “it may be surprising to see emotional sensibility invoked a propos of mathematical demonstrations which, it would seem, can interest only the intellect. This would be to forget the feeling of mathematical beauty, of the harmony of numbers and forms, of geometric elegance. This is a true esthetic feeling that all real mathematicians know, and surely it belongs to emotional sensibility.” Poincaré also suggested that “pure logic would never lead us to anything but tautologies. It is by logic that we prove. It is by intuition that we discover.”

Rosenblueth and Wiener (1945) emphasized that:

An intuitive flair for what will turn out to be the most important general question gives a basis for selecting some of the significant among the indefinite number of trivial experiments which could be carried out at that stage. Quite vague and tacit generalizations thus influence the selection of data at the start.
What Rosenblueth and Wiener were saying is that when scientists (like me) report on the “truth” we are using our scientific judgment, along with our tools in scientific method and logic. We are using our sensibilities and our feelings (whether we like to admit it or not). In the end, science is often just the tool to prove a truth you already know through intuition. Al Gore knows. And so do you.

So, while it might be ignorant to discount the very real effects of extra-planetary and solar cycles in the current global warming phenomenon, what is it to ignore the cumulative role of 6.5 billion people and associated industry in what is happening to our planet's ecosystems on a global scale? Who are we kidding?

So, my challenge is the truth…the LARGER TRUTH. I exhort us all to seek it in our own way. Watch the movie. Make up your own mind. From the heart. Because, with truth comes conviction. With conviction comes responsibility and action. With action comes change. And each of us can change the world. In our own small but not insignificant way.

Recommended Reading/Watching:
“An Inconvenient Truth” by Al Gore.

Shavinina, Larisa & Michel Ferrari (eds). 2004. Beyond Knowledge, extracognitive aspects of developing high ability. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers, London.