Coincidence?

I'm going to take a break from political commentary to share a story that raises, for me, some fascinating notions about coincidence and serendipity. Some believe there are no coincidences, which implies that there are unseen forces that guide us. 

It's related to religion, and a variety of superstitions that are part of western culture. I personally don't believe such things, and I had an experience recently that for me profoundly proves that out of randomness can come things that appear pre-ordained, and as such are more remarkable than a belief in supernatural guidance.

While in college a friend and I took a road trip and had a breakdown near a little town in eastern Oregon that necessitated an overnight stay. With some time to kill we walked around downtown, stopping in a antique store where I purchased an emblem from an old car for a dollar. I'm not sure why I was attracted to it, aside from a vague notion of using it as a decoration in my dorm room, something I never did. As it turned out I just hung on to it, something in the box of miscellaneous junk that everyone carries with them as they move from place to place.

Many years later, in 2008, when while going through "the box" I saw the emblem and got the idea to use it in a painting, to do a full size canvas of the car and attach the emblem as a mixed media element. Until this time I didn't know which car it came from, but after a bit of time on the internet I found a picture of a 1939 Ford truck and used it to make the first in a series of works I called "Vehicles". I ended up doing 13 canvasses, had several shows and sold a couple.

Here's "Ford" (Note the chrome emblem on the side), and a link to the series:

"Ford" 

"Vehicles"

This month we took a trip to Washington state to the town of Rosslyn, where the TV series "Northern Exposure" was filmed. It's an old coal mining town and we drove around looking at the little cottages of the miners from the early 1900's that had been preserved. As we turned a corner I saw this old truck parked in front of one of them and immediately recognized the distinctive front grill of the truck from my painting. We stopped and took a couple of pictures.




As we left I noticed that the emblem on the left side of the truck was missing.

It struck me that it was possible that the emblem that I had all those years could have been the one missing from this truck. If true, what are the chances that I would come across this truck so many years later? If someone believes in fate this would be a "sign" that it was "meant to be", that I was directed to this exact spot to have this experience, perhaps to affirm my faith in divine guidance.

But for me this encounter was a delightful happenstance that revealed to me the amazing power of utter randomness. To my thinking the odds of finding this old truck were literally astronomical. Over a lifetime I had journeyed from West to East and back again, had chanced on a little piece of history and incorporated it in a work of art, wandered into a little town I had never heard of and onto a street I could have just as easily passed without ever knowing the connection that waited for me there.

This is how we came to be. Science is leading us through the Universe to learn how its infinite energy is constantly creating events that lead to stars and planets, light and life, you, me and a '39 Ford in a mountain town with a story we never could have imagined.

Feeling' Lucky?

Astronomers estimate 100 Billion planets where life may exist. This number is just a guess, there may be more, as we have yet to explore the entire universe. This apparent abundance makes one wonder, as intelligent life may exist on many of them, why we should believe that our Earth is anything special or different. 

A being looking out at us from one of those planets would see the Earth as just another rock in space. Religion would have us believe, on faith, that the Earth (flat or not) is unique, yet even the possibility of life on other planets would test that belief in several fundamental ways.

A Creator ("C") would have to be given the responsibility to make all those other planets, and we also know C also has made the Universe an unpredictable place. Stars explode, asteroids strike planets, so that any given planet exists faces the possibility of destruction at any moment from some external cosmic force.

The number of possible planets suggests that life, in some form or other, is plentiful in the Universe, unremarkable, just another manifestation of matter, and completely capable of existence without any special effort from C. Life can take a myriad of paths as it spreads across a planet from the primordial spark, and while life is resilient and adaptable there exists an equal number of hazards that can extinguish it.

Some believe C has given man free will, but C is also allowing for the the possibility that on any given planet he will self-destruct, despite biblical exhortations for responsible behavior. This looks like C is hedging his bets on mankind. Even if C has a particular fondness for us it would seem our survival is arbitrary in the grand scheme. C may regret the loss of one planet, but there are plenty more so no worries.

Others hold that man has no free will and C does whatever C wants for he/she/its own reasons and therefore nothing can be done: man is helpless. Another belief is that all science is simply revealing C and leading to some grand reconciliation in the future. These are both positions that that evade a basic responsibility of intelligence which is to learn about our world and our place in it. Religion considers this a closed question, and is threatened by knowledge that challenges it.

Religion bets that The Creator cherishes mankind exclusively and that the Universe was created so man could thrive and prosper, though increasingly the evidence points to indifference at best. More likely the Universe is on its way to its own unknowable, unimaginable fate and we, life, are just along for the ride. Sure, some tinkering with dogma could include other planets, even perhaps other men, in the arms of God,  but they are out there, and we are here.

When (not if) life is found outside of our planet it will present an existential challenge to our belief systems by suggesting that we, humans are likely not unique, and will not necessarily be exempted from the forces that govern the wider Universe.

Our survival on this particular planet is up to us, save divine intervention.

At 100 Billion to 1 I'm not thrilled with the odds.

Law of the Jungle

The Law of the Jungle. 

Though mankind emerged from the animal state 10,000 years ago, this phrase has persisted as a description of the human condition, with now a political connotation. It is interesting to note that despite advances in knowledge and technology, primitive tribes exist that have only slight contact with civilization and still live in the natural state.

Once, while visiting a zoo, I paused in front of the tiger exhibit. He was pacing along the edge of the enclosure, and suddenly stopped and looked over the fence at me. For a moment our eyes met, and I felt a chill run through me, primordial and instantly terrifying because in that instant I knew what primitive man must have felt looking into implacable indifferent death. It's something I've never forgotten. Those eyes have seen thousand millenniums of nature holding dominion over all, with man only very recently having any right to challenge her.

Nature does not have a conscience or mercy. Capricious and cruel, The Law of the Jungle honors the hierarchy of predator and prey, with survival of the fittest the prevailing concept. The Oxford English Dictionary says it succinctly, defining it as: "the code of survival in jungle life, now usually with reference to the superiority of brute force or self-interest in the struggle for survival." (my italics) 

Regressive political theory, also known as conservatism, embraces this as a core concept, postulating that the individual is given the right to act in his own self-interest regardless of the consequences for the rest of society. Regressives interpret the Constitution to support these rights, with a core principle contending that  all that you may create is the result of your effort alone. This idea of "individualism" has served to hold back civilization from the beginning and is derived from another Law of the Jungle concept: "every man for himself", or more brutally, "eat or be eaten". 

Regressive politicians pander to those who believe, through their own narcissistic self regard, their wealth and property was acquired by their own effort with little credit given to the larger society for providing an environment for them to prosper in. While there was some truth to this notion some centuries ago, when men did wrest their living from the wilderness, it has little relevance in modern times, where every individual is caught in the web of an almost inconceivably complex system. 

A key element of civilization is peaceful cooperation between competing groups and individuals. Violence, whether actual or implied, has been banished from the ideal of a civilized society, but Regressives, by embracing the Law of the Jungle as a defining principle, threaten this core value. 
Anyone with wealth wants to keep it, and those with great wealth, whether earned or not, will use that  wealth to insure that government will not impede their efforts to amass the greater fortune.

Regressives believe that those who don't "carry their weight"  or "contribute" do not deserve any of the benefits of society, with only the principle of law and order, against which they strain, keeping them from violence against those they feel threaten their wealth or perceived security. It's sometimes referred to as the "code of the West", referring to a time in America when policing on the frontier was scarce. This fundamentally barbaric attitude keeps them from seeing themselves as part of a greater society progressing to an egalitarian future. One might think that the religious aspects of Regressive-ism would move them to accept the reality that their individualism is a function of their participation in the larger community, but Regressive Christianity is insular, as are all religions, exacerbating the issue.

Criminal behavior is Regressive, and raises the issue of the relationship between mental illness and Regressive behavior and beliefs, a topic that will be addressed in another post.

Regressives take power, Progressives give power with the former using violence and coercion and the latter using persuasion and superior reasoning.

Both Progressive and Regressive themes occur in modern culture. For instance, sports, especially those that involve physical aggression, are Regressive. Art and Science are by their nature Progressive in that they are forward looking and encourage people to better understand the world they inhabit, but even here a destructive impetus can be found, particularly when science is used to wage war, the ultimate Regressive pursuit.

Mankind has struggled for centuries to escape the Jungle. Along the way the Earth has helped him by providing resources that, with his emerging intelligence, has enabled him to all but conquer the dangers stalking in the shadows. We have now come to a time where the greater danger lurks in the vestiges of his primitive mind. Progress is inevitable, humanity will advance, and perhaps in a hundred or a thousand years it will look back on the Twenty-first Century as a turning point in a five thousand year transition from the Jungle to Civilization. Until then the tiger will be watching.