LAUGHTER IS A SERIOUS THING By Mike Jacobs 13/2/2003
"There's no trick to being a humorist when you've got the whole government working for you."
Will Rogers
Witty words about half-wits or the witless make for the kind of "cultured insolence"
advocated by Aristotle; or they can form the mainstay of the best humour columns around.
However, most popular humour is rather too cultural for universal coinage and rather beyond
the witty wiles of translators without explanations as to why things are "funny".
Laughing at our myriad fears is a given universal panacea for what ails the human state and
first directing such jest to self sharpens all those "slings and arrows of outrageous
fortune" to better effect. Being born and bred as a Brit and a Jew gave me double
good-fortune in being able to laugh at myself first and then rub those same pertinent spots
upon others of my ilk. The truth of humour is never chutzpah!
Funny words also make for good newsprint and from humorous columns or cartoons to the
pull-out "funnies", readers seem to clamour for lively amusement after all the serious stuff
about power, sex, aggression and money on preceding or intervening pages. Making better sense
out of society by the way we laugh at ourselves is the true hallmark of any healthy democracy
and the ability of the media to provide something or other to make us laugh in such fashion
is the touchstone of press freedom.
So why do we all smile, grin, guffaw, chuckle and laugh at life's adversities? Why do girls
giggle at me? Is it all really funny stuff or merely a safety valve for higher primates, such
as we? Knowing what makes me and others laugh is easy...... knowing why and how seasons it
even better.
A recent news story told of a new scientific theory that laughter causes endorphins to
pleasure minds by relieving stress and helping immune systems to keep on grinning and bearing
"it", or what wise folk have been saying for ages...... laughter is a great tonic. My medical
advice to all suffering from life, the largest sexually transmitted disease, is to take jokes
daily after meals, before meals and even during them; it's rumoured that a good belly laugh
can settle down the stomach.
Actually, funny is not really funny, considering that some-one is being poked either
physically or mentally with the shitty end of the stick, and such is never amusing when
happening to self; in retrospection, however, our foolish actions can be a howl. What makes
all our species erupt into spontaneous "cackling" is merely the relief that it's "them" not
us getting hit with a painful bottom line.
Just as yawns induce extra oxygen, coughs and sneezes eject excess mucus and phlegm and farts
exhaust waste gases, laughter relieves tension and stress. From Bimbo the Clown to Monty
Python, the butt end of all laughter is either a pie in the actual face or an exposure of
pretentious human minds and actions. Falling on a banana skin is really quite a horrific
thing considering the damage such may do to the fragile human body and the alleged ways of
those in league with Papacy (Ireland, Philippines, Poland et al) makes the WASPs buzz
delightedly.
People enjoy any chance to laugh, mainly to enhance or confirm a common sensitivity to the
follies, dangers and seemingly crazy variations of behaviour around them. But laughter can be
created in two ways; as a biological function of Homo Erectus and its conceptual application
by Homo "Saps". Hitting an apeman with a large club would have had contemporary audiences
rolling in the aisles with fitful shrieks of "laughter"; latter-day television viewers
seemingly a loud echo of such funny antics.
But there was no doubt to my ears about the noise made by two groupings of chimpanzees at the
Kyoto University Primate Department. They were watching their dominant males in a
fight-or-flight stand-off over territorial rights, not unlike that early noisy fracas in
"2001" (the movie, not the dot.com market), and the excited and infectious screaming of the
wound-up supporters sounded much like the crowd at any professional wrestling match
throughout the rest of the city; an extreme tension induced by aggression and adrenaline,
best relieved by a diaphragm-driven staccato of air across the vocal chords associated with a
jumping or falling-about posture. As the diaphragm is connected to the abdominal muscles,
laughter can run a gauntlet from rib tickling to
clutching-stomach-in-pain-with-eyes-streaming-tears or even involuntary urination which is
always good for another laugh.
Audiences at horror flicks periodically explode into laughter, after long spells of utter
tension, at any inane funny line and all great comedians make a living by trying to make
people "die" with laughter; of course, no television comedy series could survive without huge
cans of it.
For reasons best known to selves, happy people and maniacs are also known to laugh out loud
as well as hysterics. But in the main, laughing is more reserved for "those" people with
"funny" physical exteriors, religions, beliefs, cultures, morals and politics, plus other
things threatening to one's own way of life.
When it comes to English-language humour, the two major fields for planting human fears in
funny terms are directly connected to short and long term survival.... sex and god. Most of
the best laughs I've experienced have been to relieve human tensions about fornication and
religious belief, with wives, bosses, mothers-in-law and others trailing behind. What happens
in bed or the afterlife is the stock-in-trade for the most popular packs of jokers; premature
ejaculation being a standard end to many a sexy tale and the shortcomings of either heaven or
hell reducing our human fears.
Mark Twain noted that joyful Heaven does not need humour; if so, I'd rather spend my
immortality where you can suffer a hell-of-a-good-laugh.... just like I've been doing all my
mortal span.
EMPIRES ALSO STRIKE OUT By Mike Jacobs 12/10/2002
Top Citizens Fiddle as Tokyo Burns
The Imperial citadel of Japan is under attack! "Red-haired" barbarians have breached most of
the walls, demanding equal access to the citizenry with offers of "bread and circuses" at
much lower prices and better value. Foreign bankers are trustingly being handed wads of
wealth by the beleaguered public and the young of the metropolis are revoltingly dyeing their
hair red as well. The ancient ploys of the venerable home guard against external hordes are
creakingly being transposed into a new force capable, hopefully, of holding a sustainable
siege even though 60% of Japan's food comes from overseas and 35% of its toilets are still
not connected to main drains.
The ancient Romans set off the globalisation process of capital ways and today, the offspring
of that empire still obey those old scripts of religions, law, democracy, arts and military
prowess in Britain, France, Italy, Germany and all of North America. Japan is the odd man out
in that G7 club and is now being asked to behave like "Romans do in Rome"; members are still
wondering whether Japan is the world's most developed traditional nation or the most
undeveloped G7 nation? Both is always the answer. A paradox that may have well caused the
rise and fall of the economic "Japanese Empire". But it can be said that beneath the G7
veneer of Japan is the traditional body awaiting as a back-up system and beneath the
globalised veneer of the other members is very little indeed.
During the latter half of the XXth century AD, the sun never stopped shining on major
Japanese enterprises blossoming amid all global time zones. Japanese legions of
blue-uniformed, yen-amoured, airborne warriors made sure that all profitable roads swiftly
led back to their "Rome". Less than one generation later, the mighty empire is in ruins as
great institutions totter with long-established foundations weakened from corrupting
seepages, while the domestic customs of the politicians and business classes prove stronger
than the laws of best global practices. In the XVIIIth century, Edward Gibbon warned, when
setting down why the Roman Empire, and all other empires, screwed up that "Corruption was the
most infallible symptom of constitutional liberty."
Besides all the boozing, feasting, fornicating and status-symbol displays signalling the end
of all empires, Gibbon simply described the other decadent actions of powerful men and Roman
citizens to show how decline happens: "The various modes of worship, which prevailed in the
Roman world, were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher as
equally false; and by the magistrate, as equally useful." He also said "It has been
calculated by the ablest politicians that no State, without becoming soon exhausted, can
maintain above the hundredth part of its members in arms and idleness." Any democracy
spending 1% of its budget on unemployment and military needs gets my vote; 0% being the dream
of all peoples.
Even the earlier Greek Empire smacked of things to come in Japan according to Gibbon: "When
the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the
freedom they wished for was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free."
Tomorrow ... the World!
Japan as an Asian nation, with an adopted Roman alphabet, has long wanted to be accepted as
an equal among top equals. Ever since the Meiji Period, mentors such as the USA, Germany,
Italy, Holland, Great Britain and France have encouraged this incredibly-gifted culture to
sprint into a new century. The chance arrived to prove their commensuration with the
sophisticated Westerners after the Pacific War, through the brilliance and hard work needed
to stack up the necessary high GNP entrance fee with its appropriate standards of life for
citizens; albeit in a domestically-valued fashion.
It seems more than just coincidence that all the members of the G7 were also the major
protagonists in the last world war for globalising the empires of democracy or fascism, when
the "God-righteous" allies of Great Britain, Canada, the United States and France were
fighting the "evil empire" of Germany, Italy and Japan. How come these same guys are now such
close buddies and on each other's boards of directors? Here's a greater paradox than even
Japan can deal with, unless money really does speak all languages - in hi-tech times, swords
rapidly get forged into hard cash rather than ploughshares.
In one major way, Japan has become a splendid role model for the globe in that it has
produced within two generations a leading developed nation as far as demographics show; all
citizens now live until very ripe old age after education, employment, health care and
abundant leisure and travel pursuits. After the United States, Japan, the second richest, has
to be the envy of Asia when it comes to the lifestyle of rice communities around the region,
where US$50 dollars a week would be a dream come true for raising a village family. A
current television commercial in Japan shows a field worker at task and then applying a skin
cream retailing at 60 bucks a small bottle; luxurious decadence affordable to all the
citizens of Japan's global economic empire.
Japan may well be the last ever global empire to tumble; the next surge of national empire
building will be astro-political. China has already capitulated to the new global economic
empires as its Marxist structure reveals the red rust beneath the fast-peeling red paint.
What lessons may future historians glean from the rise and fall of the Japanese economic
empire at the turn of the 20th century? One thing for sure is that consumer-driven democratic
empires need to come complete with economic guarantees, or else all nationalistic bets are
off.
Japan's future, however, is pretty certain. It was seen well enough a couple of thousand
years ago by Socrates: "I am a citizen, not of Athens or Greece, but the world." But that
takes deeds not words.
FUNDAMENTAL ATHEISM By Mike Jacobs 2/10/2002
Note: This is a rewritten public lecture first given in Tokyo Sept 8th. 2002.
Giving a lecture about atheism to an audience mainly Japanese resulted in a new approach to
the subject. Japan lacks the monotheistic conditioning as to linear progression of self
through eternity that all other English speakers possess in spiritual or philosophical
affairs; finding the answers to existence are given more in cyclical times. Such Hegelian
oppositions are easily remedied in Japan where compromise is synthesised readily and easily
to deal with natural paradoxes. I once proposed to some Japanese scholars that time must
therefore be like a Slinky and all agreed without hesitation; the cycle slowly edging forward
along a linear line fulfilled both criteria. And there is the key to the way that the
following ideas progressed.... they had to make perfect common sense or else there is no true
creed for Fundamental Atheism.
I am an atheist.... meaning there's no place for any deified source of creation in what makes
up my immediate and distant environments. Just another genetic "Brick-in-the-Wall". A
biochemical mechanism of a life process programmed to survive, reproduce and die; as a male
of my species, the only rational reason for all of my life has been simply as a genetic
messenger service and still is. I could easily have become a rabbi instead of an atheist,
for both sides of the god/science argument are questions for distilling and establishing a
singular source of all creation from either metaphysical or empirical sources. Einstein spent
his life trying for relativity between both.
I recently published a column about atheism which joked about the predicament of folk like me
sharing a planet with huge masses of other folk professing belief and taking action in the
name of such deified entities while shaping history to their geopolitical needs. In that
column I protested strongly at all the media attention being given to religious viewpoints,
even in secular states, with scant coverage of the atheism viewpoint; other than blaming us
for rampant abortions, drugs, revolutions, homosexuality, AIDS, rock 'n roll and all other
forms of godless activities decried from many pulpits.
Here are a few short extracts to give you some idea on how I feel about other people's
metaphysical beliefs.
"Across a planet and my lifetime, Jews, Christians, Muslims and Hindus, plus Marxist
disbelievers, have fired upon each other in varying permutations and such still seems the
state of play; even the Buddhists have been known to lose their cool at times. Atheistic
aggression is more reserved for written and verbal arguments."
"From military weapons to information, modern technology and all its invasive abilities into
our lives has become the leading edge of current religious conflict and we're powerless to
stop it. The time has come for atheists to stand up and be counted in the way that the world
is run for the sake of our own children." We never did learn how many atheists were killed a
year ago in that USA tragedy by a seemingly religious cause.
"Right now, Japan is the world's leading conclave for serious atheists. Religion never enters
into any conversation, only into cash exchanges for rites of passage and atheists can marry
in a Christian-type chapel without having to lose any principles."
"The three major Middle East parties to conflict all say that in the beginning was the word,
but those three basic manuals of monotheism seem to have differing authors and points of view
and need a major edit to fit into a single volume for any sense to made out of true
monotheism."
"Lush, tropical Cochin in Kerala makes a perfect venue for atheists and believers living in
daily harmony. With Christians, Hindus, Muslims and Marxists sharing things at 25 percent
each, any unilateral belief has to contend with impossible coalition to three quarters of the
population. In the name of peaceful prosperity, anything can be tolerated...... even atheists.
"It's time for the human race to put religious ideas into hobby boxes, for optional use......
in private if possible. Time for a technologically and economically-knit world to work more
within the physical expediencies of now, rather than the metaphysical dogmatism of eternity."
"Japan makes for such a splendid role model. Its rapid leap into economic prominence over
past decades depended upon converting its national soul to Mammon and that's why it will
prove a perfect venue from where to disseminate Fundamental Atheism. Mammon is a highly
polytheistic type of belief, with icons of labels and stickers attesting the huge variety of
devotees to its grand design; for worshippers, ultra-posh glass and marble temples to such
prestigious gods are still arising high above the Ginza and Omote-Sando, at which
white-gloved ushers reverently open doors to the flocking congregations."
Thank Nature for People
A very good friend of mine upon hearing the subject of this lecture said 'Thank nature for
people like you!' She took my words out of my mouth for all I really want to say is thank
nature for people.
Religious belief is actually a black and white issue; either one has it or not; it's rather
like being pregnant. So for the sake of clarity upon the ever muddy waters of human beliefs I
must separate all entities into two camps - either eternity of the laws governing all moving
matter or eternity of a spirit doing the same job. Both are quite valid ways to arrive at the
same position. I use the word spirit, or ki, both in its Latin and Japanese senses meaning
the way or breath of universe, as with Holy Spirit or Aikido.
I may travel outwards to the smallest particles making up the universe or inwards until I
reach the self-same entities making up my life support systems and storing my mind. Like all
my Japanese friends, I believe that I'm a natural product, but in my case not even the Shinto
spirits exist to effect human life. Even the cosmic elegance of Zen Buddhism fails me as a
universal guide; human contents trying to discern the nature of their universal container may
well be as fascinating as Indian blind men trying to describe elephants; however, handing
over one's life completely to aesthetic concepts does not help the technological advance of
the human race one little bit unless there is some valid commensuration with a rational
universe - miracles, notwithstanding.
The peaceful Kyoto Buddhist dry landscape gardens may well show an elegant cosmic layout ,
however the utter ferocity and dynamic destructive creation going on throughout the universe
fail to manifest.
Eastern religions have produced human syntheses from all natural paradoxes. From the middle
path of Buddhism to the Yin/Yang poles of Taoism, balancing out all factors, such as the
original needs of chaos and order at the very beginning of all matter, follows universal
cyclic spirituality.
To me, the other great gift received from human religious needs was the creation of cause and
effect as the Judaic/Christian way to reach God's eternal residence, for it eventually helped
science to unlock creative secrets with its yes/no approach.
There is commensuration between those opposing universal values; Buddhism holds that all
things within the mind must be illusions because events are constantly changing and
Heisenberg was quite uncertain as well about his ever-moving particles.
Gods, in any sense, and I are not enemies for how can I fight against something outside of
space and time when I'm enclosed within such parameters? I just feel that my life on earth is
of no concern to any metaphysical entity, only to the eternal physical laws governing all
creation; Dharma is the same set of philosophical rules for Buddhists.
After that, I see life all as a matter of getting on with it to see what plays out. Rather
like climbing a mountain simply because it's there to climb, the organisational evolution of
matter from first energy particles to the energy now being spent in my brain happened simply
because it could happen according to all laws of probability. And in a homogenous universe of
matter and laws it really is quite probably happening elsewhere and the same questions are
being asked, and the same rubbish must be on television. The Hubble telescope has uncovered
many keyholes for peeking inside the rest of the universal establishment; the state of play
is pretty much the same in all directions so far.
A sun is sun by any other name, including a star and we all know what may be brought forth
from such simple and very common atomic furnaces - us for example and all other things
around; even the gods of ancient Egypt and Japan during the early agricultural times were
beamed down from their nearest star, one of so many other solar batteries ever ready for
consumers to spend wisely.
Why not then, a body of intelligent creatures somewhere within our Milky Way meeting at this
very moment to discuss these very same issues in pretty much the same way. After all, just
how variations of any real consequence can there be on such a simple intellectual theme of
universal homogeneity, which also seems to be the altruistic base of Christianity.
The question most folk raise in the end as proof of their belief is "well where did all those
infinite laws come from?" A typical response from an aware finite mortal. I simply assume the
obvious..... the matter and laws making up all of known creation have always been there and
always will be - amen! The infinity of pi shapes all that we know in the natural universe and
if there's no beginning then there's no end or vice versa. Singularities possess neither time
nor space.
Either all people are born with the same inalienable properties within their innate natural
constitutions or else they must be freaks and mutants. So what makes the difference when it
comes to metaphysical belief systems? Simply, local conditioning of acquired survival
techniques and, as in every nation on earth, a special belief system allied to environmental
necessity. Most of western society was based upon the needs of desert tribes to live together
under a single god. That original mission impossible was then undertaken by the continents of
Europe and the Americas, with no happy ending in sight as yet.
My DNA blueprints say that I'm 98.5% genetically connected to a chimpanzee, so I must be even
closer to you lot. Why not the biochemical base of our spiritual circuitry as well? Isn't
that liable to be virtually 100% the same? Neuroscience has now shown that out-of-the body
experiences are based upon the lack of a chemical which controls subjective awareness, thus
causing the mind to imagine an illusionary objective view from stored information; almost
like a chemical formula for calling up the gods.
God exists within the neo-cortex of an intelligent primate ape called Homo Sapiens; the rest
of the primates however, are more like me.... life goes on well enough without such spiritual
guidance. Instead, I use that portion of my advanced brain to substitute the standard
question of what is the true God? with a far bigger question of "from whence cameth such?"
Time, like god, is a man-made affair, conjured up to explain what's happening around the
place. The leading edge of natural evolution knows only of the immediate present in all
actions and reactions. Yesterday's events have greatly reduced value in a changing
environment, likewise tomorrow's plans. Both past and future are second rate information
sources, compared to now. Living upon such a timeless point negates religious needs. All life
upon earth live in such a way except us humans.
I can well imagine the beginning of all spiritual beliefs. It was a time when a beast became
aware of its inevitable death and sought ways to avoid such a terminal situation. We go
through the same prehistoric insecurities and Jungian archetypes in early childhood and
seemingly in retarded adulthood for most of our species.
Today, what presents the major problems of human religions is in fact quite a tiny thing;
differing words. Sounds for expressing the inexpressible, as Wittgenstein might have said.
Actually, I'm not really an atheist. To be such, first there needs to be theism to be away
from. I maintain that I've nothing to be away from and that's what atheism is really all
about. I'd rather be called a virtual realist. Man is not what he does nor feels but rather
action in the real world; similar to the way that Japanese people judge true love through
their eyes rather than their ears: "Don't tell me you love me... show me!"
Most folk who tell me that they're of my persuasion, turn out to be agnostics trying to hedge
their bets either way. Doubt may well be fine to hone the edge of belief, but it can have no
place in Fundamental Atheism. It's as the famed atheist Bertram Russell once said about true
love; it's either 100% or nothing.
It's also in the act of love that a very interesting link between Judaic/Christian believers
and non-believers come into play. The sexual ecstasy produced at point of orgasm brings out
religious expletives. It's quite common to hear humans cry out "Oh God!" or Oh Jesus!" as
they enter the final phase of procreation. I know that for a fact because I do it myself.
Somehow the conditioning between the act of male orgasm and the creative aspects of my early
religious conditioning can cause me to call out not only "God" when it seems an appropriate
time but even "Jesus" and I'm a Jewish-atheist. This oscillatory nature between those two
inducers of top ecstasy, god and sex, prove to me that a single biomechanism is at play,
triggered by either and often in nunneries by both.
The procreative connection between human spirit and the basic needs of nature can never be
divorced. As Richard Dawkins well-pointed out, genes, are extremely selfish in their needs of
expression. As with beliefs. Tribal belief systems, because of their equal foundation upon
both aspects tend to become a workable synthesis for local environmental use, but unable to
meld into any global uniformity.
A Case for My Disbelief
The case for Fundamental Atheism is simple: infinite systems preclude any original makers.
Any creative entity existing outside of eternal space and time is beyond any understanding
and not worth wasting valuable life over.
H.G. Wells entered my life at the same time my mother was getting me ready to make public
affirmation that the God of Moses was mine as well. The Jewish lawgiver stood no chance
against the British rationalist and in "The History of Mr. Polly" I first saw the light of
salvation. God was likened to a stern schoolmaster high above, noting down all our misdeeds
like a spy in the sky. I thought then and do now, that was not the answer for me and the old
man in the clouds blew away.
Deathbed conversion to atheism can be quite traumatic. I know of one old lady who converted
to atheism quite late, due to her very painful terminal cancer after a lifetime of complete
belief and "righteous living"; her nurse told me that she cried daily in even greater mental
pain at her only existence having gone to utter waste upon the words of priests.
There are enough empirical or self- experienced answers around right now for me to answer
99.9% of our major questions about selves. That's quite enough for me to be sure. However,
most folk want 100% when it comes to eternal affairs and that means dragging in theisms to
fill up remaining gaps. On the American Continent can be found three differing sets of such
peoples.
In the South, where animism helps jungle natives to live in accord with the daily
practicalities of nature; centrally where Hispanization brought in the Pope to fill in all
the missing parts of life and North to the States where MIT physics professors go to church
and pray to a heavenly father. Perhaps the following definition of the human spiritual need
is the one hardest for them to accept: God or theism is the soothing ointment that heals the
raw and painful edge of not knowing.
Sorry! I love the pain. It's the carrot on the stick that makes we intelligent "donkeys" pull
our heavy loads along. Theistic fundamentalism has that unnatural tendency to turn the beast
around and lighten its intellectual load.
This raises the most important issue of all. The evolution of human intelligence is geared to
technological advance in order to secure niches for life on earth around the near universe
before our solar battery expires; the use-by date is printed clearly. Sitting in a pre-heaven
waiting room, singing praises to the maker of life till hell-on-earth takes over forever does
rather crap in the face of natural intelligence. The scientifically prophesied floods of
molten matter will necessitate another Noah to ark all and sundry to planets around other
extremely longlife batteries.
The conflict between theism and atheism can only be fought upon a level playing field and so
far the only pitch I've found for both teams to show their skills is nature. Luckily for me,
monotheists see nature as their stomping ground given by divine decree and polytheists
believe themselves to be its products. Speaking purely as a primate looking in the mirror
daily and honestly, I tend to go for the latter.
As we enter this new IT century, which promises post-industrial miracles in life sciences,
there has been a surge back to religious bases with resulting tragic conflicts. Even little
stem cells are gaining divine providence, let alone eggs and sperm. Modern sciences now go
where even angels fear to tread. So it really does seem a good time to innovate a new belief
system for future mass subscription.
Luckily, or unluckily for traditional immigrant families, each new generation is born without
any metaphysical software installed and huge changes may well be effected in future through
the full IT globalisation of information, education and communications; besides globally
popular entertainment. Here is a new aspect of human conditioning taking shape. Like it or
not... such full milking of the human herd for talent and genius will become inevitable. It's
an optimal system, just like the Darwinian diversity through genotyping.
No longer will the young have to wait around for robed men on asses to arrive at the villages
to hear the words of truth, they'll have a Cyberstable full of them.
Perhaps Japan could well be the platform from which to launch a new information service
regarding the how and why of the human species; as the Meiji Era showed, society here goes
into extreme Larmarckian evolutionary mode at times to re-assemble itself in a more expedient
form to changing conditions.
Judging from my personal interrelationships with the Japanese, the answers to all
metaphysical questions seem best left to superstitious gestures by disbelievers of any dogma;
if all trains go to the same destination then why not take any or many is the cold logic.
However, here are also the minds awaiting a new way to think in an unprejudiced way, just
like all those minds of Europe in pre-Cartesian mode citing a theism as the central cause of
all matter. I say that Japan is ready for a post-Cartesian assault in the same manner and
acquire that workable synthesis that was able to produce religious scientists and artists
commensurating well enough with their atheist colleagues to unlock the workings of natural
order.
Fundamental Atheism is a creed of human thought which found its modern origins within the
mind of Rene Descartes. Coming away from God as the underpinning of all creation was the
trigger that released both the scientific revolution and eventually Marxism.
Descartes was in some way a true atheist in that he no longer wished to view a universe that
was god-centric; rather, he tried for a self-centric fount of knowledge that would also
concur with his spiritual form of guidance.
Applying Cartesian rules to theisms is fair game. That quantum swing by Descartes in European
thought, opened up the surge of science and technology that has finally produced us and the
way we perceive the physical. Before children are allowed to develop any natural means to
seek spiritual ways, the set images of a god or gods are presented for early imprinting in
true Pavlovian fashion. Heaven and Hell are early tamers and inhibitors of enthusiastic
childhood and post-puberty actions.
Within my life support system and its thought processes are the means to construct a very
good working model of all matter from early particles to my specific kit of organic cells.
Somewhere in between these generators of space and time are the realms where the
"creative-spirit-of-the-universe" awaits true belief and service of life; especially from the
fidelity of an intelligent variety able to dispense with the laws of probability in favour of
predictability. If any "spiritual" creative force can be found, then it must already exist
within us as much as without.
From an Eastern metaphysical point of view, such a spirit is the major driver of all things
and one Japanese engineer/scientist has even given its basic oscillation as an energy form.
1/ f is deemed to be the original oscillatory wavelength of all matter exploding from the big
bang. To be precise, it was that mutual compromise between order and chaos that underpinned
all proceeding motions of matter; at the other end of all flowers is a seed.
Where order and chaos meet is the easiest line possible for traversing along a singular
direction. It may wave slightly to accommodate opposing needs, but possesses no ability to
store information; it's simple binary reaction to action. The increase of energy usage to
store or process information necessitates a more vigorous oscillation of sharper peaks
inhibiting speed of forward motion, but allowing a greater amount of space for self or
"in-forming" as an entity As both the origin of all matter and its human manifestation is
information processing, it's hard to separate them, but easy to note the similarities. Much
as a computer is direct reflection of the human logic circuits.
The 1/f idea was a result of computer chip technology and a new way of classifying motion as
a variable of noise/heat rather than space/time; the noisier and hotter a chip became the
more it processed, albeit slower....... a bit like my brain at times.
So where is that special spirit which I may effuse self with in all my actions and thoughts?
Like many of you... I'm still looking. One man who helped me to find my eternal salvation
deep in the bowels of nature was the late Stephen J. Gould with his biology essays. The
absolute elegance of natural behaviour and optimal bioengineering systems overwhelms all
spiritual bases. One tale about minute ticks made me realise my true universal value as a
living entity, which I recently wrote about: "In one family of these tiny blighters, little
boys only lived a short time after birth and in another family, none at all lived to see the
world outside the womb. With vital urgency, the many sisters have sex with the only brother
who then becomes a post-coital snack for the girls. Such is the true beauty of life. Why
waste resources on a male with no more sexual function?
The true beginning of man is now measurable in the banks of Genome information for cell
replication. From a series of DNA samples taken from a long line of prehistoric females,
which would be able to go into a reproductive sequence with mine; perhaps I could love Lucy
in quite a meaningful way.
Abaking in the Sun
If there is to be any symbolic "Almighty Creator" needed by Fundamental Atheism, then it
might be the sun. As good as any other, well-used by our ancestors and empirically quite
correct. In the past, the sun played an important role in human illusion about gods, but
that's nothing compared to the grandest illusion of all upon the human race, the way that sun
sinks down at sunset and rises up at dawn.
In reality, and according to Galileo long ago, one must view the horizon and its clinging
clouds at sunset as lifting itself up and away from a stationary light source, and that you
are the object lifting backwards; then it's easier to realise that our sun is just a very
humble star within a very homogenous sphere of all the stars. But best of all..... you are
the traveller through space. Reality, as ever, being a far more exciting concept. If we can
suffer such a longheld daily illusion as the setting or rising sun, then what chance to truly
discern any metaphysical illusions?
Finally, let me confess to a sin as an atheist. I have a mental icon that I bring out often
to adjust my eternal spirit of absolute belief to. It's a sphere. The ability of the human
mind to transcend the earthly and contemplate the eternal beauty of all creation is not lost
upon we transgressors from the myriad religious pathways. Atheists are people too! The pure
concept of the sphere for me says more about perfection and absolutes than anything else.
Being the smallest possible surface for containing the greatest possible volume , not only is
it the original container for the whole universe upon which all points are the same, but such
perfection of form was then taken by suns, atoms, cells and my head and testicles; even
singularities take its form. There's sure of lot my spirit around. Spheres are so perfect
that even the modern gods of sports, hit, knock, kick and bat them all over the place to the
adulation of fanatical hordes.
I've been an atheist for over fifty years and I've bred three more of my persuasion. Am I
worried about me after I die? Indeed not. For I'm privileged to know exactly what life after
death feels like as far as I, per se, am concerned.... just like life before birth.
There are only two ways to consider the human hunger for knowing self; as either organic
matter seeking universal expansion or universal spirit residing within such. Like all other
polar states, there is effective compromise allowing both to fuse as one, where atheists and
believers may comfortably rest upon their true fundament. As with other supreme mental
quests, it ain't easy to realise, but neither is it impossible; that's why I keep on trying
to find it.
THE LAST MEN ON EARTH By Mike Jacobs 29/5/2002
A Japanese expert on pornographic movies praised his profession by telling me that sex is
only life. I replied with profound insights that for us men it's simply the reverse; life is
purely sex. There is no other reason for men to exist other than by the virtue of being
travelling salesmen in the "seed" industry . A very precarious means of survival in the
post-post-industrial world that must eventually arrive with its full controls over all life
processes.
Human history, so far, has been about grabbing more territory and filling it with genetic
imperative; in other words, after victories, pillage and plunder is always followed or even
preceded by rape. Hitler openly intended to fill the lands decimated of other bloodstocks
with hordes of copulating Huns filling up the spaces; not that differing a drive from the
"race's" early ambitions in Europe, while at the same time trying to stop the thoughts of a
Russian Jew from taking over the entire planet instead; genes and ideas often share
reproductive needs.
Even the Pope and his Holy Empire thrive on copulatory success amid their generous and
hot-blooded congregations.
This urge to make all others the same as self, either physically or spiritually, works at two
levels; the selfish and the altruistic. Here are indeed and in tale the dynamics of what
really drives the male half of the population to do what they do to each other and to the
other half of the species.
If man's genetic imperative is the cause of the primitive and barbarous acts filling our
daily newspapers and local streets during an era of supposed human enlightenment, then
"castrating" them from their savage past makes good sense. Nations boasting over 80%
literacy are still acting out daily the revenge or suppressive ways of illiterate ancestors.
There seems to be two laws in conflict; natural and man-made.
To appreciate this very apparent dilemma of harnessing primitive drives to advanced
civilisation, it's necessary to reconstruct the original blueprint of the human male as an
alternative means for life to speed up its evolutionary gears. Space and time make a splendid
platform to stretch out this complex creature to his utmost topological thinness that bears
closest inspection; for three quarters of life's sexual endeavours to keep its pot boiling,
males were not needed. The latecomers seems an apt enough term.
I Want a Girl, Just Like the Girl Who Married Dear Old Pa
Little did the those early cellular mothers begatting only daughters know what the boy babies
of mankind could eventually turn into. Those first abnormalities of life, carrying personal
genetic info to the hoi polloi souping around, had been told in no uncertain terms: " Go
forth my little information chip and multiply. Find another "beautiful" lady like me, get
inside her nuclear processor and she'll send a message back again to me almost like yours.
That way we can swap information on how to make things more interesting for all of us ladies
bored with our split ends." A little bit of nothing-ventured-nothing-gained school of thought
guided the day and the focus of this writer over one billion years later was anchored in
concrete, defying abstraction. I'm still trying to run my daily messenger service as my first
mothers requested, but alas........ that's the way the body crumbles.
Adam's Delicious Spare Ribs
Only in western monotheistic parlance does the female come from the male with such Divine
authority given unto those plumping for Adam as God's intended. The first writers being men
of course.
In many of the polytheistic beliefs, the reverse is readily accepted as the female being the
major creative force of all around, from whom males descend. Japan is a unique place being
that its Imperial family was originally born from a female sun , and then proceeded,
reputedly, down the son line only.
What really sticks in the male craw is the fact that woman does not come from the body of man
but exactly the reverse is the case. If any Divine hand was in play, then it was Eve from
whom a DNA sample was taken to grow her new gardening companion. Woman created men to get
some action and reaction going and the original dynamic is still moving the world.
Nearly all males admit that basically they're manufacturers and distributors of sperm, with a
stomach and brain attached; the former being for refuelling and the latter for marketing
navigation with rules of engagement being both a given and a taken. Schopenhauer saw them as
the twin drives of life's will, which once sated, allowed its human use for other pursuits.
What men do in between orgasms makes this world spin fast.
So what makes this once gentle gift of sexual "love" between females into such a snotty-nosed
little brat quickly learning to dominate all that he surveys at the end of his little willy?
Even when being potty-trained, he's told to do Number One with such a bio-artefact.
Perhaps it could be the fact that males can only express micro-information for their future
imperative, whereas females express macro-forms for nurturing and advancement to sexual
maturity; on their own if needs be. The rapid growth of single-parent families during the
late 20th century in the West shows such a decline in the male role to mere delivery services
with no aftersales support.
For whatever reasons, men are not keen to find the truth about themselves in public forum;
they already know it only too well. Only in the throes of laughter at comedians slinging
barbed truths in the guise of jokes is there an exception. If the act of primate laughing may
be expressed as autonomic relief mechanism for heightened tension, the genre of sexual jokes
well-registers its social need by being the biggest. Even Freud knew what the guys were
really laughing at and he made fortune and fame mainly out of such sexual insecurities. Being
a eunuch is no laughing matter, but how we guys howl at the thought of such along with
premature ejaculation onto dresses, inability to deliver, bad-fitting couplings, delivery to
wrong orifices, competitors stealing delivery routes, number of daily or yearly deliveries
and on and on at the dreadful state of being a male if truth be told.
Womb-envy leading to inferiority complex is something that most male shrinks choose to
ignore. Little do they want to admit the shock at learning their own menial messenger roles
in the universal scheme of things; a stopgap measure until better ways and means may be
formulated for governing the diverse recipes of cooking the DNA soup to ever changing
specifications.
The classic reaction to competitive inferiority always has been to bluster adversely; from
small toads inflating themselves large with air to politicians doing likewise. The reasons
men give for their patriarchal acts do not hold sound biology, but grand illusion. The
natural relative position of males in any vital plans by life is less than that of the
females, being that the latter were designated by nature to be the egg that came before the
"chick" that attracts the cock that leads to the House That Jack Built.
The next time you scratch your balls, those that have them, consider the future of a male as
a species sub-sector now threatened as the 2lst century begins to reveal its post-industrial
potential for manipulating the micro and macro with very "computerised" hands. The blueprints
of life have been "genomed" down to the very last nut, screw, washer and bolt and their
varying permutations; sperms may be made to order instead of being wasted in mass storage and
overcapacity. The architects of life and their estate developers will eventually need to
consider cost-effectiveness if real corporate profit is to be made from the reproduction
industry. If this means down-sizing suppliers in favour of MOD (manufacturing on demand),
then men, per se, will become an endangered species.
Now that the technology is to hand for usurping male sperm production and distribution in
favour of laboratory customisation and implantation, how soon before valuable natural
resources will cease to be wasted upon those with redundant sexual genitalia?
Man cannot live by balls alone. A new role needs to found before he becomes even worse off
than those ticks made infamous by the late and great Stephen Jay Gould in one of his natural
history essays. As he tells, in one family of these tiny blighters, little boys only lived a
short time after birth and in another family, none at all lived to see the world outside the
womb. With supreme elegance, the many female sisters gang-bang the only brother; after which
he's dead weight with no further use. Waste not and want not is the natural creed and the
latter mite becomes a post-coital snack for the girls. Such is the true beauty of life.
So we guys need to create better credentials for taking up valuable space, energy, air and
water for such primitive biological purposes as technology speeds us towards unisexuality
again; what goes around......
The future has already arrived, only it hasn't reached most necks of the woods. Soon enough,
the " original mother" will store up enough resources to set her maternal instincts into
action by paying an apt concern to induce and grow her replacement outside the womb in a
selfish way. Even the peaceful, castrated males will be shopping by then for their own little
'uns on the Internet. Such cloning may well produce a Mike Jacobs VIII, and that can't be so
bad from where I sit. And who dare say that a fat, beardless guy with big tits and a
high-pitch voice can't make a good parent?
The Post-Scrotum Era of Mankind
The bottom line is delightfully simple and writ in huge print for those that stand back to
read. Life's investment in testicles will prove as outdated to the future, as the radiogram
and its record collection is to Internet music deliverability - even to your phone and fridge
or warm crapper seat. Why spend so much human time and energy maintaining outdated and very
localised reproduction systems, when IT can deliver global on demand?
There's only one blessing in view from a scrotumless human world, and that's the fact no-one
can, as yet, clone minds. They happen randomly by innate and acquired information. Forming
the future of life will be a matter of minds not bodies and the male mind will be quite a
useful thing to take along, even if you have to keep it alive in a container attached to an
IT system. It started out precisely that way.
Until then dear, gentle, lady reader, be kind to those ephemeral creatures sleeping next to
you. One day, they'll join the dinosaurs and the Mohicans alongside cassette decks, buggy
whips and Enron; all now distinct as being extinct.
It about time life moved on to Unikind. Guys.... grab it while it lasts.
IT'S A SIN TO TELL A LIE By Mike Jacobs 13/4/2002
There are 17 easy ways to fill news pages; the breaking of the Ten Commandments plus the
committing of Seven Deadly Sins. Any breaches of these bulwarks of Western civilisation await
wide publicity and "righteous" condemnation.
It's seems ironic that the major conflict in the Middle East still centres around the First
Commandment of not having any other God but the original and that the sin of Greed and its
results, as well as Pride before and after its fall, daily dominate the business pages; will
the temples and bazaars ever cease to buzz with news?
Somehow or other, those 17 ways to piss off established society never go away from our
backyards and places well beyond. Such acts of hell-bent transgression make for interesting
things to read about over toast and marmalade while going to heaven safely at home. From the
way that lusty presidents get genuine office perks to the gluttonous appetites of financiers,
the affairs of mankind neatly dovetail into such transgressions and sins, committed on vast
scales for vast readerships.
Take the Tablets Daily
It is told that God called down upon the ancient Assyrians and asked if they wanted some
Commandments. "What's those?" they asked. "Rules on how to live peacefully" God replied. "No
thank you" they responded. When God called upon the Philistines to accept his Commandants,
they replied "You've got be joking!" Then God saw Moses in the desert shepherding his huge
flocks of Hebrew tribes back to Israel. "Hey Moses!" God called out. "Would you like some
Commandments?" Moses asked "How much!?" "Special free offer today" God says. "Okay!" Moses
quickly replied. "Give me ten."
High on the list are prohibitions against killing, stealing, adultery, false testimony and
coveting, and people still die or lose limbs for breaking even minor Commandments; Moses
never realised what awesome power he was handing over to the clerics with the Divine sanction
against adultery; getting stoned with a lover was no fun in Biblical times. Luckily, the
Seven Deadly Sins do not have enough power to suddenly terminate mortal spans, but plenty of
power to affect immortal destination.
Hebrew-speaking soldiers surrounding a church upon the birthplace of Christ providing Holy
Sanctuary for Islamic warriors show the jealous power of the ancient First Commandment over
life and death in a modern setting; all of them doing it by the book.
Break the Third Commandment by taking God's name in vain and get put on a hit list. The
manhunt for Salman Rushdie always made for more newsprint than his book reviews.
The early Hebrews, after a long spate of non-stop pyramid building, cheered the Fourth
Commandment. Do nothing all day once a week except think and pray.... and eat. Apart from the
chutzpah of trade unions wanting double wages for being deprived of such religious
privileges, breaking the Sabbath has lost news value. Fining shopkeepers for trading on
Sundays was news in the UK not so long ago, when Welsh publicans could also lose their
licences for pulling a pint on Chapel day.
Honouring mum and dad is a Commandment coming home to roost with a vengeance as the rare
ancient blessing of ripe old age is bestowed upon seemingly all and sundry. The current
burgeoning of this command upon the young plus the economic and political clout of the
manifold elderly is making much news.
The Divine prohibitions against killing, adultery and stealing, as ever and wherever, provide
the main fodder for the widest-read news.
Lies actually make news twice... once when they are told and again when proven false. Hitler
admitted that the bigger the lie the easier to swallow and the breaking of the Ninth
Commandment is now a major thrust of the media aimed at big business and government. Square
presidents in oval offices often fall victim to their own "naughty" lies, as too the failed
dotcoms, the false auditors, faked archaeological finds, tainted blood suppliers and such ilk,
all ending up hoisted and bleeding upon their own lying petards.
Coveting rarely makes news, only its effect. The Catholic Church deemed the final Commandment
to be so important that they included it again amid the Seven Deadly Sins.
Beasts Don't Go to Heaven
Banning Covetness along with six other devilish sins of human flesh became a seven-pronged
whip to inhibit the "beast" from surfacing amid God-fearing and decent people. As a result,
indecent, atheistic, wee beasties such as I employ them as a reliable guide to all manner of
delights behind closed doors; the food at the club, however, prohibits public gluttony.
Gluttony is such a wonderful Deadly Sin that the greater part of humankind can only dream of
this sinning. Greed to that extreme, and more especially its downfall, makes great and
regular grist for editorial milling or swathes of unhealthy fat for expensive removal.
Pride as a sin is not taken too seriously in the fields of sports, entertainment, arts and
academia if one is humble while accepting the prizes. Its main news value are the
geopolitical fires it can ignite, sparked by Envy and Anger, especially from those endorsing
Sloth.
Lust can sharply banish Sloth. Here's a Deadly Sin attacked continually with apparent social
assent, for no other reason than its unceasing prevalence amid the general populace. Lust,
either exposed or witnessed, can be a regular page filler or provide avenues of seduction for
advertisers. The power of lust is awesome. So much so, that it was responsible for the early
development of Internet marketing and if I could register the address of "sex.cum" I would
become a multi-millionaire.
OF MICE, MEN AND OTHER BUSY FUCKERS By Mike Jacobs 23/3/2002
There must be some empirical correlation between the sexual goal in human male endeavours and
the fact that corporate and national presidents, aristocrats, top bureaucrats and ministers,
bishops, artistic geniuses and those just stinking rich seem to exert great sexual choice,
despite lack of physical appeal; the choice is the hallmark of male power.
Senators and Congressmen have always publicly sported their young conquests of either sex
since democracy first simmered in its Greek and Roman stockpots; a time when High Priests,
replete with choruses of dancers and singers, pimped copiously. Such decadence wafting
through the corridors of power in G7 capitals (Paris really burns) is thought to have tumbled
both those Empires. However, the ancient architectural facades for political powerhouses in
Washington stand as mute witnesses to those very same classical sexual machinations where
procurement can be far from a committee matter.
Perhaps in the great old days, it was OK to judge a leader by how many virgins he could
deflower each and every night and be impressed with such measure of a man on the ball in all
departments; today, that's grounds for impeachment..... and a best seller. There are times,
however, when such lustful pursuits are best enjoyed in private as with holy celibates and
heads of states. Sinning Primates prefer to keep it cloistered and Gandhi, the "Father" of
his nation, is said to have lain his frail, tired, chaste body down each night, sandwiched
between two lovely young "daughters" who came with the job.
If You've Got It Then Flaunt It!
There are the times when you want the right people to know your bedmates. After all is said
and done, walking into an expensive venue with a highly-prized female draped in furs and
glittering with diamonds is really a peer sort of thing not a measure of love. Draped upon
her is the image the man wishes as his own reflection of worth; her beauty and his riches,
not his jowled, balding, ugly, wrinkled head protruding from expensive togs.
"Eat-your-hearts-out-boys" is the silent smirk at many a top gathering of guys with their
dates.
Being seen in all the best places by all the best people has long been a scriptwriters'
cliche for aspiring and attractive young ladies and parading one's sexual success in this way
as mark of high office or attainment is a natural thing to do; stags with huge antlers and
piles of "doe" do it well.
A feature of the daily news in the West has always been the goings and comings of such folk
at the glittering city venues of nightlife where the famous show off their sexual
acquisitions. "Guess which producer was drooling at the cleavage of his latest starlet?" is a
gossip columnist's question which makes all us guys want to be movie producers. What are the
folk at the top getting in the hay that I ain't!? is the ever-pervasive worry of readers and
so it should be. It's quite worrying.
To realise such scenarios of life at the top of the heap has always been a major motivator
since weaker cavemen first noted that the choicest girls permeated towards the stronger guys,
as well as the best cuts of meat. Little did they know of any Darwinian principle at work,
only that trying to be the fittest could lead to such a guarantee of best food with its
consequential attraction for the best females. Biochemical love doesn't always prove a fit
method for sexual quality control because lots of fantastic looking females are notorious for
draping themselves over men who've only flesh to offer. It's still basically a game of "womb"
economics at all levels, with bankable deposits for contracted deals; either sperms or money,
just spend and enjoy again and again.
The list of pertinent females eligible for top peer envy covers many abed; royal blood is
hard to top, only top up and marrying a princess does not make the groom a prince among men;
showgirls and models promising to remove ugly genes from a guy's offspring; singers of songs
and arias with respective increases in breast size and movie stars and television
personalities for spreading one's fame by association. Perhaps the greatest catch a man can
be seen with upon his chosen stage is with the female CEO of a major company who looks like a
sexual dream; a case of having your prized cake and eating it.
I've always liked the tale of the young actress who swerved to avoid a child and fell off the
casting couch. Using men's sexual desire to secure a high style of life, or bigger movie
roles, was first well-noted in the Bible; the clever, early Hebrew women learnt how to count
camels before removing veils. Such economic quid pro quo for sexual opportunity is not solely
show business practices, but seem to arise in many other cases of women aspiring to higher
and better-paid positions in life. Washington is as notorious as New York, as most other
places, for such sexual shenanigans, The case where one girl wishing to become an executive
of a cosmetic company and got down to her task initially with the CEO of her nation is.....
exceptional!
Climbing the corporate "phallus" for such willing lassies normally starts with a series of
lower scale power suppliers for upward thrust. There are no set rules for who's using who or
whom, and female revenge from upon high at a later stage can be devastating. The motto is
simple: Be nice to the beautiful women on the way up the ladder if she's stepping for a while
on your rung.
The converse to all such activities with the "herd" is also to hand; peer envy at actual
sexual products from pair bonding. Ask any man on his way to enjoy a sexual perk of high
office to whip out his bulging wallet and inside you're sure to find a photo of the wife and
kids for flashing around at more sedate gatherings as proof of sexual potency.
In the end analysis, human genetics are best reflected by those qualities chosen for a wife
and mother rather than a mistress and lover; male egos and ids make for bad judges in all
courts of common appeal and despite the exceedingly glib tongue of the Devil's advocate with
below-the-belt tactics, the intrinsic quality of a female in whom a man entrusts both his
genetic future and all worldly possessions must be as "Caesar's wife."
THE COMINGS AND GOINGS OF ORGASM By Mike Jacobs 3/7/2002
"The sexual drive is nothing but the motor memory of previously experienced pleasure"
Havelock Ellis
All human evidence seems to suggest that man's greatest desire in life is to experience his
penis fully engorged and about to ejaculate upon the egg of the female he loves or in more
impertinent places; luckily, his sole life task is also that most pleasurable one.
Regarding man as a creature filling in time between orgasms may well reduce him to the role
of a lion lazing around for most of the menstrual month until leonine eggs beckon for a few
days of continual partying, but somehow that cap fits many of my male acquaintances already.
Although male orgasms are designated for sperm delivery to awaiting eggs, such has become
only a secondary factor to the ejaculatory experience; men have extracted their most
sensational part of being alive away from its function by "thinking" about other ways for
triggering the act and the IT era even promises digitally-aided orgasm kits for holographic
partying.
There seems much more to this simple and deliriously pleasurable bodily spasm of fluid
ejection than meets the eye and other senses engaged; the sheer addictive ecstasy of the act
induces mass male demand for selective female supply and natural economics evolve. The
natural and social knock-ons of the male orgasm beg for objectivity about a completely
subjective affair; a problem for all men scientists venturing into their own nether regions.
One objective clue to the nature of men "getting their sexual rocks off" was discovered at
Harvard many decades ago with a bunch of laboratory rats. As women have been saying for ages,
men act like dirty rats; even like squeaky, clean ones in experiments. With their pleasure
zones hot-wired to a coloured lever dishing out brief doses of rat paradise, those lab
rodents partied and partied for hours until they snuffed it while, quite unnaturally,
ignoring the heaps of food on tap and females in heat. It was a commitment of "love" until
death do us part without concern for real life; rather like Romeo & Juliet.
The first step in understanding the nature of male orgasm is to reduce the act to its
function rather than design; a delivery system of DNA information constructed as a mind/body
entity going flat out for mass production with just-in-time deliveries.
In the natural world, any successful delivery of " I love me " messages already faces dangers
and obstacles even wilder than those in Hollywood flicks. Some virulent strain of small
monkeys devote each and every day to full production and delivery in a highly competitive
mass market with few niche openings and at the other end of the orgasm scale is the one time
a mantis prays for all his life; the latter coming and going in a trice and a salmon soon
dies after his first and last orgasm. Some guys have to take coming very seriously.
In the "man-maid" world, there are the times when "male" gets delivered to the wrong places
and is kept hushed up or gets latexed and then days when it drops upon earth or expensive
party dresses. Genetic messages, like Internet ones, are a very cheap commodity for linking
folk together in huge quantitative intercourse; the refinement of quality filters most of it
out in both cases.
The colossal scale of orgasms needed for all the successful fertilisations leading to just
one positive mutation was the only possible way that probability could cover all the bets by
life. Now that nature's hit-or-miss policies have been superseded by human targeting
practices, the need for mass expulsion of human information through orgasms is at an end;
technological information services function more efficiently.
Wind the Rubber Band Tightly and Let Go
As a child I loved I winding that rubber band before letting go of my little craft to fly
with gusto and as a man I also loved that same mechanism for sexually propelling me along.
The body at point of ejaculation is a tight-knit singularity, when all the metabolistic
systems, hopefully of both parties, tightly lock into a unified act. Even all the senses get
turned off to aid the concentration given to such muscular spasms; therefore idiots can come
as well as geniuses and often better.
Balancing upon that point of no return as long as possible is perpetual aim and surfing
reminds me much of this act. Surfers patiently bob and down amid the languid swells until a
big wave approaches with forward thrust. The secret of a non-stop thrilling ride to the
beached destination is knowing which big wave to take for championship course on water or in
bed. Making oneself completely subject to the forces of nature always prove rewarding and
exciting.
Orgasms are divided into two audible types; the bestial or the spiritual. Although those of
the latter persuasion may prefix their ecstatic delight with exclamations of Sweet Jesus!!, O
Jesus!!, Holy! Mother, O My God!!! and other providers of such hot feelings, the sounds of
men delivering their messages are generally rather quite beastly. The range from little
pet-whimpers of delight to nostril-stretching howls of utter relief. In other things than
words, final mechanisms for engaging and experiencing an orgasm are contained within that
part of brain developed before current consciousness. The point of concentration at such
times is so intense that one can only express response with blasts from a long past and the
growls, howls, grunts, snarls, neighs, whinnies, shouts, screams and cries spurring
biochemical additives to the mixture create a natural concert and worry the neighbours
alarmingly.
This experience of ecstasy, either in a church or a brothel, does rather become the extensive
measure of man as a species.
It really didn't need a poll in 2002 to discover that men and women think about sex many
times a day; it was the same in 2002 BC. The male quest for orgasm crosses any barrier if
needs be and the numbers of people engaging in orgasm or its achievement at any given minute
upon this planet makes a staggering concept at the continuous flood of information processing
going on for the development of the human race. With such prodigious global activity, many a
microbe hop onto this lively sexual bandwagon that eventually takes them everywhere; even as
jet-setters. Sexually-spread diseases know they're on to a good thing with their chosen
method of locomotion.
Honourable Perversion
If global demand for human sperm production diminishes, and it will because of its waste of
resources, spreading of disease and overpopulation concerns, then how will the male be
conditioned by Pavlovian rewards for making utmost efforts? How will the horny genius of
science and arts arise without their just desserts? Taking the orgasm away from man is a
non-starter.
Confucious might have said that if new ways cannot be avoided then enjoy them and there seems
to be an honourable perversion arriving as technology takes over reproductive needs; orgasms
will officially be for pleasure only. The need for men to experience orgasm as a daily
routine, and all that such entails for social intercourse, is truly the dynamic which drives
men to do the great as well as the foolish things they do so well; male sex is towards
creativity and its probable mistakes rather than procreativity and its possible ones.
One, or I, might say that the male urge for orgasm is also used as the leading-edge drive of
natural intelligence seeking new successful ways for an ever-changing situation. By contrast,
the female urge for orgasm, in my oft-accepted opinion, is the solid core of natural
conservatism intuiting successful ways for existing life to survive; quite a remarkable
coupling of life's interests.
However the basic fact remains, if Kinsey and my mother are to be believed, that life carries
on if females do not orgasm and dies if men do not. The orgasm was a monopoly allowing the
messenger services to take over all reproduction facilities by forcing a junior partnership
agreement. By the time the female lawyers evolved, it had all been carved into stone.
Inspiritus Sanctus
Orgasm, like all natural things, begs some philosophical positioning if any wisdom is to be
gleaned. Jerky joys aside, there's something rather elegantly beautiful in the way the mind
also conceives its progeny according to feeling and when the ways of human reproduction can
also reflect the ideas of human creation, then that's par for any truthful answer to life.
According to the idealised state of orgasm, as confirmed regularly in the Harlequin Romance
series, the male and female experiencing simultaneously "that shared moment bonding them
forever" or such sentient claims to a singular state of being, fit most ideas about love,
sex and that sort of thing.
From two hearts beating as one to two halves making one whole, the metaphysics of shared
orgasm may well lay claim to its infinitely powerful associations, besides the loins.
Starting and ending things with a big bang, is a sure way to trigger all other minor actions
in between, including you know what. If life had a PR spokesperson, it could be pointed out
its early use of such techniques had universal application and was guaranteed forever.
How would life have fared if male orgasms had been delivered with a perfunctory hiccup or
salutary wave instead of its earth-moving effect? One thing is for sure...... life on earth
would not be so plentiful.
PERSONA GRATA COLUMNS By Mike Jacobs 16/2/2002
From ancient fireside tales to the printed and electronic media, words have been the way that
love in all its manifestations gets its messages across; sensational practices from top
people in the name or by the act of love sell the words of newspapers and magazines and at
times even cigars.
Newspapers with personal columns have long been a Hollywood feature for entwining the hearts
or whatever of strangers and even the postcards displayed outside the local newsagents have
been known to work wonders. On St. Valentine's day, reputedly the time when birds begin to
egg each other on for sexual trysts, media columns of romantic twitterings and flutterings
arise annually.
Lonely hearts or empty beds, or even both, are the major components of most personal columns.
Columns usually have foundations and roofs, or else they're of no use and looking for a mate
may range between the readers of the New York Times, whose columns rest upon the firmest of
virtues and are lofted by high ideals , to The Sexmates Gazette whose columns rest upon even
firmer stuff and lofted by even greater ideals.
Readers alone create personal columns and they can be a howl and an enlightenment to read.
Even the term 'personal column' is very revealing; persona is an affected mask and column
rises high. In effect, the meeting of top masks.
During my stints within such media enjoying steady revenues from classified types of human
encounter, most of my readers would go on to idly wander the columned offertories dedicated
to Eros, Venus, Bacchus and, for a hopeful few, to Plato; in fact, many read me second or
never, but they all read the "personals".
Great social change can be well-noted within such lovely palisades of print and Japan is no
exception. The major ingredient of English personal columns is attractive Japanese girls.
Such bonny lasses wishing for a closer study of foreign relations have spacious marketplaces
where imported male wares such as true love or unbridled lust are openly offered.
Over the past few years there has been some change in attitudes by Japanese females in regard
to "having meaningful relationships with foreign men" without having to go up the aisle. A
young lady put it bluntly to me: "The attractive guys make great accessories for being seen
around with. It's quite the fashionable thing." Toting one's exotic male pet around town
definitely says more about one's sophistication than anything so easy to get as Hermes or
Chanel; "oneupwomanship" seems alive and well in Tokyo.
In between the sellers of old bikes and the savers of all souls, are pages of readers whose
black and white yearnings stir many a reticent body into action. On a Web chat room in Tokyo,
westerners praise the eager acquiescence of young Japanese ladies in personal columns to
engage in sexual relations, or words to such effect. As one guy put it: "I've never had it so
good!!"
A young, tall, dark, handsome Canadian English teacher boasted to me that his ad brought
forth over 100 replies, which upon analysis covered all the yearnings of young Japanese
women; most of which ventured upon the serious/romantic aspect of such an encounter rather
than its possible lustful rewards. Offers of marriage abounded, elicited by just a column
inch, as did needs for intimate English lessons.
Even this writer noted a girl seeking a 'British guy who loves a good cup of tea and wants to
play Scrabble'. An offer no gentleman as I could afford to turn down, until discovering it
was a bed and board game; a pastime quite unacceptable to the woman in my life.
Although the interested parties remain the same, the "personal columns" have taken a lovers'
leap over the past decade. Cyberspace search engines now railroad persons to whatever
destinations their hearts or other organs desire at speeds somewhere between light and
computer memory. Waiting around for two minutes while trying to download Prince or Princess
Charming is not so bad.
Meeting for 'Hobbies and Sports' seems a safe way to go. If romance springs forth then shared
activities are assured. 'Friends and Interests' are also fairly innocuous gatherings, where
the lonely and the faint-of-heart can seek glimmers of interest. I once followed a personal
ad to a circle of budding writers in downtown Tokyo on a lazy Sunday afternoon to discover
that it's main attraction seemed to be the flexing of literary muscles and the chance to pair
off at group dining afterwards.
However, when 'Guys seek Gals', or vice versa, there's only one destination with varying
forms of locomotion from slow to super express. As for the other variables of male and female
encounters, such personal columns tend to get exceedingly personal indeed; shamelessness even
beyond my own.
I often glance at any personal column headed by 'Women looking for Men'; it seems a natural
thing to do while hopefully awaiting a young, attractive, intelligent woman with lots of
money desperately seeking an aging, short, balding, impoverished writer with view to
friendship, love, marriage and investment advice. Offers from any ladies with such persona
reading this may contact me c/o the Editor.
Hope really does spring eternal in the personal columns.... as does despair.
BY GAD! By Mike Jacobs 19/1/2002
Another century has arrived in which the religions of mankind will dominate and shape history
to their geopolitical needs. As a fully-paid-up member of GAD (Global Atheist Denomination),
a non-Marxist sect also finding life divine when spirits are restricted to the bottled kind,
I must protest strongly at all the media attention being given to religious opinions with
scant coverage of the atheism viewpoint; other than blaming its subscribers for rampant
abortions, drugs, revolutions, homosexuality, AIDS, rock 'n roll and all other forms of
godless activities decried mainly from US pulpits.
We disbelievers bear very heavy crosses at times.
Across a planet and my lifetime, Jews, Christians, Muslims and Hindus, plus Marxist
disbelievers, have fired upon each other in varying permutations and such still seems the
state of play; even the Buddhists have been known to lose their cool at times. Atheistic
aggression is more reserved for written and verbal arguments or kicking the dog, like the
learned lawmakers of most religious/political persuasions.
The delightful parable about the Moscow atheists atop power being finally defeated by God's
earthly representative in Rome, does however, beg some uncanny or very canny credence. Church
bells now peal loud against Kremlin walls.
What worries we atheists, it was discovered at a recent congress in Las Vegas, our symbolic
"Holy City", is the tendency for the religious beliefs of others to interfere with our own
lives in more serious ways than being accosted by members of the Salvation Army or relying on
presidents and dollars telling us to trust in God. In the keynote address, Philippine
professor Jesus Cruz said: "From military weapons to information, modern technology and all
its invasive abilities into our lives has become the leading edge of current religious
conflict and we are powerless to stop it. The time has come for atheists to stand up and be
counted in the way that the world is run for the sake of our own children."
Israeli Saul Cohen captured much sympathy for his plight of being one of the non-religious
majority in his country and still having to obey fundamentalist edicts to placate the few
orthodox members of a finely-balanced coalition government. He thought it disgraceful that
dinosaurs had been banned from being printed on milk cartons for his children as they rather
predated the Bible. He prophesied that with the huge influx of Russians, Israel may well
become the first Atheist state on earth and therefore would be in a perfect position to
administer and protect all the holy sites there: "Religion, no matter its creed, will just
become an official business for tourism and therefore treated with much greater respect. Like
we show for the ancient Arab, Roman and Greek deities around these parts."
For many delegates, the highlight of the convention was the plea from the president of GAD
Japan, Taro Suzuki, in his presentation "Why God Needs Editors". Right now, Japan is the
world's leading conclave for serious atheists. Religion never enters into any conversation,
only into cash exchanges and atheists can marry in a Christian-type chapel without having to
lose any principles.
Suzuki laid the blame for the world's current ills simply on the written word: " They all say
that in the beginning was the word, but the three books of monotheism, guiding the major
combatants, seem to have differing authors and points of view and I really feel that they
need a major edit to fit into a single volume for any sense to made out of true monotheism."
Under the argument of the singular being necessarily indivisible, he believed that such a
task would be best carried out by a writer of the atheist persuasion, offering disinterest
and impartiality.
An Illinois delegate asked from the floor about how his commodity investments in pigs bellies
would be affected by such a publication. Suzuki admitted that the question of eating bacon or
not would present the greatest of all theological obstacles to success, but believed that
biotechnology and genome techniques could come up with a cute, clean animal possessing the
same textures and flavours as the pig for all believers to share at breakfast.
An Arab member told of his human rights being sapped away by believers, even within his very
home: "It's unimaginable what we atheists must put up with in the name of God. I can live
with the fact that sinful wine, women and song is too good for the masses, except here in
Vegas. But denying pure information to the human mind seems a far greater sin to me. The
unlimited access to Internet information from my hotel room here is a dream back home."
Japan and India were the nominated nations for the next GAD congress and speakers from both
made strong pleas. The lush, tropical Cochin in Kerala was featured as the perfect venue for
atheists and believers living in daily harmony.
With Christians, Hindus, Muslims and Marxists sharing things at 25 percent each, any
unilateral belief has to contend with impossible coalition to three quarters of the
population. In the name of peaceful prosperity, anything can be tolerated...... even atheists.
And that was precisely the same message from the Tokyoite selling his non-believer's
paradise. He said: "It doesn't matter what train of belief one takes in life... in Japan,
they all end up at the same destination."
Sushi won truly hands up over curry.
So get ready you club scribes looking for new news about views. GAD will be hitting town this
year with some fundamental ideas about the strange beliefs of most folk, including the
editors and publishers of the blessed media. The problem being, how does a spiritually
committed soul square it with God and the advertisers by knowingly publishing the "Devil's
tongue" abroad? Make sure we get a fair press.
This writer has been chosen as the keynote speaker at GAD Congress '02 and I already know
what I'm going to say.
It's time for the human race to put religious ideas into hobby boxes, for optional use......
in private if possible. Time for a technologically and economically knit world to work more
within the physical expediencies of now, rather than the metaphysical dogmatism of eternity.
Japan makes for such a splendid role model. Its rapid leap into economic prominence over past
decades depended upon converting its national soul to Mammon and that's why it will prove a
perfect venue from where to disseminate GAD's future objectives.
Mammon is a highly polytheistic type of belief, with icons of labels and stickers attesting
the huge variety of devotees to its grand design; glass temples to prestigious gods are still
arising high above the Ginza, at which white-gloved ushers reverently open doors to the
worshippers.
There's never been any major domestic religious objections to Japan's act of modern devotion,
as so much of its rewards trickled back into sacred coffers as a time-honoured custom. The
security firms make a bundle at New Year by safely carting billions of pennies back to
heaven.. via the nearest bank.
Japan is where the Godless create the wealth for the Godly to enjoy as well. As perfect a
world as possible and I guess that's why I love living here.
GAD bless you all!
OLD DOGS BEG NEW TRICKS By Mike Jacobs 16/11/2001
"Anyone born today may well live until 130 and be productive until 110. By the next century,
people will easily live until 250, and further still, with constant cell rejuvenation become
virtually immortal." William Haseltine, Human Genome Sciences
Prescription for Life
One day last month, at the club, there were coincident press luncheons. The one giving pulpit
to yet another High Prophet of high profits enjoyed a resplendent turnout despite the lowly
repast. Whereas in the smaller room, a sextet of top anti-aging doctors promising " the true
dream of all mankind" had much sparser attendance.
Anything even remotely smacking of extending my mortal lodgings upon this misbegotten planet
is good news to me! The other news right now seems of more ways to rapidly shorten such.
Despite joshing from my loved ones and friends not to get too serious about things
lengthening my tenure in their lives, I attended the press luncheon, for me first and
readerships second.
Dr. Robert Goldman, the supremely fit chairman of the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine
assured us that the merging of current studies, genome insights and nanotechnology, in
alliance with common sense health habits, would make sure all us decaying folk may go on
consuming our dotage beyond any reasonable dreams... if the state welfare systems are still
able to shell out on longevity of claims. Young girls marrying rich 90-year olds may well
have to wait until their own middle ages to collect.
Ironically, the folk at the large press luncheon listening to the current economic woes
crumbling the pyramids of Mammon, missed out on the most profitable business story of the
century.
If ever there was a market waiting to explode and help the world economy back to a robust
performance, then selling longevity to the G7 nations must be the one. No-one, in their right
mind and with convertible assets, argues the price of extending a meaningful and pleasurable
existence. To be or not to be is never in question....the alternative is too dreadful to
contemplate, other than by mad princes or religious zealots.
And with China looming up fast as a population willing and able to shell out for dreams of
robust longevity, there will be much better times coming for Rhinos to play their horns and
for tigers to do same with their penises.
As in the natural order of all affairs, where there's money there's associated politics as
well and some doctors and their specialist institutions will be getting a bit miffed if the
claims of Goldman and his erstwhile colleagues come to mass fruition. The guys who earn
fortunes by scraping "fatty de grois" away from rich arteries will be scraping a living
elsewhere if Goldman has his way: "In the future, there'll be little difference between
today's fit 50-year-old and tomorrow's energetic 80-year-old." He notes the speed of growth
of this new medical field for changing the rate of aging of organic systems and recharging
the lagging ones that combines all the branches of medicine with pertinent claims;
'Prevention is better and less costly than cures' is the maxim, and that sounds just the
tonic to me.
But are the dreams of mankind really fit for natural consumption?, this writer asked,
considering that the constant regeneration of species to match an ever-changing environment
favours putting down old dogs in order to train puppies. Is it really healthy for mankind to
embark on such ventures of human vanity and hamper the very mechanism of evolution? Goldman
knew of such scientific and social issues and admitted: "With so many healthy older people
staying around there may well be friction with the young. It will be a problem for
considering seriously."
Medical knowledge has been doubling over recent spans of every 3-5 years and learning how to
lure the body away from decomposition now has researchers drooling in all major laboratories.
"It's good-bye to normal medicine" says Goldman. With new scanning skills, DNA chips, 21st
Century information and its technology, genome manipulation and the lack of need for stem
cells, "thinking out of the box" is the only way he feels.
A Mass Prescription
Fooling the body with chemical messengers, such as testosterone for the guys and oestrogen for
the gals, should allow them to enjoy their libidos for many more added decades with a regimen
of daily care. In fact, one doctor admitted to me afterwards, out of public earshot, that one
of the greatest anti-aging devices around is a strong sex drive; that's why rich old men
marry those beautiful young girls..... I imagine.
Personally speaking, the most effective remedy for anti-aging the good body of self is the
abundant sexual hormone stimulation of my reproductive works by the libido; a corporation to
which I'm devoted - including all its budding branches.
As a male factor given unto the production and distribution of the most imperative genetic
message in the universe, me!, keeping the manufacturing of product at full steam encourages
the maintenance systems to go flat out for constant mass production with just-in-time
deliveries. However, once the market declines in favour of newer models, over-inventory and
product stagnation depress the hormones and encourage the "factory" to put up the shutters,
thus conserving valuable environmental resources for the fitter models. Darwin would have it
no other way.... nor I.
As the sole member of my QC Circle , I think the best medicine to keep age away is sexual
stimulation and so do the advertising, fashion, cosmetics, aesthetic surgery, wedding,
pornographic and sex industries too. There is, however, one essential proviso to go;
listening to and helping out your life support mechanism to all its demands for top notch
fuel with unnecessary additives and the conscious aid to keep it fit.
Descartes, who shacked up with a young maiden, may have the last word on the subject: I think
and act like I'm young and therefore I am so.
Israel Only Looks Jewish by Mike Jacobs 3/6/2001
As a correspondent for affairs in Japan affecting Jews and the State of Israel, I'm often in
the same quandary as my colleagues when it comes to reporting on such events. What do I mean
when I write "Israelis" and what is the Jewish element? So when "Arab fights Jew" in the
Middle East, is it a conflict of monotheistic or territorial sovereignty?
A recent editorial in the august Japan Times showed such common media ignorance. The editor
was dismayed at the fact that Wagner is banned from public performance in Israel due to the
anti-Semitic values of the composer and the use of his music by the Nazis; making it
offensive to Jewish Holocaust sensitivity. The editor asked: "How can it (Israel) be both a
democracy and a Jewish state?" Apples and pears taste differently, even with intermingled
tree roots.
Israel is simply the land of the Israelis and acts as a homeland for world Jewry, or, if
necessary, hordes of atheistic Russian scientists, lost tribes from Africa and, like a
Japanese politician recently said at the club about Japan, delighted to offer life residence
to the huge capital inflows arriving with rich Jews.
The Jewish part, whatever that might mean, may well have been the founding principle of the
nation, just as the WASPs first-papered the modern United States, but this needs some
realistic appraisal . Having a nation of Jews called Israel has yet to find some current
meaning other than surviving as Jewish citizens at war with political neighbours.
Even if peace reigned tomorrow, serious intraracial fracas awaits between traditional ideas
and modern lives: Fundamentalism or traditional elitism, either Jewish or Islamic, fares
poorly in sound democracies. Meanwhile, the normal factions of any sophisticated and modern
nation are being strongly glued together by enemies out to destroy them all. Shaky coalitions
for governing give extremist minorities great clout in any land and Israel is like all
democracies in such respects, including Japan.
A few years back, I was invited by the Kyoto local government to lecture a large Japanese
audience about "something Jewish" and much of what I said then still rings true when trying
for any objectivity about Israeli or Jewish affairs.
The problem I presented was simple...... if I as a Jew had no idea what such a label means,
then what chance did they have? All the Jews and Israelis I know are as diverse to me in
their ways and opinions as any other major grouping of human beings, including club members
and my family in particular. As they say, put two Jews together and three arguments may
evolve.
There are far too many variations of physical characteristics, cultural differences,
spiritual beliefs and historical divisions for the Jews to produce a typical example
embodying their "race".
Other Jews can seem so different from me. When a short, fat rabbi with blue eyes and blonde
hair argues with a tall, thin black man about the finer points of Jewish Orthodox law or when
an Indian/Jewish businessman discusses the meaning of Jewish culture with an
Argentinean/Jewish cattle breeder, it becomes more and more difficult to reflect myself.
Having a big nose is not a reliable guide to being a Jew and neither is circumcision.
I don't believe in a God. Neither the one nor the many. I've no religious affiliation,
neither do I go to the temple or pray on Sabbaths or holy days. I don't follow the religious
dietary or social laws, nor do I follow special customs or belong to Jewish groups. I 'm not
a businessman, lawyer, doctor or an accountant, nor a financier, a dress manufacturer or a
merchant - and, I have no money!
And as for the Ten Commandments........!
So how can I be Jewish in any accepted sense or want to live in such a state devoted to its
principles. What!? Me give up bacon!?
If there's any clue as to what a Jew may be all about, then it has to be the ability to argue
as a means to refining "absolute" truths; both physical and metaphysical. After three
thousand years arguing about God's absolute word, so many variations have now evolved that
argument buzzes ceaselessly.
A couple of years back at a club press luncheon, I put this theory of Jewish argument to
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. He agreed: "Israel's survival is the same as in its ancient
past; the ability to ask and answer really big questions. We may have a small body, but we
also have a big head. Gone are the days of Zionist ideals for working the land alone. Working
with the mind is now the greatest source of economic wealth in the modern world." Perhaps
those absolutes of rabbinical argument can effect easy entry into post-industrial economies;
getting down to black and white does seem a precursor to any later digital confirmation.
Japan please take note!
A Sabra (A Jew born in the State of Israel) friend resident in Tokyo admits, confidentially,
that he has much more in common with his international friends than with the Israeli Jews.
"I'm not interested in Jewish things, only in enjoying my life as an Israeli and that means a
rule of democracy not theocracy."
As a journalist keen on facts, I checked at the "Democracy of Israel" embassy and was
informed that Wagner is persona "very" gratis with Israeli consumers. There are record stores
and sheet-music sellers only too happy to supply all demand for Wagner and small music groups
or private individuals can play what the Hell they want.
Israel is a political state and being Jewish is a personal state.....by my life already!
The Way of All Flesh by Mike Jacobs 3/6/2001
As a journalist and photographer, one of the greatest arrows in my professional quiver is
speedy reaction. So often, I just do things without thinking and, somehow, great results
occur with regularity. A hallmark I share with all the others in this trade who act first and
think later to beneficial effect.
As a young Flyweight, I was thrust into a boxing ring wherein full permission was given to an
aggressive opponent to smash his fists into my bloody head for a full nine minutes and crowds
of spectators yelled approval of such alarming events. Only a natural speed of reaction kept
my face unmarked and with my nose as a prime, large target, being quick on my toes was
essential.
Acting without thinking was well-suited to my military life and then followed me
professionally into the theatre, propelled my love life, cost money at poker and produced my
best works as an artist. So it's no wonder I've written extensively over the past couple of
decades about the martial arts in Japan, which seem to peak at the very same point of the
human potential for thinking about nothing.
One of the best reasons for coming to work in Japan for so many expats who make up a lot of
my news sources, is the chance to study and perhaps master the martial arts; getting a black
belt, not eye, is the desire of most.
For readers not too well-versed in submitting physical self for punishment ( mental self is
another tale) here is a succinct guide for those contemplating such esoteric deeds or just
spectating.
I guess, Buddha is the guy to really thank.
The slow, powerful journey of the martial arts took ages to cross Asia from their
sub-tropical origin in Kerala, Southern India. Two millennia ago, Kalarippayat, the earliest
recorded form of martial arts, using body and stick, gave the emerging Buddhist monks at that
time a "non-aggressive" way of defending their lives and meagre purses, while carrying their
teacher's message of non-violence; along with the correct mental and moral thinking plus
dedication to mastery of self.
On their eventual journeys across Asia, the monks defended themselves with those acquired and
further-refined fighting skills, impressing would-be bandits with physically disarming ways.
After centuries of gradual development, onto the Japanese islands and then, via Hollywood,
across the Pacific, various Buddhist factions and men of genius fashioned these defensive
arts into the many ethnic variations or schools of combat now globally franchised across the
entire human race. Even atheists confess to finding some spiritual enlightenment during a
speedy fracas.
The bottom line that joins all of them together is the human ability to discover within its
very own being the supreme forces governing all universal action; in other words, the
physical and the spiritual acting in singularity. That balance between mind and body was the
beginning point of all the classical forms which then evolved and are still to be found
around all the dojos or gymnasia where teachers hand on and off their secrets.
Recently, another martial arts disciple took stance in Tokyo, with a message from his own
teacher, when Mark Stewart, 47, arrived from his Boxer Rebellion Gym, downtown Los Angeles,
where he teaches the JKD style of Bruce Lee (Jeet Kune Do - The Way of the Intercepting Fist).
Stewart, who became one of the world's youngest 5th Dans in Okinawan karate and an
instructor in the Philippine style of Lucaylucay kali, now often returns to Asia to "drink
from the fount."
Teaching Asian students oriental skills developed on the US West Coast takes some chutzpah,
but that's the way Bruce Lee would have liked it Stewart says: "Martial arts are not really
sports - they're ways to develop a harmony between mental and physical efforts in bringing
body and mind into a single effective unit. Such things are within all humans. There are no
champions to emulate, only masters like Bruce Lee who teach."
An acknowledged master by the age of 21, Bruce Lee was stunning top karate competitors with
his innovative style of fighting. Clean, crisp, pragmatic blows geared to speed with no
wasted motion won the day against the more flamboyant styles. Stewart likens the JKD style of
fighting to: "Creating as large a sphere of action as possible by fencing with the hands and
boxing with the feet so that foes will keep their distance from an impenetrable ball of self."
Bruce Lee perfected a blend of three fighting styles which relied on speed and balanced
footwork; Chinese martial arts, boxing and fencing; speed of reflex and reaction combined
with agile footwork. The fencing lunge sending the outstretched fist to its fullest possible
extension, while at the same time being capable of instant pull back.
As for the spiritual or mental power that goes with the territory, there's an oscillating
point of energy balance between chaos and order around which perfect fluidity conducts fully
effective motion. At the exact centre of any sphere of action is complete stillness;
hurricanes and spinning tops as well and that's the point of "being" Stewart attempts to
attain in combat: "Such deep, inner calm is my strength that supports all action - hopefully
in my real life as well."
In martial arts there are three essentials, each as vital as the others. The body must
acquire strength, endurance and quick reflexes; mental processes need absolute concentration
and finally action must flow as near to "ki" as possible. "Ki" is the Japanese word ("Chi" in
Chinese) for the way that nature flows in perfect action, as with kittens playing, horses
running or bamboos dancing in the wind. It gets defined in Japan as "the breath of the
universe", which is also the same definition of the Latin word "spiritus".
As all of natural action was laid down long before language and thought, it's obvious that
thinking can only get in the way of unconscious reflexes and reactions. Stewart feels that
the big question still unanswered for him is whether the spiritual philosophy behind the
originating martial arts is his goal or the physical extremes of such ideas. He says both are
true manifestations of self.
Tiger Woods owes a lot of his success to Thai Buddhism and its associated teachings on how to
harness great human powers. He captured golfing's greatest secret by following the simple
Buddhist dictate of losing one's self through absolute concentration and letting the
unconscious take over all thinking and doing - the meditative state. Before Mark Stewart or
Tiger Woods undertake any bodily motion, their individual selves become still, silent and
amazed spectators at what their minds and bodies can do when left to own devices and genius.
But then, all that's just about par for any great sportsman showing championship skills and
for all other good artists as well.
Perhaps my ma was my first guru when she scolded me as a child for being thoughtless and
selfish. However, for martial arts, make that selfless.
Beauty can be Beast by Mike Jacobs
Under the influences of the muses, words are able to express the "beautiful" thoughts and
feelings of the human race to each other. Such overwhelming things are restructured for the
medium and hopefully reconstructed again to full splendour within the importer.... or so
reason would seem to rhyme.
But hang on a second there! Words are mere symbols or sounds, just like music, maths or
binary notation; the beauty of rain is better felt or heard rather than read about. The
inadequacy of words to express one's truest senses has been the plaintiff cry of all cultures
since human tongues first began to wag them.
Words can only approximate the metaphysical realms where beauty lies beyond all eyes of
hopeful beholders and way beyond the comprehension of Wittgenstein. Perhaps the worst word of
all for failing to deliver is beauty itself; it's completely meaningless and can only be
defined by even more meaningless words of aesthetic elegance, whatever that means. Yet, it
continues to be one of the most overused and misunderstood words around; almost as useless as
that "delicious" that comes from every mouth on television eating mundane food.
As a writer, I use that B word sparingly and to an extreme point, for in the right hands it
truly can become a word of beauty. As a kid, I was told that beauty is truth is love is God
and so on. I got the picture then, but I grew up. That logic no longer goes for me. Love and
God got chucked out on account that they were only supported by words; the stock-in-trade of
poets and clerics - and writers.
Truth/beauty still remain my eternal twins, just as those other heavenly twins do of
space/time, male/female, chaos/order and ad infinitum.
Beauty is obtained either as a highly desirable and ephemeral experience or a realised
concept. Usually the experience is repeatable upon demand, from beautiful prime steaks to a
harem of beauties; or the concept is empirical enough for permanence. The elegant beauty of
an art work or a mathematical idea should bring equal tears to the eyes of any scientific
beholder, besides the rest of us. For they both apparently present universally-held truths.
Large Hollywood tits are also truly beautiful for most of the globe's currencies, as much as
the talented legs of the top soccer players; even goals or Home Runs may be deemed beautiful.
Pain can also become beautiful when revealing truth through deed or word; just like a virgin
or freeing from ignorance.
Normally, beauty is a pretty relative idea; its quality usually leaves room for improvement.
Finding that peak of beauty which transcends all cultural norms is the force behind the Arts,
fashion, music and a whole lot of other shaking going on. "Ain't that the truth!" is the
hand-slapping gesture which also comes with "Man! That's beautiful!". The most beautiful
jokes are always very truthful and vice versa.
This writer discovered some real pointers to beauty/truth from only two gurus; one was my
maths teacher at 11 who made sure I realised that the incompleteness of pi was infinite and
the late Japanese ikebana artist Hiroshi Teshigahara who demonstrated such a thing for me
with a bamboo stave.
The fact that the very shape of the universe conformed to pi seemed absolutely bloody
beautiful then and ever since. Even Euclid, who knew all the angles, was able to theorise
about such matters. That infinite order produced the smallest possible surface for containing
the largest possible volume as a sphere. I guess that's why such perfect packaging, used from
singularities to soccer balls, also coincides with eyeballs, testicles, eggs, heads, cells,
atoms and just about anything at all in the heavens above and earth below.
The avant-garde, ikebana master, showing me shapes of space, selected a long, thin bamboo
stave and bade me be silent: "Listen well and you'll hear highest beauty escape. The secret
is to see her before she does." He took each end of the stave and bent it into a most elegant
arc, before freezing the action. The extremes of flexible tension showed him that bamboos not
only can hold much snow with such arcing, but also achieved his creative needs to express
beautiful shapes. The he increased tension beyond its ultimate curve and I heard the crack of
the bamboo splintering and understood; not unlike the beautiful pitch of an operatic note
peaking and decaying.
I discovered another variation of beauty/truth being a progression towards the absolute in a
1917 Punch magazine cartoon. It showed a young worried recruit complaining to an old sweat in
a trench as all exploded above. The sharp response from that older soldier has followed me
daily in my search for truth/beauty and just about any other hopeful pursuits: "Well! If yer
know of a better 'ole, then go to it mate!" Beautiful!!
Perhaps our problems with "beauty" are better expressed by the frog who was reputedly kissed
by a beautiful princess: "Yuch! She was big and white with warm lips and had a lot of hair
growing out of the top of her ugly head."
Better to do as old Plutarch suggested and blow out the candle so that all woman become
beautiful.
