Occupation Nation (movie review)

:: by B Media Collective ::

This is one of those edit/recombine jobs I used to dream about before the Web, when back in Jersey City at PWS 284 (what I called my personal workspace).

Download from sources, remix / value-add, and upload.  That's what people do.  That's what this movie does.

Today's video editing equipment makes that a lot easier.

Take a lot of Dominic's videos from the Laughing Horse collection, run them through a blender, and dollop in healthy doses of recent footage from the Occupy camps, and you've got a basic clay.  Shape it to tell more of a story, and you've got a movie.

That sounds really critical but I'm actually somewhat a fan of video collage, as a still life collage maker myself.  Fast cuts are OK with me.  I appreciate the bandwidth.  I recommend 2:01 to 4:01 as a great sampling, so reminiscent of a Rev. Billy video, I couldn't wait to show it to Melody (she'd missed the first 20 minutes at the opening showing -- a town meeting somewhere).

But it helps to already know a lot of history.  Same as when listening to Billy Joel's We Didn't Start the Fire.  In particular, it helps to know about the Spanish Civil War and the world wide movement to have more local control in the form of worker owned co-ops.

That might be called "communism" or "socialism" in some necks of the woods, but in Oregon we're more likely to think of Burley (no longer a co-op) and Tillamook.  Fascists in Europe moved quickly to put down the 99% in Spain (with Hemingway a witness) but Oregon is pretty far from fascist centers, including from WDC (somewhat strait-jacketed by looney tunes "corporate persons" in this chapter).

Also, the Bonus Army chapter:  there's some good archival footage here.  Again, Portland figures in, as OPDX Park was also the Bonus Army's staging ground (45:10 - 46:10).  Smedley "fighting Quaker" Butler was a hero both times.

JenQ, currently occupying mom's office (with permission -- Carol is away), gets to tell us what Food Not Bombs is doing in the early hours of OPDX (29:40 - 30:18).  Later, FNB moved to a separate tent in Beta Camp.

Lindsey, another housemate, sings Ya Gotta Have Coffee to the camera (53:38 - 53:51) during Occupy the Ports (the movie is chopped into segments).

Good job, B Movie Collective, getting a lot of the action into perspective, and in time for Spring of 2012.

My own work since Occupy has been working with teachers, other characters, on an Occupy STEM initiative, curriculum writing designed to shake more people out of complacency and/or apathy.

On the other hand, for newcomers, it's more about turning the page and moving on from the 1900s and its nightmares.

We don't want the 2000s to be colonized exclusively by those suffering from 1900s reflex-conditioning and/or PTSD.

Faster responders with more apropos reflexes, good intuitive sensibilities are in the pipeline, many of them recruited from Occupy camps and now on more global circuits, looking at lots of problem situations, reporting back to meetings e.g. at Pauling House or whatever.

Speaking of the Pauling House, good job Lew Scholl for rendering Julian's Alpha Helix for Google Earth.

Graywater LLC

Suffering from black & white views? 

Give us a call. 

We'll help you gain a more nuanced vision.

Experienced Graywater dude (note Princeton shirt, cuffka) discerns relevant factoids.

Hugo (movie review)

On Facebook I mentioned this movie was better than I'd expected.  However, going in, I had few expectations, other than I expected a 3D cartoon, like where you have to wear glasses (or glasses over glasses).

Hugo would probably be something cute, like a Lorax, I was thinking.  Surprise:  not a cartoon, or not really.

The idea that films are deliberately illusions (which they are), like stage magic, is very much a core theme.  We celebrate that history, its characters, the worlds we get (like this one).  The killjoys are the ones who bring in the reality of killing machines.

The film is about healing, people recovering from war in various ways, which just reminds us of how wounding the war was.  Like losing your father suddenly, your best friend.

Those who have it hard end up teaching about how hard it can be, sometimes unwittingly perpetuating the nightmare.

I was sure that was Ali G's voice -- it all of a sudden jumped out at me.  Yep, Sacha Baron Cohen.  His character would get the girl if only he had more compassion for the orphans he hunts.  "Why do adults like torturing children so much?" the movie keeps asking?

Hugo is something cute, a boy mainly, but with lots of surreal parts.

The world they inhabit is just like the movies.  The clock tower from within, looking out, is like Big Ben, taller than anything within the Paris landscape save the Eiffel Tower.  Within and without need not jibe in the movies, a house of mirrors.

I came into this film straight from fantasies about city bus systems, Trimet's trip planner (which I'd tweeted about).  We rode in on the Max train.

Minutes later I'm watching a pulsing set of city circuits, trains galore, plus there was something in the previews about trip displays.

"Look at that gear thing" she said pointing up at some Trimet infrastructure, where the train's wire gets pulled (in front of Finnegan's).  Walking back the other way, after the movie, she called it a premonition (is there a post-monition?).

Almost a lucid dream, with Henry Sessions smack in the middle of it, as we were leaving the theater.  So much thinner -- seemed surreal.  With entourage...  Yeah, we should catch up guy.

Martin Scorsese directs, Johnny Depp produces.  This is no small time film I discovered.  One of the masterpieces.  Works great in 3D.

These kinds of wonders get postponed, damaged, when war times begin.  WW1 hurt the movies, WW2 hurt TV.  No wonder the true moguls in these media prefer war's simulation to the real deal.

Killer meme viruses are bad for the entertainment industry, hurt the circus.  Hence all the antibodies, the stronger immune system, even funnier clowns.

She asked the bartender to switch to PBS.  Transportation networks again.  Illuminated cities.

Spring Cleaning

 :: Keith McHenry, co-founder of Food Not Bombs
at St. David of Wales kitchen ::

I have my appointment with Nikki again, same as three years ago, to sort out the tax situation.  I'm claiming 1099 income in 2011, which is a pleasant change from 2009, 2010 during which I racked up a deficit on my SBA loan (since repaid), doing the coffee shops circuit, roadshow stuff.

That was all at a loss, net negative (in the red).

I got Friendly with Food Not Bombs and we learned to live off what others would throw away.  We got by on no dish TV and very little heat, and will probably live longer and prosper more as a result.

Others had it much worse.

Anyway the neighbors have HD and we never unplugged from the Internet.  Tara got a good public school education, thanks to Mr. Nims, Gonzo, and many others, dedicated pros.  Go Cannibals.

April 9 was a red letter day in that I finally got to meet, cook and serve with Keith McHenry, cofounder of Food Not Bombs.

He grew up in the national park system, having been born on base in Germany (Weisbaden, where Reggie Hyde and his family were from -- friends in Rome down the street).  I'm not surprised he thinks and breathes Logistics and does it well (including big time during Katrina).

Keith's level of management skill has not gone unappreciated.  Some Peruvian group, with hazy ties to IBM, interviewed him for hours.

He's like that advanced CEO you read about in management school, who mingles freely on the line, yet has overview and organizational memory.  Yes, some FNB servings feature table clothes.  Yes, biodiesel has been in the pipeline.  Yes, he's been offered use of airplanes.  All things I'd wanted to know.

As a long time target of negative scuttlebutt campaigns, he's been more successful than most.  FNB still has a great reputation, because it's a great idea and intelligently designed.  People can see for themselves what goes on at all levels.  What's not to like?

As I said in our meeting (St. David of Wales) what other charitable activity allows really well off people to dive in and reap the same benefits (develop cooking skills, eat fresh vegan, work out, do cardio, meet cool people, practice self organization) on an equal footing?

A community gets created where the 1% don't feel demonized, and the 99% don't feel they're being controlled.  The operations are quite transparent.  Rescuing perfectly good food from the compost compressors and taking joy in its preparation and sharing, with due attention to issues of food safety and sanitation, is hardly a stupid thing to be doing.

Boosts IQ and EQ both.

Working with FNB reduces cognitive dissonance by up to 30%, studies have shown.  Walking your talk in a philanthropic endeavor is a privilege not a burden.  One nets rewards, such as even better ideas for how to do the work.

Keith says Donald Rumsfield's maintenance guy has been active in FNB, when not working on the bomb shelter.

Philosophical Investigations

Related:

Link from Sean's list
Philosophy of Mathematics
Re: Influences
More buried writings...

Study Hall

The Blue House is in full swing as a study hall again.

Melody just screened a documentary about the Stonewall Riots in New York.  I caught most of it. Satya was in the basement providing an audience for the solo musician, working to blast through 11 minutes of continuous keyboard with no errors.  She made very few.

Satya watched a few minutes of Stonewall then took off, continuing the journey home.  Alex's mom (ASSK) is much in the news today.  The captain called me about that from his boat.  Patrick sent me a link.

The musician and Melody have now gone off into Joseph Campbell territory (more DVDs) while I've returned to the back office to continue with my own studies.

Tara had a good experience at Earlham and will be sealing the enrollment.  She has state championships coming up this weekend, me a judge (though not in her events).

SMAD (Sunday Morning Adult Discussion) was led by Mendel this First Day.  He discussed Lookism, putting a negative spin on the term (he's a skilled public speaker).  The term was originally coined by fat people fighting back.

As one of the fatter guys in the room, I spun a positive counter, pointing out how early Quaker focus on plain dress, no cosmetics, no titles, was precisely a look and feel, sending a message through dress and so on.  To communicate by appearance, costume, dress, is efficient, not necessarily empty vanity.

I cycled between Meeting and the Blue House quite a few times, twice forgetting my camera.  I wanted to have pictures of Bob Smith, a long time family friend and pillar of Multnomah Meeting, in my Photostream.  I have this practice of taking pictures of pictures at memorial services, been doing it for years.  Birthdays too of course.

Some of my conversations were on PHYSLRNR today, another listserv archiving at the University of Buffalo.  I say "another" because that institution pulled the plug on our GEODESIC after all those years, meaning some of my old hyperlinks are now just dead ends.  Such is life in the Wild West of the Internet.

Will I need to get a Kindle after all?  I'm tempted, knowing there's something on Python decorators I might read.

Probably some of my best writings today had to do with influences, though thanks to a crossed wire (as we say in neuroscience) I had Conway confused with Coxeter in one post.  I managed to patch that up, and still be happy enough with the posting.

I'm suggesting we all do more to map ourselves against a backdrop.  Construct your model of history and then fit yourself into it.  Make this a front burner project.  You have a role, and not just if you're a president.

Friday night I rode the bike to 23rd and Alberta and back to celebrate a birthday. After meeting on Sunday I rode 20 miles on EmoKid.  Tonight I bicycled to Food Not Bombs (hi Tre).  These are gestures suggesting I'm hoping to get in better shape for the spring and summer.  This is an established pattern with me.

The more programmed ordeals that would result in stronger skill building will have to wait a little more.

The "off your duff" curriculum is still unrolling (scrolling) and is in the early stages.  "Girl scout math" (as I call it in shorthand) features these Tarzania types I specialize in recruiting, doing all these "tom boy" activities.  They're civilians in my scripts, perhaps training to become doctors without borders.

Kids drawing programs (sketching themes):  tail fins for airplanes for organizations you think might need them (including new ones you invent); the museum / memorial grounds at Gitmo (use Google Earth to get some views) in light of plans to close it.

Stonewall was a Mafia bar in Greenwich Village NYC (one of several) that permitted people to be openly affectionate (slow dancing OK) with members of the same sex.  The police were always raiding the place.  Even cross-dressing was a crime.  During several days of uprisings, several corners were turned.

Talking heads included former Mayor Koch and NYPD as well as bar goers from that time.

Wanderers: Equinox 2012

We enjoyed another free ranging, somewhat informal retreat this equinox.  We included some new faces and noticed absences.

Some, such as Lindsey, made only brief appearances, flitting through.

Patrick brought his boy Spencer, our youngest.

We had three accomplished guitarists.

My own experienced encompassed Blue House happenings and the fact that Tara was at "nat quals" seeing if she could qualify for the NFL championship.  She was undefeated.  She managed to join us on the final day, for a discussion of snake species, their habits and splendors.

Axolotls and salamanders also featured.

Glenn's pad was a part of it too, a source of scholarship and a place to catch up.

Nirel has been enterprising with her Cuffka line, building equipment, inventory and skills.  She has maximized use of her digs.  Her practice is high level.  She is one of my teachers.

We had a visitor at New Zealand at Blue House, who accompanied Melody to an Alice in Wonderland party.

Terry joined us on the Saturday morning walk to the top of Mt. Tabor.

Gus from Silverton shared flyers for his upcoming talk on April 24 regarding Homer Davenport, the famous political cartoonist and Arabian horse afficionado.

We had the projector set up and watched quite a few Youtubes, other videos.

Lew Scholl shared pictures from his trips to Peru, and to Nicaragua as a part of Multnomah Meeting's delegation.

Considering Nomenclature

A respected member of Multnomah Friends has requested that we change the name of Oversight Committee on the premise that it's deeply offensive to some people who harbor memories of slavery.  Plus there's a question of whether slavery ever went away, including in this country, or just went into prisons and/or became wage slavery in other forms.

In comparing notes with some UK citizens last night, we agreed that "oversight" and "overseer" contain different connotations and moods.  The east coast Quakers have used "overseer" more and many have already retreated from that use.  I think marrying "overseer" with "tryant" makes some sense, as per the paragraph below which I sent out from the Blue House recently:

In particular, the fact that many have championed the cause of freedom against coercive overseers who would impress slave-draftees into military service, is a source of hope in many chapters.  Relatively recently, Muhammad Ali stood up against overseers of the Vietnam War and served as a role model for a growing underground of anti-war youth who are clearly not cowards nor afraid of a good / fair fight.  Islam put a damper on the lust for war then, as did Buddhism-Hinduism through The Beatles.  There's a rush to war again, with many of the same voices that encouraged a pre-emptive attack on Iraq again at the forefront.   

"Oversight", on the other hand, is maybe something we don't have enough of, although it's also a pun or double edged word, like "sanctions" (which means "punishes" and "permits").  An "oversight" is something missed, sometimes leading to hurt feelings, as the connotation is "out of negligence".  Should we call it "the Negligence Committee"?  Some Friends skeptical of the committee's performance might consider this ironically honest.

Yes, there's a sense of hierarchy or topography in the word, in the sense of some committees providing more overview.  Would "the Overview Committee" sound less like it's about holding slaves?

However the important point to make here is that Friends are expected to rotate through these committees, more like going from ride to ride at the carnival.  Sometimes you ride the Ferris wheel, a nice sedate image of what Oversight may be like (another image is "roller coaster").

I'm inclined to hold on to "Oversight" for backward (and forward) compatibility while meanwhile continuing to chip away at the whole concept of "race", which is 98% pseudo-science with an ugly past.  A racist is anyone who believes in races, which would be most USAers at this point -- an especially ignorant demographic in light of all the facilities they're privileged to have.  In terms of ratios, we're looking at a far from equilibrium biological phenomenon, likely to alter state in dynamical ways (chaos is like that).

I'm also against circulating this comforting myth that slavery has gone away, as if Quakers were really finished with their underground railroad business.

In terms of people taking offense, this is part of the new diplomacy where Diversity is concerned.  Those harboring some guilt complex are likely to find a shoe that fits in such an atmosphere, and begin issuing apologies on behalf not just of themselves, but on behalf of others as well.

What's true about guilt complexes is they often seek to involve others i.e. once one decides to fight a crime one sees oneself as guilty of committing, there's a tendency to not want others to "still get away with it". This is why the guilty tend to turn against their former friends and then run in packs, often whipped on by spin doctors (a kind of overseer) in the background.

Beware of the guilty, as they tend to attack in hoards from hidden positions -- like those rogue uber-coward drone people, who claim allegiance to a bankrupt nation kept on life support by their Beltway Junta.  They wrap themselves in the flag of "we the people" while confessing to and/or committing war crimes.  They carry brief cases to work and frequent think tanks.  Washington DC is full of these creatures, many of whom stalk the halls of government, imagining their own legitimacy, feeling entitled in some way.

I'm glad Quakers are having this nomenclature discussion, which has spread across several Yearly Meetings by this time.  The debate will impact the membership discussion as well, as some meetings have turned their Oversight Committees into Member Care committees, trading overview and integrity for a sickly cliquishness.  This is not a time to take the continuance of liberal Friends for granted.

Pi Day 2012

I didn't do anything special around Pi Day this year.  However I did mention the University of Havana's role in one of my meetings with a Pycon delegate.  cu.pycon.org is not yet spoken for, but I know Python is being used there.  With the liberalization of the Internet (thanks in large degree to software libre), come new freedoms for its user-developers.

St. Patrick's Day is coming up and the bloggers are making their usual point that Ireland didn't have snakes since at least the last ice age, and therefore St. Patrick's famous feat of ridding said island of snakes is at best a figurative accomplishment -- some say the Celtic druids are what the snakes symbolize.

March 17 is also when Dawn died.  We had a dinner in her honor a couple nights ago, near the Unity and Friends establishments -- with a focus on Unity's outdoor labyrinth (we didn't walk it, but we all were aware of it).

Might some readers of the Book of Genesis and the Garden of Eden story think this logo is offensive?  I plucked it from a web site in India, where snakes are associated with wisdom, perhaps going back to Chinese dragon iconography.

The positive spin on snakes remains in the caduceus in Greco-Roman cultures, and as Athena's familiar.  But then some Christians tend to demonize Athena as a version of Eve, whom they consider somehow a cause of Man's downfall.


That's a blame-based interpretation of the Bible my version of Quakerism would not subscribe to, but this doesn't keep people from seeing West Point as some kind of Eve-centric cult (because of all the Athena motifs).

I find it natural, as many do, to associate the circle (back to pi day) with the image of a snake eating its own tail, the Uroboros.  This may also be taken as a symbol of the eternal return or eternal spiral.  These are not new ideas.

Pycon 2012 in Pictures

Music as Water

"Music like water" will be a paraphrase of David Bowie, with a screen shot in my slides.  That was from my Spotify meeting.  Tara and her peers appreciate what this company is doing.  It all started in Sweden, with a couple of friends wanting to stream music at a private birthday party.

Echoing Graham's talk:  what's "property" is fluid.  On Luna ("Luna Park" -- our moon), they'd sell you the smells of Planet Earth, but we get those for free here (duh) -- or used to.  I've not seen the biosphere without its layer of human industrial gases at any time during this trip.

That we've morphed the planet, beyond all recognition, like a Borg, is not debatable, whether the "climate" (chuckle, what's that?) has changed or not.

I'm in the chairman's suite at the moment, having just met Julie in-the-real for the first time.  I'm seeing light at the end of the tunnel with my queues.  This was not a paid-by-work conference.  I have only Ewa to thank for the promo, and Steve.

Would I have been here otherwise?  Maybe.  Parallel Universe talk, best to leave it alone ("other tomorrow" -- hello Trevor Blake).

What I saw today:  the guy who invented Selenium is well on his way to having a "magic fingers" with eyes, that tipples through your phone apps looking for bugs.  He controlled it with Python, as it played Angry Birds on his tablet and managed a decent (I thought -- not being a player) score.

As I was explaining to some of my colleagues, I'm busy losing my virginity in several dimensions here, such as in letting my Droid scan some garbage that led it to eat a 4.5MB application.  eXistenZ again.

A high point today:  I grabbed the mic after an ESRI guy called the Fuller Projection crazy.  This was after lots of reminders that the Mercator is nuts.  We had a jovial exchange.  He politely paused while I took a picture (ESRI has the Fuller Projection as an option), saying I'd put it on Facebook & Twitter (which is true).  Julie Steele (O'Reilly) tweeted the buzz, which I retweeted.

Congrats to Carl Trachte for the Community Award this morning, presented in absentia.

I'm pleased with the new Nikon Coolpix S8200.  It has a lot of built in intelligence, and as a guy with bags, swag, on the move, huffing / puffing, there's not all that slow motion time to set up a shot, use the gauges.  The approximations taken by the on-board algorithms seem pretty on target.  See what you think.

Work in the Service Industry

I admire the professionalism of the personnel and the high living standards to which I am treated, and not because I am royalty or especially entitled.  I'm just another paying customer taking care of business.

Glenn and I parted, talking global climate change and solar flares, as I boarded the 75 at Chavez & Hawthorne for Hollywood Transit Center and thence to the airport.  However, having watched eXistenZ again (movie night) I had lost a battle with my cell phone charger (I no longer saw it as being the right one) and left the Blue House with a dead Droid.

So instead of riding to the airport I jumped off in this new Mall City for some low density strategic shopping, Rev. Billy a role model, like when he buys that sweater, suits him.  No crushing through the doors in a panic for some stupid "deal".

I picked up a high zoom high megapixel camera, more later, and a new charger with built in buffer / battery for the Droid.  Got back on the next Max and resumed the trip.

I worked through a lot of my queue in Sacramento but still have a ways to go tonight.  I wanted to meet some of the Python MVPs, both on the ground floor and in Steve's suite.  I was not disappointed.

All in all, I have nothing to complain about at the moment.  As I reminisced with Steve, even though I've traveled a lot, it was under the aegis of my parents, my dad the trip planner in particular, and he was quite the smooth operator.  I was openly critical, but also admiring.  He knew his stuff.  We were the people to share it with him.

I feel I'm more disorganized and hit the TSA station like a cloud of loosely connected particles.  This guy came up to me with my postage stamps that had dropped.  I'd leaked coins as well.  A team helps me win.  Alaska Airlines still gives complementary wine on these short hops.  A high culture.

What do Pythonistas talk about at gatherings such as this, informally?  Just like everyone, we compare notes about life's journey and children are a big part of that.  We talk a lot about children, about parenting.

Not that I talk all that much.  I toted Naga this whole way, our PSF totem.  I have this newly embossed bag, done in Florida, with the stuffed / toy python inside.  Quite light and airy.  I also checked one bag for $20, well worth doing.  Again, the service has been excellent.  Alaska Airlines, the various airports, the drivers, the people helping me at the Verizon (charger) and Best Buy (camera).

My blog post on Pycon for the O'Reilly site is worth a link here.  Grandma and Grandpa O'Reilley would be amused and I think happy enough with this new incarnation.  The potato famine came up recently, where was that?  Tom's relatives came over as a result of that, or so goes the family story.

I brought (Over)interpreting Wittgenstein again, like on the trip to Philadelphia.  This book might actually pass for an anthropology of philosophy in some ways, and when I encountered has passages paying respect to Clifford Geertz, an anthropologist, I felt some happiness.  Wittgenstein and Geertz were both my heroes but I'd either forgotten or never known how much Geertz in turn admired Wittgenstein, took his thinking to heart in crafting his own style of rendering "thick description".

My Invisibile Landscapes series says "Hello Clifford Geertz" in one part, and was written closer to that time.

I consider myself to be in the service industry as well.  I work long hours, if odd ones.

Quakers and Nationalism

The AFSC has clearly bought into the nationalist model for organizing human affairs.  This has much to do with its history with the UN and the legacy of the 113 history of the British Empire, which gave rise to nationalism in its modern from.  Gandhi was a nationalist.  The split of India and Pakistan into separate nations, largely along religious lines, demonstrates the consequences of nationalism.  Now these are both nuclear weapons states, which would have upset Gandhi greatly.

Albert Einstein was more skeptical of nationalist programming.  He'd lived through the rise of German nationalism and saw how the Third Reich manipulated people into responding viscerally and emotionally to its symbols.  Humans are designed to process symbolically and to channel the archetypes by this means.  If an alchemy goes awry, the consequences may be deadly.  Ideologies channel energy and drive behavior.  If they're out of sync with the Holy Spirit or Noosphere (as some call it), nightmare scenarios may ensue.

Will humans a thousand years from now, a hundred years from now, look back on our 190+ national sovereignties as a passing phase / stage in evolutionary development?  A lot of us hope so.  However the picture is more nuanced in that one may conceptualize in terms of nations at the same time as one looks at other organs of governance on other levels.  As people continually point out these days, many a corporation has assets and annual budget exceeding those of some smaller states.  The 190+ states already share the stage with a number of other actors, including the world religions, with their own capitals such as the Vatican and Mecca.

Some people talk about Friends Center as the Quaker Vatican.  I like this nickname because it reminds us of non-national governance structures that have a global aspect.  Quakers need not be nationalist, anymore than they need brand themselves "Christian".  Like nations, religions are long-running PR campaigns, memeplexes, designed to manage human emotions and marshal behavior.

I'm interested in working with Quakers who are distancing themselves from Christianity partly because the Christian brand has lost so much of its luster in its service to nationalism and the goals of Manifest Destiny.  The institution of Pope, based in Rome, inherits from the position of Roman Emperor with the title of Caesar (Czar).

Christianity has worked hand-in-glove with imperial powers, of necessity, and absorbed much of the apparatus of nationalism.  To question the efficacy of nations, of dividing the world into a jigsaw puzzle of "nation states" is to think "outside the box" where many Christians are concerned.  It's taken for granted, to the extent that its resultant ills and pathologies are overlooked.  "Could the whole concept of 'nations' be sinful and against God's will?" -- that's not a question that gets asked much.

Moving away from nationalism does not mean strictly avoiding its core concepts ("when in Rome...") but it does mean brainstorming ways to reduce its influence.

Using world maps and globes that show no nations, or do so optionally as an overlay, is one aspect of the youth programs some Quakers have been working on.  Our Multnomah Monthly Meeting has a Fuller Projection in the childrens classroom.

Adult Quakers may have interest groups wherein a future without nation-states is contemplated, along with the question "how do we get there from here?".

Does this de-emphasis on the importance of nations put some Friends in conflict with the AFSC and its overtly nationalist programming?  Do we side with the AFSC and it's proposed "two state solution" for the Israel-Palestine conflict, or with Rabbi Lerner and his vision of a "no state solution"?  Clearly I'm more biased towards the latter solution, as are many religious leaders.  The nation-state "system" is too broken and psychologically immature for the long haul.  Humans will eventually outgrow it.

Corporation Meeting

:: Trip to AFSC / Philly ::

So here I am in Philadelphia at the annual corporation meeting.  I'm representing North Pacific Yearly Meeting. I also have long experience with the local (Portland) AFSC office, though not so much in recent chapters.

I was wondering if Hugh Thomforde would be here again this year.  He showed up just now at breakfast.  We did some catching up.  Hugh and I were part of the small clique of Quakers that met in Rome, Italy in the 1960s.  His dad worked for the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO).  Now he lives in Arkansas.

Last year, we had a timeline about the AFSC around the breakfast room.  This year it's The Faces of Occupy.  Philadelphia's camp was right nearby and used the Friends building for bathrooms and a kitchen.  Hugh says Little Rock still has its camp going.  I showed him some pictures of from Occupy Portland on the Mac Air.  Then we moved in to Meeting for Worship.

Mom and I met at the Philadelphia airport last night and had a small meal of mussels and crab soup. This was behind the security line, so mom's carry-on, which US Airways had wanted to check, went ahead to the baggage claim area.  Recovering it from the office, where they said it would be, took some fussing, but it all worked out.

AFSC is a Quaker meme pool and switchboard, one might say.  It rises to the occasion.

Does this corporation have corporate personhood?  US law currently says it does, but Quakers have a history of considering lawyers and the law behind the times (look at immigration law), mired in superstition and obsolete thinking.  That's a perk of having a religion based on continuing revelation I suppose.  This is how new rules come about.

The AFSC has the word "American" as a first word, which suggests "America" has some role to play in Friends service.  In the obsolete world order, Americans saw themselves as helping the world be a better place.  These days, more of Friends' work is about educating Americans to be less destructive in the world.  As civilizations go, many of the North American ones are turning out to be quite militaristic and therefore frustrating and debilitating to many peoples around the world.

People "look up to" Americans a lot less than they did when the AFSC was first founded.  Working in a world that demonizes / vilifies Americans (USAers call themselves Americans) is more challenging in some ways.  As we move towards a Global University aesthetic, we learn to accommodate these twists and turns, to stay effective.

Mostly the AFSC needs to focus on its North American regions, of which there are four.  The rest of the world will be better off to the extent that Americans get their act together and stop being a drain on the world economy.  Helping peoples to avoid coming under the jurisdiction of American laws and lawyers is a worthy objective (remember the Bremer Edicts?). Many of their ideas regarding intellectual property, corporate personhood etc. are not conducive to human / humane development.

Importing better ideas from elsewhere is a top AFSC priority the way I see it, especially where alternatives to violence are concerned.  Occupy is one of those imports, to which USAers have added their spin (each city in a different way).  The idea that the USA has something valuable to offer is more back burner these days -- it does, but mostly USAers need to do their homework.

Friends are not uniform in their practices and expressions of belief.  The AFSC gets caught in the middle sometimes, as Friends project their fears and worries about one another's lineage onto their various agencies.  Many Friends have distanced themselves from the AFSC even as they have distanced themselves from other Friends.  This is not unusual for a religious tradition:  it forks and branches, not unlike software projects on Github or whatever.  Such is life in the big city.

Forest Grove

I'm with Dr. Nick Consoletti at Grand Lodge in Forest Grove.  We drove through a lot of Intel territory getting here.  Now we're both on the wifi, catching up, a working breakfast.  I Facebooked about some of it.  Medard has a blog.  Myopia versus Utopia is one of the posts.  Picture of Kenneth from 1959.  Lots of news from Synergeo, which I haven't been monitoring, having switched over to Koski's list for the most part.

I need to forward Tre's request to the Clerk, that MMM fund at least a portion of his budget for getting into the voter's pamphlet as OPDX mayor.  I use OPDX and PDX somewhat synonymously in this context, as the latter is the embodiment of the former.

In calling it the Blue Tent, I'm calling attention to the earlier Westward Ho! type would-be occupiers who made it this far.  They tended to be tough and self reliant, but also more tolerant and welcoming of other peoples, having suffered so much just to get here.

That accounts for some of our cosmopolitan ethics -- another New Amsterdam (unlikely to succumb to the Yorker types this time).  Friends have some of that anarchic flavor that Occupy Portland had going, with long experience at self administering, both regionally (NPYM) and globally (FWCC).

Alex and I had a wifi work meeting recently, both plying our respective tracks.  He was more into hardcopy actually.  That's when I forgot to mention about Tintin.  You might find Bader at such a meeting, if not away.  I'm still just learning how to use the new Air.  Costco after this, as Blue Tent needs restocking.

Sarah-the-dog had a play date with Sarah-the-corgi yesterday.  Walker has taken to walking Sarah and she's always welcome where Portland Energy Strategies is concerned (her anti-consumer based ethics, similar to Reverend Billy's, are fascinating to psychometricians, especially in Japan where the trend may be even more pronounced).

Ecovillages frequented by FNB style "girl scouts" will need to be tight ship operations to satisfy their owner-operators. I can well imagine more wasteful, less disciplined bases, such as the US Army might administer, coming under fire for their less-with-more waste stream.  Documentary film crews might compare them, in terms of training provided.

Alternatives to Violence and PBI have much in common, as does the Amnesty International approach to preventative protection (don't wait for a tyranny to over-reach, move in early).  Our ecovillage school campuses, in being safe for diplomats' kids, also serve as channels of communication between estranged regions.  The situation might involve Ireland, or Utah.  Anna from Alaska on the Droid.

I just pre-ordered Edward Popko's new The Divided Spheres, in early draft of which I scanned in Magnus Wenninger's office.  He wrote back appreciatively, reminded me I'm in the book.

If your kid is Palestinian and needs a family visit, the bases network might be pressed into service on your behalf.  Stay close to the tarmac and don't tell the locals you're fomenting a family reunion.  Medical leave is an important aspect of serving one's community, including one's nation-state if that's the duty one signed up for.

Tonight is the Academy Awards.  I may find a screen somewhere.  Maureen wanted me to see The Artist today, but she didn't know about the ODEC training.  Good hanging with Bunce & Co. last night.  Lots of movie and TV talk.  Portland knows media, especially comics and animation (Dark Horse is here).  ToonTown, some call us.

Tintin's Great Adventure (movie review)

We didn't make it to a 3D rendering, all the better to compare apples to apples, when thinking of other illumined worlds (anime).  The movie asks, right from the top:  how do you like my Tintin?

Then the movie really shows off:  look what it can do with light.  Mirrors, magnifying glasses.  Serious students of optics captured a lot of it in their mathematics, and it didn't all leak away.  We use it to computer generate and share what's in our imaginations, as well as to prescribe lenses for ourselves.

The movie (a snaking twisting scenario, always fast moving) makes fun of his signature tuft of hair.

We get used to the character, comparing it with our memories of the comic book if we have any.

I do have such memories, as I'd poured over Tintin as I had Mad Magazine and many others.  Nestro made a deep impression as the butler.  Shades of Batman.

This new ability to animate worlds, based on characters developed by artists past, is a stellar direction in which to be pioneering.  There in The Avalon, I was seeing the state of the art unfold.  A couple o' geezers (as Jane Snyder calls us) in future-ville.

Then we played retro games.

I got the biggest kick out of being a long haul North American trucker, from a Japanese point of view (some of those trucks you just wouldn't see on a standard stint).

Captain Haddock was formative in my characterization of Captain Wardwell, and that forced me to keep looking at Tintin and deciding what I didn't like about him.  He's eerily action-oriented, this guy, in hot pursuit of his story. He's a story chaser, that's his raison d'etre.

One can't dispute he's good at his job, so he wins high marks for professionalism, if that's really what a journalist is.

One never reads what he writes for the newspaper.  They haven't invented TV yet, in that world.  He's like one of the first one-named celebrities, like Madonna, like Prince.  Everyone knows him, they say, in his home town.

Tintin reminds me of this girl Sintel in the Blender anime -- very single minded and agile in pursuit of goals.  Now that's giving him a lot of credit, more than I usually do.  Credit Spielberg and his crew.

Anyway, I'll be curious to check this out in 3D someday maybe.  Alex, you've gotta see this.  Avalon flashes by in the opening credits of Portlandia.  Consider it a tourist destination if from out of town and doing the off-beat "real Portland" tour.  Go at night, foggy is best, and savor the outdoor lighting.

State of Society

The practice in many branches of the Religious Society of Friends is to reflect on the spiritual health and/or unhealthiness of the meeting and capture some of the tensions, joys, anticipations, in the form of a write-up called the State of the Society report.

You can see where the US Americans might have copied, with their SOTU et al, or maybe we got it from the Iroquois originally, I don't remember.

After several hours of intense discussion, I released myself to walk down the street to inquire about San Miguel beer, a beverage from my young adulthood not often consumed in these parts.  Lo and behold, they had some, so I took it to Steve's place, where he was doing his usual international Skyping and guitar strumming (good to be home again -- he's been away in Minneapolis).

I've got a drive out the gorge tonight, further than Hood River, to fetch some young Quakers and return them to Portland safely.  I need to get out my maps and plot a course.

What we discussed is confidential for now, but of course we surveyed the timeline, pointed to various events.  The delegation to Nicaragua was important, as was our involvement with the Occupy movement.  We're also looking at many recent deaths and memorials.

This is an occasion for Worship and Ministry, and the Committee on Oversight, to get together and compare notes.  The annual joint meeting is written into the script, as is so much of our yearly routine.  We call ourselves "unprogrammed Friends" but of course that's a relative term.  We're all running programs, says the engineer within (who has truth within too).

Friends up here always ask for news from Whittier.  We keep tabs on one another that way.

Touchdown

This touchdown was in contrast to fumbling the ball last time, and forgetting my appointment to present at 3Ms, our noon time potluck for MMM oldsters, mostly (MMM being Multnomah Monthly Meeting).

I'm an oldster now myself, so this was also a welcoming.

A lot of us there went back a long ways, to being almost babies together:  Linda Holling, Lael Pinney -- these were my contemporaries, and long time no see.

Bob Smith was already an adult when I was a baby, and he was there too.

:: fuller, me, overlap ::

I'd listed my talk on the backs of five envelopes, an ironic gesture to a cultural meme (we're supposed to brainstorm on napkins more than envelopes, Kehrnan signaled his agreement).

Envelope One was about me, the inveterate browser, anticipating hypertext.  I loved Princeton's open stack libraries.  Those international schools left their stamp on my character as well.

The next envelope was about Fuller, the New Englander, expelled from Harvard, loving the Navy, going broke, getting better, the inveterate counter-culture contrarian.

Our overlap (next envelope), and the people I've met as a consequence:  Applewhite, Snelson, Koski, Chu, Kasman, DeVarco, Lanahan... Trevor.  A great ride.

Then looking ahead, how I brand a kind of Transcendentalist / Tantric blend, using LCDs with reveries (as in hypertoons).

:: recap, on ahead ::

We were moving in to Q&A.

Marion asked about shelter, Lew about buckyballs... lots of good segues.  About 25 - 30 of us.

I had lots of books, toys, artifacts, Barrel Tower (also the major Snelson retrospective in my collection).

Marty was there, knows a lot about transcendentalists I'm pretty sure.

A great group to be listening.  I'd packed 'em in, thanks to Sonya, various announcements.

I fumbled later though, in that I got Tara to her driver's ed session on time, but then she left her permit in the car, which I drove off to a wifi spot to work for two hours.

If I'd only heard my phone or checked my personal email (reasonable expectations) I'd have been able to get the permit to her in time.  As it was, she missed getting to drive.

I'd been scheduled to clerk Oversight that night and had made arrangements with Betsey to be late, but to be late on top of having botched the mission (ostensibly) left me a bit stressed, bent out of shape.

I raged at the fact that I couldn't see house numbers on a dark street in North Portland (looking for the meeting in a neighborhood I've never visited).  Never mind the satellite informed GPS device in my pocket, with illuminated maps -- I was too busy being a victim to actually use my tools effectively.

Still, a good day all in all.

I had another dinner with Alex, first in awhile.  He's been meditating up a storm, making use of some of the professional Zen facilities in the region.  The Pacific Northwest is a Buddhist nirvana -- even better if you like beer.

Calendar Dates

No NFL for me this season, as in football, not forensics league.  Athletes in the latter guild I salute as "second to none" in my pro-student rant on Math Forum today, taking issue with some LA Times journalism.  Just another citizen, sounding off.

Sampling the Python buzz, if pycon.org.ir wants a pointer from ir.pycon.org, all they need do is ask.  I've been informing PSF about some of my ventures, both in trucking and no-fast-food.  us.pycon is sold out by the way. I got in under the wire with a promo.  I've paid full price for van / hotel.  This will be your typical Silicon Valley sojourn.  I haven't attended a Pycon since Chicago.  I'll be in Philly the week before.

We'll probably do movie night again at Blue House.  Melody has a sequel to Yes Men I didn't know about.  The DVD on Reverend Billy was truly eloquent and I sung his praises on WikiEducator.

Pycon, for those who don't know, is a brand of Python circus or conference, pioneered by Steve Holden, the current PSF chairman.

I started attending Pycons in Washington, DC, at George Washington University.  You'll find quite a few blog posts from those.  One year, a Pycon was just starting when I found out my wife had cancer and I flew home immediately.  She joined me for the next one.  We commemorated her death after the first in Chicago, with me and the two girls driving all night from O'Hare to Indiana, Pennsylvania.  I missed the two in Atlanta.

OSCON is also rolling around again and I've been reviewing talks.  Really high caliber stuff.  I'm looking forward to again joining.  Will I make the one in Newark?  I have to ask about the next staff meeting, and whether there's a conflict (I'll do that on Facebook).

:: storyboarding new infrastructure ::

Synergetic Democracy

We may not think of ant colonies as democratic.  We've decided they have "a queen" in some cases and that colors everything.  A Bugs Life captures a consciousness.  Ants live in monarchies.

Of course that's a rather irrational chain of "reasoning", somewhat of the kind Danny Oppenheimer says you'll find if you pull any "ant" aside (say an undergrad at Princeton) and send him through Danny's lab at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public Affairs.

What you'll find are things like:  if the subject / ant / village idiot sits in a chair that leans slightly to the right, literally, then their political views are measurably slanted the same way.  Flaming liberals tone it down and sound a tad more like William F. Buckley when right leaning.  Lots of silly circuits like that.  An ant is a primitive creature and mostly just says "duh" when asked to explain its reasoning.  Return it to the hive though, and the miracle of self organization continues to unfold.

I wasn't sure what I was getting into in going to this event, but sort of knew, because I'd been at this tap room at McTarnahan's (a HQS) for a similar Connie-organized Princeton Club of Oregon event some years back.  I'd replied some weeks prior that I'd be bringing one guest, not knowing whom that would be.  When push came to shove I decided to try Facebook, offering to pay the admit fee for whomsoever wanted to join me on short notice, just a few hours before showtime.

Buzz Hill stepped up to the plate.  He's an avid Facebook user and believes in the power of social media and networking tools to transform the ant colony.  He thinks humans are at their best in conversation, different from taking orders, engaging in transactions, or bombing one another.  The new media, like some of the old ones, are fostering transformative forms of interaction, especially in promoting conversations -- Buzz's brief.

Dr. Oppenheimer was right there in the middle of the room.  I introduced Buzz and myself as frequent attenders of meetings at the Linus Pauling House, with Linus Pauling being a proud son of Oregon and yadda yadda.  Danny's and Mike Edward's tome, and the event in general (an opportunity to hear about and buy a book) was taking me back to Mike Satin's presentation at Powell's on Hawthorne.  Had Danny ever heard of that book, I wanted to know.

Buzz and I drifted on back to the beers (he just had diet Coke) and I asked if his smart phone could get us to Satin's book on Amazon, so that when we drifted back to the author we could have a Part 2 discussion of book marketing and how it's smart to visit a few other book web pages when buying, as Amazon pays attention to that and alerts more browsers to the "also bought" option (might be Democracy Despite Itself, our focus this evening).

Danny thinks that even though the individual ants behave in irrational ways that key of metaphors and precessional cues, ala George Lakoff, there's still feedback and participation and the phenomenon of self organization.  Democracies are more robust regardless of how weakly the voting piece might be performing.  You could disconnect all the levers and just randomly toss people into office, but as long as the people felt some sense of responsibility, they would behave more as stakeholders, which means a "sense of the meeting" (Quaker talk) would guide them to support the colony in a push-come-to-shove world.

I bought the book, it's only the next morning so I won't claim to have read it yet.  I checked the index for Bucky Fuller and Ludwig Wittgenstein, something I almost always do for "sweep of history" kinds of books, plus the latter was a philosopher of language and I wondered if psychologists were picking up on that at all.

Couldn't there be some ants, seemingly even more irrational than average, that served as a source of cues.  I was thinking of so-called "opinion leaders" or "movers and shakers".  Danny claimed he used his powers as a psychologist only occasionally and in a benign manner, had only rarely been "tricky" in an almost magical way.  But not everyone has those scruples, or thinks exercising psy-powers is a bad thing.  They feel it's their way of contributing to a democracy -- thinking of spin doctors here, some better at it than others.

Connie said this was the 2nd best attended Club event ever.  My table mates were as one might expect for Princetonians and their others, well traveled and cognizant of world history.  We talked about Japanese prison camps and people we knew who'd been in them.  I mentioned knowing some Japanese with American prison camp experience as well.

The gentleman next to me had had a career in teaching at private secondary schools, ending up at Catlin Gabel.  We talked quite a bit about the Black Mountain contingent there among the faculty.  I'd joined that cabal on a couple of Thanksgivings having tracked them down through my study of Kenneth Snelson's work among others (some Freudian overlaps there).

A lot of memories came flooding back, which is part of the fun of conversation.

Joseph, who found my hat that time greeting me upon arrival, accepted my funds (these events just break even).  Since finding my hat (again missing) and realizing it was by Paul Kaufman, he had made contact with Paul, mentioned my name, and had a hat custom made.

Tim's mom Lori was there, from a class behind me.  Todd had mentioned she'd be there on Facebook, interleaving with Buzz and I on my wall / profile.

Dr. Oppenheimer didn't say a word about ants by the way, that was my resorting to metaphor, with the example of literal ants.  Vote for me.

:: from buzz's smart phone ::