Remembering Names

Flight 93 On Sept. 11, 2001, courageous passengers and crew on Flight 93 decided to sacrifice their lives in defense of their nation. The plane they were traveling on was infected by malignant terrorism. They fought back. They developed a plan and attacked the cancer. We honor their courageous citizenship. We know the names of…

| | | |

Retroactive Xenophobia

The Ten Commandments appear three times in the Bible. Each entry is different. The Jewish, Protestant and Roman Catholic versions of the Ten Commandments are similar but not identical. The precise intention of the original text was subject to interpretation as the sacred words of the Ten Commandments were translated into new languages and cultures….

| | |

Excerpts from The Federalist, No. 10 by James Madison (1787)

So Much Alarmed Among the numerous advantages promised by a well-constructed Union, none deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency to break and control the violence of faction.  The friend of popular governments never finds himself so much alarmed for their character and fate as when he contemplates their propensity to this dangerous…

| | |

Parenting Is Our First Line of Defense

Parenting is the most important responsibility shared by all humanity. Every people’s future is likely to be managed by their children. Parents have more impact on what’s in store for civilization than any other social cohort. Parents hold the long suit for advancing humankind. A thousand generations of passionate parenting hasn’t led to perfect people….

| |

Surprise

Nightmare of Devastating Surprise Embedded in Nature Think of civilization as a living treasury of self-protective culture and technology developed to avoid devastating surprise.  Civilization maintains early warning systems, sponsors safer building practices, encourages an educated citizenry, builds hospitals, signs treaties, and shares sacred covenants in part to protect against destructive surprise. The Most Devastating…

| | | |

Assembling Humanity’s History

So now we know that early humans bred with Neanderthals and Denisovans. We know this because genome sequences from these “evolutionary cousins” make up from 4% to 6% of the genomes of some humans. And we’ve recently learned that some of the genetic material introduced by this cross-breeding included an upgrade of our immune system’s…