Okay so Jesus...

Okay so Jesus was born during the Roman Empire and was subjected to persecution because He said God was mightier than the ruling Emperor - then, considered the ultimate blasphemy - and, therefore, punishable by death. 

 And so shit happened. But 300 years later with the decline of the Roman Empire, the most recent emperor Constantine saw the strategic importance of resurrecting Jesus to Divine status; so he reported he had seen a flaming sign on a cross (fraudulently?) proclaiming victory as he headed into battle, and thus he declared Christianity to be the sole legal religion in the newly-named Holy Roman Empire because he was "ordained by a vision". Too good to be true? 

 A couple of years later he hung his second wife and son from his first marriage when he found they were screwing behind his back. Not very Christian of him to kill his family, eh. Any hoot, over the next several centuries there followed a series of 'Ecumenical Councils', a fancy Christian term for 'changing the rules and moving the goalposts'. 

Generally, Christianity had moved underground by necessity through persecution (hence the symbolic fish painted over doors due to covert worshipping places) and had dissolved into a multitude of teachings.

 Bits of The Bible were chucked out and others brought in. There is even speculation/evidence of an early form of Christianity that accepts reincarnation as a valid doctrine! Even King James got in on the act and had an altered bible named after him (KJV, the official King James Version, for the Church of England). The height of the entire farce was when the Vatican approved the questionable practice of "Indulgences" whereby "sinners" could "atone" by paying (seriously!) a sum of money to the Holy Fucking Church thereby settling the moral debt. FFS! 

 Okay so then came the Age of Enlightenment, or the Renaissance, or the end of the Dark Ages, or whatever. Martin Luther (not the negro activist) got involved with the Gutenberg Press and organised a new printing of the Bible to be distributed everywhere. This is arguably the most important and first technological revolution that changed the modern world as we know it! 

 This really pissed off the clergy because prior to this, the only way laity (the common people) had access to scripture was through ordained Priests reading it aloud at congregation (bibles were hand-written and therefore scarce). This meant 'no need to congregate' which really pissed off the Church. 

 Power To The People!

 The protests that arose (and the book burning?) gave rise to the Protestant Movement. Derr. And Lutherans. And later Methodists. And yeah, you know the rest. Gone was Constantine and the Vatican's monopoly of Christianity. Next was evangelicals, pentecostals, mormons, adventists, born-again, you name it. Roman Catholics no longer had a monopoly on Christianity. Sure enough, just like Hinduism with its endless string of "avatars of Vishnu", along comes a bunch of "Second Coming Of Jesus" wannabes. Except their dates for end of the world Armageddon never materialise on schedule. Whoops. Another prediction, then another failure. Starting to wear thin now. 

 No, I will not digress into fake Bart Simpson Version or Ron L. Hubbard nonsense. Although i DO believe that there are authorised versions out there, I have no idea which is which. That is entirely outside the area of my expertise as I am not a cleric.

How To Measure God And Personal Power

However noble the concept of 'the encyclopaedia anyone can edit' may be, in practice Wikipedia falls down for that very same reason. 

The best cyclopaedias are written, overseen, proofread and edited by experts, pundits and leading academia in every category. Although the president of the local footy club may indeed provide keen insights into the regional competition they can hardly be regarded as the most reliable knowledge base of the global game. 

Likewise, Wonkypedia cannot be considered an authority on noumena (non-phenomena). Noumena is a Kantian term coined by the German philosopher Immanuel Kant to refer to 'the thing in itself', devoid of outward manifestation. Because science is based on observation and data collection, by such definition noumena is non-scientific. 

Therefore God, by a similar definition, is non-scientific. God is practically 100% noumenal, i.e. 'in the eye of the beholder'. There is a saying that God only appears in front of believers and hides His form from the non-faithful (the literal meaning of infidel). Atheists demand proof of God's existence, of course of which there is none; simultaneously reinforcing their beliefs yet at the same time strengthening the argument for noumena. As the saying goes, 'absence of proof is not proof of absence'.

The theosophical reasoning behind why it is necessary for God to hide goes as follows:

Let's say the kiddies are playing dress-ups. The eldest son pretends to be the father, the eldest daughter the mother, and the rest of the siblings and friends play the part of naughty children. This can only convincingly take place if the parents are absent - for if they were present, the child actors would cringe in their rôles. 

In the same way, for the individual spirit souls to play out the false dream of material life seeking happiness independent of any supreme authority, this can only be convincing in the absence of any such authority. So God hides, that we may continue with the fanciful delusion that we answer to no-one. Otherwise there is no meaning to 'independence'. 

Actually we are never truly independent. Whatever independence we achieve is an illusion granted by our Lord, just like the fanciful playing of children playing dress-ups. 

We depend on air to breathe but we have no control over the atmosphere. We need water but can't control weather. We need sunshine for warmth but can't control that either. None of the force majeure do we have control over. We can control little things, like how much sugar to put in our tea, when to turn up to work, which route to take on the roads, whether to return a phone call. 

If it is by those minutiae that we define our lives then our lives are indeed trivial. This is where Whakypedia comes in. Wankerpedian editors may war unendingly over moot points that really have little influence on the world outside their desk. They are, in effect, 'playing God' in their tiny little worlds, incapable of allowing opposing opinions to breathe precious air. Who made them 'God'? They did, themselves in a self-indulgent display of excess hubris. 

Look, if God wants to thump His chest saying "I am the best", I don't have a problem with that. It's when pissweak little Johnny down the road does it that I take offence. 

The LIV Tour and American School Mass Shootings

 What does the LIV Tour have to do with US school massacres, and why xenophobia (fear of foreigners) is wrong? 

The name LIV is a reference to the Roman numeral for 54, the score if every hole on a par-72 course were birdied and the number of holes to be played at LIV events.

9/11 survivors are protesting against the new Saudi-backed breakaway LIV Golf Tour because 15 out of 19 of the 9/11 hijackers were born in Saudi Arabia. That is as racist and xenophobic as refusing to eat pizza because the Italians were on Hitler's side when WWII started. Or giving up Chinese takeaway because of the Tiananmen Square Massacre.

Do Americans protest at the Major Golf Tournaments where the prizemoney comes from US companies because 15 out of 19 school massacres were committed by mass murderers born in the USA? No. And just because someone is born in Saudi Arabia does not mean they are an Islamic jihadist any more than an American is likely to be a mass shooter at a school.

It wouldn't at all surprise me if the LIV Tour protesters were also religious bigots and Islamophobic zealots.

To all the sportswriters dishing out on pro golfers abandoning the PGA Tour to join the alternative LIV tour, it's not all about the money. As Phil Mickelson says: "I can't even show my kids footage of me winning PGA tournaments because the Tour owns the rights. It's my swing but I have to get permission... it's as if they own my shots!"

More and more golfers are leaving the PGA Tour for LIV. I think it's a good thing. For too long the PGA had a bully-style monopoly in golf where there hasn't really been any other alternative for golfers to earn a living.

It's the epitome of American Capitalism with a capital 'C'.

Religion v Archaeology

Arriving at a correct historical perspective – why is there so much mutual exclusivity? 

Every religion has its own peculiar account of history that is not only different from the others but also the current scientific understanding. For instance there is no physical evidence of any early Mormon settlement in the Americas which they claim to have happened over 2,500 years ago - well before the time of Jesus! When we consider that their version of history contains numerous anachronisms (such as horses, elephants, wheat, barley, solk, chariots, windows, steel, swords etc that were not in the Americas at the time) this is totally at odds with accepted science eg archaeology, genealogy and linguistics. Therefore - either science is wrong, the Mormons are wrong, or, possibly, both are wrong! 

Let us consider:

Australian Aborigines and the Dreamtime stories (Spiritic) 

Biblical creation stories (Abrahamic) 

Chinese creation stories (Taoic) 

Hindu creation stories (Dharmic) 

and several other (Animistic, Magic, Mystic, Siddhic, Superstitious) etcetera, such as Manichaeist, Vudun and Zoroastrian creation stories

That none agree indicates there is no one theory that fits all accounts. One or two or more may be partially right or they could all be wrong - and that includes the scientific view. Yet because of geographical isolation, cultural norms and value systems all may have 'evolved' from the one creation event (including the Big Bang, Mediocre Kerfuffle, or Tiny Little Pop.. depending on one's bent) into varying interpretations and theories. 

Non-religious philosophers argue that Man invents religion to try to make some sense out of the seemingly chaotic world and to give some purpose to the randomness of life. Religious philosophers argue that without a higher spiritual being there is no reason-to-be and life is devoid of any meaningful purpose. 

That a person may change their belief systems more than once in a lifetime illustrates that faith is an acquired facet of the personality, not something we are born with, like arms and legs. The tendency to develop faith may in itself be innate, but exactly what the object of such faith may be is left open at birth. The line that divides faith from belief may be more semantic than logical in that beliefs may be more easily changed and faith more or less fixed or fixated. Often faith is recognised by swearing an oath of allegiance to a single God or Dogma but even that is a formality rather than an actual state of consciousness. 

Indeed, one may change faiths several times, including apostasy and agnosticism – or even flip-flop between Creationism and Darwinism! However, none of that resolves the differences in history between science and religion/s. These accounts are just observations, much like history itself is a set of observations, and there are many perspectives, resulting in differing sets. 

What an oxymoron it is that what unites them all is their exclusivist nature - they all declare that they are the one true knowledge! (and mutually exclude each other) Hence the age-old paradox of life, consciousness, our capacity to feel and think (or not) and what to do with all of that. What sets humans apart from other lifeforms is the ability to act apart from the dictates of the senses and to choose rather than react automatically or instinctively as creatures do. Seagulls foraging discarded fries on the motorway do not look up at the Mack truck bearing down on them and muse, "You know what? I'm done with this life as a seagull. To hell with it."

One of the silliest, illogical and blind things about a human is that they decide that their own philosophy is superior to anyone else's - to the point of telling seagulls what to do. "No, you cannot commit suicide, Mr. Seagull; suicide is illegal in the State of Suchandsuch." Actually, seagulls follow their instincts and do not listen to humans. Probably just as well. It could even make them smarter than us. 

So what do we do with all these different histories, religions, philosophies, etcetera? I say we start a war. Isn't that what we humans do, after all? Okay, now we're like seagulls fighting over discarded fries on the motorway again, and this time some of us don't make it out, despite our best efforts. 

Have you got a mouse on your windows?

Saying that the new jabs aren't vaccines because they're different is a very weak argument for them not being a 'vaccine'. First of all, define vaccine (not one modern vaccine has anything to do with cows - Latin, vacca = cow (where the name came from). 

A sedan used to be two long poles with a cabin in the middle for royalty which was lifted and ported by several strong slaves or servants. Vehicles don't have to have wheels. 

The meaning of words in the English language is continually changing. Have you got a mouse on your windows?

English is not a dead language. Unlike Latin and Sanskrit, the English language is always evolving and to get stuck on old-fashioned definitions may be somewhat pedantic about semantics in certain circumstances. Regarding 'vaccine' and 'immunity', as the meaning of words change over time, the limited definition of a word's meaning a hundred years ago may no longer be appropriate now. The word 'nice' used to mean silly or foolish, as in "that fellow is a nice idiot, isn't he?". Similarly, 'awful' meant wonderful as in "that was an awfully good show, old chap". Fully sick. Wicked. Etc.

Yes, I know I'm the fly in the ointment here, but please hear me out. I remember you once joked about no longer communicating via smoke signals and have learnt how to use a computer. As a musician I used to be a stickler for analogue recording and for years strongly resisted adopting the new digital format. These days I have come around and when I 'tape' my songs I no longer use physical magnetic tape. Over time words take on new meanings and I try to get my head around new definitions lest I become an old fuddy-duddy - for instance: a 'mouse' on 'windows', 'footage' of 'films', 'video clips', 'crank' the engine to start the car, etc. When we do a search for something we no longer use a magnifying glass but instead utilise a search 'engine' - so, how many cylinders does this search 'engine' have?" I'm joking of course. 

These examples of old terms that have found new meanings with modern technology are similar to the development of new mRNA and viral vector vaccines where the words 'vaccine' and 'immunity' take on new meaning as technology advances. This is a natural development, not a sinister plot. It is merely the English language growing. As I have mentioned before, vaccines no longer have any association with cows. A century ago a pretty woman would be described as being handsome, yet these days the adjective is used almost exclusively with the male gender. A chip used to be a fragment that flew off a woodcutter's axe and now among other things is a component of a computer. I could go on but I'll stop there. 

Without arguing the speculative merits vis a vis acquired vs induced, it doesn't matter HOW your body's immune system mounts a response - as long as it's there, it's 'IMMUNITY'. You either have it or you don't. Without an immune response it is impossible to develop immunity in the first place UNLESS such immunity is acquired from another source - like a tetanus booster which is the transfer of antibodies from a healthy donor who has recovered from the disease.

You don't have to have had tetanus to develop immunity to it. Likewise you don't have to have had CoViD-19 to develop immunity to that either. 

To have immunity you just need to have gotten your body's immune system responding - by whatever means, be it exposure and recovery, antibody boosters, inoculation, vaccination, immunisation and/or a prophylactic regime of a healthy diet (and supplements if needed). 

I don't consider it a fair and reasonable argument to on one hand to declare that we don't know enough about the new 'experimental' vaccines and then on the other hand make any predictions about the terrible things that will happen. Surely this line of thinking is purely speculative? How can we predict the outcome of any unknown quantity? 

Donbas, DPR, LPR - what's really happening?

Ukraine and NATO v Russia. I'm trying very hard to get both sides of the story. But Big Tech (GOOG, FB, TWTR, YT, MSOFT) are actors for Gov'ts. They kick off anyone who dares to go against their one-way narrative. Watching the reporting on the current Donbas/Kyiv drama I can't help but draw parallels with the untransparent way information/misinformation about THAT virus was handled. 

Anything contrary to the World Health Organisation's agenda was labelled as a conspiracy theory. Natural immunity. Zinc, vitamins C and D. Healthy exercise in the fresh outdoors instead of confinement indoors. Bushwalking, golf, surfing, or just the beach. Prophylactic use of antivirals etc (Ivermectin, Hydroxychloroquine - they are actual medicines). Eating lots of fruit and vegetables, and herbs, or doing anything to boost the immune system. 

NONE of these were recommended by WHO, to the point of medical experts labelling them as taboo. Yeah… sure they are. Even meditating and/yoga would probably help but no-one is gonna say "got a virus? Get hip, man!" Ffs, the WHO didn't even recommend Vit C for it! 

The problem with protocols is that they work well with known situations, but sometimes new circumstances require novel approaches (pun intended). I'm sure War Experts know everything about strategies, targets, decoys, which type of combat or Forces to deploy, etc. And as depicted in sci-fi films with invading aliens, often the usual military tactics are useless if not counter-productive. 

We have to know the enemy. That is the key to winning, whether it's a virus or a mutant alien lizard-man. Or a puppet battle with a hidden agenda and secret enemies pulling the strings. If you think this Donbas thing is just Russia trying to get back some lost Soviet territory then you have fallen hook, line and sinker for the picture newsmedia is trying to paint. Do you really think Putin is that stupid to bombastically clomp around trying to take over countries because he's on a megalomaniac power trip? 

That's exactly what America/NATO want you to think. I guarantee he's not that stupid. Neither is Trump. Not saying a word about Biden. But sure, they all love power. All successful politicians do - tell me one that doesn't! 

But what's really going on? 

Electronics, Digitisation, Faithful Acoustics and EQ

With acoustic instruments, it is fairly straightforward using equalisation to render a recorded channel faithful to the natural sound. Usually it is as close as possible to the ideal, or to be contrary, it is deliberately or accidentally made to sound different to achieve a particular effect. 

For example, acoustic steel string guitars rarely sound "good in the mix" unless the middle frequencies are taken out, often with both extremes of the bass and treble range boosted as well. Mainly this is to make the guitar stand out, as the middle frequencies clash because they are shared by vocals and so many other instruments of the middle register. 

However, we have no way of knowing in unbiased reality what electronic/digital instruments actually sound like 'unprocessed' (think Moog synthesiser), because their sounds do not occur in nature. They only come out of amplifiers and speakers, and depending on the types used, sound completely different in different set-ups.

 Even without effects processing, every amplifier lends its own colouration to any driven sound. And so do speaker systems - even more so. A quick and simple way to grasp this concept is to try to put the bottom end through tweeters and the treble end through woofers. Neither speaker is designed to faithfully replicate those opposite ends of the frequency spectrum, and they end up 'colouring' them to the point where both sound like someone banging a china plate on a table. There goes your cymbals and bass drum, gone! 

In fact we are so used to the way sound engineers have mixed electronic instruments in the past (think Hawkwind, Pink Floyd, Emerson Lake & Palmer, Rick Wakeman) that we take it for granted that's the way they're supposed to sound. 

And in the same way that our subconscious mind interprets film score cues - pizzicato strings to build suspense, tubas to illustrate clumsy buffoon-like idiocy, violins for romance, or bass and guitar riffs for Al Capone drama (theme from Peter Gunn, James Bond) - in a similar fashion à la Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf - we attribute certain digitally fabricated tones such as the famous Fairlight CMI and even the analogically generated ones such as the Hammond B3 organ and Moog synth as an unquestioned 'given'. We expect them to sound a certain way purely from being conditioned by our past experiences. 

But - they all sound different depending on which amp and speakers are used. And without them you won't hear nuthin'. They don't have a sound of their own. Except maybe, if you're old enough you'll know the sound of putting a needle on a spinning record without amplification. Sort of like a bunch of ants yelling in a foam coffee cup. I suspect that if digital music had a similar naturally produced sound it'd be like the old dialup to get on the net. A cacophony of bleeps and squawks. 

I hear a lot of so-called 'music' these days that simply would not exist without electricity. Or computers. It is impossible to reproduce those sounds on any acoustic instrument apart from the human voice. And therein lies their only validity - if it wasn't for that, I would just call it noise. Any of that rap, dance, house and hip-hop converted and played on purely acoustic instruments would immediately sound like a Weird Al Jankovic send-up. 

Which just gave me an idea, to record my next song totally á cappella, mimicking synthesisers and drum machines. Weird Sam Yankabit. 

Booster dependency?

Will we end up dependent on boosters if they stop our natural immune system working? 

After searching online for hours/days to no avail, I rang the Covid Hotline but they couldn't answer my question either. It's a pretty straightforward query, not that technical - and you'd expect a straightforward "we don't know" if that is the case. They ended up telling me to ask my doctor - but I doubt if they know either. 

The second part to my question (which no-one can answer yet) is, "if I stop any further vaccinations (I've had the mandatory two) and refuse the third, fourth, etc boosters, will my natural immune response kick in and how long will it take?" 

Instead they (the 'authorities', they ones who are supposed to be informed) prattle a load of stock standard responses, indicating that they didn't even take the time to listen properly to my well-worded inquiry, which went like this:

"Given that we know (according to reputable peer-reviewed medical sources) that CoViD-19 vaccines artificially induce an immune response and thus interfere with the body's natural immune system, how long will it take for the mechanism of the body's immune response to return to normal?"

Too much of a mouthful? What I'm asking, in plain terms, is:

"What happens if I don't get any boosters? When will my immune system kick in?"

That's a fairly simple and reasonable question, I think. But they don't. They don't have an answer because they don't know. If they don't know, then aren't they playing with fire? 

Instead, the poor girl on the hotline (she's only doing her job, to the best of her ability, with the info she's given) began a spiel of how the vaccine works, how effective it is, blah blah blah. That wasn't what I asked. I want to know how long it will take for my immune system to return to pre-vaccination status. As I understand it, your body loses its ability to create antibodies to CoViD-19 once you have been vaccinated and instead becomes reliant on the artificially induced response. 

That's all good and well if it means developing antibodies without having to get infected in the first place. But as the immunity wanes, when does the body's natural immune system kick in? Do we become dependent on boosters if it doesn't? 

The plain truth is they don't know, I don't know, and neither do you.