Wednesday, August 26, 2009

for the love of it! appreciating the amateur scientist

i am riled by the pompous attitude of academia. if not for the amateur scientist, we would not have academia. most of the current information in any subject is based on the information culled from the original brilliant minds of the thinker. scholarly work is important and it must be held to standard and proven, but academia should embrace the amateur. many use technology to spread their pseudoscience and profit, but i believe the public wise enough to cull information and seek the truth. even in the physical sciences i know there needs to be controls and studies, but we are far too constricted in our degrees. in the field of medicine we are too restricted and controlled. we have lost the natural homeopathic way. we have lost touch with nature through constraints in academia. it is frustrating when your field of study is sensationalized, but the truth might not be what is written in a text. astronomers understand the importance of the amateur more than any other field of study. many of the objects we see in the night sky were discovered by the amateur. the field of archeology is currently undergoing an interesting transition. in the past sites were quite isolated and archaeologists were able to do the work as Teilhard, with a small group under their control. today archaeology is accessible to the everyday archaeologist. people are technomads that travel to many sites of interest. so much has been lost due to war, greed and ignorance. the proof may be lost in translation and time. i think academia should embrace and support the amateur for sometimes the walls of academia fall on ideas and creativity. when one has a passion for a subject, a true love for the quest for answers without reward of a profession, one finds true answers. these answers may not be what is studied. i think the amateur keeps the scholar in check. many of today's scientist are far too biased in personal opinions and religious beliefs. i will continue to enjoy shows like the quest for the lost ark. i will read historical fiction and the research cited, but i will question even the scholars. as Napoleon is believed to have said "history is a version of past events that people have decided to agree upon." the scientific theory must be followed but knowledge is fluid. archaeologist face the philosophical and the methodological issues when formulating theories. Fagan's oxford companion of archeology recommend the use of logic and reasoning and the natural sciences as scientific method. rigid narrowing methods could overlook logical answers that are culled outside of mainstream scientific data. the groves of academe are paved with many disciplines and i believe in interdisciplinarity. the changes within academia and at universities from Plato to Da Vinci to Einstein to modern times may have slowed the evolution of knowledge. could we be quantum leaps ahead if we restructure our systems? if not for amateur computer scientist, Bill Gates, you would not be receiving this enlightening information quite the way you are. as academia has splintered and become corporatist, academic freedoms are compromised. academic elitism quells personal knowledge and scientific freedoms. discursive theory has become the goal of many archaeologists and this may be the best approach. you never know if the theory of the amateur that seems so sensationalized may end up being the reality, and unfortunately you may not know until you see the face of the tetragrammaton.
walking and coffee are the stimulants i need for writing, and the sky is my inspiration!

Friday, August 21, 2009

Monday, August 10, 2009

The Mississippi delta begins in the lobby of the Peabody.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Two bottles later and I am the raconteur of the evening!
I wish the sun would come out, and stay out, so I could lay out!
Genetically wired to live life in dog years! Live fast, love hard, die young and leave a good looking corpse. Lifespan advantage= woman

Thursday, August 6, 2009

The full moon is strong tonight after the third lunar eclipse of the season. I am such the moonchild but truly a libra stargazer.
You can write it, but until you live it you never get it!

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

beauty

"It hurts to be beautiful" my grandmother would say, and it does. Of course she meant that you had to endure the pain of a brush the pain doing all the grooming it takes to be a girl accepted. It took me a long time to realize I should take this literally. To be beautiful is painful, I thought the stares were because something was out of place. Yes beauty gets you in the door but does it walk you around the room into other doors. It can be a curse from the jealous onlookers that think they do not have the same value. There is something to the survival of the species in beauty and proportion. Then my grandmother would say "beauty is only skin deep". The inner beauty is greater and when you know thyself you are beyond the onlookers. Born in the image die in the light. "pretty is as pretty does" ugly is as ugly does. Don't act so ugly you handsome thing. How do we get beyond outer beauty. Evolve to the post human?
Define your BEAUTY!