The genius of Da Vinci and the Tao (audio)

Wisdom Quarterly; Dr. Fritjof Capra, Mitch Jeserich (Letters and Politics, Dec. 30, 2013)

Fritjof Capra's new book Learning from Leonardo: Decoding the Notebooks of a Genius presents an in-depth discussion of the main branches of Da Vinci's scientific work. What was it?

Da Vinci pioneered fluid dynamics [the Tao being the way, the flow, the path of least resistance], geology, botany, anatomy, mechanics, aerodynamics, [ecology, eco-designing, war and weapons engineering, vegetarianism, pacifism, art most famously painting the "Mona Lisa" but, notably, not the social sciences or any political or economic phenomena].

Most of his astonishing discoveries and achievements in these fields are virtually unknown to the general public. Dr. Capra's thesis is that, at the most fundamental level, Da Vinci always sought to understand the nature of life. This has often escaped earlier commentators, because until recently the nature of life was defined by biologists only in terms of cells and molecules, to which Da Vinci had no access.

 

Popes were more like Roman emperors

THE POPE of Da Vinci's day, in tune with the corrupt Holy Roman Catholic Church he led, was absorbed with mistresses, children, and imperial wars. He was not concerned with Da Vinci's heretical ideas, like his view of the "soul." Da Vinci thought it akin to cognitive psychology's view of cognition [or the Buddha's detailed analysis of citta, the process of consciousness, as an interdependent process]. Galileo, a century later, would face a much different pope and inquisitive Church that allowed no deviation from its dogma.

 

Mona Lisa and Leo (gregoryherpe.fr)

 

The enigmatic Leo Lisa (lewets)

But today, a new systemic understanding of life is emerging at the forefront of science -- an understanding in terms of metabolic processes and their patterns of organization. And those are precisely the phenomena which Da Vinci explored throughout his life. The book has been published in three editions in three languages.

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Fritjof Capra, Ph.D., physicist and systems theorist, is a founding director of the Center for Ecoliteracy in Berkeley, California. Dr. Capra is the author of several international bestsellers, including The Tao of Physics (1975), The Web of Life (1996), The Hidden Connections (2002), and The Science of Leonardo (2007). He coauthored Green Politics (1984), Belonging to the Universe (1991), and EcoManagement (1993), and coedited Steering Business Toward Sustainability (1995). His most recent book, Learning from Leonardo, was published in Italy and Brazil in 2012 and will be published in the United States in 2013. He is currently working on a multidisciplinary textbook, The Systems View of Life, coauthored by Pier Luigi Luisi and to be published by Cambridge University Press. See bibliography for book details.

Marijuana versus Alcohol (radio)

Pat Macpherson, Pfc. Sandoval, Wisdom Quarterly; Sonali Kolhatkar, UprisingRadio.org

Alcoholic Homer Simpson tries a new "medicine." The moral of the story? Avoid booze, avoid pot, and learning to cope with stress is a beneficial habit to develop.

 
Which is worse, Weed or Alcohol?

Arrest photo: I'm not an alcoholic!

(Sept. 30, 2013) Uprising radio host Sonali Kolhatkar speaks to the lead author of a new book called Marijuana is Safer: So Why are We Driving People to Drink? If alcohol is worse, why are people pushed to resort to it and pressured to avoid a safer and more medicinal alternative? In the past year two states have legalized its recreational use. The financial infrastructure of legalization is in its infant stages with investors pouring in money and big banks agreeing to accept profits. Such steps were unthinkable a few years ago. Pot was thought far more dangerous as a vice than booze. The US is now closer than ever to legalizing cannabis. Even CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta recently changed his position on weed. Trying to overturn the legal ban on marijuana, activists and advocates have hit upon a winning formula: point out the fact that alcohol leads to far more public violence and that having the option to use marijuana instead could lead to a safer, less criminal society. Guest Steve Fox is Director of Government Relations at Marijuana Policy Project. AUDIO

Steve Fox, Paul Armentano, Mason Tvert

(AlterNet.org) A book explains how we are steering people away from cannabis and toward the use of a very harmful and deadly substance: alcohol. The following is an excerpt from the book: It’s Super Bowl Sunday and throughout the nation millions of Americans have stocked their shelves and refrigerators with alcohol for the big game. In living rooms across the country, guests will enjoy the libations and gawk at the humorous beer commercials sprinkled liberally throughout the telecast. Like the Fourth of July and fireworks, the Super Bowl and booze are an American tradition. There is no societal stigma associated with this excessive drinking. It is all part of the celebration. Like the old saying goes: “We don’t have a drinking problem. We drink. We get drunk. No problem.” More

DemocracyNow.org (Sept. 30, 2013)

 

Leading the legal fight against Government Surveillance

Sonali Kolhatkar

Cubicle criminality at the offices of the NSA

When I first met Reverend Rick Hoyt he said, “You don’t have to call me Reverend; just Rick is fine.” The First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles has taken a stand against the NSA surveillance program. The bespectacled and youthful pastor, sporting a salt-and-pepper beard, certainly didn’t look like a conventional “man-of-God.” In fact, the Unitarian Universalist church to which Rick belongs is known for defying Christian theological convention. Rick’s home at the First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles also has a history of defying political convention. The church, according to Hoyt, has been a “fierce advocate for personal liberties.” Even before Edward Snowden became a household name, the First Unitarian Church of LA became a plaintiff named in a major lawsuit against the National Security Agency (NSA) over privacy violations. Nineteen organizations have joined Hoyt’s church in an unusual coalition that includes the Marijuana legalization group, NORML, and gun rights groups like the California Association of Federal Firearms Licensees.

Fire Dog Lake: How Obama punishes Medical Marijuana patients

Troops swoop in on illegal growers (scpr.org)

(Aug. 22, 2013) Despite overwhelming support from the general public, significant backing from medical doctors, and even several prominent Republicans publicly acknowledging that cannabis has a legitimate medical use, the Obama administration officially insists it does not have one.The administration’s dodge when asked to explain this unpopular and scientifically unjustifiable position is to act as if it is a non-issue because they are not arresting medical marijuana patients. When Jessica Yellin asked why the administration refused to use its power to reschedule marijuana to make it legal for medical use, Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest responded: “the President and the administration believe that targeting individual marijuana users, especially those with serious illnesses and their caregivers, is not the best allocation of federal law enforcement resources.”

Cannabis is a safer plant? (hempsaves.net)

The administration pretends that since they are not arresting patients, rescheduling marijuana does not matter. The possibility of arrest, however, is only a small part of how legitimate medical marijuana patients are significantly punished because the Obama administration refuses to use its power to remove marijuana from Schedule I (an assignment shared by the worst drugs of abuse with no redeeming quality whatsoever). Over the years the legal tentacles of the so-called "War on Drugs" have been allowed to touch all parts of federal policy, from gun rights to education. According to Hoyt, some of these groups are not ones his church normally works with and “aren’t necessarily politically sympathetic with.” But the right to personal privacy is a Libertarian position deeply held by both ends of the political spectrum. Complete interview:

Why are we really fighting a war in Afghanistan, DRUGS? (TheRealNews.com)

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• (Sept. 30, 2013) Cancer-stricken "Angola 3" prisoner Herman Wallace has been given just days to live after being in solitary confinement for 42 years His crime? Robbery then being falsely accused of participating in the killing of a Louisiana ("the incarceration capital of the world") prison guard. His actual crime was forming one of the first Black Panther chapters in prison, making him a political prisoner, which the US claims not to have. More
•  Climate Change protests heat up

  

  Host Amy Goodman

  Last week, far out in the Arctic Ocean, the Greenpeace vessel Arctic Sunrise approached a Russian oil-drilling platform and launched a nonviolent protest, with several protesters scaling the platform. They wanted to draw attention to a dangerous precedent being set. The platform, the Prirazlomnaya, owned by Russian gas giant Gazprom, is the first to begin oil production in the dangerous, delicate, ice-filled waters of the Arctic.
   
  

  KPFA FM - Pacifica Radio, Berkeley

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  Alternative News Sources (endthelie.com)

Sex Doctor gets Penis Cancer (video)

Pat Macpherson, Ashley Wells, Wisdom Quarterly

He's not Dinah Cancer; he's Dr. Drew, America's sex and addiction therapist for 30 years.

 

Physician, heal thyself with your own advice.

"Doctor Drew," 55 (radio  host Dr. Drew Pinsky, M.D.), announced today that he is suffering from prostrate cancer, which is ironi c since a health professional of his caliber should be able to heal himself. Natural remedies like saw palmetto (extract) and a healthy sex life, in conjunction with an alkalizing diet (rather than the acidifying S.A.D. or "standard American diet") and a serene (rather than stressful) lifestyle would have kept him well. But as a doctor who promotes invasive surgery, deadly radiation treatments, and toxic allopathic pharmaceutical poisons all in the name of "medicine," this is what Drew and his patients can look forward to. He has, by his own admission, already submitted to voluntary surgery. Can it be long before he confesses to intentional radiation exposure and a regimen of chemotherapy?

Funnier and saltier than Dr. Ruth

Starting Wednesday he will be the guest on a barrage of television and radio shows promoting harmful cancer screenings, which seem to do more to cause cancer than cure it. He is already a white haired, neurotically nervous overachiever (formerly a sufferer of intense panic attacks that even his former radio co-host, Adam Corolla, could barely help him with), who began Loveline with the show's originator DJ Poorman on KROQ FM in his hometown of Pasadena, California.
 

Now he has an media empire consisting of a podcast with Latino heartthrob and former addict Mike Catherwood as well as their nationally syndicated, ever-fresh, ever-educational Loveline Radio Show (lovelineshow.com), an off-again-on-again rehab celebrity TV show, former MTV show, and a much more tame HLN talk show. Drew may not be much of a healer, but he is a well tuned "medical intuitive" showing off his skills in short call in spurts and an addiction medicine specialist. Everything we have ever learned about aberrant sexual behavior, sexually transmitted diseases, and philosophical quandaries about why humans repeat dysfunctional patterns over and over again -- answered with stunning clarity by addiction specialist Dr. Gabor Mate, M.D. -- we learned from Dr. Drew. He may not be, but to us he will always be a real Schmendrick.

(32:00 mins) This is the introduction to the third Zeitgeist film, "Moving Forward," featuring Dr. Gabor Mate. It covers truths about human nature, genetics as non-determinants of disease, health, and concepts and popular misconceptions about "Nature vs. Nuture."

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• MacArthur Genius Grant recipients' list announced!
• 
  This year's 24 recipients of MacArthur Foundation "genius grants" include a physicist whose work was inspired in part by a NPR report he heard a decade ago. As Carl Haber of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory explains in a video posted by the foundation with Wednesday's awards announcements:
  

  "About 10 years ago I happened to hear a report on NPR about the Library of Congress and their large collections of historic sound recordings, which described them in some cases as being delicate, damaged, deteriorating, and so forth." More