< Back Joseph’s Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat David Cowles Nov 6, 2025 “Jacob’s gift of a robe is symbolic of Joseph’s special status in the ancient line of mystical succession.” The Book of Genesis is many, many things. It begins with a Hymn of Creation (1:1 – 2:4) and continues with a Prologue (2:5 - 11:32) reprising various Middle Eastern myths (e.g. the Flood), reinterpreted a millennia later in the light of now fully developed Jewish theology. From there Genesis moves onto the proto history of the Hebrew nation (12:1 – 36:41). These are the stories of the Patriarchs (Abraham, Issac, and Jacob) and they represent a transition from myth to legend. (Think King Arthur.) The final 14 chapters contain the story of Joseph, son of Jacob ( aka Israel). They form a bridge connecting the legendary Patriarchs with the historical Exodus and they introduce another dimension to our narrative: the mystical . Mysticism here refers to a fabric of super-ancient spiritual practices, woven across cultures, irrespective of boundaries, topological or political. It would appear that this wisdom precedes the development of religions per se . Let’s listen in: “Now Israel (Jacob) loved Joseph more than any other of his sons…and he made him a long sleeved robe ( aka a ‘coat of many colors’). When his brothers saw that their father loved Joseph more than any of them, they hated him… (Then) Joseph had a dream and they hated him still more.” Jacob’s gift of a robe is symbolic of more than just parental favoritism. It is a recognition of Joseph’s special status in the ‘ancient line of mystical succession’. In the 1st Book of Kings (19: 17 – 21), Elijah passes the prophetic mantle to Elisha in a very similar ceremony: “ So Elijah…found Elisha son of Shaphat. He was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen, and he himself was driving the twelfth pair. Elijah went up to him and threw his cloak around him. Elisha then left his oxen and ran after Elijah… He took his yoke of oxen and slaughtered them. He burned the plowing equipment to cook the meat and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out to follow Elijah and became his servant.” Interpretive Notes : The coat and cloak are the veil of maya , the woven garment (shroud) covering noumenal reality (Kant), i.e. Aletheia ( Parmenides ). The 12 yoke of oxen are the signs of the Zodiac, signifying the cosmic dimension of mystical initiation, corresponding to Joseph’s welcoming the 12 tribes of Israel (his brothers) to Egypt. The Electro-Magnetic (EM) spectrum (Joseph’s colors ) is an alternate way (vs. signs of the Zodiac/yoke of oxen) of representing entirety, i.e. kosmos . In the spirit of the New Testament Letter of James , both Joseph and Elisha give expression to their faith by ‘feeding the people’ (see below). Jesus picks up on this critical theme by feeding first 5,000 and then 4,000 hungry followers . We are indebted to Kings . It’s only that light that we can confidently interpret Jacob’s ‘anointing’ of Joseph as a sacrament in the Mystical tradition. It is unclear (intentionally so?) whether the bestowal of the robe is an acknowledgement on Jacob’s part that Joseph has a special connection with the divine or whether the gift itself confers new powers on the son. I am reminded of Mary Poppins : “ What I want to know…is this: Are the stars gold paper, or are the gold paper stars?” (Jane Banks) In each case, of course, the answer is both ! The world is maximally recursive. What goes around comes around. IRL, all verbs need to be Middle Voice (vs. Active/Passive). The Jacob stories are nothing if not down to earth. Neither Jacob nor Joseph model what we would call virtue . Joseph is a right Eddie Haskell ( Leave it to Beaver ), a goodie-two-shoes intent on currying his father’s favor by ‘tattling’ on his older brothers. Joseph is only too eager to lord his advantage over his senior siblings. Shamefully, he exploits his spiritual gifts to tease and demean them; his behavior is so egregious that even the doting Jacob is offended: “Must we come and bow low to the ground before you, I and your mother and your brothers?” “His brothers were jealous of him, but his father did not forget.” Like all marks of social distinction, Joseph’s coat inspires jealousy, and even hatred, in those less favored (e.g. his brothers). Any modern day parent could have written this script. Out of 13 siblings, one is ‘the favorite’… and treated as such. What could possibly go wrong? Pity Jacob that he did not have Dr. Spock to advise him! The Hebrew phrase translated as ‘many colors’ in the Septuagint is obscure. That said, much is baked into the traditional panchromatic symbolism. First, of course, there is allusion to the rainbow, bridge to Me Pot o’ Gold , nature’s symbol of harmony and peace, token of YHWH’s covenant with creation. On an even deeper level, the rainbow represents the essence of all Process, i.e. Being per se , described by Alfred North Whitehead as the creative flux of one into many and many into one. The noumenal EM spectrum becomes the phenomenon of white light which in turn refracts to give us that rainbow. As Genesis comes to a close, the Hebrews (descendants of Jacob), the Edomites (descendants of Esau), and the Ishmaelites (descendants of Ishmail) have all carved our successful niches in the Middle East. Our origin story is poised for a happy ending…but of course, human frailty ( aka sin) soon intervenes. Following his angry confrontation with Joseph, Jacob sends his chosen one to accompany his brothers ‘in the field’. Was this intended as punishment? Or was it Jacob’s attempt to toughen up his pampered offspring? Or was it done in the vain hope that sibling rivalry might be resolved? In any event, it was yet another miscalculation by the hapless Jacob; he certainly did not anticipate, much less intend, what happened next: “Seeing him approach from a distance, the brothers immediately conspire to do away with this Lord of Dreams .” Fortunately, Reuben commutes Joseph’s death sentence and instead they arrange for him to be sold into slavery. Soon Joseph is in Egypt where holds a series of administrative posts and earns his Pharoah’s respect and trust: “…The Lord is with Joseph and gives him success in all things.” While managing various offices of state, Joseph continues to interpret dreams. Pharoah dreams of seven fat cows followed by seven lean cows who proceed to devour their more corpulent predecessors. Based on that narrative, Joseph predicts seven years of ‘feast’ followed by seven years of ‘famine’ in Egypt. Pharoah acts on Joseph’s intelligence: he stores surplus during the fat years to cover the needs of the realm during the lean years to follow. As a result of God’s favor and Pharoah’s wisdom, Egypt alone prospers during an historic, region-wide famine, recorded simultaneously throughout the Middle East. The Book of Genesis is many things. It is history, legend, mythology, anthropology and ethics. But going back to the Hymn of Creation , Genesis also has a cosmological dimension. Pharoah’s dream allows the narrator to introduce a theory of time crucial to the later development of Judeo-Christian cosmology. Ask most people how they would describe time and you’re likely to hear a lot about beads on a string, buds on a branch, birds on a wire, Xmas lights on a strand. Why not? It’s a natural way to think of the succession of events that constitute our lives. But it is not the Judeo-Christian way. Genesis uses the story of Jacob’s sojourn into Egypt to propose a radically different way to imagine ‘sequence’. The Future does not follow the Past, it consumes it! A perpetual Present projects what has been into what is coming to be. It’s the Blob of cinematic fame (1958), consuming everything it touches. It confers eternal life, or at least potential immortality, on what is no more substantial than a “mist” (James 4:14), i.e. our mortal lives. We see this model displayed again and again throughout Judeo-Christian scripture and practice: YHWH is the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; he is the God of the living , not to the dead. The Patriarchs (above) are consoled knowing that their descendants will be numerous as grains of sand on a beach or as stars in the sky. King David is promised that the Messiah will be from his house . At the Transfiguration, Jesus reveals Moses and Elijah, ‘alive’ in him. Roman Catholics, et al., consume Jesus in Eucharist and are simultaneously ‘uploaded’ into his Mystical Body. The fat cows don’t become lean, nor do the lean cows simply succeed their plumper forebears. Nope! In a stroke that would have made another Josef (i.e. Stalin) blush, the lean cows devour the fatties. Pity the bourgeoisie! Incredibly, you have just entered the Twilight Zone , i.e. the bizzarro world of 20 th century mathematics. Welcome to the non-Archimedean (non-A) universe. Here, all events are either embedded in one another or disjoint . Events B and C are inert quanta until they are uploaded (embedded) into Event A. In A, B and C ‘interfere’ and that interference, X, in turn interacts with and modifies both B and C. Reality is on a perpetual, non-linear loop. B and C do not interact, but they do interfere…in A. Each contributes to A (in the form of X, their interference pattern) and through the intermediation of X, A modifies B and C. In this model, A corresponds to the future, B and C to the past, and X to the present. X is what we call History (or Process). So no, Dorothy, we’re definitely not in Kansas anymore! To find out more about this world where we actually live, check out: What’s the Matter with Archimedes? Archimedes and Christianity But in the meantime, bear one thing in mind: This is the real world. This is how things actually work. Deal with it! *** Diego Velázquez — Joseph’s Tunic (1630) depicts the dramatic moment when Joseph’s brothers present his blood-stained coat to their father, Jacob, leading him to believe Joseph has been killed. Velázquez uses strong chiaroscuro lighting to heighten the emotional intensity, illuminating Jacob’s grief and the brothers’ tense deception. The painting exemplifies Velázquez’s early mastery of psychological realism, conveying profound human emotion through gesture, light, and shadow. Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? 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< Back Is It Time for Really New ‘New Math’? David Cowles Jun 3, 2025 “1 + 1 can be more than 2 or less than 2 but it can never equal 2…Jam yesterday (< 2) and jam tomorrow (> 2) but never jam today (= 2).” Remember the ‘old math’ - ‘rithmetic, taught with a (hopefully metaphorical) hickory stick? Meet the ‘new math’ (scourge of Gen Xers) – same as the old math! ( The Who ) Boomers can at least make change, albeit with ‘fear and trembling’, while Xers just shrug and say whatever ! In this article, I hope to demonstrate that the purported differences between new and old math are superficial at best, imaginary at worst, and that neither has any applicability in the Real World. Today’s math, new and old, is based on premises that I contest. Let’s start with something simple: 1 + 1 = 2… not! 1 + 1 can be more than 2 or less than 2 but it can never equal 2. In fact, 2 is the only value for 1 + 1 that we can exclude ab initio . As in Carroll’s Looking-glass World, there’s jam yesterday (< 2) and jam tomorrow (> 2) but never jam today (= 2). Of course, according to the system known as old/new math, 1 + 1 = 2 just because we say so in our best imitation of a 1950’s parent. And we’re perfectly entitled to do just that! And we have built a magnificent intellectual edifice based on it! And that’s A-Okay, as long as we don’t imagine we’ve created anything relevant to anything real. Math (old or new) is Minecraft! So what’s wrong with 1 + 1 = 2? How could any sane person even question it? (Please don’t answer that, at least not until you’ve read what’s coming.) First, ‘one’ is not a number; it’s a way of referring to an atomic entity, i.e. a quantum of the Real World. It’s roughly equivalent to ‘that’ or ‘this’. There’s nothing in the Real World that corresponds to the number one in math. How could there be? There’s no such thing as a being in isolation, not even (trinitarian) God . Think about quarks in a sub-atomic particle. They cannot exist in isolation. “Three quarks for muster mark.” (James Joyce) And even if an isolated unit of being were possible in some real world, which it is not, ‘1’ would still not properly belong in any number system with aspirations to apply to real events. Case in point : an Amazonian tribe, the Piranha , have no math…and they do not have the concept of one . Instead they use demonstrative pronouns and adjectives (like this or that ) to designate real entities. The concept of ‘number’ only applies once two or more atomic entities are considered as a group . We can measure such ‘groups’ by their size, i.e. by the number of elements in each group. So it’s possible to imagine, again ab initio , that a group might have a value of ‘2’ if it groups two atomic entities together. R. Buckminster Fuller was fond of saying, “Universe is plural and at minimum two;” but as we shall see, even ‘2’ is not a stable state. To make our so-called ‘number system’ work, we postulate that a group can have a ‘value’ (size) of 1, or 2, or 0, or even ø, but there are no such groupings of elements in the Real World. Math, old and new, is based on the premise that atomic entities, even if they are totally unrelated, can nonetheless be grouped together without impacting in any way the contribution of each element to the ‘size’ or ‘measure’ of that group. Of course, this is impossible in any real world. Any real process of ‘grouping’ must impact the value of the group’s elements. If it doesn’t, there’s no process and there’s no group. Why? The real world Law of Recursion : Every ‘process’ (by definition) must alter the values of its elements. The definition of a ‘process’ is an act that modifies the values of its constituents. Of course, here is where professional mathematicians will part company with us, and that’s ok, so long as they don’t expect us to believe that their ‘ice cream castles in the air’ have anything to do with the Real World. If ‘grouping’ is real, then it must be a ‘process’ applicable to real elements and it must then alter the values of those elements. Therefore, 1 + 1 could never equal 2. Here we are borrowing a concept from Gregory Bateson and extending it: A ‘difference’ is a difference only if it makes a difference! The process of grouping two elements must impact those elements in some way; otherwise ‘the process is inert’, meaning that the ‘alleged process’ is not an ‘actual process ’ at all. I can fantasize about a grouping of 2 or more entities where the process of grouping has no impact on the elements grouped…but that’s exactly what it is, a fantasy. Once grouped, the elements co-modify one another. So the process of recursion is self perpetuating and interminable. Fortunately, however, the process tends toward a limit. But what limit? When two atomic elements are grouped, they interact until they result in a stable, concrete value, a ‘steady state’. That interaction can take either of two forms: Fission or Fusion. (No, this is not a category in Jeopardy .) In the case of fission , the grouping of two atomic units automatically generates a third: 1, 1, and (1, 1). (In Trinitarian theology, the Holy Spirit ‘proceeds from the Father and the Son’; likewise, (1, 1) proceeds from 1 and 1.) So the minimum quantitative value of a group assembled via the procession of fission is 3. ‘3’ is a fundamental unit of quantity – ‘1’ and ‘2’ are not. But what of groups created by the process of fusion ? If Trinity is a model for ‘grouping by fission’, Quantum Entanglement (John Bell) is the model for‘grouping by fusion’. When the solution of 1 + 1 < 2, 1 and 1 are grouped by fusion. According to Bell’s Theorem of Non-Locality, two independent entities, ‘entangled’ by fusion, have the quantitative value we know as √2. The process of fusion eliminates ‘redundancies’ inherent in the concept of two . The resulting ‘simplest possible quantity’ is neither 1 nor 2 but √2. We can think of such a ‘complex unit’ as akin to ‘heavy hydrogen’, deuterium. While ‘normal’ hydrogen consists of 1 lepton (electron) and 1 hadron (proton) and ‘normal’ helium consists of 2 leptons (electrons) and 2 hadrons (protons), heavy hydrogen consists of 1 lepton and 2 hadrons (proton + neutron). To summarize, ‘one’ does not exist in any real world and ‘two’ is inherently unstable. Any two entities must either collapse into a single, complex entity with a quantitative value of √2 or they must generate a third, resulting in a single entity with a quantitative value of 3. In biology, the 30 Trillion cells that make up your body are all descended from a single cell that merged with another cell and formed a symbiotic relationship (cell + nucleus). The resulting organism is clearly ‘more’ than a single prokaryotic cell but ‘less’ than two completely independent cells. Similarly, in math one entity and another entity merge creating a single entity with a ‘heightened value’. As noted above, in the Real World, all process, including the process of grouping, is recursive. Therefore, there are no linear equations. Mathematics begins with equations that have at least two solutions, e.g. √2x or 3x. Note that we seem to be relying still on ordinary ‘natural’ numbers like 1, 2, and 3 to tell our story. But these, obviously, as just placeholders. To avoid massive confusion, we’ll need two new symbols to represent our two quantitative minima. I suggest Δ for the fundamental unit of fission and ꓦ for the fundamental unit of fusion. We also need symbols to represent the two basic arithmetic processes, fission and fusion, replacing addition and multiplication. Instead of + and * from linear arithmetic, I propose ↗ for fission and ↘ for fusion. And for the inverse operations, currently represented by – and /, I propose ↙ and ↖. Armed with these basic symbols we can now build a new algebra. Note that the familiar identities of linear arithmetic 1 + 0 = 1 and 1 1 = 1 disappear since + and are processes and no process in the Real World leaves its elements unaltered; the result of a process can never be the same as any of its elements (except perhaps in a rare case of accidental coincidence). Counting works quite differently in the new new math. There are two different counting systems depending on whether we’re in fusion or fission mode. In fusion mode, instead of n = 1, 2, 3, 4… we count like this: n = 2^((n-1)/n) < 2. I’m looking forward to playing a game of hide and seek with my great grandchildren (my grandchildren have aged out) and asking the cherubs to count using new new math in fusion mode. Where a muggle-child might begin “1, 2, 3, 4…”, my great grandchildren would say “2^(0), 2^(1/2), 2^(2/3), 2^(3/4)…” In muggle-speak that corresponds (approximately) to “1.0, 1.4, 1.7, 1.8…” Bonus : I’ll never have to worry about being found because in the entire history of the cosmos, they’ll never even get to 2. I think a little frustration can be character building, don’t you? Plus, I can head into the house and make up a pitcher of margaritas, no salt…for me, of course, not for them. (They’re still counting, remember?) But take heart, children. Counting in the fission mode is a bit easier…at first; but it gets progressively harder as we climb the number ladder (rather than slither along the Real Number line). Instead of n = 1, 2, 3, 4, we count “Δ^1, Δ^2, Δ^3, Δ^4…” Again, in muggle speak, we’re talking 0, 0, 3 … 9 … 27 … Wait, there’s already a name for these numbers; they’re called p-adic . Obviously, I am limited by space and by ability to this simple outline of new, new math principles. You, dear reader, are better qualified to expand this sketch into a full algebra and to explore the nooks and crannies of this system and I, for one, look forward to the results. Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! Thoughts While Shaving - the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine. Click here.

< Back Official Launch of Aletheia Today Magazine David Cowles May 31, 2022 Your exclusive look at the all-new magazine for believers in science and God! Tomorrow, June 1, is a landmark day for Aletheia Today (AT). Tomorrow, we publish Issue #1 of AT Magazine (ATM, Summer 2022). Our first issue includes a total of ten feature length articles spread over four departments: The Great Convergence: Science in the 21st century Philosophy Theology Culture Features contributed by AT staff writers and independent contributors include: Science & the Yellow Submarine Eternity vs. Immortality Jesus meets Mr. Spock In the Tween & Teen section of ATM Issue #1 we have two articles: Vacuum Monster (from Yellow Submarine) Quark Soup Our Education, Evangelization, & Prayer section includes prayers, poems, and short stories written by contributing writers to AT Magazine. We want to engage with you, our readers, in every way possible. We encourage you to send us an email ( editor@aletheiatoday.com ) to leave comments on any of our articles, or to contribute something of your own for publication in a future issue. In order to promote engagement, Issue #1 includes two Reader Challenges . We encourage you to participate in those, as well and share them and any other article and essay that you find interesting with others. Finally, as a loyal reader of “Thoughts While Shaving,” we would like to offer you a chance to begin reading ATM Issue #1 right now , one day ahead of its official publication date! Click here for a peek at our first issue. Let us know what you think. - David Cowles, Editor-in-Chief, Aletheia Today Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! Thoughts While Shaving - the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine. Click here.

< Back God Does Yoga! David Cowles Aug 10, 2023 “We engage in spiritual practices and so does God…we both seek the Unity that underlies Plurality…but so does everything else!” Have you ever taken a Yoga class? Then you may have run into God doing warm-up stretches along with the rest of the yogis and yoginis. Didn’t notice? No problem. He doesn’t stand out. He usually keeps to himself. (He’s reputed to have something of a temper, but I’ve never seen it.) Anyway, he wouldn’t be wearing Lululemon ! I only just learned about God’s interest in yoga. I was reading Zen and Hasidism - not exactly where you’d expect to find a meditation on the Trinity, and yet… Contributing author, R. Shatz points out that God has the same spiritual ‘problem’ as the rest of us: how to experience Unity ( Parmenides’ Aletheia ) in the midst of Plurality ( Doxa ). Have you ever tried to meditate (often part of the practice of yoga)? What happened? Was your supposedly ‘blank mind’ flooded with thoughts? Did those thoughts sometimes take the form of an audiobook, a steady stream of inane babble? You want to shut it down, but you can’t find the off switch. Makes you want to scream! Well, don’t beat yourself up too badly; you’re in good company. God has the same problem. “Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is One!” So begins the day for every observant Jew around the world. Help God discover his Unity. Christians might do well to adopt this practice: God is three, Trinity, but also one, Unity - one substance ( ousia ), three persons ( personae ). ‘The Father’ is God’s ‘executive persona ’: God being ‘God’, the first among equals, the unifying principle. In the person of Father, God creates, gives laws, negotiates covenants, and intervenes in history. ‘The Son’ is God’s ‘projective persona ’: God speaking ‘God’, the Word, logos . Through the person of Son, all things that come to be, come to be. (John 1: 3) ‘The Spirit’ is God’s ‘reflective persona ’: God thinking ‘God’. The Spirit is the relationship, the eternal dialog, between Father and Son and by extension between us and God. The Spirit is the searcher of hearts who prays to the Father for us and through us in ‘inexpressible groanings’ (Romans 8: 26-28). God is, in fact, God is Being. God does ; in fact, God is Doing. God reflects, in fact, God is Consciousness. We are by our participation in Being (God); we act by our participation in Doing (God); we reflect by our participation in Consciousness (God). We live by our participation in Trinity (God). We are like God…and we are not like God. Like God, we have executive, projective, and reflective functions, but none of these functions is fully and completely us. They are aspects of who we are, not who we are. God has no aspects (no ‘parts’). Whatever God is, he is always and completely. God’s functions are his personae , but each persona is ‘true God’. Unlike us, God does not perform his functions; God is his functions. “I am what am.” (Exodus 3: 14) God poses a standing challenge to us: “Don’t dream it, be it!” ( Rocky Horror Picture Show ) We engage in spiritual practices, and so does God. Without forfeiting our aspects or God’s personae , we both seek the Unity that underlies Plurality…but so does everything else! Any Universe consists of a multiplicity (M) of events or Actual Entities . M is a measure of Potentiality. For example, in a baby Universe consisting of just 10 events, those events can be configured in more than 3,600,000 different ways. Extrapolate that! Novelty ‘begins’ when an emerging Actual Entity (AE) constitutes M as its unique Actual World (AW); this is its executive function . ( Note : the use of temporal language here is metaphorical; there is no temporal dimension within an AE. Spacetime is what connects AEs.) Each AE reflects on its AW by comparing the values manifested by that AW to Values (e.g., Beauty, Truth, Justice) that are transcendent (i.e., normative for every AE). This is the initial application of AE’s reflective function . The objective of every AE is to transform its AW into an AE that perfectly manifests these Transcendent Values (V). Here the projective function kicks in. An AE ‘proposes’ a different arrangement of the elements in its AW: it generates a ‘proposition’, a plan. Using that proposition as its blueprint, the emergent AE preserves and intensifies certain elements of its AW and dismisses or diminishes others. But novelty does not spring full-grown from the head of Zeus; the concrescence of an AE is a process – an iterative process of trial and error, guided all along the way by the reflective function . Ultimately, each AE becomes a settled matter of fact and achieves Objective Immortality (OI). As OI, that Actual Entity enters M and becomes part of the AW of every future AE. So it’s not just you and God that practice yoga. Every event (AE) is engaged in the process of finding Unity (OI) amid ‘naked’ Plurality (M). But it’s not easy. In fact, since every AE is novel (unique), only one AE can achieve the universal objective of perfectly manifesting the Transcendent Values; we call that AE, ‘God’. Every AE manifests V, but only one does so perfectly! Meanwhile, we are busy, busy, busy, executing, projecting, reflecting. “Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers.” (Wordsworth) We strain to experience the Unity behind Plurality; we struggle to find the pearl hidden in the bale of hay. That’s why none of us can afford to miss Yoga class, not you, not me, not a quantum fluctuation in deep space, and not God. So, armed with these insights, I plan to open a chain of Yoga Studios all across the Galaxy. Can I put you down as Member Zero? Keep the conversation going! 1. Click here to comment on this TWS. 2. To subscribe (at no cost) to TWS and ATM, follow this link . 3. We encourage new articles and reprints from freelance writers ; click here to view out Writers’ Specs. 4. Aletheia Today Magazine (ATM) will be devoting its entire fall issue (released 9/1/23) to artificial intelligence (AI). What are the philosophical, theological, cultural and even spiritual implications of AI powered world? If you’d like to contribute to the AI Issue, click here . Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! Thoughts While Shaving - the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine. Click here.

< Back Revolution Number 9 David Cowles Jan 25, 2026 “Beatles’ lyrics, despite the Fab Four’s suspiciously overzealous denials, are rarely without meaning, albeit often esoteric and obscure.” 1,500 words; 7 minute read The Beatles are not shy when it comes to including enigmatic lyrics in their hit songs. I am the Walrus is a classic example; but Revolution 9 takes it to a whole other level. Listening makes you feel like you’re hearing words from an Edward Lear non-sense poem . But regardless of your take on Lear, Beatles’ lyrics, despite the Fab Four’s suspiciously overzealous denials, are rarely without meaning, albeit often esoteric and obscure. Like that other Lear’s Fool, the Beatles embed difficult, controversial, and politically incorrect messages in language that allows them plausibly to deny such intentions, turning the spotlight instead on their critics, aka their accusers, in the process: “Of course we didn’t mean that . Why would you think that? What a perverse imagination you must have!” Revolution 9 lives in the White Album (1968) along with the much better known Revolution 1 . The latter takes an equivocal but largely conservative approach, well-crafted for public viewing, but then Revolution 9 comes along and blows the lid off. Bottom line : the Beatles are understandably skeptical of a merely political revolution rooted in ideology; instead they call for a much more radical ( radix = root) cultural revolution. This situates the Mop Tops’ social philosophy in a long tradition, for example: Jesus of Nazareth – “I have come to set fire to the world and oh how I wish it was already burning…render unto God the things that are God’s.” Mao Tse-Tung – "Let a hundred flowers bloom, let a hundred schools of thought contend.” Revolution 9 lyrics are a mash-up; they beg to be excerpted and quoted…but not necessarily reproduced in toto. In that way, they are very much in the tradition of the holy trinity of 20th century English language literature (Pound, Eliot, and Joyce). Check it out: “Then there's this Welsh Rarebit wearing some brown underpants…” An absurd juxtaposition of images introduces us to the genre with a sidelong allusion to the high priest of cognitive revolution, Lewis Carroll. “About the shortage of grain in Hertfordshire.” A snippet from a radio broadcast, a political stump speech, or perhaps the PM’s question time in the House of Commons. “Every one of them knew that as time went by, they'd get a little bit older and a little bit slower but it's all the same thing, in this case manufactured by someone who's always…” Someone…who? Always…what? We’re left to guess. “I sustained nothing worse than/Also for example/Whatever you're doing/A business deal falls through/I informed him on the third night/When fortune gives…” A mash-up of everyday memes and phrases, taken entirely out of context. Memes have a life of their own, divorced from context, denotation, reference, and meaning. “With the situation/They are standing still/The plan, the telegram/A man without terrors from beard to false/As the headmaster reported to me/My son, he really can try as they do to find function…” Ah, to ‘find function (as they do)’ – that’s the pre-eminent virtue in the ethical pantheon of the bourgeoisie. (And BTW, who is this they ?) Now there’s nothing wrong with being Useful per se but consider the ‘old fashioned’ virtues it’s crowding out: Kind, Honest, Brave, Nobel, Creative, Compassionate, Loving, et al. Sidebar : Children’s literature was forever changed by Thomas the Train , a multi-media franchise built around Thomas’ obsessive desire to be ‘a really useful tank engine’. “ His head was on fire, (but) his glasses were saved...which enables him to move about.” Reminiscent of Kafka’s Metamorphosis , the catastrophic is buried in the mundane. The practical obscures the existential. Techne trumps bios , but…and this is key…we mistakenly credit technology (e.g. glasses) with things accomplished organically (e.g. mobility). “So the wife called me and we'd better go to see a surgeon/Or whatever to price it yellow underclothes/So, any road, we went to see the dentist instead/Who gave her a pair of teeth which wasn't any good at all.” Notice his head was on fire, but she got the teeth. What a cock-up! He had no need of new glasses so she got new teeth , which presumably she did not need either, leaving the inconvenient matter of the flaming head unaddressed. Faced with a major but difficult problem, we tend to create smaller, imaginary problems that we could solve more easily…but don’t. We spring into action, but our actions (1) ignore the real need, (2) deliver the wrong solution and (3) deliver it to the wrong person. It’s a perfect Trifecta. Place a tenner with the Cream Cookie (‘bookie’) for me…and box it! Paraphrasing and expanding on St. Paul, ‘I do not do what I intend to do, but what I do not intend, that I do, and what I neither intend or not, God does through me’. We are men (sic) of action, but our acts are radically alienated from our intentions and from the problems at hand (e.g. a flaming head). And yet reality, dream-like, leaves a trace: she gets ‘a pair of teeth’, suggesting ‘a pair of glasses’, which of course would have been no help either. “So instead of that he joined the fucking navy and went to sea/In my broken chair, my wings are broken and so is my hair/I'm not in the mood for whirling…” Faced with an absurd and dysfunctional reality, we seek a way out: we run away from home to join the circus, or the French Foreign Legion, or our country’s armed forces. We also give up our precious mobility in the process, yet our head’s still smoldering. But back to functionality: “Dogs for dogging, hands for clapping, birds for birding and fish for fishing, them for theming and when for whamming…” We are what we do and we do what we’re told (i.e. what society demands of us). Dogs do doggie things, fish do fishy things, etc. Note #1 : ‘Dogging, clapping, birding, and fishing’ are not things dogs, hands, birds or fish do ; they are what we do to them, e.g. by turning ‘wolves’ into household pets. Note #2 : They do not exist to be them ; we turn they into them . From our privileged perch, we turn subjects into objects. Dogs are not for dogging; they are not for theming! “Only to find the night-watchman/Unaware of his presence in the building…” Exactly! If ‘finding a function as they do’ accomplished something, it might perhaps be defended…but it doesn’t. The person whose one and only ‘function’ is to guard a building is completely unaware that an intruder is already inside. It’s the plight of the middle class: we trade freedom for security and get neither. “Onion soup/Industrial output/Financial imbalance/Thrusting it between his shoulder blades/The Watusi/The twist/Eldorado/Take this brother, may it serve you well…Hold that line! Hold that line! Hold that line!” Our chants become memes, endlessly cycling though our pre-conscious minds. “It's quick like rush for peace is/Because it's so much/It was like being naked/It's alright, it's alright, it's alright/If you become naked.” Revolution is immediate and opportunistic; no time to dress the part. It may catch you naked. “Block that kick! Block that kick! Block that kick…” Sports culture taps into our brain at its most primitive, reptilian level. With Revolution 9 , we have a sense that we’re eavesdropping on random conversations, always cut short. It is as if we were gradually circulating at a posh cocktail party or slowly turning an old fashioned AM Radio dial. The result is weird snippets of language and odd juxtapositions of words and phrases. Language is divorced from its usual denotative function. ‘Spoken word’ is treated the same as output from any musical instrument, appreciated solely for its sound and emotive associations. Specifically, Revolution 9 is reminiscent of Leopold Bloom’s soliloquy near the end of Ulysses . Joyce captures Bloom’s thoughts, becoming progressively less discursive as he drifts off to sleep: “Sindbad the Sailor and Tinbad the Tailor and Jinbad the Jailer…” Which leaves one last question: Why the number 9 (rather than, say, 42)? Nine, 3 x 3, captures an important and yes, revolutionary, aspect of things: Being is essentially fractal (self-similar at all scales) and trinitarian (three in one). As such a case can be made that 9 is fundamental, even substructural. “No Stephen, you misheard me. It’s not ‘turtles all the way down’, it’s ‘triplets’, triplets all the way down, triplets embedded in triplets across 60 orders of magnitude.” Does this seem like a stretch? Of course it is…but I’m not alone in my obsession with this number. The Lord’s Prayer is a fractal consisting of triplets in a triplet. The Enneagram ( Ennea = 9) is a mainstay of certain Roman Catholic spiritual traditions and Kabbalah consists of 9 sefirot (plus Keter, the ineffable whole). Revolution 9 is no more a collection of random ravings than The Waste Land (Eliot), and the Beatles’ revolutionary street cred is no less genuine than Bakunin’s . *** Dean Martin in Some Came Running (1990–1991) by David Salle is a large postmodern painting in oil and acrylic that exemplifies his characteristic layering of disparate imagery and cinematic juxtapositions, executed with three inset panels on the canvas. The work’s title references the 1958 film Some Came Running starring Dean Martin, while the painting itself combines historical tapestry motifs, modern figures, and fragmented visual elements to create a complex, non-narrative visual “chorus” typical of Salle’s style Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! Thoughts While Shaving - the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine. Click here.

< Back Pre-existing David Cowles Jan 6, 2022 In my last post, I reflected on the idea that all the world’s ontologies (philosophical, theological or scientific) fall into one of two camps: (A) Some sort of Determinism, where the ‘actual’ is ultimately embedded in what is falsely called the ‘potential’ or (B) some sort of Indeterminism where potentiality is selectively converted to actuality through an agency that somehow, in some way transcends pure potentiality itself. In my last post, I reflected on the idea that all the world’s ontologies (philosophical, theological or scientific) fall into one of two camps: (A) Some sort of Determinism, where the ‘actual’ is ultimately embedded in what is falsely called the ‘potential’ or (B) some sort of Indeterminism where potentiality is selectively converted to actuality through an agency that somehow, in some way transcends pure potentiality itself. Group A would argue that there must be nothing before there can be something; Group B would reverse it: there must be something before there can nothing. At first glance, Group A might seem to have the better of the argument. After all, doesn’t it make sense to move from ‘nothing’ to ‘something’? But there are two problems: (1) No one has been able to explain successfully how nothing can give birth to something without reference to some pre-existing actuality (e.g., chaos, virtual particles, negative vacuum pressure) or some transcendent agency (e.g., a probability function, the fundamental laws of physics) (2) The notion of Nothing, by itself, has no denotative meaning. No-thing implies ‘thing’ and there are no pre-existing things in this ontology. On the other hand, if one posits Something then the notion of Nothing emerge Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! Thoughts While Shaving - the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine. Click here.

< Back God & Time Crystals David Cowles Dec 13, 2025 “Value forms the basis of the judgments that motivate the islands of order we call events. 1750 words, 8 minute read For centuries (Aquinas), if not millennia (Cicero), philosophers have struggled to prove the existence of God. According to most logicians, they have failed, either because God does not in fact exist or because the existence of such an entity is not within the universe of propositions subject to proof. Christians believe that the existence of God is revealed in Scripture, in the life of Jesus, and in prayer. Roman Catholics believe that the existence of God can also be adduced via experience and reason alone ( aka science); and now we have important new confirmation of this premise. According to Christian cosmology, the universe not only has a beginning (the Alpha point) but also an end (the Omega point). Call it Eschaton, Parousia , Kingdom of Heaven…or whatever. Science agrees! Call it Big Crunch, Big Freeze, or Heat Death; the universe has a sell by date. Genesis ( Alpha ) and Apocalypse ( Omega ) do not occur within time. They happen outside of time ; they are to time as bookends are to literature. My choice of decorative bookends for my library contributes nothing to the content or quality of the books I place between them. They are of a different logical order entirely. So it is with Alpha and Omega . The transition from Genesis to Apocalypse occurs in what we call ‘time’. In fact, this ‘transition’ is time. But where we regard time as a line segment or ray, it is seen as a single point from the perspectives of Alpha and Omega . It is as though they see the timeline rotated 90°. They look at it from its end points. Therefore, from their perspectives, spacetime is a dimensionless point…and the same point in both cases. But if Alpha sees the ‘first point’ on the line and Omega sees the ‘last’ point, how can we say that they both see the same point? Because all of the structure at all of the moments in time is visible from either end. Imagine looking through a kaleidoscope from both ends: same pattern, different perspectives. That’s Alpha & Omega ! Both Alpha and Omega are perfectly ordered states. They are what ‘order’ is. They define it. And between these two ordered states? Chaos , spacetime, i.e. where we live. Our temporal realm is globally disordered; however, local islands of order can and do emerge, to wit: this dialog we are having right now. This ‘local order’ is imperfect and transient. It inevitably dissolves back into the flux. That’s what we mean by entropy : “Islands in the stream, that is what we are.” (Kenny Rogers, et al.) How is it that order can emerge out of Chaos ? How come ‘islands of order’, if any, don’t just flicker in and out like virtual particles? In fact, pockets of order, when they do occur, seem to be auto-reinforcing. They are homeostatic, recursive, and they have a ‘dissipative’ relationship with the chaotic background. Which brings us to the fundamental question of cosmology, if not philosophy itself, “Why (or how) is there something rather than nothing?” The recent discovery of a new state of matter/energy called a Rondeau Time Crystal provides a relevant physical model. This entity cycles perpetually from an ordered state ( Alpha ) through a disordered state ( Chaos ) to an ordered state ( Omega ). Rinse and repeat. This is not a purely mathematical concept. It’s a physical reality. But how is it that local order emerges and endures in the midst of global chaos? While a theist might credit God ( Alpha & Omega in this context), a secularist might posit some property of being itself (e.g. negative vacuum pressure). Turns out, both are right! To be clear, causality vanishes at the shoreline of Chaos . Whatever order emerges out of Chaos is sui generis and causa sui . However, the fact that Chaos is suspended between Alpha and Omega ‘shapes it’ or ‘fine tunes it’ in a way that allows for the emergence of independent islands of local order. Again, there are physical analogies. Imagine a hammock strung between two trees. The trees contribute nothing to the hammock other than potentiality . However, the strung hammock automatically assumes its signature catenary shape which defines the hammock in the universe of Platonic forms. The ‘islands of order’ that populate Chaos do not emerge accidentally. If that were the case, they would be fragile and extremely short lived, flickering in and out like fireflies. In fact they are remarkably resilient and enduring. What’s the half-life of a diamond? “Diamonds are forever” (DeBeers); well, maybe not forever forever but still… Events are homeostatic, dissipative, and recursive. They struggle heroically against inexorable entropy. Their raison d’etre appears to be being itself…and that’s half true. They devise incredible strategies in pursuit of that goal, for example, reproduction . We take it for granted that things want to be : one example, the so-called survival instinct , another, surface tension . But not everything ‘wants to be’. Cells practice apoptosis , people commit suicide. So the survival instinct can’t be primal. Entities that ‘want to be’ must want to be for an even more fundamental reason. That reason is what Whitehead called their Subjective Aim . For most of us, survival is a necessary condition for the furtherance of our aims. But for some cells in some circumstances, apoptosis is a more appropriate strategy. The concept of Aim implies the existence of Value . We ‘aim’ for what we consider ‘good’. Robert Browning: “A man’s reach (aim) should exceed his grasp or what’s a heaven for.” In the Gospel of John we read, “No one has greater love than to sacrifice their life for another.” (15: 13) And what parent would not risk their own life to ensure the survival of their child? Good trumps all, even life itself! But where do we find this Value , this Good? Not in our chaotic realm! Nietzsche: “…One belongs to the whole, one is in the whole – there exists nothing which could judge, measure, compare, condemn our being, for that would be to judge, measure, compare, condemn the whole… But nothing exists apart from the whole!” ( Twilight of the Idols ) The Gospel of Mark quotes Jesus: “Why do you call me ‘good’? Only God is Good.” (10: 18) In Nietzsche’s realm (i.e. our own) things are ‘good’ relative to one another but Good per se characterizes God and only God. Good is God. Nietzsche was right : “…One belongs to the whole, one is in the whole – there exists nothing which could judge, measure, compare, condemn…the whole.” Nietzsche was wrong : “But nothing exists apart from the whole!” Yes, it does! Value exists apart from the whole. Robert Browning says so! The whole exists as it is, but Value (Good) allows, impels, the whole to pass judgment on itself (and on each of its parts). My wife says I’m judgmental. Damn straight! But judgment does not preclude tolerance or mercy; in fact, it is their prerequisite. Aim is the culmination of a multistep process, beginning with the requirement that the universe pass judgment on itself (conceptual recursion). Ordering (physical recursion) is the active consequence of that judgment. Just as ‘faith’ is not true faith unless it leads to works ( Letter of James ), so judgment leads to execution . In the context of Value , execution is the inevitable consequence of judgment: identify and optimize! But in our chaotic world, “nothing exists apart from the whole.” Nothing except, non-thetically, Alpha and Omega . Of course, these are states of maximal order and value per se . Value (i.e. Good) defines Alpha and Omega and so ‘shapes’ the Chaos (as trees shape a hammock): Value gives Chaos its topology - that is how Value is felt in the midst of Chaos . Value forms the basis of the judgments that motivate the islands of order we call events . Of course, these local manifestations of order are ephemeral; they are bound to be reabsorbed into Chaos . “… Our actors, as I foretold you, were all spirits and are melted into air, into thin air; and—like the baseless fabric of this vision— the cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, the solemn temples, the great globe itself, yea, all which it inherit shall dissolve, and like this insubstantial pageant faded, leave not a rack behind.” (Shakespeare, Tempest ) But order has a definitive signature. The strings of a lyre can be ‘tuned’ continuously within a range. When each string is tuned to a particular frequency, the lyre is capable of producing a series of pleasant, harmonious tones which we can identify, record (musical notation), and remember – e.g. a melody. Local islands of order are like a few bars of Brahms heard over the cacophony that is Lower Manhattan. Fortunately, the vibrations of a string can be reproduced via ‘sympathetic resonance’ in other strings so long as those ‘other strings’ are tuned to a compatible frequency. When a string vibrates, it creates sound waves that travel through the air. If these waves encounter another object that naturally resonates at the same frequency (or a harmonic of that frequency), they can set that second object in motion. The second object "responds" to the vibration because the incoming frequency matches one of its naturally resonant frequencies. Strings are like AM radios, tuned to sound, rather than EM, waves. In this analogy, melodies are manifestations of the Good that resides in both Alpha and Omega . When a melody emerges out of the chaotic medium, it resonates with that same melody in Alpha & Omega . The two become one. The temporal realm and the eternal realm merge. A melody is a melody regardless of the medium. The Ode to Joy is the Ode to Joy no matter who (competently) performs it, whether it’s on paper (musical notation), on tape (recording), or in concert. It has its own unique identity (signature) regardless of context or medium. Likewise, the local islands of order that emerge within Chaos , to the extent that they manifest Good, resonate with the perfect order eternally resident in Alpha & Omega . But it is the same ‘melody’ whether in a state of perfect, eternal order or transiently emerging out of Chaos . It is both temporal and eternal. Here I’ll take the wisdom of Yogi Berra over that of Bill Clinton: Whatever is, is ! *** Henri Matisse’s The Joy of Life (1905–06) presents a radiant pastoral scene where nude figures dance, recline, and play music within a boldly colored, flattened landscape. Rejecting realistic perspective, Matisse uses intense, non-naturalistic color and simplified forms to convey emotional harmony rather than physical accuracy. The painting celebrates sensual pleasure, freedom, and a utopian vision of life, marking a defining moment in the development of Fauvism. Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! Thoughts While Shaving - the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine. Click here.

< Back High School David Cowles Sep 14, 2023 “In place of the general knowledge you somewhat willingly soaked up in primary school, information is now noxiously technical and specialized.” “Latin, when am I ever going to need to speak Latin. Or French! Everyone speaks English anyway. Biology? Like I’d ever be a doctor! Extra school, student loans, and blood – no, thank you! Trig? Seriously? Do you see a pocket protector; is there a propeller on top of my beanie? And don’t get me started on the calculus !” A new school year has begun and we’ve all been there. The prevailing view is that these are just adolescent rantings. Supposedly, adulthood brings an appreciation of knowledge for its own sake - an understanding that knowledge is fungible: it can come in handy at times and in ways you could never anticipate. So who’s right, the hormone rich adolescent or the ‘sober’ adult? Actually, both! There’s no doubt that general knowledge can make life more interesting, and a broad educational background can open doors. On the other hand, people can lead perfectly successful and fulfilling lives without ever learning a foreign language, understanding biochemical pathways, or calculating the height of La Tour Eiffel – oops, French! Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad for all the bits of irrelevant information I was made to learn – and I wish I’d had the self-discipline to learn a lot more. General knowledge comes in handy when you find yourself editor-in-chief of a bleeding edge online magazine. On the other hand, knowledge is not a set of isolated facts. It is a pattern, continually expanding while filling in detail. Novel facts become relevant when they are linked to something that is already meaningful. Imagine instead reciting a poem in an entirely unfamiliar language (how’s your Finnish?) with no clue as to its content or tone. No information is created or communicated. That’s high school! You’re the VP of a local bank. Congrats, BTW. As an adult, how often have you used trigonometric functions to solve a real-world problem? What, never? So, you spent 9 months of your life learning something that you had no interest in at the time and that you’ve never used since? Really? The ‘best knowledge’ is knowledge rooted in inquiry. When I ask a question, there is at least a 50/50 chance I will pay attention to the answer. Knowledge thrives in a semantic community; it atrophies in isolation. Fortunately, life is endlessly interesting. Every day, we ask questions about the world. But how often do those questions refer to things we learned in high school? Everyone jokes about young children being ‘perpetual question machines’. Of course, they are! Everything is new to them…and interesting. The simple rhythm of ‘ask and answer’ fascinates them. Some of their questions may sound silly to your ears, but how does a toddler know what’s silly and what’s profound? Baby Einstein asked, “Bupe, why is time different from space?” Not so silly, was it? When my children and grandchildren were young, they asked the most amazing questions, and often came up with incredibly creative and insightful answers. So what happened? Nothing! My teenage grands still ask great questions…and they’re never ‘silly’. But their questions are about things addressed inadequately, if at all, in their classrooms. Faced with an impenetrable and seemingly irrelevant curriculum, high school students look for other ways to make their 4 years of drudgery meaningful. Some of these ‘extracurricular’ activities are constructive, some harmless, and some extremely dangerous. For example: Drama, clubs, choruses, etc. After school and summertime jobs. Volunteer work in the community. Sports. Reckless behavior. Addiction (screens, alcohol, drugs): Mind-numbing escape from mind-numbed boredom. Delinquency. Self-harm. Wouldn’t it be marvelous if the organic process of growing-up was engaging and relevant enough to make such auxiliary activities optional, unnecessary, or undesirable? “I can’t get drunk tonight; I’m working on a really cool science experiment.” I’m willing to concede that most of what we learn in Grades 1 – 5 is useful. It may not always be pleasant, but generally speaking, the more you learn at that age, the happier you’ll be, both immediately and down the road. But sometime between Grade 5 and Grade 9, something happens. It may be gradual…or abrupt. In place of the general knowledge you somewhat willingly soaked up in primary school, information is now noxiously technical and specialized. It no longer speaks in any way to your native curiosity…or life experience. This article is not meant to be a How-To manual; but may we suggest a few guiding principles? Education is an activity. People learn by doing. That doesn’t have to mean Industrial Arts, though it certainly can. It can mean any activity that a person finds engaging, from birdwatching to star gazing. Challenge : many teens have already lost the sense of engagement itself; they no longer know what interests them. Education is ‘client centric’. It springs from a person’s native curiosity. Adolescents are people too. They observe patterns, ask questions, imagine answers, make tools, accomplish projects – just like Homo sapiens . Welcome, aliens; won’t you join us? Life is not Jeopardy ! Real education does not flow from answers to questions; it’s the other way around. People learn from other people, not from just books. Competence and enthusiasm are attractive…and contagious. We need to recruit teachers who are passionate about their subject matter if we hope students will become passionate as well. Life’s a banquet! Classrooms are ‘resource centers’ led by charismatic subject-matter experts. Teachers offer traditional classes (like Oxford lectures), meet with small groups of students with similar interests (seminars), and work on projects with individual students (tutorials). Ok, you caught me! None of these ideas are new. At best, we’ve given this ‘tired but untried’ agenda new urgency and broader purpose. Hope so! Because it’s necessary. Keep the conversation going! 1. Click here to comment on this TWS. 2. To subscribe (at no cost) to TWS and ATM, follow this link . 3. We encourage new articles and reprints from freelance writers ; click here to view out Writers’ Specs. 4. Aletheia Today Magazine (ATM) will be devoting its entire fall issue (released 9/1/23) to artificial intelligence (AI). What are the philosophical, theological, cultural and even spiritual implications of AI powered world? If you’d like to contribute to the AI Issue, click here . Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! 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< Back What It's Like to Know It All David Cowles Jan 18, 2026 “it felt as though what I didn’t know couldn’t hurt me…and it still seems that way to me today.” 1500 words; 8 minute read When I was 25 years old, I knew pretty much everything there was to know… and I still do! (Just ask my long-suffering spouse!) More precisely, I knew almost everything I needed to know. (Who needs Latin, or Trig, right?) Sure, there were important holes and considerable elaboration was still required but it felt as though what I didn’t know couldn’t hurt me…and it still seems that way to me today. Of course, most of the socially conditioned propositions I accepted eagerly c. 1970 turned out to be false. I have replaced them with a new set of eagerly accepted, socially conditioned propositions. The content of my gnosis has changed ( doxa ) radically but the structure ( Aletheia ) has not…with one exception: I now know something I didn’t know 50 years ago. I now know that I didn’t know sh*t in 1970. Therefore, symmetry requires me to be at least open to the possibility that what I think I know now may be no more accurate or exhaustive, objectively speaking, than what I thought I knew 50 years ago. (Intuitively, I’m sure that’s true!) Let’s get clear: most of what I thought I knew at 25 was wrong – partly because of my own shortcomings but mostly because of the ‘primitive’ state of global knowledge c. 1970, compared to now. Compared with everything that is available to be known, objectively, it is likely that the sum total of everything that is known is infinitesimal. Put another way, the gap between what is known or knowable (at any point in time) and what is actual at that time may be infinite. Sometimes called the ‘Negative Way’ by philosophers and theologians, this approach was ‘popularized’ by Nicholas of Cusa (15th century CE): the most we can ever hope to know about God is that we know and can know nothing! That is not to say that knowledge is useless. It has enormous importance, but that importance is limited to local regions of spacetime and specific human projects . There is no such thing as a universal algorithm or problem solving technique. (Godel) What I know I know in relation to a specific undertaking in a specific region of spacetime. Shift my situs or my focus and you change my gnosis . Speaking simplistically, every actual entity, every event, every undertaking is concerned with knowledge at three levels: (1) what is actual, (2) what is knowable, (3) what is known. By ‘actual’ I mean an exhaustively detailed account of the event itself. By ‘known’ I refer to the sum total of true propositions I entertain relative to the event. By ‘knowable’ I mean the universe of true propositions, relevant to the event, that lie within my universe of discourse . A newborn does not know that she does not know the structure of the solar system. Not her fault. It’s just not in her universe of discourse. So we don’t say that her intuitive model is ‘wrong’ – she can’t be expected to know what she can’t even imagine. In order for X to be knowable , it is necessary that I be able to form propositions related to X. That requires something akin to a language, though it need not be verbal. Musical chords, for example, work just as well. Rhythms in jazz. Rhyme in poetry. How about olfactory layers in haute cuisine ? Or the interplay of light and shadow in fine art? My friend is an oenophile – he can’t drink a glass of house wine without detecting hints of leather and cassis. Me, I just wait for the buzz. My friend can taste the wine same as me, but he can’t ‘know’ the wine until he is able to place it in a conceptual matrix populated by ‘cigar, must, and fruit’. Me, I don’t know what I don’t know about wine. I barely know that there is something to know beyond the obvious. My friend’s detailed knowledge vastly exceeds mine, but it is likely that I know as much, in proportion to what we each know to be knowable, as my friend does. So let’s return to the opening sentence: “When I was 25 years old, I knew pretty much everything there was to know…and I still do!” I might have more accurately have said, “When I was 25 years old, I knew a healthy portion of everything I knew to be knowable…and 50 years later, I still know that same ‘healthy portion’, although what I know is radically different.” To be clear, the propositions that I entertained as true in 1970 have almost all disappeared or changed, replaced by new, unanticipated factoids. But the ratio of what’s known to what’s knowable is unchanged. This phenomenon strikes me whenever I read Genesis . The authors had no telescopes, microscopes, or particle accelerators. They knew nothing about genetics (DNA, gene mutation, evolution, etc.). Yet they produced a work that probably contains as large a portion of what was available to be known - in these disciplines at that time - as any textbook today. So which is more true, Genesis’ creation story or Hoyle’s steady state model of the universe; the question is inherently undecidable and therefore meaningless. In business, I often heard it said, “There are 3 kinds of lies – white lies, damn lies, and statistics.” In that spirit I would say that there are 3 ways something may be knowable : (A) it may be objectively knowable, i.e. it’s available to be known, (B) it may be subjectively knowable, i.e. it’s available for me to know it, and (C) it may actually be known, i.e. I know it. Gnosis is fractal! In proportion to what is subjectively available to be known by me, my level of actual knowledge is always more or less constant…as is yours…regardless of scale, regardless of topic, even if we have little else in common. So let’s draw some conclusions. Depending on your model, what is objectively knowable (A, above) is either unimaginably vast…or infinite. If it is the latter, then whatever is subjectively knowable (B, above) is effectively zero relative to A. In any case it is miniscule. So you get no ‘extra credit’ for your grotesquely inflated universe of discourse (B); in the end, we’re all drowning in the same sea (A). Likewise, we’re all in the same boat when we compare what we actually know (C) relative to what is available to us to be known (B). So what? Well, Sheldon over there explains things using an impenetrably complex model derived from cutting edge mathematical physics. Missy on the other hand imagines God as an emaciated version of Santa Claus – a kindly old man (sic) with twinkling blue eyes and a flowing white beard, sporting Joseph’s technicolor dream coat. Who’s right? Both…and neither. But needless to say, Sheldon is cruelly dismissive of Missy’s metaphysics…and indeed, of Missy herself. How ‘stupid’ of her not to know what he knows! Is Sheldon right, or at least justified? No way! Missy knows the same proportion of what’s subjectively knowable to her as Sheldon knows of what’s subjectively knowable to him. Plus what’s knowable to each is the same proportion of what is available to be known. Sheldon, of course, wants to add another dimension of comparison. He wants to weigh his knowledge (C) against Missy’s (C’), but there is no warrant for doing so. The proposition itself is meaningless. C compares with C’ only if there is an absolute, transcendent standard to serve as the metric of comparison; but there is not. The model we’re presenting makes no provision for any such Platonic mysticism . What is objectively knowable is ill-defined and constantly in flux. The Roman Catholic liturgy offers a useful paradigm. It is more or less the same everywhere on earth, and as far back as the first century CE, and yet if you scratch 10 congregants, you’ll find 10 different cosmologies, theologies, and eschatologies. So who’s right? They all are…and no one is. They all know the same proportion of what is subjectively available to them to be known (B). But the temptation to compare actual knowns (C) can be overwhelming. What percentage of life’s acrimony boils down to I’m right and you’re wrong ? How different would life be if we eliminated this dimension of conflict! Note : This is neither skepticism nor relativism . Each of us has an obligation to know as much as we can within our universes of discourse and to expand those universes, our conceptual vocabularies, as far as possible. We are not, however, obligated, or even allowed, to evaluate what we know relative to what others know. What others know can only be evaluated relative to what is subjectively knowable within their universes of discourse and we have no direct, independent access to that information. Two corollaries: (1) There is no room in philosophy or science for intellectual pride, and (2) we can learn from everyone’s models because all such models represent good faith efforts to express the ineffable. *** Stadia I (2004) by Julie Mehretu is a large abstract painting in ink and acrylic that uses layered architectural lines, flags, and geometric forms to evoke the dynamic, chaotic energy of stadium spaces and other large‑scale public arenas. The composition’s complex interplay of marks and colors reflects Mehretu’s interest in how collective environments, movement, and social structures intersect in contemporary urban life. Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! Thoughts While Shaving - the official blog of Aletheia Today Magazine. 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< Back The Crucible Challenge Winner: Integrity vs. Life Grace Krzenski We are thrilled to share with you the winning essay from our first Young Writers Challenge, this one conducted exclusively at Cabrini High School in New Orleans. Our winner, Grace Krzenski, answered the prompt, "Why do you think Arthur Miller decided to call his play 'The Crucible' and which definition of crucible do you think Miller had in mind when he wrote his play?" Grace's essay has also awarded her $100. Congratulations, Grace! In the spring of 1692, Abigail Williams and Betty Parris, two children, started what would become a full-blown witch hunt that would result in the death of twenty people and the imprisonment of at least one hundred. Today we refer to this as The Salem Witch Trials. Arthur Miller, author of the 1953 play entitled The Crucible uses this unfortunate period of history to reveal what happens when fear and hysteria take control. According to dictionary.com , the word crucible is “used to refer to [a situation] that represents an extreme trial for someone, especially a situation that tests courage or preparedness.” Arthur Miller titled his play as he did in order to show that the residents of Salem were put to a moral test: they could tell the truth and die, or lie and live. Characters John Proctor and Tituba personify this moral dilemma and the two courses of action it presents. More specifically, John Proctor chooses integrity over life, while Tituba forfeits her integrity to live. John Proctor, a farmer in his mid-thirties, is cast as a morally challenged man who is not afraid to stand alone. Early in the play, we learn that he has chosen to stop going to church because he despises the sermons, and we also learn that he has had an affair with his servant, Abigail Williams. Clearly, John Proctor is an imperfect man; however, he has one incredibly redeeming quality: he cannot cling to a lie in order to save himself. Despite his absence from church and his infidelity, he passes the ultimate moral test when he refuses to perpetuate the lies that resulted in the death and imprisonment of so many in Salem. He stands alone when it would have been easier to do what so many others did; they lied to save their lives. Shortly before he is hung, he says, “I cannot throw away my life in a lie, even though it would save my life.” To John Proctor, life without the goodness of your word is not worth living. On the other hand, Tituba, Reverend Parris’s slave from Barbados, chooses life over integrity. Tituba is the first to be accused when Abigail Williams, Reverend Parris’s niece, claims that Tituba made her drink blood. Abigail does this to shift blame from herself to Tituba because at the time, witchery was a “hangin’ error.” When Tituba realizes that she will be faced with a fatal beating or hanging on the gallows, she confesses to witchcraft and quickly incriminates two others, Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne, both easy targets in the community. While one can empathize with Tituba’s choice, certainly John Proctor is the more admirable character; he chooses integrity above all else. However, it’s likely that Miller wants us to understand that this “crucible,” this test, is complicated, and that the way one responds cannot be so easily judged because fear and hysteria obscure both reason and the truth. So, while Tituba lies to save her life, it’s hard to condemn her. In short, Arthur Miller prompts readers and viewers to carefully consider the moral dilemmas in their own lives and to think about what lessons they might learn from what happened in Salem. At what point is it okay to lie? Is life more important than one’s integrity? Moreover, is it vain to choose integrity over life? These are the questions that Miller’s masterpiece raises. So, did John Proctor pass the test? Did Tituba pass it? It’s difficult to say definitively because it all depends upon what is most important to each individual. Grace Krzenski is a junior at Cabrini High School , New Orleans, where she enjoys studying science and English. Grace is on the varsity Cabrini basketball team, and in her spare time enjoys reading, playing basketball, and spending time with family and friends. She is looking forward to attending college somewhere in the southern states to study marine biology. Do you run an English or philosophy program at a school in search of a publisher for your students' content? Look no further! Email editor@aletheitoday.com for more information about how ATM can bring your young writers to the next level and get your department the publicity it deserves. Previous Next

< Back The Wisdom of Wisdom David Cowles Jun 9, 2026 “Who would have guessed that the struggle of Good vs. Evil would boil down to a debate pitting King Solomon against Bertrand Russell?” 1500 Words, 7 minute read The Old Testament Book of Wisdom is traditionally attributed to King Solomon (10 th century BCE) but it was actually written in the 2 nd century, in Greek (vs. Hebrew or Aramaic), and most likely in Alexandria (Egypt, not Virginia…and not in Palestine). 200 years before Jesus, the author of Wisdom was already attempting to reconcile Judaism with the best of Greek philosophy – a noble project, elaborated by the Apostles John and Paul and culminating in the work of Thomas Aquinas a millennium later. That said, the brilliance of Wisdom could not be fully appreciated until the 20 th century CE, when Solomon, the wisest man of his generation, met Bertrand Russell (the wisest man of his?) in the mud wrestling pit at the Oxford Union. Why the grudge? It’s just a tiff about gods, nature, math, logic, and God. I mean, Jeez, it’s not the World Cup or anything! But still… “Some men (sic) see things as they are and ask Why . I dream of things that never were and ask Why not .” (Bobby Kennedy) Our Solomon (KS) is firmly in the first camp; he is a pragmatist. He recognizes an abundance (not necessarily a preponderance) of Beauty (Nature), Truth (Order), and Justice (Harmony) in the World. When he asks, “Why?” the answer (to him) is obvious: God! KS might have said, “God created the World, God sustains the World, and the World is made in God’s image and likeness. Any Beauty, Truth or Justice (i.e. any Good ) that happens in this World is a reflection/refraction of God’s nature and/or the fruit of God’s generative (and generous) activity.” He might have said that! Our Russell (BR) did not deny the existence of ‘good things’ and he did not even dispute the idea that ‘all good things’ could constitute ‘a set’ (math & logic), i.e. the Set of all Good things. Russell argued on logical grounds that the ‘Set of all Good things’ (SG) could not itself be a good thing, i.e. that no set can be a member of itself. This seems counterintuitive. Of course SG is a good thing; therefore it must be a member of the Set of all Good Things. And this doesn’t seem to be a one off anomaly. The set of all mathematical objects is itself a mathematical object; no? How about the set of all technologies? The set of all information? I could go on. Of course, there are sets that are not members of themselves. The set of all horses is not a horse. Clearly, there is room here for pluralism, but no, BR is insistent - so much so that he makes it an Axiom of Logic that no set may be a member of itself (even if it obviously is). ( Note : Russell gets around this apparent absurdity by saying that when a set is a member of itself, it is not a set after all but a class .) The set of Logical Axioms is a secular version of Moses’ Ten Commandments so when BR spoke ex cathedra , the world dutifully went silent…and stayed that way for more than half a century…until one brave soul (or fool) dared to shout, “Look, BR has no clothes!” Wisdom defeats Russell, a British Empiricist at heart, with an argument that begins with their shared recognition of Good (i.e. Beauty, Truth, Justice) in the World. Humans instinctively and correctly recognize the ‘divine’ in concrete manifestations of such Virtues. Sincerely if mistakenly, we elevate ‘good things’ to the level of ‘god things’, aka gods. The Sun is good; we recognize it, we deify it ( Ra ), and ultimately, we worship it; we are animists. Only later do we personify it ( Helios ); now we are pagans. Polytheism has its plusses: e.g. its penchant to recognize traces of divinity throughout the natural world; but on the other hand, the tendency for gods to proliferate makes the system quite unwieldy. What can be deified and what can’t? The wind, a waterfall, an eddy, my uncle’s pipe? The pagan equivalent of the Council of Nicaea (325 CE) would have to be in nearly continuous session, sorting out the conflicting claims of the pseudo-divine. Here, theology reached an inflection point: Do we collapse the various gods into a single divinity (monotheism) permeating all things or do we go all in on idolatry? Do we solve the problem of divine proliferation by designating ever more gods? And when we have exhausted Nature’s storehouse, do we start manufacturing our own gods, i.e. idols? This is the turn that has Solomon in a snit. It’s one thing to associate unique gods with specific natural phenomena. The impulse is benign. It’s quite another thing for us to make our own gods. Instead of a God who ‘made all things’ and/or is ‘incarnate’ in the World, we make gods of the works of our own hands. We become creator, gods are our creatures. We reduce divinity to the status of a bobble, a trinket, or a toy. That is a level of blasphemy that Solomon, for all his patience and wisdom, simply could not countenance. This time, we don’t need to put words in Solomon’s mouth; we have his own words (by attribution), compliments of the Book of Wisdom (chapters 13, 14): “ For all men who were ignorant of God were foolish by nature; for they were unable from the good things that are seen to know him who exists unseen, nor did they recognize the craftsman while paying heed to his works… They should have realized that these things have a master and that he is much greater than all of them, for he is the creator of beauty… (Solomon is clear: Beauty is a thing-in-itself, an objective reality, and not a subjective accident but the product of intentional agency.) “Yet these men are little to be blamed, for perhaps they go astray while seeking God and desiring to find him. For as they live among his works, they keep searching, and they trust in what they see, because the things that are seen are beautiful.“ But the most miserable people of all are those who rest their hopes on lifeless things, who worship things that have been made by human hands—images of animals artistically made from gold and silver, or some useless stone carved by someone years ago… “The idol made with hands is accursed, and so is he who made it; because he did the work and a perishable thing was called god . The ungodly man and his ungodliness are equally hateful to God; what was done will be punished together along with him who did it… For the worship of idols not to be named is the beginning and cause and end of every evil.” According to Solomon, all ‘beautiful things’ share a common quality (beauty), thereby disclosing the real existence of Beauty. Beauty per se is ontologically prior to its expression in various concrete objects and events. The set of ‘all things bright and beautiful’, by virtue of their shared Beauty is itself a beautiful thing; therefore Beauty, the common element of every beautiful thing, the element that makes the ‘beautiful’ beautiful, is itself beautiful and therefore is itself a member of the ‘set of beautiful things’. God is good, and God is the Good per se , and the Good is experienced in our World as Beauty, Truth, and Justice. Consequently, Keats can write, “Beauty is truth and truth beauty.” Both are manifestations of the Good and therefore manifestations of God. God is both beautiful and Beauty per se . Likewise, God is both truthful and Truth; God is just and Justice. Therefore God is a member of the set of all things beautiful, the set of all things true, and the set of all things just. Recognizing that beautiful, true, and just things exist in the world, understanding that Beauty, Truth, and Justice are objective absolutes, neither subjective nor relative, and concluding that Beauty, Truth, and Justice imply intentional agency (i.e. the existence of God) preclude any rational preference for Evil over Good. Conversely, all evil is at its root a rejection of what is beautiful, true or just in deference to some other pseudo-value (e.g. unjust gain, lust, power, sloth), i.e. in deference to the works of our own hands, i.e. in deference to idols. Who would have guessed that the struggle of Good vs. Evil would boil down to a debate pitting King Solomon, ‘the baby splitter’, against ‘better red than dead’ Bertrand Russell? But that is the whacky world of Intellectual History…and I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else! Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! 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< Back How 2024 Became 1959…Again David Cowles Dec 10, 2024 “In both the UK and US, the voters who made a difference in 2024 were the voters who chose not to make a difference, Alienated Voters who just dropped out.” On October 15, 2023, Aletheia Today published an article on a mayoral race that took place in Boston 60 years ago. No, we did not use that article to predict with uncanny accuracy the outcome of 2024‘s Presidential Election…but we were definitely looking ahead. “This is a book about…people who have come to believe that voting is meaningless and useless because politicians or those who influence politicians are corrupt, selfish, and beyond popular control.” – Surely this is a quote from some just released rehash of recent events, correct? Not even close. This is the opening paragraph of a book published in 1960: The Alienated Voter , by Professor Murray Levin (d. 1999). Levin’s singular contribution to ‘electoral science’ is his discovery of a new species of voter that he called ‘Alienated’. The Alienated Voter (AV) does not vote with the intention of reshaping public policy or even in the hope of improving conditions for herself, her family and her friends. She no longer believes such things are possible. The Alienated Voter doubts her elected representatives have the power…or even the desire…to make life better for her. They are looking out for themselves…and their cronies. In any event, their influence is limited by a ‘system’ that co-opts every good intention for its own undemocratic ends. Nor is the AV a ‘message voter’. Who would she be messaging? In her world, there’s no one worthy of such a message. AV often does not belong to any political party; she has no discernable ‘ideology’. If challenged, she simply says, “I’m not political.” and turns away. But in fact, she is very political! She devours alternative media, rounding out the personal version of Leviathan she carries in her head. Nor is AV an ‘identity voter’. Her ‘class’, the exploited . Her ‘race’, the powerless . Contacted by a pollster, she is unashamed, “I did not vote!” and she wears that like a badge of honor, and scoffs, at least to herself, at her misguided neighbors who proudly but foolishly display their “I voted” stickers, like first graders hoping for a treat. The Alienated Voter knows, “There will be no treat!” Let me set the scene. It’s Boston, 1959. The City’s incumbent mayor is not running for reelection. The runner-up in the previous mayoral race, State Senate President John Powers, has been informally designated ‘mayor presumptive’ by the Boston ‘establishment’ and its media outlets. (Ring any bells?) Nevertheless four brave candidates entered the nonpartisan primary against Powers. Possibly the least well known of them: Registrar of Probate John Collins. As expected, Powers won the primary easily with 34% of the votes cast. Surprisingly, Collins finished second, but with only 22% of the total. The Boston media promptly promoted Powers from ‘mayor presumptive’ to ‘incoming mayor’. The outcome of the final election was never in doubt…until about 8:45 PM on the evening of November 3, 1959. At the time, Boston was best understood as an uneasy confederation of ethnically defined neighborhoods. Tell me your postal code (no zip codes yet) and I could tell you where your ancestors were from, what religion you practiced, and how much money you made. “You are where you live.” Yet, Levin’s study showed that religion, income, and ethnicity played no significant role in the 1959 election results. Collins won the votes of Catholics, Protestants, and Jews, high and low income earners, Irish, Italian, Yankee and African American voters. Somehow, a consensus emerged without anyone (not even Collins) explicitly calling for it. Nobody saw it coming. It was not reflected in the size of crowds at political rallies; it was not reflected in public opinion polls. It happened under the radar, at bus stops and in barrooms, and it cut across all the city’s neighborhoods. In the end, Collins won, 56% to 44%. Powers carried only 4 of Boston’s 22 wards; he’d been expected to win them all. Collins turned a 12% primary deficit into an astonishing 12% election day margin. Both candidates received more votes in the final election than they had in the preliminary. Powers doubled his primary vote total, but Collins quadrupled his (from 28,000 to 114,000). 10% of those who voted for Collins in the final had voted for Powers in the preliminary! How does that happen? The verdict of Boston’s voters was delivered loudly…and clearly: “We won’t let the city’s ‘power elite’ take us for granted any longer.” May I ask you a question? The last time you voted in an election, did you think your preferred candidate would do a better job than their opponent? Not necessarily a ‘good’ job but a ‘better than the alternative’ job? Of course you did…you’re not an Alienated Voter. Professor Levin’s most astonishing finding was that a majority of voters in Boston’s Mayoral election did not think their candidate would be a better mayor than his opponent. This tendency was especially prominent among Collins voters. Voters did not vote for Collins; they didn’t even vote against Powers. They voted against a system that took them for granted. This phenomenon resurfaced in 2024, this time on a national stage. Just look at the 2024 vote totals: the Republican got just 3,000,000 votes more than last time – not enough to change the result; but his Democratic opponent got 6,000,000 fewer votes – and that’s what flipped the switch! The same thing just happened in the United Kingdom. Labour received only a few more votes in their 2024 landslide than they had in their 2019 rout; but the Tories received 6,000,000 fewer votes in 2024. In both UK and US, the voters who made a difference in 2024 were the voters who chose not to make a difference, Alienated Voters who just dropped out. How do we know that these results can be attributed to alienation and not just apathy? In the final New York Times/Siena College national poll in late October , nearly two-thirds of voters said the government was “mostly working to benefit itself and the elites,” rather than “the people and the country.” The establishment parties never had a chance! Keep the conversation going. 1. Click here to contact us on any matter. How did you like the post? How could we do better in the future? Suggestions welcome. 2. To subscribe (at no cost) to TWS and ATM, follow this link . 3. We encourage new articles and reprints from freelance writers ; click here to view out Writers’ Specs. Previous Share Next Do you like what you just read and want to read more Thoughts? Subscribe today for free! 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