A Moment's Reflection

For those of us who have a generalist background, who lack a dogmatic loyalty to any political doctrine and who are paying attention to the large picture, there is present in these troubled times a sense that this is a critical moment in Western Civilization.
It is not a radical intrepretation of the history of Western Civilization that when the complexity of the social norm is raised, as the Greeks with mathematics and philosophy, it essentially raises the bar to meaningful participation in one's own society. When people find that the bar is over their heads, their knee jerk reaction is to do the limbo, to be a player in a game that is negatively referential to the social norm. They do this because they find themselves aggressed against by what is represented as civilization. Being the target of social aggression, they exhibit a counter aggression in a sort of psychological self-defense. This is the problem that all political address with the exercise of powers we have come to call counter-insurgency.
This is all comprehensible. What is not particularly comprehensible is the reaction of what we call liberals in Western Civilization, people who honestly care about the dispossessed. Their knee jerk reaction is to raise the bar further as though people doing the limbo to a higher bar would improve their social performance. The net result is that more people are dispossessed, aggression in social behavior is increased and at some level of significance, society endures but civilization is lost.
We have now empowering technology. We have the essential element in the construction of a society of minimal aggression, Game Theory. It will take twenty years for incremental advances in our knowledge of this paradigm to reach a critical mass sufficient to a General Game Theory. Which means we face twenty years of social aggression and counter-insurgency.
We are at a critical moment in Western Civilization, let us behave temperately, rationally and with compassion. It's for all the marbles.
Do well and be well.
'Chances Basil Brylcreem' on http://www.amazon.com/books

Time goes away and the world with it.

'There is more day to dawn.'
Henry David Thoreau

I can think of very few moments in that memoir and museum we call Western Civilization that is so defining and differentiating as the moment we are now expecting in five years. In that moment, an experimental fusion power reactor will flash into life and a new world will be born.
Costly and difficult in its initial implementation, it will someday power the world and the hybrids the world will drive. I cannot imagine a more momentous occasion in the whole of that lore and lexicon that generates our institutions and values than when that reactor generates its first few kilowatts.
We are twenty years away from a coherent and comprehensive postmodernist model and twenty years away from a first generation of producing fusion power reactors. That is the kind of coincidence that is driven by inspiration and drives large events, such as a new world being born. We are so close to doing that that even a reclusive, provincial Southwestern writer can see it.
It is a huge moment.
Do well and be well.
'Chances Basil Brylcreem' on http://www.Amazon.com/books

Taking 'Chances'.

Basil here. I'm enjoying the reactions to a very light and entertaining video trailer for my detective novella, 'Chances', currently available for viewing on my Amazon.com/books display page.
Speaking of 'Chances', I guess it's time again to write a little about the book. It's an entertaining look at the desert Southwest structured around a gritty tale of terrorism and smugglers. The message is that there is meaning in the moment. When someone is searching for meaning, a common pursuit in the dehumanizing machine culture of Modernism, they are searching for a defining moment, an instant of being alive in and to the universe.
I enjoyed writing the book and, judging from the critical comments I've had, it shows. It's written to be read quickly. It's an entertainment for an hour or two, not a hobby. If it interests you, check out the campy video.
Do well and be well.
'Chances Basil Brylcreem' on http://www.amazon.com/books

And time goes away and the world with it.

'The sun is but a morning star.'
Henry David Thoreau

At this critical moment in economic history, we see an incredible scenario unfolding. OPEC is now an established power in economic affairs. Their pricing and market strategy will not allow unrestrained growth. If the economy grows, their price will spike causing both inflation and a consequent rise in interest rates will choke off continued growth. We have seen their strategy in action and it has stopped the industrial world in its tracks twice. It is a fact.
Growth and innovation go hand in hand. Easy money feeding innovation causes growth. However with growth off the table, innovation continues as a function of investing opportunity cost. Stability puts a premium on the sort of risk opportunities which characterize entrepreneurs and innovation, however the implementation of that innovation with low growth and the technology that is coming into existence becomes both more difficult and more costly in its social effects.
So we are now looking at high structural unemployment, high rates of innovation and a steady rise in productivity. And these parameters are so unusual and so beyond the reach of the paradigms that exist today that we will have to, and are actually in the process of development of, a new economic paradigm.
It is a critical moment in world history, whether one views that as a grand narrative or a picaresque memoir. It is one for the books.
Do well and be well.
'Chances Basil Brylcreem' on Amazon.com/books

Postmodernism and the 'L' Economy

J.M. here. Don't forget to check out the new video trailer on Amazon.com for 'Chances'.
Watching the CNBC crew puzzle at the new market is extremely entertaining for me. They have become so used to following large trends that a stock market doing what it is supposed to do, interest rates doing what they are supposed to do, and creative destruction proceeding inexorably puzzles them.
We live in a technological age. That may sound trite, but the technology in question, while empowering, is extremely capable, more capable than some people. This is raising the bar and driving the 'L' recovery. As Basil writes in the book in process, 'You can't make a market on the backs of dead people.' The gigantic market driven redistribution of wealth is triggering a significant governmental response of a countering redistribution of wealth. People are the essential element in markets. Robots don't buy cars.
So here we are in the midst of the definably final chapter of the Grand Narrative that is Industrialism, large events driving large responses. And the economy is in 'L' mode. Unless you share the conceptual basis of postmodernism that will confuse you.
So postmodernists watch as trends vanish into normal market operations secure in the knowledge that we are functioning at a high level in a critical and difficult moment.
Sooner or later, the CNBC crew will solve this puzzle and focus on individual stocks on a value basis while factoring in that complex equations drive economies and markets and the ability of any one person to understand what is going on in the world of finance is very limited.
This scenario is extremely amenable to the rise of a rational postmodernism and as sure as the sun rises that will occur.
Do well and be well.
'Chances Basil Brylcreem' on Amazon.com/books

Is Love the Answer?

I dunno. What's the question?
Basil here. I am extremely proud of my new video trailer for 'Chances'. You can see it by searching 'Chances Basil Brylcreem' on Amazon.com books. Check it out.
Being creative, I have a continuing interest in the process and context of creativity. Writers write. Should the world end, the last light will go out on a writer's desk while he's writing. There's no cure for the disease. To write well, however, requires the writer to be engage' with the world around him and that's just code for emotional involvement and that's just psychobabble for love.
I'm at the genesis point for a new book, good concept, good characters and a strong sense of the story. My muse and I have parted company. Love abstracted is not engage'. So I tweet and blog waiting for my motivation to begin. I'll write it even if I have to use espresso to make my hand move. Writers write. I just don't know how good it will be. It's like that.
The question to which love is the answer is what motivates excellence. I endure but I will probably not excell because I have no answer to give.
Do well and be well.