Interview with Galatomic

Whenever your ready...

Who? Sorry that wasn't nice of me.

no I agree.

Yikes! I guess I didn't even fill out my user profile so I'll have to play catch up now.

I'm 67 with 3 daughters, seven grandkids and 1 great grand son. I never felt like a grandfather and my only notion of a "great grandfather" comes to me from a recollection of my great grandmother(sex being unimportant in this context) who lived next door to my grandmother. I sat in her lap alot but actually never saw her move from the chair she was in.

I grew up in Ill., a suburb of Chicago (21yrs.) moved to Southern California, then Oregon, Upstate NY, NJ, Oregon, Maryland and now NJ.

I went to catholic grade school, public high school and evengelical "liberal arts" college. Degree in math, minor philosophy and almost a master degree in math at the univ Missouri. I then went to work by necessity (go figure) and I was drawn into the computer field by default. No one else at work(1961) had a clue how to program them and "it" came to us without any software. You had to enter the program through the console in octal machine code. There were no computer courses in school.

I worked as a programmer, analyst and consultant until about 2000 and then have gradually retired from this work I got paid for.

During the late 60’s early 70’s I dropped a lot of acid, smoked a lot of pot, was active in the communal movement, lived in a commune in Oregon and worked a regular job throughout that time.

I was divorced around "78" and have a new "significant other" for the past 10 years whom I met "online" at the AOL philosophy boards.

I am now fully occupied pursuing interests that were mainly subliminal all those years. These include in order of importance philosophy, watercolors and "go"(an eastern board game more frustrating than chess) and bridge which I play with my SO. We are both newcomers to "bridge" but have learned fast and find it very challenging and fun.

I have done a lot of traveling since I retired. Fiji, Australia, New Zealand, Pitcairn, Bahamas, Thailand, Hawaii, Ecuador, Peru, Easter Island Tahiti and more than I can remember at this moment, oh yeah Greece, Spain, Madeira Portugal and a lot of islands here and there; most of it on Cruise ships but also on Freighters. On these trips I have taken along copious numbers of philosophy books that I read seriously and found exciting. I've had "affairs" with Whitehead, Schopenhauer, Kant, Heidegger Bucky Fuller, Ram Dass and many of the "New Agers". I skimmed the rest.

I am writing a paper on philosophy about a new world view that I feel is on a par with the likes of Copernicus, Newton and Einstein. It is a fantastical shocking new view of our world that develops a fractal model of the world asserting that our galaxy and all the other galaxies in our world are not just collections of tiny "atoms" but are really collections of tiny galaxies populated with advanced civilizations.

I doubt anyone in the scientific community will take me seriously because I have also come to realize that there are literally hundreds of others with websites out there making similar but different bizarre claims of having found “it”. So it really is more of a “Don Quixote” quest and this explains why I am at FrostCloud rather than presenting this new theory at some philosophical forum. But, like most of these others, I think I am on to something.

This is not to put FrostCloud down in any sense. I loved the AOL philosophy boards and gained many friends there who helped me develop philosophically. I have not found anything to replace that experience (95-98) but FrostCloud “feels” promising. What I am working on now has been accomplished in isolation, since those days, and I am now looking forward to returning in spiral fashion to explain the “gap” between visits, to say I have climbed up and have seen new things. To my chagrin, I not only return changed but the world (read Internet Philosophy Board Talking Heads) has also changed and I have no footing so to speak. But if the only price I need pay to gain your ears is to listen in kind then I have found a new “home” and we can share.

we really are all unique, ya know...

galatomic

I knew it...j/k Won't get any conflict from us. Ever hear of candiflipping? Forget that question.

The traveling sounds great. I'm glad to hear you are enjoying your retirement. Doesn't sound like things can get any better.

The tools for managing the topics are great. They are really superior to what we had on AOL. I always resented the fact that in AOL you had to get to Philosophy through the religion&ethics section.

I think FrostCloud will live or die based on the volume of users. Whatever you can do to increase participation I am all for. If there is something we can do as users then ask and you shall recieve.

Since I'm new, I am still focusing on all the plusses.

galatomic

I absolutely will Not say I like balls on a woman, but you sure got em!

That's funny. I haven't used aol in a while but I remember that.

I guess using the cloud as long as we are compelled to relate to others is the best thing. There are many subjects here, and half the time I am fulfilled simply by the daily chat back and forth. Debate is fun, and so is sharing.

3) What makes you really angry? What makes you very happy?

I try not to get angry but get even. Anger is usually the wrong response to things you dislike. Anger can be used to control children through intimidation but that is simply abuse and will train them to deal with problems the same way. The only time anger doesn’t make things worse is when those around you are wise enough not respond in kind. Many parents are actually intimidated by their child’s angry tantrums and the child learns anger as a control strategy. Their only hope as teens would be getting sent to “tough love” survival camps where they have to start their own fires without matches if they want to cook their food or warm their tootsies.

My Top Ten Dislikes:

1.) Stimulating the economy by giving tax money to the rich.

2.) Stimulating the economy by giving tax money to the military.

3.) Our enormous stockpile of WMD.

4.) What we did to Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

5.) Having a military rather than a “powerful peace corps”

6.) The way people think individuals can own the land and develop it for their profit. We need to return the land to nature and let it be managed by the wise old Indians who have counseled their brothers not to build casinos on their reservations. We should build communities in space, orbiting around our “Earth Paradise”, where we cannot screw it up. We should only be allowed to visit the surface on weekly permits after passing “awareness” exams.

7.) Teaching “Religion” to children.

8.) The fact that all schools are not voluntary.

9.) The only thing schools should teach is “how to think” not what.

10.) The teaching of “Science” as more than a tool but as our “Savior” from religious superstition.



My Top Ten Likes:

1.) I believe our soul is relatively indestructible. Because of this we can recover from mistakes, even big ones like genocide or the loss of the buffalo.

2.) The Rich are often benefactors of the Creative Arts.

3.) Our WMD could power spaceships or be used to turn asteroids that are on collision courses with our Earth home.

4.) The military is a good model for communal living for a “Greater Objective”. We just need to change their “Mandate”.

5.) The Marshall Plan.

6.) The Hubble Telescope.

7.) The Internet

8.) Our Technological Possibilities. We could build orbiting communities.

9.) The fact that we have a moon and it has a likeness of the face of a woman.

10.) The peace corps was a very popular program.


galatomic

Ok i know this is an interview with him, but i had to comment. And its a good compliment. I both love and hate some of your ideas, but you have great way to approach to the world(even if i find some, not quite to my liking)! ANd i never heard of ya till now, which i find refreshing to see new faces.

Comments Welcome

Thanks Dragon. I hope we can discuss these issues and I am curious to learn which ideas you agree with and which you do not.

galatomic

He does have a nice approach. I don't really care that people posted on this thread, but you might since its your interview. I would like to keep that to a minimum though if possible, just for the sake of the interview. However, it is Gal's interview so he is free to call on other members during in this thread.

Haha, nobody chimed in during Symptom's interview. Everybodies afraid of em!

I think you and I agree on anger. It really doesn't add anything positive to the equation, unless anger is used as an asset. If anger is the governing force of the intention then it will almost always be counter productive. Anger for survival or practical purposes is cool, but psychological anger is poison to ourselves, but even more so to others. Especially children.

I'm with you on 5, 7, 8, and 9 on the dislikes. And 4, 6, 7, and 8 on the likes.


4) What kind of near future would you like to see, and how do you suggest we get there?

Afraid of Symptom?!? Hahaha. No i get enough of him on other threads.

Anyways back to galatomic.

Oh please, please everyone join in and let’s have a party and a Revolution.

In the near future we tend to hope for political solutions. Unfortunately the possibilities are not promising. I am personally optimistic about Hilary C. She has the qualifications and smarts for leading this country in new directions. She also has been very active in supporting children’s rights and has run a children’s advocacy foundation in D.C. since the 70’s. I don’t know its current status. Her problem is that she will have to move to the “right” and even so she will remain a very polarizing figure. To bad Al Gore self destructed because he has all the credentials and “correct” attitudes toward the environment and the use of technology. And since he already won the election all he would have to do is win it again.

Bucky Fuller said that politicians mainly are there to fight over the distribution of our resources but engineers figure out how to do more with less. So we need to look to our engineers to make our dreams possible and our Philosophers to guide those dreams and correctly spell out our relationship to nature.

We do need a new philosophically driven “World View” that exposes the empirical shortcomings of “hard” science, revolutionizes biological research and closes the explanatory gaps in our thinking about consciousness. I happen to have this new world view in my back pocket and if I am respectfully coaxed by members of this forum will reveal it for all to judge.

galatomic

And how might we "coax" you into revealing your world view? Don't we all have those? I'm sure you will get respect from most of the members here. I already like what your saying so post your little heart out!

Sorry, Kyman...*locking mouth shut now*

Thanks IsIs.

Yes we do all have ideas about how things are in the world. What I am claiming is that I have a “new” world view that I can argue for from a secular, rational, philosophically critical perspective. I come to this “Philosophical” forum prepared to have just such a discussion. I have been testing the waters to see if this forum is a good place to launch this discussion and will it be of benefit to the people here and will it help me develop these ideas. I think there are many very “sharp” people here with their own perspectives whose ear I would hope to gain and whose own insights are very relevant to what I have to say. This includes kyman and Mike D(where is he?) and even Symptom777 whose scientific knowledge and criticism I would gladly welcome. I am yet unfamiliar with the opinions of other people who hang out here. I am a just newbee having only recently gained “adept” status.

Rather than launching into a discussion of “My World View” at this point, I feel that I should complete this interview, merely noting this as my reason for being here. When and if the time comes for this discussion I will begin a new thread and I think I will call it “The World as Civilization and Technology”.

galatomic

I guess this interview is over. Game called, lack of interest. Bye!

Keep posting! Sounds like an interesting thread I'm sure RA will be a huge fan when you decide to start it!

All good things come to an end. However why would you say bye merely because the questions stopped. GO and share your view whever it intrest you.

Geesh, I was thinking the same thing!

UH RAH!