open-source.. way to go.

open source

the internet makes available for the asking more knowledge and information tools than were available to the most sophisticated agencies dealing with such matters less than a generation ago.

of course unorganised facts have negative value when it comes to gaining the comprehension that is the object of research. philosophy or a comprehensive world-view is what is valued ….as it gives coherence to life.. it is order that overcomes chaos. light of reason that overcomes the darkness of ignorance. these are truths.

that knowledge is freely available is so a great portal to a better world. we are standing on it.. and passing through in greater numbers as the clock ticks (in gigahertz these days.)

open source software is the way it is happening. it is the alternative to proprietary software. the source code of the programs is freely available. its like the guys who didn’t get the job at Microsoft decided to work for nothing and posted the fruit of their labour on the net for the good of all.

well.. its not new to say that it is better to work for nothing than do nothing. (check out my blog.. hehehhe)

i use wikipedia several times a day. its open source. linux, the o.s. on my computer is the same… I think my cell phone runs on open-source software.. probably a dozen other things I do in a normal day are totally underwritten by it..

if you want to improve the program you are free to do so.. its open and non-commercial. everyone benefits and growth is explosive.

that knowledge is a public good is a huge boon.

education is becoming transformed. whatever you need to know is available. you can have a whole library on a flashdrive. a lifetime’s reading.

the university down the road used to be surrounded by a high wall of sandstone and wrought iron….with sharp spikes on the top…… even broken glass set in the stone. like a loony bin…..

its so come down like a berlin wall.. or great chinese one.

open source is a revolutionary model. it is the model that offers the dynamic to change …..it points to a very bright future.

hurrah!!hurrah!! hurrah!!

tejas fu.

elizabeth, fact and fantasy.

over the weekend I got Elizabeth out .. a movie with cate blanchet and geoffrey rush..

cate blanchet put in a performance I thought. not an easy character to play.. and structurally the movie is well, good...

in fact Elizabeth is quite an extraordinary character. a whole ‘age’ is named after her. very interesting times. (elizabethan times maybe said to continue in the fantasy of some.)

but was/is it all actually as rosy as the cheeks of cate blanchet??

i think not.

daughter of henry VIII. and anne boleyn. kinda harsh childhood.( henry had anne’s head off when Elizabeth was 2 .) it was a thing for which her father developed a penchant.)

she secured an education of sorts (at the time a good one for an english girl), was appointed to the throne at the age of 25 after an upbringing on court intrigue.

England was in a position of extreme luck.. start of the more enlightened age of the industrial revolution…many of the developments started in England....the rest of europe exhausted by war (100 year war).. .. the renaissance blooming.. in Elizabethan England..

Protestantism seems to have delivered a flowering of culture sheltered from the stifling religiosity from rome and its proxies.…

.. it was a period of change…rapid progress intense intellectual activity in so many fields..

as the movie portrays .. john dee, the occultist, indicates that it was a time for one empire to take off..it was to be either the Spanish or the English..

well.. with the benefit of hindsight we know what happened.

one of the more remarkable events of her time was the defeat of the Spanish 'amarda'. this is a pivotal point in the history of international relations.

12 july 1588 a combination of bad Spanish strategy, miscalculation had the Spanish fleet destroyed. a huge blow to the trumped up pomp of the spaniards fresh from a glut of new murders and pillage in south America.(subsequent to the inquisition.) they also probably got more fight than they were used to after the pathetic efforts of the moors and the asymmetrically armed incas. etc. ( it could be something that started the urban rumours of cursed spanish gold.. as the fleet was bought with gold i suspect... from abroad.....)

what the movie doesn’t mention is the brutality of the scorched earth policy of elizabeth’s ‘protestant’ armies in ireland.. the confiscation and appropriation of the entire country from its people.... (this is the point I want to make.) elizabeth 1 seems to have had a more than mild race hatred for the irish. (she even murdered mary queen of scotts . it does come out though melodramatically in the movie.)

still…. out of sight .. out of mind. as they say. but ..its actually very much alive in the minds of people with an irish background ..

speaking from experience (humbly I hasten to add) …of the intimations passed down in a family.. through the generations.. the blighter who mostly gets the finger pointed at him is Cromwell rather than elizabeth.. ….

it was cromwell’s armies in the mid 17^th century (half a century after the end of elizabeth’s reign) that were responsible for the murder of thousands of irish civilians .. even some 50000 sold into slavery in burma and Barbados.. (check the record if you don’t believe me.)

Elizabeth tudor wasn’t directly responsible for cromwells psychopathy but it was in her time that the policy encouraging the like was launched. it was elizabeth tudor's british crown that started with a scorched earth policy in ireland.

these were policies that were set to starve a million odd to death and destroy the prospects of millions more.. as the next 200 years unrolled.

and she was directly responsible for starting it.

people are reported to say ‘malacht cromail ort’ ..’the curse of Cromwell on you’ but even then it maybe not just a reference to oliver but to the earlier Cromwell Thomas 1485-1540 an uncle of oliver…. the architect of the English reformation. (for whom henry the 8^th was arguably just a front.)

they’re old wounds .. septic basically. gangrenous.. on the body politic (a phrase Elizabeth used)

shekur kapur , the director of the movie, argues that the movie portrays Elizabeth against fanatical Spanish intolerance.. but it is not that simple.. he is way out of touch with what was really going on .. way out of his depth.

still truth never sold dvds .. probably never will. kapur obviously has no understanding of the wounds Elizabeth tudor and her father opened and was probably chosen for the job on account of his qualification. its not just about eye candy and pretty costumes. this is spreading misinformation and ignorance about the root of a certain leviathan…. and should be snubbed heartily (as it has been in reviews and the boxoffice.)

shekur if you’re reading this, maybe he should try bollywood mate. but I guess that if you could get a gig there, you wouldn’t have gone to universal pictures.

…

epicurus of samos.

epicurus 341-270 bc. was a philosopher of classical Greece,, (born in samos of Athenian parents) his school met in his garden in athens, small in his life but his influence was lasting. along with the stoics and skepics it lasted well into roman times.

though some people say it is a form of hedonism, this is definitely not to do it justice.

the reason why I want to get it clear is that I was thinking about john stuart mill the other day.. he is know as an English utilitarian. actually he was just an emotionally twisted boy who was parroting his teacher Jeremy bentham who himself was a crank regurgitating the ideas of others (including epicurius.)

the concept of utilitarianism was delt with long ago by epicurus, and delt with far more subtly than mill or other ‘utilitarians’ since.

when ‘Christianity’ became the state religion of rome (--as if the teachings of Christ could be a state religion. ::snort:: ), epicurius was basically banned and reviled. establishment ignoramuses equated him with hedonism. anyone who’s views lack a conventional spiritual morality was targeted. ( it was the dark ages…in some places they haven’t finished)

according to epicurus…

individual pleasure is the sole or chief good in life. it should be taken in moderation. and the greatest pleasures are those of the mind. one must also be careful about ones pleasure as some are not legal and prosecution is something definitely to be avoided. ( disclaimer: do not try this at home. lol. fu.)

knowledge is to be sought to rid oneself of superstition and fears. otherwise learning is to be discouraged as making inroads into time that could be spent having pleasure I guess.. heheh.

he rejects mysticism and is really very down to earth about what he likes. (which I imagine comes from his islander background and must have been a breath of fresh air in athina.)

other than the possibility of gaining happiness from it, virtue has no particular value. ( I guess virtue in the sense of αρετή )

Epicurus was an atomist and epistemologist. his outlook is not superficial. his utilitarianism is but one facet of a way of life embracing what planetary being has to offer.

he contrasts sharply with platonic ideas and directions. no wonder the Christian neo-platonists hated him.. hehehe.

it’s the creed of a cultivated minority as Bertrand Russel points out. it could survive in the refined atmosphere of an elite Athens or rome perhaps. (not sure about new york). virgil the great latin poet was an epicurian.

in the dark ages people turned to mystery religions.(Christianity ) or neo Platonism or stoicism.. equating anything remotely engaging pleasure as sin eminating directly from hell.. . a warped position to be sure.

epicure in common parlance these days is a yuppie who only buys designer gourmet which is exactly the kind of cheapening/debasing one should expect in modernity.