Tom Barrack is one of the biggest real-estate deal-makers in the world…

But recently, it turns out, Mr. Barrack has also been doing some soul-searching—…

Bella and Edward Who????
July 02, 2010
Gang,
The last few weeks have been an incredible adventure. Thanks to you, Colony is on fire across the globe and we are conquering new frontiers and new themes on a daily basis in almost every venue in which we conduct our business. You are the A Team and I am deeply grateful and proud of what all of you have “teamed” to our reality.

As you know, I have been caught in a vortex of meteoric movement in every aspect of life and that has intensified on a cosmic scale the last few weeks. My personal goal has always been to feel the wind blow through my hair when standing on the ledge. Well, I certainly found the ledge, if not the hair. It is where I thankfully and excitedly anticipate the scent of excitement and fulfillment the most. I seem to love the edge.

My real job is to act as the Senior Information Officer for all of you and share my points of view, newfound information, instincts, and reactions so that you can incorporate them into a plan of action, which, through sweat and alchemy, becomes profit for our investors as well as ourselves. Today the volatility and uncertainty in the world is at epic proportions and perhaps the most valuable tool that I can share with you is the ability to adapt to, and analyze other points of views. Especially, to understand those points of view which you find truly frightening, disturbing, or life threatening. We all find comfort in crawling into our own “content” of life and with death defying stubbornness refuse to look outside to the “context” in which other people view our “content”. The wars of the world since the beginning of time have been fought over diverging points of view. There is no price too great to defend it. Unfortunately, that inflexibility does not work well for global traders or businessmen. Adaptability and understanding of strange bedfellows becomes a competitive edge.

I am going to share with you a personal breakthrough, which does not relate directly to our business but does reflect upon how we all look at all the “stuff” that drives us on a daily basis. Many of you will think that I have lost my mind or have finally experienced a mystical intervention of “my feminine side”. I promise you, it is neither.

I have had an agonizingly tough couple of weeks and have survived on pure adrenaline in the midst of tumult, controversy, tough negotiations with business counterparts, and a grueling travel itinerary that was challenging even for me. One of the recent meetings was in Turkey with our Mars partners. I made arrangements to have a bit of yacht time with them. When the meeting got cancelled I did the unthinkable for me, have a little down time all to myself. I boarded the gorgeous but stark Turkish Gulet right as the sun was setting. As I made my way into the main cabin I saw something so frightening it left me speechless. There, staring up at me from the ebony coffee table was a book. On the cover was a gorgeous red apple nestled between two soft and caring hands. Between the hands were written the words that strike terror in the hearts of every macho, red-blooded male…TWILIGHT. AAAARRRGGGGHHHH!! Alone, on a boat, with no wifi, no satellite, no magazines, no newspapers, just me and this book. This piece of chick lit, teeny bopper heartthrob stuff. Terror on the high seas! I wanted nothing to do with any of it. Not relevant, not interesting.

As I sat there with nothing to do the book kept taunting me. I began to think that there must be something I don’t understand. What could it be? What is it all about? Women don’t just read these books, they live them. They become each paragraph. I picked it up, but then immediately dropped it like a hot coal. What if someone saw me reading this? My macho reputation would be finished! I would be kicked out of the bench press section of the gym. My polo compadres would send me packing to the pony rides and my surfing buddies would exile me to the kiddie pool.

But it was a long night and there was absolutely nothing, and I mean NOTHING else to do. Long story short – not only did I read Twilight, I read the other two as well!! I was fascinated, captivated even. However, what intrigued me was not the same thing that hooked the millions of women whose lives and had been changed by this series, but something else entirely.

For you male Colonists, here is a brief synopsis. Stubborn teenage girl meets a handsome but moody vampire and against all odds they fall in love.

Here is my macho take – Stephanie Meyer is a total genius. As I flipped through the pages I was startled by the lack of detailed description of Bella and the surgical and illuminating development of Edward. As hard as I tried I could not really picture Bella, but I was grabbed by Edward’s character – gorgeous, super human, super strong, super fast and most importantly encompassing the wisdom of a 109-year-old man in the guise of a 17-year-old boy.

The description of Bella on the other hand, was not moving, or compelling. What I realized is the genius of Stephanie was that she knew that by keeping the character generic, any and every woman could climb inside and picture herself in Bella’s shoes. Thus the fascination and deep emotional reactions to what many (including myself) thought was a foolish teenage trashy novel.

I definitely got that the “anticipation” was much more romantic and sexy than the “consummation” to the woman. Slow, patient, caring, tender…. (guys have you heard those words before?) I found him incredibly appealing as he was taking care of Bella, putting her first, distancing himself from her to protect her and yet never being able to get her out of his mind. The relationship stood the test of time through many years, other men, family challenges and misconceptions of valiant and loving acts. A human relationship with a vampire is challenging on many levels, the least of which being you get older as your partner remain timeless. It was enticing, captivating, alluring…and dangerous. Through it all she believed that she could do it…. change her life… change his life…make it different…in spite of what conventional wisdom dictated.

Every woman longs for the anticipation, the romance, the journey, the taboo, the patience, and the attentiveness. Men, however, are all about the destination, the result, the speed and the outcome. The journey is merely penance to get to the destination. Which is why despite the vampires and werewolves, this book is kryptonite to most men.

In a world of technology these books are unique. There is so little imagination left in most of forms of entertainment today. See it, Google it, play it, do it…there is very little old fashioned make believe anymore. I could go on and on, but I know by now many of you are saying, “what happened to our leader?”… “Maybe Lebanese really is a sexual preference rather than a nationality”. I promise none of the above.

Here is my point. The idea of devoting half a day to reading these books was something that never, NEVER, entered my mind as something I would ever, EVER do. I hated them. I mocked them. It made no difference to me that over 20 million books were sold, movies made, and Team Edward and Team Jacob pandemonium had engulfed the world. I was simply stuck in my point of view.

Once I ventured into the books I learned something. I now understand why some women are emotionally altered from merely reading a book. I have also gained a deeper realization that understanding the circumstances and points of views of those with whom we are negotiating, working, living, loving or fighting is the key determinant factor in an enduring relationship.

In every day business, we think we know it all. We are the captains of our industry and we possess all the global knowledge. That which we don’t understand we push a button and it appears before us. We are lacking creativity…. it is hard for us to dream… harder for us to change our lives… hard to live in a situation that other people view as unconventional. [emphasis added] And for sure, we all have no idea on how to be satisfied with the status quo.

It is time for all of us to become more creative, spend more time outside of the strict arithmetic cadence of our business, and understand foreign points of view. Most importantly we must really find the “moment”. Anticipation is everything. The process of getting to a destination is the objective and the more illumination, color, and vitality we give to the “road” the less important the final destination becomes. It will be what it will be!!! [emphasis added]

On this 4th of July, slow down, take a breath, rediscover your imagination and create some excitement in your life. Take a few days to expand on the qualities of the character you would really like to become. Then live it, do it, become it! The better you are as an individual, the better we will be as a team.

I feel renewed and refreshed, having gotten out of my comfort zone and experiencing something so totally out of my normal realm. I don’t get it…. but I feel it. Taking the agenda-less time to absorb a point of view that I had ignored while loved ones around me relished in it, was an oasis for my soul. Having been unwilling to investigate the cause of such a startling movement until now was ignorant. Move your cheese!!!! Break through the comfort barriers, you can handle it whatever it is. The earth is turning on its axis. Planets and moons and suns are in orbit. Gravity is pulling and tugging, and molecules and quarks are warring inside of us. We need movement to live…

Do it Now!

Tom

 …The law of non-contradiction is the foundation for all logical thinking. It is known by a couple different names: the law of contradiction, and the law of non-contradiction.  No matter what you call it, this law is absolutely inviolable. The law may be defined as follows: a statement cannot be true and not true at the same time and in the same respect. For example: It cannot be both raining and not raining at the same time and in the same respect…

But how many drops of water constitute rain?  One drop?  100 drops.  What if a drop lands next to me but not one me?  What if the drop is 10 meters  away from me?  100 meters? 1,000 meters?  What if the moisture falls from the clouds but evaporates before it hits the ground?

The answer to most complicated questions is not simple black and white, but “it depends”.  And the answers are almost always contextual.  That’s why there are differences between the teachings of Jesus and Mohamamd.  They taught different students in different cultures at different periods of time.

It takes a flexible mind to attempt to understand the universe.  Einstein would not accept the tennets of quantum mechanics but modern experiments have proved its validity.

See http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein

Quantum mechanics is certainly imposing. But an inner voice tells me that it is not yet the real thing. The theory says a lot, but does not really bring us any closer to the secret of the ‘old one’. I, at any rate, am convinced that He does not throw dice. [emphasis added]

Schrödinger’s cat is an attempt to explain how logic works in a quantum world.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger’s_cat

Schrödinger’s cat is a thought experiment, often described as a paradox, devised by Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger in 1935. It illustrates what he saw as the problem of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics applied to everyday objects. The thought experiment presents a cat that might be alive or dead, depending on an earlier random event. In the course of developing this experiment, he coined the term Verschränkung — literally, entanglement.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mechanics

…The mathematical formulations of quantum mechanics are abstract and the implications are often non-intuitive…

I believe both polytheism (many gods) and monotheism (one god) could be used to describe the universe depending on the level of consciousness of the describer.  A Shaman who interacts with the different aspects of the Gaia mind would see the different pools of consciousness from different cultures as different Gods.  A Master like Jesus, Buddha or Milarepa would see beyond that grid on consciousness to a galatic or universal level of consciousness and recognize all is one.  See http://esotericvoyage.com/blog/monotheism-vs-polytheism/

Creationism (God created the universe) vs. Evolution (radom chance started the universe and life and survival of the fittest was the sole cause of evolution) are both valid ways to describe the creation of the universe to different students in different cultures at different times.

By the way, science hasn’t yet found the driving force behind evolution.  Hint:  See http://esotericvoyage.com/blog/the-real-cause-of-evolution-2/

The best part was actually the reader’s guide at the end.  Very thought provoking.  You can see it at http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780449912553&view=rg

… What kinds of changes do you think will occur during the twenty-first century–with governments, technology, society, and so on? Do you think America will lose its predominant status in the world?

…Do you think it likely that we will make contact with extraterrestrials at some time in the future? What will the implications of such an event be? … Will such a discovery confirm the existence of God or cause us to question his existence at all?

…In an interview, the author said, “I wanted readers to look philosophically at the idea that you can be seduced by the notion that God is leading you and that your actions have his approval.”

JAY LENO says he is old enough to remember when Detroit was a symbol of America’s prestige and manufacturing might, unlike its image today as a symbol of industrial decay and economic failure.

“In 1963, Chrysler Corporation produced a batch of turbine cars and took them on test drives around the world,” said Mr. Leno, the reinstated host of “The Tonight Show” who is now 59. “In countries where people were still riding bicycles and donkeys, Americans were driving jets.”

Now, Mr. Leno noted dryly, Americans are driving by in Toyotas, a situation that he thinks holds a deeper message — about Americans losing control of their own destiny.

“That is sort of a cheap shot,” Mr. Leno said, flashing his trademark smirk. “It’s probably unfair to Toyota, but everybody’s piling on. I’m just as guilty as anyone, making Toyota jokes now just about every night.”

Actually, Mr. Leno said there’s nothing about America’s battered auto industry that Yankee ingenuity and a can-do attitude couldn’t fix. So Mr. Leno, owner of a vast collection of unusual vehicles, is proud to show off one of his most outlandish creations: the turbine-powered EcoJet supercar concept.

In a nod to their shared technology, he parks the EcoJet next to a 1963 Chrysler Turbine Car in his collection. “It’s the only one in private hands,” he said conspiratorially during a recent tour of his sprawling garage complex here, not far from the studio where his show is recorded.

The EcoJet is the result of a collaboration between General Motors and Mr. Leno’s crew at the Big Dog Garage, as his hangout full of motor-driven toys is called. His collecting tastes run from 150-year-old steam engines to a turbine-powered motorcycle built at his shop.

Technological singularity refers to the hypothesis that technological progress will become extremely fast, and so make the future unpredictable and qualitatively different from today.

Although technological progress has been accelerating, it has been limited by the basic intelligence of the human brain, which has not changed significantly for millennia. However with the increasing power of computers and other technologies, it might soon be possible to build a machine that is fundamentally more intelligent than humans.

If such a machine were built, then the machine itself could build a more intelligent machine. If the machine is more intelligent than humans, then presumably it would be better at building a more intelligent machine. The more intelligent machine would then be better at building an even more intelligent machine. This process might continue exponentially, with ever more intelligent machines making bigger increments to the intelligence of the next machine. (This process is referred to as Recursive self improvement.)

I. J. Good described this as an “intelligence explosion”. It is quite different from normal technological progress because the underlying intelligence is increasing. The term Technological Singularity reflects the idea that the change may happen suddenly, and that it is very difficult to predict how such a new world would operate…

…A flashback character in Ken MacLeod’s 1998 novel The Cassini Division dismissively refers to the singularity as “the Rapture for nerds”, though the singularity goes on to happen anyway.

…

Paige Bennethum, 4, holds her daddy’s hand as he lines up in formation before heading to Iraq. Credit: Abby Bennethum

“God is infinite, so His universe must be too. Thus is the excellence of God magnified and the greatness of His kingdom made manifest; He is glorified not in one, but in countless suns; not in a single earth, a single world, but in a thousand thousand, I say in an infinity of worlds.”

-Giordano Bruno (1548-1600)

Bruno was burned at the stake in 1600 after the Roman Inquisition found him guilty of heresy.  His wikipedia article is interesting.  Here are some exerpts:

…he is the first man to have conceptualized the universe as a continuum where the stars we see at night are of identical nature as the sun.

…Bruno’s taste for free thinking and forbidden books soon caused him difficulties, and given the controversy he caused in later life it is surprising that he was able to remain within the monastic system for eleven years.

…were twice taken against him for having cast away images of the saints, retaining only a crucifix, and for having made controversial reading recommendations to a novice. Such behavior could perhaps be overlooked, but Bruno’s situation became much more serious when he was reported to have defended the Arian heresy, and when a copy of the banned writings of Erasmus, annotated by him, was discovered hidden in the convent privy. When he learned that an indictment was being prepared against him in Naples he fled, shedding his religious habit, at least for a time.

In Paris Bruno enjoyed the protection of his powerful French patrons. During this period, he published several works on mnemonics, including De umbris idearum (On The Shadows of Ideas, 1582), Ars Memoriae (The Art of Memory, 1582), and Cantus Circaeus (Circe’s Song, 1582). All of these were based on his mnemonic models of organised knowledge and experience, as opposed to the simplistic logic-based mnemonic techniques of Petrus Ramus then becoming popular.

Some of the works that Bruno published in London, notably the The Ash Wednesday Supper, appear to have given offense. It was not the first time, nor was it to be the last, that Bruno’s controversial views coupled with his abrasive sarcasm lost him the support of his friends. While conclusive proof is wanting, the theory has been advanced that, while he was staying in the French Embassy in London, Bruno was also spying on Catholic conspirators under the pseudonym ‘Fagot’ for Sir Francis Walsingham, Queen Elizabeth’s Secretary of State.

The numerous charges against Bruno, based on some of his books as well as on witness accounts, included blasphemy, immoral conduct, and heresy in matters of dogmatic theology, and involved some of the basic doctrines of his philosophy and cosmology. Luigi Firpo lists them as follows:

• Holding opinions contrary to the Catholic Faith and speaking against it and its ministers.
• Holding erroneous opinions about the Trinity, about Christ’s divinity and Incarnation.
• Holding erroneous opinions about Christ.
• Holding erroneous opinions about Transubstantiation and Mass.
• Claiming the existence of a plurality of worlds and their eternity.
• Believing in metempsychosis and in the transmigration of the human soul into brutes.
• Dealing in magics and divination.
• Denying the Virginity of Mary.

 On the 400th anniversary of Bruno’s death, Cardinal Angelo Sodano declared Bruno’s death to be a “sad episode”. However he added that people should not judge those who condemned Bruno and maintained – invoking “historical records” – that the inquisitors had in fact “had the desire to preserve freedom and promote the common good and did everything possible to save his life” by trying to make him recant and subsequently by appealing the capital punishment with the secular authorities of Rome.

Stone Age satnav: Did ancient man use 5,000-year-old travel chart to navigate across Britain

By David Derbyshire
Last updated at 9:07 AM on 15th September 2009

It’s considered to be one of the more recent innovations to help the hapless traveller.

But the satnav system may not be as modern as we think.

According to a new theory, prehistoric man navigated his way across England using a similar system based on stone circles and other markers.

Connected by triangles: Some of the sites created by Stone Age man (below)

The complex network of stones, hill forts and earthworks allowed travellers to trek hundreds of miles with ‘pinpoint accuracy’ more than 5,000 years ago, amateur historian Tom Brooks says. The grid covered much of southern England

and Wales and included landmarks such as Stonehenge and Silbury Hill, claims Mr Brooks, a retired marketing executive of Honiton, Devon.

He analysed 1,500 prehistoric sites in England and Wales and was able to connect all of them to at least two other sites using isosceles triangles  -  these are triangles with two sides the same length.

This, he says, is proof that the landmarks were deliberately created as navigational aides. Many were built within sight of each other and provided a simple way to get from A to B.

For more complex journeys, they would have broken up the route into a series of easy to navigate steps.

Anyone starting at Silbury Hill in Wiltshire, for instance, could have used the grid to get to Lanyon Quoit in Cornwall without a map.

Mr Brooks added: ‘The sides of some of the triangles are over 100 miles across, yet the distances are accurate to within 100 metres. You cannot do that by chance.

One One of the monuments was on Silbury Hill, Wiltshire. It was part of a giant geometric grid used for navigating

‘So advanced, sophisticated and accurate is the geometrical surveying now discovered, that we must review fundamentally the perception of our Stone Age forebears as primitive, or conclude that they received some form of external guidance.’

On the question of ‘external guidance’, he does not rule out extraterrestrial help.

However, Mike Pitts, editor of British Archaeology, said: ‘The landscape of southern Britain was intensively settled and there are many earth works and archaeological finds. It is very easy to find patterns in the landscape, but it doesn’t mean that they are real.’

‘Oldest musical instrument’ found

By Pallab Ghosh Science correspondent, BBC News Scientists in Germany have published details of flutes dating back to the time that modern humans began colonising Europe, 35,000 years ago. The flutes are the oldest musical instruments found to date. The researchers say in the Journal Nature that music was widespread in pre-historic times. Music, they suggest, may have been one of a suite of behaviours displayed by our own species which helped give them an edge over the Neanderthals. The team from Tubingen University have published details of three flutes found in the Hohle Fels cavern in southwest Germany. The cavern is already well known as a site for signs of early human efforts; in May, members of the same team unveiled a Hohle Fels find that could be the world’s oldest Venus figure.

The most well-preserved of the flutes is made from a vulture’s wing bone, measuring 20cm long with five finger holes and two “V”-shaped notches on one end of the instrument into which the researchers assume the player blew.

The archaeologists also found fragments of two other flutes carved from ivory that they believe was taken from the tusks of mammoths.

Creative origins

The find brings the total number of flutes discovered from this era to eight, four made from mammoth ivory and four made from bird bones.

According to Professor Nicholas Conard of Tubingen University, this suggests that the playing of music was common as far back as 40,000 years ago when modern humans spread across Europe.

“It’s becoming increasingly clear that music was part of day-to-day life,” he said.

“Music was used in many kinds of social contexts: possibly religious, possibly recreational – much like we use music today in many kinds of settings.”

The researchers also suggest that not only was music widespread much earlier than previously thought, but so was humanity’s creative spirit.

“The modern humans that came into our area already had a whole range of symbolic artifacts, figurative art, depictions of mythological creatures, many kinds of personal ornaments and also a well-developed musical tradition,” Professor Conard explained.

The team argues that the emergence of art and culture so early might explain why early modern humans survived and Neanderthals, with whom they co-existed at the time, became extinct.

“Music could have contributed to the maintenance of larger social networks, and thereby perhaps have helped facilitate the demographic and territorial expansion of modern humans relative to a culturally more conservative and demographically more isolated Neanderthal populations,” they wrote.

That is a view supported by Professor Chris Stringer, a human origins researcher at the Natural History Museum in London.

“These flutes provide yet more evidence of the sophistication of the people that lived at that time and the probable behavioural and cognitive gulf between them and Neanderthals,” he said.

“I think the occurrence of these flutes and animal and human figurines about 40,000 years ago implies that the traditions that produced them must go back even further in the evolutionary history of modern humans – perhaps even into Africa more than 50,000 years ago.

“But that evidence has still to be discovered.”

Follow the link to listen to a reconstruction of the sound from the flute.