4/8 Introduction to the Philosophy of Evil (Ponerology)

We are going to examine the concept of evil as the concentration of power by exploring aspects of the history of the CIA as a window into the American "Deep State." Please read the first two pieces below and, if you have time, listen to David Talbot explaining his book "The Devil's Chessboard." Of course if you have more time and interest, I've included more material below.

Texts for this class

1. Andrew Lobaczewski, Introduction to Political Ponerology
2. Nicholas Davies, "America's Coup Machine: Destroying Democracy Since 1953"
3. Interview with David Talbot discussing his book The Devil's Chessboard: Allan Dulles, the CIA and the Rise of America's Secret Government.

Other recommended materials

4. Steve Kangas, "Origins of the Overclass"
5. Veterans Today: "The CIA continues trafficking drugs from Afganistan"
6. "Secret World of US Election": John Pilger Interview with Julian Assange
7. Corbett Report: "How the CIA Plants News Stories in the Media"
8. Famed JFK researcher Mark Lane discussing his book"Last Word: My Indictment of the CIA in the Murder of JFK"
9. Edward Curtin, "The Government that Honors Dr. MLK with a National Holiday Killed Jim.

Evil as the Concentration of Power

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. 

Great men are almost always bad men.” 

- 19th century British politician Lord Acton

O, yes, I say it plain, 

America never was America to me, 

And yet I swear this oath -- 

America will be!

- Langston Hughes

“The United States is the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.” 

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Deep State

…another government concealed behind the one that is visible at either end of Pennsylvania Avenue, a hybrid entity of public and private institutions ruling the country according to consistent patterns in season and out, connected to, but only intermittently controlled by, the visible state whose leaders we choose.

[http://billmoyers.com/2014/02/21/anatomy-of-the-deep-state/ ]

A loose (non-monolithic) network of financial(banking) organizations, intelligence agencies, powerful law firms, military leaders and political powerbrokers who come together from time to time when their interests coalesce. 

[my definition]

The CIA as a case study in the Evils of Centralized Power

Part I: The CIA Anti-democratic Playbook: How to murder a democracy

“CIA operations follow the same recurring script. First, American business interests abroad are threatened by a popular or democratically elected leader. The people support their leader because he intends to conduct land reform, strengthen unions, redistribute wealth, nationalize foreign-owned industry, and regulate business to protect workers, consumers and the environment. So, on behalf of American business, and often with their help, the CIA mobilizes the opposition. First it identifies right-wing groups within the country (usually the military), and offers them a deal: "We'll put you in power if you maintain a favorable business climate for us." The Agency then hires, trains and works with them to overthrow the existing government (usually a democracy). It uses every trick in the book: propaganda, stuffed ballot boxes, purchased elections, extortion, blackmail, sexual intrigue, false stories about opponents in the local media, infiltration and disruption of opposing political parties, kidnapping, beating, torture, intimidation, economic sabotage, death squads and even assassination. These efforts culminate in a military coup, which installs a right-wing dictator. The CIA trains the dictator’s security apparatus to crack down on the traditional enemies of big business, using interrogation, torture and murder. The victims are said to be "communists," but almost always they are just peasants, liberals, moderates, labor union leaders, political opponents and advocates of free speech and democracy. Widespread human rights abuses follow. This scenario has been repeated so many times that the CIA actually teaches it in a special school, the notorious "School of the Americas." (It opened in Panama but later moved to Fort Benning, Georgia.) Critics have nicknamed it the "School of the Dictators" and "School of the Assassins." Here, the CIA trains Latin American military officers how to conduct coups, including the use of interrogation, torture and murder.” [from http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/CIAtimeline.html ] 

Several infamous examples of CIA-orchestrated coups against democratically-elected governments.

(1953) Iran – CIA overthrows the democratically elected Mohammed Mossadegh in a military coup, after he threatened to nationalize British oil. The CIA replaces him with a dictator, the Shah of Iran, whose secret police, SAVAK, is as brutal as the Gestapo.

(1954) Guatemala — CIA overthrows the democratically elected Jacob Arbenz in a military coup. Arbenz has threatened to nationalize the Rockefeller-owned United Fruit Company, in which CIA Director Allen Dulles also owns stock. Arbenz is replaced with a series of right-wing dictators whose bloodthirsty policies will kill over 100,000 Guatemalans in the next 40 years.

(1961) Congo (Zaire) — The CIA assassinates the democratically elected Patrice Lumumba. However, public support for Lumumba’s politics runs so high that the CIA cannot clearly install his opponents in power. Four years of political turmoil follow.

(1973) Chile — The CIA overthrows and assassinates Salvador Allende, Latin America’s first democratically elected socialist leader. The problems begin when Allende nationalizes American-owned firms in Chile. ITT offers the CIA $1 million for a coup (reportedly refused). The CIA replaces Allende with General Augusto Pinochet, who will torture and murder thousands of his own countrymen in a crackdown on labor leaders and the political left.

Part II: Some notorious and well-documented CIA programs

Operation PAPERCLIP – While other American agencies are hunting down Nazi war criminals for arrest, the U.S. intelligence community is smuggling them into America, unpunished, for their use against the Soviets. The most important of these is Reinhard Gehlen, Hitler’s master spy who had built up an intelligence network in the Soviet Union. 

Operation MOCKINGBIRD — The CIA begins recruiting American news organizations and journalists to become spies and disseminators of propaganda. The effort is headed by Frank Wisner, Allan Dulles, Richard Helms and Philip Graham. Graham is publisher of The Washington Post, which becomes a major CIA player. Eventually, the CIA’s media assets will include ABC, NBC, CBS, Time, Newsweek, Associated Press, United Press International, Reuters, Hearst Newspapers, Scripps-Howard, Copley News Service and more. By the CIA’s own admission, at least 25 organizations and 400 journalists will become CIA assets.

Operation MK-ULTRA — Inspired by North Korea’s brainwashing program, the CIA begins experiments on mind control. The most notorious part of this project involves giving LSD and other drugs to American subjects without their knowledge or against their will, causing several to commit suicide. However, the operation involves far more than this. Funded in part by the Rockefeller and Ford foundations, research includes propaganda, brainwashing, public relations, advertising, hypnosis, and other forms of suggestion.

Operation PHEONIX — The CIA helps South Vietnamese agents identify and then murder alleged Viet Cong leaders operating in South Vietnamese villages. According to a 1971 congressional report, this operation killed about 20,000 "Viet Cong.”

Operation CHAOS — The CIA has been illegally spying on American citizens since 1959, but with Operation CHAOS, President Johnson dramatically boosts the effort. CIA agents go undercover as student radicals to spy on and disrupt campus organizations protesting the Vietnam War. They are searching for Russian instigators, which they never find. CHAOS will eventually spy on 7,000 individuals and 1,000 organizations.

Part IV: The CIA and Drugs - Nicaragua and Afghanistan

[From http://www.veteranstoday.com/2016/06/04/the-cia-continues-trafficking-drugs-from-afghanistan/ ]

“The CIA has a long history of being involved in global drug trade in all parts of the world under the control of the US or where it has considerable influence. While a few cases have been investigated and exposed by journalists, the issue continues to remain in the shadows.

The CIA’s history began in the 1980s. Drugs were seen as the quickest and easiest way to earn money to fund CIA proxies and paramilitary forces that served them, in different countries. Gary Webb, the brave journalist who exposed the Nicaraguan Contra drug trafficking scandal and was eventually driven to suicide by an extensive smear campaign by the mainstream media, described the process like this:

“We (CIA) need money for a covert operation, the quickest way to raise it is sell cocaine, you guys go sell it somewhere, we don’t want to know anything about it.”

Read the original articles by Gary Webb HERE

[https://www.narconews.com/darkalliance/drugs/start.htm ] or watch the film Kill the Messenger

This tactic worked very successfully in Afghanistan during the Cold War when the Mujahideen forces serving the US were funded through drugs. Before the US invasion in 2001, the poppy fields were eradicated by the Taliban. Right after the US invasion, drug production began increasing drastically, and today Afghanistan produces 90% of the world’s opium, and on the verge of becoming a narco-state.  

More on how the CIA smuggles drugs

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJkFZ4W4bjg ]

The CIA and Political Assassinations JFK and MLK

"Someone would have talked," goes the old refrain. In the case of some CIA officers and others associated with the Agency, they did talk. But who's listening?

In 2007, legendary Watergate burglar E. Howard Hunt died, leaving behind a taped "confession" in which he claimed knowledge of the plot to kill Kennedy but not active participation, describing himself as a "benchwarmer." Hunt named names - including Lyndon Johnson, Tracy Barnes, William Harvey, Frank Sturgis, and others - but provided no substantiating details. For many observers, the hard-to-credit confession was a "last laugh" and a parting gift to his ne-er-do-well son, who has attempted to capitalize on it.

Other confessions have carried a bit more weight. David Morales, Chief of Operations at the JMWAVE station in Florida where he trained Bay of Pigs participants and by some accounts was involved in assassination operations, was getting drunk one night with childhood friend Ruben Carbajal and a business associate named Bob Walton. Both men said that Morales went on a tirade about Kennedy and particularly his failure to support the men of the Bay of Pigs. Morales finished this conversation by saying "Well, we took care of that son of a bitch, didn't we?”

[https://maryferrell.org/pages/The_CIA_and_the_JFK_Assassination.html ]

Writing Assignment for Wed 4/8

Dear Philosophers,

For your next writing assignment, which is 2 pages (min) and due via email to me (justin@oursanctuary.org) on Wednesday, April 8th, I would like you to write a reflection about the current crisis which addresses (either by answering explicitly or raising as an unknown) the following questions:

1. What social-economic-political problems is the COVID-19 crisis making more obvious and highlight?

2. What is the current crisis teaching us about the nature of money and the economy?

3. What new positive opportunities for change is the current crisis making available?

Working Class Debt Jubilee for COVID-19

Check-in information for Monday’s class on April 6th

Zoom meeting link:

https://zoom.us/j/168030412?pwd=bTVUbmNvNEREZzI0dzl0bm5TeUFndz09

Or via phone: 

1 (646) 558-8656

Meeting ID: 168 030 412

Password: 04052020

Please note: Zoom is now asking for you to submit a password in order to access meetings.

See you there! :)

Notes for class on Mon April 6th

A propos of the "nationalization" of the Fed

"This new phase of the crisis is, at the very least, making it clear to us that anything goes – that everything is now possible.… Whether the epidemic helps deliver the good or the most evil society will depend … on whether progressives manage to band together. For if we do not, just like in 2008 we did not, the bankers, the spivs [petty criminals], the oligarchs and the neofascists will prove, again, that they are the ones who know how not to let a good crisis go to waste. 

         Yanis Varoufakis

Some Observations from Charles Eisenstein's "The Coronation"

THE POWER OF COHERENCY

"Covid-19 is showing us that when humanity is united in common cause, phenomenally rapid change is possible. None of the world’s problems are technically difficult to solve; they originate in human disagreement. In coherency, humanity’s creative powers are boundless. A few months ago, a proposal to halt commercial air travel would have seemed preposterous. Likewise for the radical changes we are making in our social behavior, economy, and the role of government in our lives. Covid demonstrates the power of our collective will when we agree on what is important. What else might we achieve, in coherency? What do we want to achieve, and what world shall we create? That is always the next question when anyone awakens to their power.”

SUSTAINABILITY? SUSTAIN WHAT?

“We might ask, having done without it for a while, whether we really need so much air travel, Disneyworld vacations, or trade shows. What parts of the economy will we want to restore, and what parts might we choose to let go of? And on a darker note, what among the things that are being taken away right now – civil liberties, freedom of assembly, sovereignty over our bodies, in-person gatherings, hugs, handshakes, and public life – might we need to exert intentional political and personal will to restore?”

CRISIS IS THE ROAD TO CONTROL

“Some commentators have observed how it plays neatly into an agenda of totalitarian control. A frightened public accepts abridgments of civil liberties that are otherwise hard to justify, such as the tracking of everyone’s movements at all times, forcible medical treatment, involuntary quarantine, restrictions on travel and the freedom of assembly, censorship of what the authorities deem to be disinformation, suspension of habeas corpus, and military policing of civilians.

IS THIS FRENZY FOR CONTROL EVIDENCE OF DEEP STATE OPERATIONS TO CENTRALIZE POWER OR BUSINESS AS USUAL FOR TECHNOCRATIC SOCIETY?
NEW CONTROL MECHANISMS 

• The tracking of people’s movements at all times (because coronavirus)
• The suspension of freedom of assembly (because coronavirus)
• The military policing of civilians (because coronavirus)
• Extrajudicial, indefinite detention (quarantine, because coronavirus)
• The banning of cash (because coronavirus)
• Censorship of the Internet (to combat disinformation, because coronavirus)
• Compulsory vaccination and other medical treatment, establishing the state’s sovereignty over our bodies (because coronavirus)
• The classification of all activities and destinations into the expressly permitted and the expressly forbidden (you can leave your house for this, but not that), eliminating the un-policed, non-juridical gray zone. That totality is the very essence of totalitarianism. Necessary now though, because, well, coronavirus.

"Wisdom is Knowledge of One's Own Ignorance." 

CAUSES ARE STILL UNKNOWN

"What I will say next is relevant whether or not SARS-CoV2 is a genetically engineered bioweapon, is related to 5G rollout, is being used to prevent “disclosure,” is a Trojan horse for totalitarian world government, is more deadly than we’ve been told, is less deadly than we’ve been told, originated in a Wuhan biolab, originated at Fort Detrick, or is exactly as the CDC and WHO have been telling us. It applies even if everyone is totally wrong about the role of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in the current epidemic. I have my opinions, but if there is one thing I have learned through the course of this emergency is that I don’t really know what is happening.

“Viruses are the excretions of a toxified cell. They happen when a cell has been poisoned. They are not the cause of anything, they are a symptom.” - Dr. Thomas Cowan. 

PERSPECTIVE ON THE NUMBERS

“Whether the final global death toll is 50,000 or 500,000 or 5 million, let’s look at some other numbers to get some perspective. My point is NOT that Covid isn’t so bad and we shouldn’t do anything. Bear with me. Last year, according to the FAO, five million children worldwide died of hunger (among 162 million who are stunted and 51 million who are wasted). That is 200 times more people than have died so far from Covid-19, yet no government has declared a state of emergency or asked that we radically alter our way of life to save them. Nor do we see a comparable level of alarm and action around suicide – the mere tip of an iceberg of despair and depression – which kills over a million people a year globally and 50,000 in the USA. Or drug overdoses, which kill 70,000 in the USA, the autoimmunity epidemic, which affects 23.5 million (NIH figure) to 50 million (AARDA), or obesity, which afflicts well over 100 million. Why, for that matter, are we not in a frenzy about averting nuclear armageddon or ecological collapse, but, to the contrary, pursue choices that magnify those very dangers?”

WHY ACTION HERE AND NOT ACTION THERE?

“Please, the point here is not that we haven’t changed our ways to stop children from starving, so we shouldn’t change them for Covid either. It is the contrary: If we can change so radically for Covid-19, we can do it for these other conditions too. Let us ask why are we able to unify our collective will to stem this virus, but not to address other grave threats to humanity. Why, until now, has society been so frozen in its existing trajectory?”

WHAT IS UNACCEPTABLE RISK? WHAT IS ACCEPTABLE RISK?

"My 7-year-old son hasn’t seen or played with another child for two weeks. Millions of others are in the same boat. Most would agree that a month without social interaction for all those children a reasonable sacrifice to save a million lives. But how about to save 100,000 lives? And what if the sacrifice is not for a month but for a year? Five years? Different people will have different opinions on that, according to their underlying values. Let’s replace the foregoing questions with something more personal, that pierces the inhuman utilitarian thinking that turns people into statistics and sacrifices some of them for something else. The relevant question for me is, Would I ask all the nation’s children to forego play for a season, if it would reduce my mother’s risk of dying, or for that matter, my own risk? Or I might ask, Would I decree the end of human hugging and handshakes, if it would save my own life? 

WHAT KIND OF WORLD DO WE WANT TO LIVE IN?

"How much of life do we want to sacrifice at the altar of security? If it keeps us safer, do we want to live in a world where human beings never congregate? Do we want to wear masks in public all the time? Do we want to be medically examined every time we travel, if that will save some number of lives a year? Are we willing to accept the medicalization of life in general, handing over final sovereignty over our bodies to medical authorities (as selected by political ones)? Do we want every event to be a virtual event? How much are we willing to live in fear?

Philosophy of Money Continued: Options for Democratizing the Money Supply

Dear Philosophers, we will continue our discussion of money on Wednesday. We will be examining Ellen Brown's argument for public banks and the concept of Debt Jubilee. Read as much as you can and check out one or more of the great videos I posted below. And stay healthy!

Readings for Wednesday, 4/1

1. Ellen Brown, “The Key to a Sustainable Economy Is 5,000 Years Old”

2. Ellen Brown, “Universal Basic Income is Easier than it Looks”

3. Ananya Garg, “California Just Legalized Public Banks. Will the Rest of the Nation Follow Suit?”

Notes on Public Banking, Debt Peonage and National Dividend Checks

A. Summary of argument that private banks create the public money supply from Ellen Brown:

§1. “Private bankers own mankind. You know they create money on a computer screen. Take their power away, but leave them the power to create money, and with the touch of a button they will create enough money to buy the earth back again.

You know that bankers create principal, but not the interest to service their loans. To find the interest, new loans must continually be taken out. This expands the money supply, increases prices, and robs you of the value of your money. Thus, private bankers ultimately rule through inflation, (ever-increasng debt) which makes you run faster and faster on a treadmill owned by the private bankers. Eventually you must drop.

You also know that the government does not create money (except for coins). The Federal Reserve creates money and lends it to us. Every dollar in your hand is a debt note to private bankers. And since we all use money, we all play with debt (negative capital) whether we like it or not. If we ended the private banking cartel, the federal debt could be paid, income taxes could be eliminated, and social programs could be expanded — all without imposing austerity measures or sparking runaway inflation. This is not utopian. It has been done many times in history, starting with ancient Rome.

The International Banker is like the Wizard of Oz, standing behind the curtain of policymakers and “elected” leaders. Behind the curtain is a little old man, playing with lights and loudspeakers.”

§2. In fact:! “Frank Baum wrote his Wizard of Oz books at the turn of the century, when the money question was still a hotly debated issue. His Oz books were an allegory for our tyrannical money system. Example: In the 1890s, the private bankers did not yet own all the media sources. Therefore everyone was concerned with how money should be created. Should the government create it with full accountability to the people — or should private banks create it in secret? After the Jekyl Island meeting in 1910, the latter option won. World War I and the Great Depression sealed the private banks’ power. We have been enslaved ever since.”

B. The Crazy 5,000 year history of debt peonage

“Debts that cannot be paid will not be paid. The only question is how they won’t be paid.” - Michael Hudson. 

§3. “A study of the long sweep of history reveals a universal principle to be at work: The burden of debt tends to expand in an agrarian society to the point where it exceeds the ability of debtors to pay. That has been the major cause of economic polarization from antiquity to modern times. The basic principle that should guide economic policy is recognition that debts which can’t be paid, won’t be. The great political question is, how won’t they be paid? There are two ways not to pay debts. Our economic mainstream still believes that all debts must be paid, leaving them on the books to continue accruing interest and fees – and to let creditors foreclose when they do not receive the scheduled interest and amortization payment. This is what the U.S. President Obama did after the 2008 crisis. Homeowners, credit-card customers and other debtors had to start paying down the debts they had run up. About 10 million families lost their homes to foreclosure. Leaving the debt overhead in place meant stifling and polarizing the economy by transferring property from debtors to creditors. Today’s legal system is based on the Roman Empire’s legal philosophy upholding the sanctity of debt, not its cancellation. Instead of protecting debtors from losing their property and status, the main concern is with saving creditors from loss, as if this is a prerequisite for economic stability and growth. Moral blame is placed on debtors, as if their arrears are a personal choice rather than stemming from economic strains that compel them to run into debt simply to survive.”

§4. “Mainstream economic models leave this problem to “the invisible hand of the market,” assuming trends will self-correct over time. But while the market may indeed correct, it does so at the expense of the debtors, who become progressively poorer as the rich become richer. Borrowers go bankrupt and banks foreclose on the collateral, dispossessing the debtors of their homes and their livelihoods. The houses are bought by the rich at distress prices and are rented back at inflated prices to the debtors, who are then forced into wage peonage to survive. When the banks themselves go bankrupt, the government bails them out. Thus the market corrects, but not without government intervention. That intervention just comes at the end of the cycle to rescue the creditors, whose ability to buy politicians gives them the upper hand.”

C. Documented Periodic Debt Jubilees in the ancient Near East

§5. “Sumerian kings solved the problem of “peak debt” by periodically declaring “clean slates,” in which agrarian debts were forgiven and debtors were released from servitude to work as tenants on their own plots of land. The land belonged to the gods under the stewardship of the temple and the palace and could not be sold, but farmers and their families maintained leaseholds to it in perpetuity by providing a share of their crops, service in the military and labor in building communal infrastructure. In this way, their homes and livelihoods were preserved, an arrangement that was mutually beneficial, since the kings needed their service.” (Ibid.)

D. How do create a modern debt jubilee?

§6. “One possibility is to nationalize … banks and sell their bad loans to the central bank, which can buy them with money created on its books. The loans can then be written down or voided out. Precedent for this policy was established with “QE1,” the Fed’s first round of quantitative easing, in which it bought unmarketable mortgage-backed securities from banks with liquidity problems…. “Another possibility would be to use money generated by the central bank to bail out debtors directly. This could be done selectively, by buying up student debt or credit card debt or car loans bundled as “asset-backed securities,” then writing the debts down or off, for example. Alternatively, debts could be relieved collectively with a periodic national dividend or universal basic income paid to everyone, again drawn from the deep pocket of the central bank.” (Ibid.)

E. Won’t creating free money lead to inflation?

§7. “Critics will object that this would dangerously inflate the money supply and consumer prices, but that need not be the case. Today, virtually all money is created as bank debt, and it is extinguished when the debt is repaid. That means dividends used to pay this debt down would be extinguished, along with the debt itself, without adding to the money supply. For the 80% of the U.S. population now carrying debt, loan repayments from their national dividends could be made mandatory and automatic. The remaining 20% would be likely to save or invest the funds, so this money too would contribute little to consumer price inflation; and to the extent that it did go into the consumer market, it could help generate the demand needed to stimulate productivity and employment.” (Ibid.)

F. California Legislature Assembly Bill No. 857

§8. “It is the intent of the Legislature that this act authorize the lending of public credit to public banks and authorize public ownership of public banks for the purpose of achieving cost savings, strengthening local economies, supporting community economic development, and addressing infrastructure and housing needs for localities. It is the intent of the Legislature that public banks shall partner with local financial institutions, such as credit unions and local community banks, and shall not compete with local financial institutions.”This bill establishes “banks that hold the government’s money and include socially responsible charters, anticorruption clauses, transparency, a board that includes community development professionals, and prohibitions on retail locations and on competing with community banks and credit unions.”

Some Recommended Videos

Ellen Brown's argument for public banks

A good documentary on the history of the Fed

The 5,000 history of debt slavery

Still confused about how banks create new money? 

Read this explanation from the Bank of England.

3/30 The Money Problem and the CO-VID19-related Financial Crisis

Dear Philosophers,

We are going to continue our discussion of money and the background context of the new Federal stimulus package on Monday. We will focus our discussion on the two links below. I've also posted an article about the stimulus bail-out, read as much as you have time for. 

The Zoom Meeting link for this class is zoom.us/j/528542085 or by phone 1 (646) 558-8656. Our Meeting ID: 528 542 085. 

The Money Question and Financial Crisis

1. Ellen Brown's piece on why the Federal Reserve should be "de-privatized" in order to better serve the democracy.
"The Banker's Power Revolution: How the Government Got Shackled with Debt"

2. Why and How the Federal Reserve can be de-privatized (i.e. "nationalized")
The historic HR2990 Monetary Reform Bill drafted by Stephen Zarlenga

3. An overview of the ethics and political economy of the bailout
David Dayen, "Unsanitized: Bailouts, A Tradition Unlike Any Other"

A Deeper and More Interesting way to think about Immunity

On a different topic, I've also posted an extended conversation between the wonderful Regina Meredith and the microbiologist Compton Rom about COVID-19 which offers a really interesting holistic way to look at immunity, viruses and the whole vaccination issue. If you take the time to listen to the whole thing, and I hope you do! because it's both super interesting and super helpful, here's a time: take notes on, and try make sense of the differences between, the what Rom calls the SEVEN LEVELS OF IMMUNITY. This is quite eye-opening. We can talk about any of this stuff on Monday too. Enjoy!

Hey guys, you may not have realized that you need to login with a different zoom number for each class. 

Today’s number is:  https://zoom.us/j/838840117  or by phone: 646 558 8656

Meeting ID: 838 840 117

Key Questions for the Philosophy (media ecology) of Money

Money as a Technology with Design Flaws 

Is money a thing(commodity) or is it an agreement(IOU)?

How does the use of different kinds of money affect the moral relationships between people?

Can morality be defined economically in terms of debt, what we owe each other?

Are we ethically-obligated to pay back our debts?

Is there an essential systemic connection between monetary systems and violence?

What is usury, and is it a sin?

Is global debt peonage a justifiable result of monetary systems or an ethical abomination?

Should commercial banks have the power to issue new money?

Should the FED be nationalized?

Should there be a global debt jubilee?

Presentation on the Philosophy of Money and HR6550 Monetary Reform Bill

3/25 Economic Dimensions of COVID-19

Dear class, we're gonna look at start our discussion about the philosophy of money, banking and wealth. We'll begin by looking at some of the economic stimulus proposals being discussed to mitigate COVID-19 (see links below).

Here's the link to our Zoom meeting or via cellphone  +1 646 558 8656

and Meeting ID: 340 754 0334.

I've also set up a discussion forum on our Blackboard for this class. Make sure you check in with that discussion and participate by posting at least one comment and at least one response to someone else's comments. Try to do this before our next class on Monday.

We have two primary documents for this class, an article and a video by Ellen Brown

1. Ellen Brown, "The Banking Model that's Bankrupting America"

2. Ellen Brown, "A Deep Dive into Money and Banking" (video below)

Other related articles

3. Matt Stoller, "The coronavirus relief bill could turn into a corporate coup if we aren't careful"
4. Jon Queally, "Bernie Sanders Proposal for $2 Trillion Coronavirus Emergency Plan"
5. Ellen Brown, "Socialism at Its Finest after Fed's Bazooka Fails"

Some documents related to the Philosophical Analysis of COVID-19

Hi Philosophers, I'm going to start posting different articles and resources related to COVID-19 and our new social-economic-political possibilities, we'll draw from these next class so find something here that speaks to you and bring try bringing it to our discussion, during our virtual ZOOM meetings and well as on the Blackboard discussion boards. Stay Healthy! :)

1. This first one is the one I'm sharing during our first virtual class, relating to a spiritual-ecological-transpersonal interpretation of the virus.
Jeff Vander Clute, "A Message from the Coronavirus"

2. Good overall discussion of the science behind COVID-19.
Gregg Braden, "Coronavirus Truth and Fiction"

3. Dr. Neal Barnard on where viruses originate.

4. 5G be a factor in the creation and spread of the virus. (and other health concerns about 5G).

5. Mehdi Hasan interviews Jeffrey Sachs on Trump's response to the outbreak.

6. Naomi Klein on COVID-19 and Disaster Capitalism.

7. Richard Wolff on the Economics of COVID-19, capitalism and privatized healthcare.

8. Interview with Joseph Farrell on the Geopolitical Implications of the pandemic.

9. Pepe Escobar on China's suspicions that the virus is an American bioweapon.

10. Charles Eisenstein and Sayer Ji on the science and philosophy of health and immunology.

11. Evidence that high dosages of Vitamin C can cure COVID-19.

12. Dr. Joe Dispensa on the immunological benefits of high vibrational emotions.

13. How the pandemic will change our society (from Politico 3/19)

Our First Virtual Meeting on Monday, March 23rd

Dear Philosophers,

In our first virtual class together on Monday, we will meditate and then debrief about this new reality we are facing. I'll post some articles on this blog and also on Blackboard for you to check out.

To Join our Zoom Virtual class on Monday, March 23rd at 11 AM for section one or 1:30 PM for section two, you can use either a computer (easier if you have access) or by smart phone. See instructions below.

By computer

Goto: https://zoom.us/j/829907796

And type in our Meeting ID: 829 907 796

By phone

Call 16465588656 

And type in our Meeting ID: 829 907 796

When you have a chance, let me know that you are okay and have understood our new game, and that you have successfully logged into Blackboard.

Be Well :)

   Justin

Our New Post-COVID19 Virtual Philosophy Classroom

Dear Mighty Companions,

How are you? I am sure you are experiencing a similar mix of bafflement and unease about our new Condition. I applaud your effort to manage your mind and time enough to check in to our class and reconnect!

We are going to continue our study of philosophy together in this online format for the duration of the semester. I am going to be using Blackboard to post content and assignments, and also to run some discussion boards, which will be a way for us to continue our discussions during non-class time. In addition, I'll be running our classes themselves at their usual scheduled times using Zoom.us for live video. I've never done this before so we'll just have to try and see how it works out, and you guys will have to figure out how to access these live feeds on your side.

I'm also going to be having virtual office hours for anyone who wants to chat about class or anything else.

I'll be sending and posting more information soon. When you have a chance, let me know that you are okay and have understood our new game.

Stay healthy and Mindful!

Best to You, 

         Justin

3/9 • Introduction to Social Philosophy: Origins

Texts for Mon. March 9th

1. Helena Norberg-Hodge, "Ancient Futures: Learning from Ladakh"
2. Clare Brant, "Native Ethics & Principles"

Other recommended sources

3. Recommended: Howard Zinn's masterful recounting of Christopher Columbus's psychopathology in the classic "People's History of the United States"
4. Four Arrows, "The Continuing Saga of Anti-Indianism in America"
5. Chief Seattle's speech to Chief Washington
5. Justin Vood Good, "Walking in Beauty: Why Higher Education should be Indigenized"
6. J. Good "Indigenized Education teaches Democracy" 
7. Peaceful Societies database
8. Iroquois Confederacy: Oldest participatory democracy in the world.

Ask of Me and I shall Give to thee the Heathen as Thine Inheritance and the Uttermost parts of the Earth for Thy Possession. -Psalms 2:8

Presentation on Perennial Wisdom & Transpersonal Psychology

Link to my presentation on Perennial Wisdom & Transpersonal Psychology

Stan Grof, founder of Transpersonal Psychology: 

"The leading philosophy of Western science has been monistic materialism. Various scientific disciplines have described the history of the universe as the history of developing matter and accept as real only what can be measured and weighed. Life, consciousness, and intelligence are seen as more or less accidental side-products of material processes. Physicists, biologists, and chemists recognize the existence of dimensions of reality that are not accessible to our senses, but only those that are physical in nature and can be revealed and explored with the use of various extensions of our senses, such as microscopes or telescopes, specially designed recording devices, and laboratory experiments.

In a universe understood this way, there is no place for spirituality of any kind. The existence of God, the idea that there are invisible dimensions of reality inhabited by nonmaterial beings, the possibility of survival of consciousness after death, and the concept of reincarnation and karma have been relegated to fairy tales and handbooks of psychiatry. From a psychiatric perspective, to take such things seriously means to be ignorant, unfamiliar with the discoveries of science, superstitious, and subject to primitive magical thinking. If the belief in God or Goddess occurs in intelligent persons, it is seen as an indication that they have not come to terms with the infantile images of their parents as omnipotent beings that they had created in their infancy and childhood. And direct experiences of spiritual realities are considered manifestations of serious mental diseases -- psychoses.

The study of holotropic states has thrown new light on the problem of spirituality and religion. The key to this new understanding is the discovery that in these states it is possible to encounter a rich array of experiences which are very similar to those that inspired the great religions of the world -- visions of God and various divine and demonic beings, encounters with discarnate entities, episodes of psychospiritual death and rebirth, visits to Heaven and Hell, past life experiences, and many others. Modern research has shown beyond any doubt that these experiences are not products of pathological processes afflicting the brain, but manifestations of archetypal material from the collective unconscious, and thus normal and essential constituents of the human psyche. Although these mythic elements are accessed intrapsychically in a process of experiential self-exploration and introspection, they are ontologically real and have objective existence. The matrices for them exist in deep recesses of the unconscious psyche of every human being.

In view of these observations, the fierce battle that religion and science had fought over the last few centuries appears ludicrous and completely unnecessary. Genuine science and authentic religion do not compete for the same territory; they represent two approaches to existence, which are complementary, not competitive. Science studies phenomena in the material world, the realm of the measurable and weighable, while spirituality and true religion draw their inspiration from experiential knowledge of the aspect of the world that Jungians refer to as "imaginal," to distinguish it from imaginary products of individual fantasy or psychopathology. This imaginal world manifests in what I call "holotropic states of consciousness" -- the altered states in which experiences surface that, as stated above, are very similar to those that inspired the great religions of the world."