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/ The Dark Side / - bad things
/ Desires, Goals, and Maslow's Hierarchy / The Greens /
/ Naturalism and Supernaturalism / A Pattern Language / Progress Report /
/ "Summations" / - "a few quick summaries of some of the concerns of this site."
/ Taking Action / Ten Key Values of the Greens / a link to the most important item on this site

/ Values /
to the top page of this site.

"... let us not be blind to our differences -- but let us also direct attention
to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved.

And if we cannot end now our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity.
For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet.
We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal.

John F. Kennedy
Commencement Address at American University
10 JUN 1963





"Peace, in the sense of the absence of war, is of little value to someone who is dying of hunger or cold.
It will not remove the pain of torture inflicted on a prisoner of conscience.
It does not comfort those who have lost their loved ones in floods
caused by senseless deforestation in a neighbouring country.

Peace can only last where human rights are respected, where the people are fed,
and where individuals and nations are free."

Nobel Lecture, December 11, 1989
The Nobel Peace Prize 1989
The 14th Dalai Lama





"Senator Hubert Humphrey once said that 'the moral test of government is how that government treats those
who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly;
and those who are in the shadows oflife - the sick, the needy and the handicapped.'"

from "John Kenneth Galbraith Talks About 'The Good Society' "
by Randolph Holhut




"I will give you a talisman.

Whenever you are in doubt, or when the self becomes too much with you, apply the following test.
Recall the face of the poorest and the weakest man whom you may have seen, and ask yourself, if the step you contemplate is going to be of any use to him. Will he gain anything by it? Will it restore him to a control over his own life and destiny? In other words, will it lead to Swaraj for the hungry and the spiritually starving millions? .

Then you will find your doubt and your self melting away."

Mahatma Mohandas Gandhi




"... in looking into matters social and political I have but one rule,
that in thinking of the condition of any body of men (and women)
I should ask myself,

'How could you bear it yourself?
What would you feel if you were poor, against the system under which you live?' "

William Morris, letter of 01 JUL 1883 to C.E. Maurice
Included as "A matter of religion" in
William Morris: Selected Writings and Designs
by William Morris, Edited by Asa Briggs
page 136




In Ursula K. LeGuin's great science-fiction fable, The Left Hand of Darkness, the Ekumen
-- the galactic federation of inhabited worlds -- sends representative Genly Ai to the planet Gethen to invite it to join,
and the sovereign Argaven Harge XV of Karhide inquires as to the purpose of such a commonwealth --


"Material profit. Increase of knowledge.
The augmentation of the complexity and intensity of the field of intelligent life.
The enrichment of harmony and the greater glory of God.
Curiosity. Adventure. Delight."





Physicist Robert Rathbun Wilson replies to a question from Senator John Pastore:

- Will a certain line of physics research will be relevant in national defense? --

"It has only to do with the respect with which we regard one another, the dignity of men (and women),
our love of culture. It has to do with those things. It has to do with: are we good painters, good sculptors,
great poets. I mean all the things we really venerate and honor in our country and are patriotic about.

It has nothing to do directly with defending our country
... except to make it worth defending."




The question "How shall we live The Good Life?" has been a perennial obssession (and what could be more natural?)Many different attempts have been made to develop a prescriptive ethical code, a Pattern Language for society.

So much thought has been given to these issues by so many fine minds, over literally millenia. And yet, when I see recent discussions of these issues, I am often surprised at connections between them that are not made.

It seems to me that an integration of these "discoveries in the search for truth" is long overdue.

This site is my own small contribution to this effort.



This site is under construction
-- these links will take you to some of the more "central" pages

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- / Naturalism and Supernaturalism / -

This is probably the most "central" page on this site.

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- The State of the World -
by Stephen R. Shalom

In my opinion and as of 14 DEC 99, this is the single most important item on this site.

UPDATE: JUL 2008. Well, a lot of water (and horribile dictu, blood) under the bridge.
Although this quote is a few years old now, it's still an excellent summary of "why this site?"
"The state of the world" is overall, I think, no better and in many details is probably worse.





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.

"No sane person seeks a world divided between billions of excluded people living in absolute deprivation
and a tiny elite guarding their wealth and luxury behind fortress walls.
No one rejoices at the prospect of life in a world of collapsing social and ecological systems.
Yet we continue to place human civilization and even the survival of our species at risk
mainly to allow a million or so people to accumulate money beyond any conceivable need.

We continue to boldly go where no one wants to go."

When Corporations Rule the World
by David Korten
page 261
I have slightly edited grammar of last line -- ed. Links are mine.




Sarah: When you look to the future, what do you think are humanity's prospects?

Malidoma: It's not good. Compulsive denial, arrogant paternalism, and hollow pretense have become viral infectionsendangering the future. The direction of the world, at least seen from an indigenous point of view, is like something that is in adirect collision course with catastrophe, and the more an indigenous person understands this culture, the more he (or she) becomes baffled by the direction it's heading.

But in the middle of that are people who are waking up slowly, people whom I like to call the new shamans, the new healers,the new energy, the repair people.

"Remembering Our Purpose"
an interview with Malidoma Some, by Sarah van Gelder

Originally published in IN CONTEXT #34, Winter 1993, Page 30
Copyright (c)1993, 1996 by Context Institute



"... we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. On the one hand we are called to play the good Samaritan on life's roadside; but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring."

"Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence"
(Or here)
speech by Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
04 APR 1967
Links are mine -- ed.
Excellent speech; please read in its entirety



"In this era, when the whole future of sentient life seems to hang by the frailest of threads, the kingdom of Shambhala begins to emerge.

You can't go there, for it is not a place, it is not a geopolitical entity. It exists in the hearts and minds of the Shambhala warriors- that is the term Choegyal used, "warriors." Nor can you recognize a Shambhala warrior when you see her or him, for they wear no uniform, or insignia, and they carry no banners. They have no barricades on which to climb to threaten the enemy, orbehind which they can hide to rest or regroup. They do not even have any home turf. Always they must move on the terrain of the barbarians themselves.

Now the time comes when great courage - moral and physical - is required of the Shambhala warriors, for they must go into the very heart of the barbarian power, into the pits and pockets and citadels where the weapons are kept, to dismantle them.To dismantle weapons, in every sense of the word, they must go into the corridors of power where decisions are made.

The Shambhala warriors have the courage to do this because they know that these weapons are manomaya. They are "mind-made." Made by the human mind, they can be unmade by the human mind. The Shambhala warriors know the dangersthat threaten life on Earth are not visited upon us by any extraterrestrial powers, satanic deities, or preordained evil fate. They arise from our own decisions, our own lifestyles, and our own relationships.

So in this time, the Shambhala warriors go into training. When Choegyal said this, I asked, 'How do they train?' They train, hesaid, in the use of two weapons. 'What weapons?' I asked, and he held up his hands in the way the lamas hold the ritualobjects of bell and dorje in the lama dance.

The weapons are compassion and insight."

World As Lover; World As Self
by Joanna Macy

Originally published in IN CONTEXT #34, Winter 1993, Page 22
Copyright (c)1993, 1996 by Context Institute
The Book




"We affirm that there is an irrevocable, unconditional norm for all areas of life,
for families and communities, for races, nations, and religions.

There already exist ancient guidelines for human behavior
which are found in the teachings of the religions of the world
and which are the condition for a sustainable world order."

from / The Declaration of a Global Ethic /
of The Parliament of the World's Religions





"All men (and women) in their native powers are craftsmen,
whose destiny it is to create ... a fit abiding place, a sane and beautiful world."

Louis Henry Sullivan. 27 JAN 1924
Quoted as the epigraph of
Good City Form by Kevin Lynch
(I'm almost sure this is the same as
A Theory of Good City Form by Kevin Lynch,
but I haven't had the chance to compare them side-by-side yet.)





I am not healed until the world is healed.

from Travels In India by Vicki Robin
from The New Road Map Foundation / newroadmap.org




Every individual
matters


Every individual
has a role to play




Every individual
makes a difference

Only if we understand
can we care


Only if we care
will we help




Only if we help
shall all be saved