Life without a future?

I was once asked a very interesting question. “Would I change the way I lived my life if I was given incontrovertible proof that there was no life after death?”

It is a very interesting question, one for which there is no simple answer.

My initial reaction was – probably. After all, if there is nothing beyond this one, why not take everything from everyone I can manipulate, bully, outsmart or simply overpower? Why not take advantage of everyone and take everything I can so that I can live in luxury? If there is no greater power than anyone more powerful, more manipulative or aggressive than me, what should I be afraid of?

A Humanist would immediately argue that my ‘basic goodness’ would prevent me from doing that. They would argue that mankind have an innate morality which prevents us from such excess, but history seems to me to disprove that – the greatest genocidal acts, the worst atrocities have all been committed by atheist leaders who were also first class manipulators and propagandists. They were men and women who believed that belief in any higher power was something to be exploited to their advantage in those they ruled.

The atheist would, of course, be delighted by such a revelation. Such a proof would give them exactly what they want – proof that they are right and everyone else totally wrong. But would it lead to a better world? Or simply to a world without any restraint other than those made by man – which, again, history shows us very rapidly degenerates into tyranny?

Then another thought began to form. If there was proof that there is no hope of something better beyond this life, what does this say to those who have lived lives of suffering and deprivation? What does it say to those for whom this life has been one long struggle to raise, feed, clothe and house a family in the presence of neighbours enjoying plenty and unwilling to share?

That thought filled me with sadness. If there was no life beyond ours, nothing beyond the grave to hope for, then there is nothing for any of us in this existence but the pursuit of self-gratification and self-fulfillment. What a pointless existence. In fact, only those born to wealth, power and all that accompanies that, could really enjoy life to the full. For the rest of us there would be nothing but years of work, perhaps some small rewards and finally oblivion. For those crippled by any number of childhood diseases, and some adult ones, there is even less. The term from a TV show comes to mind – “Suffer, baby, suffer – there is nothing else to look forward to.”

All very well for those, like Dr Dawkins, in good health and in well paid positions, living comfortable lives in professions and careers which gave them fulfillment and rewards. Tough for the genius born into the family of a heavy drinking dustman without ambition, compassion or civility. Perhaps this was what drove those who have attempted to impose socialism upon the world, arguing that this was the only way to ensure ‘fair’ distribution of wealth. Notably, of course, only they should determine who is ‘wealthy’ and who not and who should give up what they had earned and worked to achieve, and who not – and naturally, they were among those giving up least. Notably, many of those who espouse this ideology are also atheists or humanists and freely attack those of faith – from which the ideas they now attempt to manipulate originated – and do so from their comfortable positions in well paid professions and from the material fulfillment of their very comfortable lives.

So what do they say, what do we say, to those who do not have the good fortune to be born to comfort and loving homes? Here’s a handout? Join a gang and take everything you can because life is short, brutal and a free-for-all? This is where we really do run into a problem with morality. Why shouldn’t they beat up old ladies, break into and rob your home of the possessions you have worked so hard for? The Socialist would say to you that it is the desperation of poverty that drives people to crime; that your refusal to give up some of your ‘wealth’ in order to ‘combat’ that poverty is what causes crime. But is this necessarily so?

No - I do not believe that it is, though it may be a part of the overall problem. There was far greater poverty and a far greater gap between rich and poor before the 1950s, yet, with the notable exception of the Mafia gangsters in the Prohibition period, crime had not reached the proportions it has today. Today, at least in Europe, we live in a society that provides for the jobless, for the ailing and for the retired. Interestingly, though there is always a great emphasis on raising retirement ages and ‘freezing’ or reducing pension entitlements, no one ever dares to take a hard look at the runaway benefits system which grows by leaps and bounds.

If there is no ‘life beyond this’ then it is easy to justify handing out endless ‘benefits’ to those who do not work and even to those who have never worked and to justify reducing what we give to the aging as ‘they’ve had the benefit of employment’ and have ‘assets’ they can sell to live off. After all, you can’t take it with you even if there is a life beyond this.

Now this all leads back to the original thought, if there was proved that there is no God, no life beyond our present existence, then we are utterly without hope. Not just those at the bottom end of society, but all of us, the rich, the comfortable and the poor – because now you have nothing but man-made and man enforced ‘laws’ to guide us. Nothing at all to restrict us, since laws can be manipulated, changed and even ignored.

Would such proof change the way I live? Yes, it would. It would make me very wary of the intentions of those around me. It would make me behave in a manner that brings out the ruthless side of me, and it would certainly make me a far worse person than I am now.

Fortunately, despite the best efforts of the Humanist Society, Dr Dawkins and now Professor Hawking, I am still convinced that the Gospels are correct and that they do reveal a life beyond this one, a life to which even the Dawkins', Hawkings' and members of the Humanist Societies are invited.

Hope in higher power and in a life to come is what makes our societies work and holds them together. Why should I believe that a politician canvassing my vote for his party is more likely to give me what is not in his power anyway – and not in a life that God Himself has promised? For millions of people of all faiths, the life they live now will never be more than one hard struggle, and one which, if they are lucky, may be very short. Our early ancestors decorated vast caverns with images they hoped would guide them into a ‘spirit life’ which would offer some easier aspect. Even Neanderthal men buried their dead with tenderness and care decorated graves.

Does it not seem strange that in the 100,000 years that modern man has been around, no one has yet ‘proved’ there is no afterlife? In fact, increasingly, there is growing evidence that there is. Perhaps that is what gives rise to the question with which I began and which, I am happy to say, I do not believe will ever be the case.

I do not look forward to death and I do not seek it. I confess to being uncertain as to what precisely awaits and to facing it – especially as it gets closer – with some trepidation, but I am convinced that once I have passed through the pain of parting from those here that I love, I will find a welcome.

I dare to live in hope and faith – and through holding to them, I live in the Love of a God who loves His creation – all of it. As St Paul wrote almost 2,000 years ago; “And now abide these three, Faith, Hope and Charity – and the greatest of these is Charity.” In language of the King James Bible, “charity” was the same as the Greek “philos” – the love that is without eroticism or expectation of reward.

Yes, I dare to live in the hope of the “Charity” and that moderates the way I live my life.

Anglican Arguments...

The Sydney Archdiocese in Australia has always been out of step with the rest of the Anglican Communion and their latest Archbishop has turned their disagreement with the rest of the Church into something of a power struggle for the leadership of the entire Anglican world. The bulk of the Anglican Communion is a synodically governed church. It's bishops are consecrated in the 'Apostolic Succession' - the continuation of spiritual authority stretching back to the appointment of the first 'Episcopio' (Bishops) by the Apostles and recorded in the Acts of the Apostles and in some of the Letters that form the bulk of the New Testament. Anglicans have no 'Pope' and follow, instead, the practice of the Early Church in recognising a 'Senior See' and holding a Conference and Synods in order to examine doctrine and dogma issues that need to be addressed.

For some, this process is far to slow, for others it is far to fast - and, as always, there are those who go along with it as long as it says and does what they demand of it. The Archbishop of Sydney and his followers fall into that category. The bulk of the Anglican Church has moved on from the ghastly era of the Edwardian (Edward VI - son of Henry VIII) and Cromwellian periods. But Sydney wants to cling to the fundamentalism of the 'reformers' of 1552-4 and drag the entire church away from the 'universal' church (Also called the Catholic Church) and back into something that more closely resembles the 'Deep South Baptist' tradition of the US. Frankly, a eucharist in the Sydney Diocese, with one or two exceptions, bears no resemblance at all to what is practiced everywhere else.

And now, Archbishop Jenkins wants to take the Sydney Diocese out of the Province of Australia. He argues that his diocese holds 25% of the funds and makes 25% of the payments; that only his diocese is seeing growth and that only his branch of the church is the 'true' Anglican Church. Anyone who has attended one of their services will also know that they make the Baptists look like Roman Catholics...

All of this is giving a number of people a lot of ammunition to use against Anglicans - mostly from an ill-informed, or biased, base point. Catholic Convert is a friend of mine and a Roman Catholic, so it was a little concerning to me to see his post on the latest attempt by Archbishop Jenkins to seize authority for his desire to drag the Anglican Church back into the age of presbyters (unordained) and fundamentalist driven anti-Roman excess.

Let us hope that the common sense of the rest of the Anglican Church will eventually prevail. Archbishop Jenkins has hitched his particular wagon to some very odd fellow travellers. There are several American and Canadian bishops who are so 'Catholic' they make the Romans look like Methodists, several African Bishops and one Archbishop in the same camp and, worse, who have dismissed their Synods and refuse to operate in the democratic synodical manner of the rest of the church. Sydney is alone in its 16th Century 'Protestant' stance on doctrine, dogma and worship patterns and traditions in that group. That alone should warn those tempted to follow this attempt to split the Communion.

Global Cooling?

The "Bilderberg Group" are often portrayed as the modern face of an even more shadowy 'bogeyman' group - the "Illuminati" - every true 'Conspiracy Theorist' loves to hate. The Bilderberg Group are a group of super-rich industrialists, landowners, politicians and includes people like the Queen of the Netherlands, Bill Gates and Henry Kissinger. Their meetings are never publicised, always behind closed doors and always about long term trends. So their latest meeting, in June this year, and held in Spain hardly hit the headlines. Maybe it should have.

One of the items under discussion was "Global Cooling."

No, that wasn't a misprint. What it says, perhaps more loudly than anything else could have, is that the wheels are about to come off the "Anthropogenic Global Warming" bandwagon. And the funding tap is about to be turned off on all those 'scientific' units that have been milking the system and the taxpayers. We'll still be stuck with the damage they have done - probably for the next century at least. James Dellingpole has written a very well researched article on this in the Telegraph Online under the title "Bilderberg Group discusses Global Cooling at 2010 meeting."

The science is far from reliable or settled. Most of the 'warming' data comes from weather stations sited in areas that have seen a huge increase in urbanisation with tarmac acting as a heat trap, central heating in buildings and, in the case of the Siberian Arctic, above ground heating pipes and systems. In fact, tracking the data from these sites shows the sudden rise in temperature is directly related to the expansion of towns and even airports where these 'weather stations' are located. The classic example is Svalbard. The weather station is exposed to the backwash from taxiing jets, situated on the edge of a tarmac taxiway and a micro-climate generated by the expansion of airport buildings and paved areas. Move 2 kilometres away and the temperatures are two or more degrees lower than what the 'weather station' (on which the EAU/CRU models are based) are reading. Other stations in this 'model' are exposed to the hot exhauts of airconditioning units, up against sun facing walls of buildings and so on.

If the data is slewed - the model is spewing out garbage. That seems to be the conclusion that the Bilderbergers have finally figured out. After all, other indicators are actually contradicting the CRU/Greenstrife/Fiends of the Earth favoured 'evidence.' In fact, most 'weather' (as opposed to 'climate') records show that the last ten years have NOT been 'warmer' but actually static. In terms of the Arctic Ice, there are now ice and sediment cores which show that it was warmer in the early medieval period - excluded from the CRU et al model - and cows could be grazed in Greenland - impossible today. In fact, 9,000 years ago, there was even less ice in the Arctic basin - it may even have been ice free! Sadly all of us are already paying for the folly of allowing policy to be dictated and directed by a bunch of hysterical terrorists under the banner of pressure groups such as Greenpeace, Fiends of the Earth, Earth First and all their related 'direct action' spawn.

Wind Farms are only viable of you keep a number of ordinary power stations 'spooling' to bring on line as the wind turbine output drops. That means every single one of us is paying twice for the power we use and we're paying again in tax. All these "green" taxes do nothing for the environment except take more out of our pockets and divert it to subsidies that enrich the owners, makers and promoters of the 'wind farms.'

As they say, if you want to know what is really going on - follow the money. Watch the balance of funding swing away from all the "green" projects that cost an arm and a leg, are crippling our economies and can never be viable. Watch Greenstrife and Fiends of the Earth start to have to cut back their piracy and terror operations in the media, on the high seas and on our streets.

Book relaunched

The observant among my readers - hopefully everyone - will have noticed that there is a new link in the sidebar. I have republished The Enemy is Within! and it is now available from the publisher, Xlibris via their online book store, as a hardback, a paperback and as an e-book. I am assured that it will be listed by Amazon everywhere very shortly and I will provide links and the new cover design as soon as it becomes available.

I hope that everyone who hasn't attempted to buy the original version from the disappointingly expensive "joint venture" I had with the previous publisher will now find the book not just accessible but available. Republishing has given me the opportunity to revise one or two small sections and to correct some of the things which slipped through the editing in the first edition. I hope everyone will find a chance to get a copy now.

Another new book will make its appearance shortly. Watch this space for the appearance of "Their Lordships Request" which tells the story from Harry and Ferghal joining the Royal Navy to the eve of the event that will catapult them 400 years into their future. It also introduces that future and the people they will meet and serve with in the 23rd Century.

There's a hole in our modelling...

Recently a well reviewed and well researched paper has identified the solar cycles as having a major influence on the global temperatures. Now there's a big surprise - except that these solar cycles have, until now, been discounted as having any inlfuence at all by the Greenstrife/Fiends of the Earth Warmist lobby. I'm also willing to bet that, despite the New Scientist - a rabidly "The Sky is Falling and we're all going to die!" supporter of the CRU/IPCC model predictions - actually publishing a reasonable report on it, the Anthropomorphic Global Warmistas will continue to insist it has no impact.

In an even bigger surprise, to the modellers at least, a German team have now published a paper which reveals that the oceans play a huge role in the weather and climate - again something the CRU and other 'Climate Modellers' have consistently declared 'irrelevant.'

Oh dear. Oh, dearie, dearie me. It seems that far from warming, the oceans are about to drop back into a cooling phase. The sun is in a really passive phase of its cycle and so isn't doing much to stir up the atmosphere and the cool damp weather may be the way it will go in the next few years.

Looks like there's a big hole in the model predictions. About three quarters of the 'atmosphere' - the oceans - aren't even considered in them. Back to the drawing board folks?

Throw away remarks...

A day or two ago I caught a fascinating interview on BBC World Service in a programme called. Sadly, I missed the name of the scientist and of the show which I think was "The Interview." I'm glad I watched though, the interviewee was an eminent astro-physicist, a true scientist and a gentleman through and through. The interviewer tried to draw him into the latest controversy stirred by Stephen Hawking with his anti-God remarks and the old boy refused to be drawn - But he did enter the politest and most devastating riposte to it I have ever been privileged to hear.

He said: "I have known Stephen for over 40 years and he is a great scientist. He has made an enormous contribution in his field - but he has no expertise in natural philosophy and probably less in theology. I wouldn't place to much credence on his pronouncements in either of those subjects."

Having firmly and politely slammed that door in the interviewers face he dealt with Hawking's other contentious statement - that the book and his work on "M-Theory" would bring the end of science in an equally balanced and gentle manner.

"I doubt very much that the human mind will ever be capable of understanding everything. While Stephen's work in this field may well close this branch of research it will have no impact at all on the biological sciences and many other branches. I think he is being humorous and having a little joke at the expense of other sciences"

The interviewer struggled, as has become the modus operandi of BBC interviewers over recent years, to introduce something contentious or damaging - and was consistently put in his place with perfect politeness and perfectly sound answers to every question. It was wonderful to watch. If only all the members of the UK's scientific community behaved with such restraint and politeness.

New Computer

Yesterday I splashed out and today I'm test driving my new iMac computer. It has a very large screen has installed itself and made itself right at home on my desk and even has a minimum of wires trailing everywhere because the mouse is wireless and so is the keypad. The one thing I'm struggling with is the German language keypad!

There are a number of small differences - like where the 'z' and the 'y' are - and these can certainly throw you off if you are used to 'qwerty' and it now is a 'qwertz' instead! But it also has all the Umlaut characters and even the 'ß' symbol, which, for those who don't know, is actually a double 's'.

So far, so good. But, boy, is this a learning curve!