M&M Monday - Skandhas

In Buddhism, the skandhas are any of five types of phenomena that serve as objects of clinging, grasping and craving. These lead to "attachments" which are the root of "suffering" in the buddhist philosophy. The skandhas are often referred to as the "five heaps" or the "five piles".

Depending on which Buddhist tradition one follows the path of enlightenment is either found by releasing all attachments to the skandhas or in the full and complete exploration of the nature of each of the five aggregates.

The five are:

1) form or matter; "rupa" or the external material world and the internal material body and sense organs;

2) sensation or feeling, including the labels pleasant, unpleasant or neutral;

3) perception or cognition; simply whether or not we recognize a sense object;

4) mental formations; thoughts, ideas, opinions that arise from interaction with objects;

5) consciousness; the condition of mind;

I have been scouring buddhist literature but have yet to find any references to devouring the skandhas.

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M&M Buddhist Art by me

Saved by a Collie

I told a friend a childhood story the other night and she said: "Have you blogged that yet?" Wow I have really infected my friends with this blog. But no I have not told my collie story and I should, so I will.

We grew up with two Blue Merle collies. Kerry was the first and Shane the second. They were each with us about a decade. We got Kerry soon after we moved out of Detroit, so I was just about two at the time. A little over a year later a house was being built across the street from us; the basement had been dug but heavy rains had delayed further work and there was about three feet of standing water in the hole.

On a sunny Sunday afternoon a 3 year old Timothy wandered away and a semi-frantic search was underway when someone spotted the wagging white underside of Kerry's tail through the bushes across the street. They ran over and found me half-in and half-out of the basement hole, a laid out Kerry sprawled across my body with her teeth holding onto my belt. I don't know if I would have drowned, how tall are 3 year olds? Needless to say everyone was happy not to have tested the science of kid and muddy water in a hole.

Those were wonderful dogs, we had cats too of course and as I grew up I became a devoted feline lover but Kerry and Shane hold a special place in my heart, perhaps a bit more special for the collie that may well have saved my life.

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photo: that is a blue merle collie, not one of ours but the closest I could get in an internet search, I wonder if any of my siblings have old photos of those dogs.

Godwin's Law

I wrote about Godwin's Law way back in January of '07, soon after I had started this here blog. Well it clearly has been too long because I have run into several discussions recently where a good dose of Mr. Godwin's logic would have served all parties well.

Here goes:

Godwin's Law (also known as Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies) is an early principle of Internet dialog or it damn well should be. This sanguine postulation was formulated by Mike Godwin in 1990. The law makes the trenchant observation that "as an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis, Fascists or Hitler approaches one." 


Or to state it less mathematically: some lame ass who can't really think for himself is going to call the other guy a Nazi or a Fascist or even Adolf himself. Sooner or later as the discussion heats up and the flaming begins, someone will pull out this universally overused analogy. Generally the user cannot spell analogy nor pronounce fascist.


Godwin's Law does not dispute whether, in a particular instance, a reference or comparison to Hitler or the Nazis might be apt. It is precisely because such a reference or comparison may sometimes be appropriate, Godwin has argued, that overuse of the Hitler/Nazi comparison should be avoided, as it robs the valid comparisons of their impact.

Although in one of its early forms Godwin's Law referred specifically to Usenet newsgroup discussions, the law is now applied to any threaded online discussion, electronic mailing lists, message boards, chat rooms and more recently blog comment talk pages. To this I would add any and all group discussions particularly one that involves the potential consumption of large amounts of wine. [Oops, did I give too much away there. Will they know I am writing about them?]

M&M Monday - Clothing

You know someone is going to say something about "melts in your mouth not in your hands" . .

. . . but that would clearly be wrong;

because that line obviously goes with this picture.

A Higher Education

I pose a simple question: What percentage of the population of the United States hold a college degree? The answer will appear below the cyber-fold. I must admit I was surprised by the number. I assume that lots of folks who hold a degree estimate too high, I did a quick unscientific survey of a small group of individuals and found that those who do not have a degree give a slightly lower number but still aim a bit too high.

So you have a clue, your guess is probably too high, so knock off 5% maybe 10% if you have a masters or a doctorate, we know those advanced degrees really schew your perception of reality.

So what was your guess? The answer is that as of 2009, twenty-seven and one-half percent of the adult population holds a college degree.

Here is a very cool interactive map from the Chronicle of Higher Education that shows where these over educated people live. It's a county by county breakdown and here is the really cool part, you can track back from 2009 to 1940. You thought the college numbers were higher today, only 4.6% of the country were college educated in 1940. When I got my B.A. in 1969 the overall number had just reached 10%.

The map also has breakouts by gender, ethnicity and income. Before you leave the map, be sure to set it for 2009 and click the Asian button.

Circulation of Elites

An academic friend tells the story of being asked about the 'revolution' in Egypt and replying: "It's not a revolution, they aren't changing the government only the names on the masthead." That basically describes the principle known as the Circulation of Elites. Vilfredo Pareto is credited with postulating this theory in the late 1800s. He suggested that political and therefore governmental change is nearly always the result of one elite replacing another. And despite the images on television and the internet it is not clear that Egypt was a popular uprising or simply a popular following of the new elite.

Most of the talk about democracy comes from outside Egypt. It appears what most Egyptians wanted was the removal of a tyrant who had ruled for three decades. Time will tell if any actual governmental or political change will result from the departure of the most recent elite. 

Revolutions, on the other hand, sweep the old regime from power and replace it with a new government. Not always a new form of government and not always a better one for those who were actually in the streets doing the revolting. You could use Cuba as an example to prove either point of view here. But one might better look to the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia in 1989, where actually governmental change (communist to democratic) did take place and then either did or did not sustain itself depending on your political point of view.

There are those who would argue that bloodless revolution is an oxymoron. Others might look to the old adage 'revolution is the result of a nation pregnant with itself.' Both good solid political arguments, which may or may not speak to what is actually happening in the backrooms throughout the region. What remains to be seen is what actually did happen in Egypt. Was it a revolution? Probably not. Was it a change of elites? Most likely. What will be the eventual outcome? Ah, well there lies the piece for the historians. 

Now what about Bahrain, Lebanon, Yemen, Iran, Libya and . . .


[It has been pointed out to me by the aforementioned "academic friend" that Ibn Khaldun back in 1377 proposed the theory of the "oscillation of elites," which may be an even more explanatory model as it suggests that elites not only supplant each other but they also recycle (oscillate) and recirculate through the corridors of political power.]

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art - Clay Bennett in The Christian Science Monitor

Elisângela Zanza, Golfinhos 207

"Minha 1ª tatto foi muito bem pensada, porque em minha casa sempre houve um pouco de regras(e talvez preconceitos também), por parte de meus pais. Quando decidi fazer, já estava com a idéia fixa que seria "Golfinhos", por serem considerados anjos do mar, pela inteligência, e a ligação forte com os seres humanos.


Não esperava que a reação deles fossem ser tão boa, elogiaram muito e foi uma surpresa prá mim! Enfim, tirei o preconceito deles e acabei com as 'determinada' REGRAS ashuashua... adquirindo o respeito deles pela arte!

Além dos meus 'Golfinhos' tenho uma 'Estrela' no pulso também e já penso em mais. " A arte é um instante de eternidade e perfeição "
Um beijo á todos.

Tatto feita em 05/03/2010 por MV Tatto Piercing
Rua: Nilo Peçanha, 643 Centro Birigui SP"

Elisângela Zanza