Perception on Theories (05/12/09)

Having read a good deal of theories and conspiracy theories, I've come up with a few ideas of my own and my interpretations of them. This post is entirely meant for those who likes to challenge the "truth" and loves analyzing stuff like I do. I will cover 5 pressing theories which have been on my mind for some time and I've finally found the time to type them down...

1. September 11

There have been claims that the tragedy of September 11 was deviously orchestrated by the previous US President, George W. Bush. It was alleged to have been planned by him to put the blame on Osama Bin Laden so the entire world can treat the terrorist mastermind as an international criminal and sprout the excuse of declaring war on Afghanistan.

I believe this is absurd. Though the conspiracy theory would first come off as a stunning possibility, on further rationalising, this theory is flawed. First off, I do not think it imaginable for a person of his status to be able to execute such a devious plan on his own people; it’s too far-fetched to actually believe he can massacre his own nation’s citizens at its very heart, the twin towers, all for the cost of declaring war on Osama.

From what we have learnt about Bush so far, where he was ridiculed online for his “low IQ”, how is it possible that someone of his calibre would be able to devise such a plan? You might say that he wasn’t the mastermind, merely the puppet put out at the very front but I doubt he was that “gullible” to be made use of. It may be true from his confusing and contradicting lines made at times which may come across as “silly”, but no one is perfect, you can’t have him saying the right stuff all the time after doing say like, 100 over live speeches.

There has been a claim on youtube that the collapse of the twin towers is not due to the crashing of the planes but an internal bomb which triggered it. This was based on previous incidents that plane crashes were insufficient to bring down a building, furthermore the video claimed that there was a thermal cam that day that registered the temperature way off to “melt” the top down. I do not see how the cover up of the bombing would make Bush the culprit, it could be due to holding back the information so as not to further bring up the tragic incident and bring more agony to those who lost someone that day. Furthermore, the video itself didn’t make much sense.

I have to admit the collapse of the building could be due to an internal bomb, but the reason for the analysis calls for much scepticism – why would someone be able to capture the collapse of the building on a thermal cam at such a shocking event? If you had a video cam with you on a day which you witness a car accident, would you be so on the ball as to take the entire accident? Or would you be trying to help them out? Furthermore, who in the world would carry a thermal cam with them around?

Assuming, the bomb did occur internally to further demolish the building, assuming the plane did crash on site due to negligence of the control tower, assuming the other plane crashes of the paragon and flight .... (can’t rem the number) were all planned by the terrorist to create multiple damage to the nation, assuming most of what the media reported were true, then there’s without a doubt that it was the terrorist organisation which orchestrated the tragedy.

Though we know we cannot trust everything the media reports, we also know that criminals can get away scott free easily due to negligence since honestly speaking, crime fighters are not all so noble themselves to get their jobs done all the time, therefore, there is more evidence to proof that it was the work of terrorist instead of mere theorized unproved accusations for it being the work of the US ex-President. Sometimes, we just have to accept that the truth isn’t as elusive as we may want to believe it to be.

2. Area 51

There have been claims that the US government is hiding a secret place called Area 51 from the its nation and the world. At Area 51, it’s speculated that the evidence of the first alien landing at Roswell are kept and alien bodies are brought there ever since.

I believe there is some truth behind it, but not the very existence of aliens. Area 51 could be a place where weird objects are brought to for experiments, where there is a group of scientists who would work for them and is kept under the radar by the US elite force. But aliens, though very tempting to believe in their existence, I doubt they (if they ever existed) landed on earth, or even visited us.

First off, for other life forms to come to our world, the so-called aliens, they will have to own a technology far greater than ours. It’s not impossible for that to happen, but to travel from other galaxies to ours, to land specifically on our world, to remain so elusive – that’s not quite possible. Why do they want to come to our world like ninjas, or as claimed by the Roswell events that a UFO crashed and Martian bodies were found... If their technology was this good, why would they crash in the first place?

If their space shuttle did crash, why do their appear so stealthily when they next come back to Earth to explore, or even find the cause of the first crash? If there were ever living organisms on the Moon or Mars, I would be extremely certain they would be aware of any “intruders” landing on their territory. And if they were that advanced to travel to other planets to find life forms, why don’t they just come to Earth in broad daylight (they always conveniently come at night where you can see it’s mysterious light beams) at the speed of light (since that is what is needed to travel from other galaxies to our world), shine a beam of light over a group of humans, gather them into their ships, experiment on them and move on?

Why return them back to Earth so that they live to can tell the tale? If humans gather living specimens from Moon or Mars, they don’t return them back to the planet after experimenting on them do they?

And one of the most pressing issue I have is that... Why do all the alien sightings all happen in US? Is US a hot spot for alien landings? Is the land there better and more conducive for landing? Why not Singapore? Why not India, why not... Maldives? Any islands would be fine, if you want stealth, just fly to any habituated islands, snap a couple of humans or other life forms, experiment on them and if they want to keep the equilibrium, return them and end of story.

If their technology is already advanced, I’m sure they would be intelligent enough to either go both extremes, if they want stealth, I’m sure we won’t be able to see them, if they want to make a huge entrance, I’m sure we won’t fail to experience it either.

Once an alien species were to investigate on our life forms and move on, further alien invasions should be for accounted for other sightings. But why do all the aliens look the same? Inverted oval shapes with large black eyes and a humanoid body (as documented by those abductees). Follow-up?

All of that versus the susceptible and vulnerable minds of those believers and how they are able to create false memories. Which seems more possible?

3. Michael Jackson

There’s a recent speculation that MJ is not dead and there were photos, shots of capturing someone who looked like him attending his own funeral.

Once again, this is utter rubbish. First off, why in the world would anyone want to stage his own death? What does he get to gain? Publicity? For wealth? For fame? He has everything already, and he has been living that way in the spotlight as a “child molester” so does his death take away all that? No? He’s the legend as he is, and staging his own death is absolutely ridiculous. It’s a similar case for Elvis Presley. There has been claims of him being sighted at bars around US.

This theory, is easy to debunk. There are so many fans of MJ and Elvis Presley, and the way they idolize them have created “duplicates”. So the sightings of any resemblance to the departed legends are merely avid fans who believe that they are their idols themselves, and to keep their legends alive, they decided to be as identical to them as possible. It’s not difficult to recreate the persona of MJ or Elvis, as has been proven time and time again but those fans.

The photos are is a scam. Why would anyone be at MJ’s funeral to be on a lookout for “him”? What I think is that some fans decided to keep their legends alive by plotting it. Get one of them to dress as close to him, get another to film it, and get another to post it. There you have it, the creation of a scam. Furthermore, there were so many fans and relatives over there and they must all have been that blind to miss the “real MJ”.

Let’s say if I did think I see him, took out my handphone camera and snap it, wouldn’t I want to squeeze my way through in front of him, snap him upclose and ask him myself? Why would I keep myself at a distance all the time? To respect his privacy? If so, why in the world would I still post his photos up online?

4. Time Travel

Not exactly a conspiracy theory but my theory on time itself. Scientist theorized that time travel is impossible due to the grandfather paradox – about going back in time to kill your grandfather then you will not be born to even be able to kill him. That was why the theory of travelling forward instead of back arose.

But what I believe is that time travel itself is impossible. It is possible only on assumption based on Einstein’s theory – if we can travel faster than the speed of light, we should technically be able to travel in time. What if time itself isn’t a variable, but a constant?

Time is a variable because humans give meaning to it, the hours, the minutes, the seconds, days, months, years etc. But if we were to really think about it, time is constant. It is not ever-changing, it is us who are changing, life is the variable, not time. A million years ago, is time the same as the present? Time is relative, if we had 25 hours a day, 8 days a week, would that give us more time? Or merely create another “timeframe”.

If assuming, we can travel faster than the speed of light, we create a “reality” that we are able to move slower (ironically) than the rest of the human race and other life forms. That is why what we are after the “travelling” will be more constant than the faster changing lifeforms. So, is that time travel? Or merely a change in the variables?

Take for analogy, in all equations, there are constants and variables. Time is the constant. There are two equations, one equation for the faster moving lifeform, the other equation for the other lifeform. So in essence, time travel does not exist, just merely a change of forms, or functions in any sense.

That is why to even start addressing the possibility of time travel, time itself has been assumed to the determining factor and has not been challenged... till now. Of course, it is highly impossible that a human can even travel faster than the speed of light in the first place, though the idea of time travel to change the “wrong” things you did in your life, or any life altering events in history will always remain a phenomenon and never reality.

5. Dejavu

Dejavu is probably one of the most talked about phenomenon in life, how the human mind can “play tricks” on you. Though it’s sensible to think that way, I will approach this theory along the lines of the further-fetched point of view – the world of alternate universes, the instability of realism etc.

With the help of my girlfriend who read possible explanations about it in a book about something to do with the wonders of life, I think, dejavu could be because of a split of interpretation between the spirit and the mind. Of course, that is assuming we do have a “separate” soul that is embedded in our physical body. This is highly hypothetical assuming that ghosts exists and are lingering spirits of the departed souls without a physical body.

When dejavu happens, during the actual event, there is a time lapse. The mind works faster than the soul, therefore it interprets the event as “happened” and the soul interprets it as “as yet to happen”. So after that split second of the event, the soul comes to terms with it being “happened”, thus the interpretation of dejavu. It would be easier to view it from the analogy of the conscious and subconscious mind – the conscious mind “lagging” and the subconscious mind being the “updated” one.

The idea of alternate universes sounds cool and novel, but to rationalize it from a most logical point of view, this is the best explanation I’ve got assuming ghosts are real, which I believe they do, even though the very existence of the soul is not scientific and has no real evidence or proof.

I think the most important thing about theories, is not just about being open-minded and being able to accept explanations which sound "cooler" and which makes you feel more at ease, but it's also a balance of rationalising what makes sense and which had the greater tendency to be "created". The first truth always seemed less "true" when challenged with another, but that doesn't make the 2nd truth any more right than the first.

The Limit of Tolerance (05/11/09)

Is my patience thinning, or are my friends going more overboard?

A question that greatly sparked my reflections and the people I call "friends" around me. Come to think of it, it has been a good 2 years since I last left my blog alone, thought I would never have to come back to it.

Though I would usually blog about new inspirations on the many chance occurrences, the "Finer things in Life", this post will be more skewed towards a selfish cause - myself. I've gone through a fair deal of "downs" to be where I am today. I could bitch about my life all day, all night and it would prolly take a 10,000 word essay to pin down my discontent but there's always that glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel.

The world in which we live in is much "darker" than we actually know. About a recent facebook vid post about how Einstein questioned his professor about the very existence of cold, darkness and religion, I shall challenge him here. In science, darkness is present only in the absence of light, ie, darkness doesnt exist. However, in the real world, "darkness" is the prevalent existence while light, only exists in its absence.

I cannot imagine when I've felt that way, but growing up exposes me to the "dark" side of humanity. I don't need to be a hundred-year-old demon to truly understand that or to be able to comment about it. But don't you just hate it when others question your age and ends with "What do you know? You're still young." Though age is in a way related to experience, but I don't think we can ever be "too young" to grasps the concept of life, to understand the "essence" of humanity.

I underwent my first test when my grandfather passed away many years back, and that was a major turning point in my life. I grew up wanting to do goodness, to repent for what I did, or what I didn't do. But it seemed that there's some truth behind the saying, "Good guys finish last". My supposed iron will has been smashed countless times, and right now, though still strong, it has incurred several unammendable dents.

"Do not do unto others what you do not want others to do unto you." I thought by living with that mentality in mind, I can make peace with everyone around me, and probably open the eyes of others to show respect to all. But not everyone thinks the same. What is intolerable to you, might seem tolerable to them, just because they have never felt it being done unto them before. Like the saying goes, "You'll never know until you're in it yourself." Perhaps what people lack these days is the ability to empathised, though hugely taught and preached in school and in books, I will make a general statement by saying there's only a good 5% who can really grasp that "essence".

Humans are selfish, it has and will always be all about themselves. Altruism, does it really exist? Or is it all but a show? Singapore's very own National Kidney Foundation and the more recently RenCi hospital, where there were cases of embezzlement of charitable funds simply showed that no matter who you are, how well-respected you might be, how divine a person may look, deep down inside, they are all the same. There was a newspaper article in yesterday's Straits Times that wrote "Magician, 68, sexually abuses ... a young boy...."

Just take a look at the way it was phrased. Firstly, Magician. It spoils the image of Magicians, but then it was ironically good in a sense that it alerts the public that no occupation is free of potential crimes. But the way it was phrased was so lobsided, the media just wants it's viewings, and the public just wants another excuse to find fault in whatever or whoever did something wrong.

Lawyers, doctors, policemen, pastors, CEOs - all of them have an equal potential of committing something criminal compared to a bank robber or a snatch thief. What makes you, you? There have been so many cases of thefs backdated from my primary school all the way to my tiertiary level and as long as there's a window, a potential to not be caught while doing something wrong, there's going to be someone who does it. Perhaps this is prominent only in Singapore, either that or it's well hidden in Scotland - back then the honesty system was so impressive I almost.... almost believed that there was goodness in humans.

Let's get back to what I intended to write in this post. Ever felt that you really hated some things that were done on you, to you that you just wanted them to be stopped, but were not within your control? That has been happening to me since a long time ago, but has aggravated recently. That's where the million-dollar question comes into play. Why was I able to tolerate it then, but not now? Is it because..... "Is my patience thinning, or are my friends going more overboard?"

As I laid in bed last night, I was unable to find an answer for that. Even if my patience did thin, I cannot understand why others will so very much take joy in my demise... therefore, I can only conclude it's probably the later. Putting more thought into it, I'm probably the only one who stupidly self-reflects after something nasty has been done to me, what an extreme fool I am!!

From this very moment, I will no longer think for others, to rationalize or to even self-reflect because if there's ever going to be a miserable party in such scenarios, I've had it with that party always being me. But there are exceptions. I realised that there was someone in my life, who makes me feel good about being myself, who makes me feel appreciated for the "empathy" i've shown, who makes me feel that there is still but a little "goodness " left in the world. In a world of a billion humans, there is definitely a few exceptions. Just like the way a supercell would evolve from so many normal cells. I just didn't believe I would meet that person...

Which also makes me think about the very contraversy behind the war of religion (in particular Christianity) and altruism, some youtube vids I was checking out yesterday. But that is another story, for another time. For now, I shall let my anger dissipate further by shifting my focus onto something else...

One of the most classic sight I saw yesterday at school was a DHL vehicle following behind a FedEx vehicle, with only seconds to react, all I captured was the scene in my mind. But I believe if it had been caught on camera, it would be a "priceless" addition to the library of funny photos online.

With the skies casting its shadows and grief over Singapore for the past few days with the arrival of the monsoon season, I can only hope that the days to come will only be as gloomy as the hangover caused by the insensitivity of my friends, the "puked" milk that I will no longer clean up for them...