Tag: programming

Who is Steering the Ship?

Is the captain of a company the CEO?
Is it the board of directors?
Is it the Stockholders?

I would argue yes and no. The customer most probably guides or “tugs” your ship through the turbulent waters of the industry you are in, more than you might think.

Since the driving force is out of your complete control, can your ship stand up to the pressures of high winds or traversing into territories which are uncharted? Is there a reef ahead waiting to break the spine of your vessel? Will Sirens lure your men into a false state of complacency?

While need necessitates the possible paths that you as the captain choose to follow, the infrastructure and robust nature of your data systems will be part of the viability of your success.

Companies must be robust enough to change directions or take on more massive task as the customer demands. As an SME in Data processing (Information Systems) and Disaster Recovery, frequently I find through the audit process that the ship is traversing the waters without a rudder, and an engine that is held together with duct tape and bailing wire.

Some of the critical problems in this industry are human nature, underperforming CIO’s, and lackadaisical staff. Other issues often include a CIO taking on the job of CFO.

Encouraged by upper management to rain in cost, the CIO might look for ways to cut the budget using poor quality sheets, and used line, taken from derelict ships that have already made their way to Davy Jones locker.

When the proverbial fork in the road or in keeping with the metaphor, when the winds change, will your company be ready?

Often, Board Members or CEO’s look at disaster recovery like insurance. It is much more than some policy that you purchase.

When you bring in a person or company, who specializes in Disaster Recovery many things happen.

The first two are a risk analysis and an audit of how you currently do business regarding Data processing. The scope, of course, can be more than just your data processing capabilities and often it is expanded to include all functions of your company.

Depending on the size of your company and its complexity this could be a project for a consultant, or it might include one or more FTE’s that maintain your ships viability into perpetuity.

While the Risk Analysis may or may not be a surprise to you, the audit will almost certainly be a surprise. Nobody wants someone poking around in their business.

Frequently those in charge of the department will make themselves scarce. While weekly meetings and deliverables are a must, I often find that an audit shakes things up, and that can be a good thing. This process also exposes any weak links in the proverbial chain.

Your IT department is a dynamic part of your company and often is the engine which drives your ship. While frequently looked at as a cost center, without it, your company I dare say would die on the vine or flounder.

In the final examination of your company, we will discover if you are ready for the next opportunity or the next fork in the road. We might also learn that you are treading water.

When the prevailing winds shift directions, will your ship be able to adjust?

Smooth Sailing!

Scott Taylor

Is Buffoonery the new American Norm?

“Doctor, when I do this it hurts. My hair is thinning, and I am tired all the time.”

“Is that all?”

“Yes, other than this strange growth on my neck. What can you give me to make it better?”

“We must run some test first to see if these symptoms are related and then figure out what is causing them.”

“You doctors are all alike, you just want to run my bill up with unnecessary test, so you can make a car payment or even a house payment. Just prescribe something, and I will be on my way.”

The patient in the above dialogue is a Buffoon.

Oddly enough, I get this same kind of rhetoric when I am called out to come up with a disaster recovery plan and discover that they have many other issues.

“Do you think you can fix these issues we are having?”

“What are some of the issues?”

“Computers drop off the network for no reason. Printers often don’t get their print jobs, we think it is the printer, so we keep calling Cannon out, but they never fix it! The internet is slow and sometimes unresponsive. Our phones don’t always work. The phone vendor keeps telling us it is not his problem but you know those vendors, get your money and then forget they know you. My lead guy tells me we need more internet bandwidth, would that fix it?”

“It sounds like you have some serious issues, when would you like me to start?”

“Start? Just go push the right button and fix it! How long will it take?”

“It depends on what I find.”

“What do you charge?”

“$125 an hour unless you would like to have me out here on a contract for a set amount of time.”

“What would you charge if I contract with you for two hours.”

“$250, (and it may be more if I have to deal with stupid nonsense like this, while I am working.)

“Truly I get this kind of stuff from CIO’s no less.”

The old joke about a thousand dollars regarding kicking a computer to make it work is just a joke. While that might end up being the final diagnosis (which I doubt), this is a mindset from those who have no idea of what they are talking about.

Truly if it is from someone outside of IT, it is not their fault. Their job is to run the company, turn a profit or drive the business to produce more of what they do. It is not to run IT. Now if the CIO has this dialogue with you as a consultant then you have issues.

Some people are in high up positions because of who they knew and not what they knew. Some are there because their parents own the company. I personally try to stay out of situations like that because it hardly ever ends well. I have done it many times in the past. One of the most frustrating things is working for a guy “CIO” who did not even have a computer at home. He knew little about computers or technology other than green screen 5250 stuff as a programmer, using RPG or Cobol.

When I walk in your door to resolve an issue or create a disaster recovery plan, there are things that I want to see.

Up to date network map.
A runbook
I will want to see the recent logs from the servers.
I will want to see your notes from the change control committee. (living document)
I will ask about your issues from the past to current. Are there pain points and what are they?
I will want to know what you would like to see as a deliverable. (an end goal)
I will want to know about your business model, so I can best position you for the future.
I will ask about the age of the hardware and what your hardware asset management looks like.
I will also want to know the same about your software. S.A.M.
I will want to see the licenses for the software that you have and I will want to see where the software is and when, if ever was it updated.

If you asked your CIO for these things, could he provide them?

As the CEO, ignorance is not an option. There are seldom good surprises in business.

There are many other things I will want to have handy before I even begin to diagnose, troubleshoot or create a disaster recovery plan. One of the most effusive displays of frustration from a client was when I discovered through digging that someone had spliced network cable improperly and it would need to be replaced. Cat 5 to Cat 3 no less.

Yes, I will want to know about the cable plant. Was it installed all at one time or has it evolved over the years? When you climb into the overhead ceiling to find a gob of electrical tape or even scotch tape holding network cable together, that will make your blood run cold. If they are that stupid or cheap unless they are under new management or are willing to hand you the checkbook, you probably should just walk away. Life is too short.

When I talk with potential customers, I can get a sense of their knowledge level quick enough. How is that done?

I was in data processing long before Bill Gates was a household name. Steve Jobs was still a criminal selling blue boxes made in his garage and CPM was the operating system. What I do is not cheap but, it is worth it. Most companies that have a disaster if not resolved within three days go out of business.

“We live in Dallas Texas, what kind of disaster could we have that would put us out of business?”

The disaster that I see the most often was caused by employee error. I do a risk assessment as part of the deliverable which many companies need for their insurance provider.

Now that we are in 2018 is this the year that you pay attention to your network and other infrastructure? Is this the year that you look at security both digital and physical? “yes, I do that too.”

If you like my blog, please consider following me.

-Best

Why should you use Rent-A-Geeks for your disaster recovery drills?

The pushback I get on this one topic is phenomenal. Their IT people who know their boss better than I, always question the need for a disaster recovery audit in the first place.

“I Get it! To them, that is synonymous with taking your shoebox full of tax information to the IRS and asking them for an audit. Please let me suffer through an audit because I love pain!”

So who in their right mind would do it?

I can think of no better argument than Puerto Rico. That island was wiped off the map. They have no power grid left. They have no data communications and let’s face it; It will take years for them to recover.

I had customers there, but I bet that those businesses may no longer be viable.

They are requesting of all things truck drivers, among their many lists of needs. Why?

Their truck drivers were affected by the buss’s called Irma and then Maria.

I am speaking to the owners of businesses with this next sentence. “Folks, your IT guy that tells you that you don’t need an outside firm or audit, is setting you up for disaster.”

Objectivity is essential. You need an honest assessment by someone who does not have a dog in that fight.

If a team of rent-a-geeks cannot restore your company at a warm site, the DR plan that you think you have is worthless. It may satisfy the ISO folks or the other government or banking or insurance companies, but the sad truth is, in an actual Disaster your people may not be around to add their collective knowledge to the process.

One client did not even look at one I prepared for them. When I asked if he wanted to go over it he shook his head. “No, I just need something for the auditor to show that we have one.”

My reports go to you the customer, nowhere else. My recommendations are put forth in a clear, concise manner that you will not need your IT guy to explain to you. Read and understand my blogs on the topic and then ask the critical questions. If you hold your SA’s feet to the fire or your CIO’s feet to the fire, you will far better off than most of the firms I deal with.

One firms CIO that I worked with was not suited for desktop wizard much less the end all be all guru of all things technology. Now if numbers are what interested the CEO, this was his guy. He could pinch a nickel with the best of them. “Penny wise pound foolish,” should be on this man’s card.

It does not take an Irma or Maria to sink your business. It only takes a Ted or Bob or a fire of some small part in the computer room to decimate your company. Assume nothing! Do you have the right employees doing the job?

Pray for our brothers and sisters in Puerto Rico, and if you have the ability, you might consider donating something to some of the excellent organizations who are working so hard to bring some relief to those affected.

Having lived through Alicia, I would not wish that on my worst enemy.

-Best

Ready, Fire …Aim

After the recent storms, one might have guessed that my phone has been busy. Firstly let me say that Disaster Recovery by its very title is a bit of a misnomer. While I have some abilities to recover lost data using some forensic skills developed over decades of twiddling bits, that is not really disaster recovery.

Disaster Recovery and business continuity are about planning for an event which may or may not happen. The “plan” assumes that your business systems will be affected negatively and puts forth a tested strategy to recover from the said event.

With the recent devastation by hurricanes and earthquakes, one would think that those businesses not affected would be learning from those that were. If you search my blogs on this site, you will see that I have laid out

Do not ask him or her, are we covered just in case, ask them specific questions laid out in this blog here.

Yes is not a satisfactory answer, demand the details and the proof. I don’t care how much of a friend he or she is, demand the evidence. The devil is in the details, and the last thing you want is a bunch of excuses.

I am learning from phone calls that too many have been assured that they are covered, and that is very possibly why today they are looking for ways to recover data from destroyed equipment.

Disaster recovery is not some dark magic spell cast under the voodoo magic of bits and bytes in the wiring closet or back part of the computer room. The bottom line is to test it, whatever your people come up with, check it. Keep checking it until you can recover your business with outside contractors and hardware with data and documents prepared by your staff. There is to be no input from you or your staff during the test. The hurricane, earthquake, fire, attack from zombies or employee error took you and them away from the scene. The plan provided must work!

This is why we who do this insist that companies use “best practice” standards in the industry when creating your individual networks and systems.

One such company has a senior IT staff littered with programmers. These people think they know more than Microsoft. Using kludges from Unix, Linux and other programming wizardry to subvert some of the basic tenants of networking, they have made their network so unique that it will depend on them to be there to recover.

If it is not broken, don’t fix it!

Writing programs that workaround things like DNS is just crazy stuff and now it is dependent on the network never changing, at all.

If your data is successfully mirrored offsite, an excellent team of engineers might get you going in weeks, not days if you have failed to follow best practices. While your data might eventually be usable, you and your company will be on the sidelines as most businesses do not recover from such a catastrophe.

Folks I have been at this since 1982, I have learned a thing or two in those years. Ask your team the questions or be prepared for unpleasant surprises should you ever face a business stopping event.

Got to go and explain once again what disaster recovery is and is not.

-Best

Enlightenment and the Truth

So I have few thoughts that I wanted to share with you.

If you have read the first page of this blog you know that I am interested in Enlightened Conversation. Enlightened conversation however; depends upon “enlightenment.”

It should be no surprise to anyone that has read any of my postings that I am a Star Trek Fan, from the first episode with William Shatner getting all the girls; and the guy in the red shirt dying of some horrible attack, to every version there after of the series. The consistent trait among them however is the red shirt guy dies. You would think that the red shirt people would figure this out. 🙂

As a writer, even since the beginning, I appreciated well written scripts. Most have no idea when they watch something on TV or at the movies, why they either liked it; or hated it.

Look inside First

Part of the process of becoming more than you are, is to know yourself. “Well that is just stupid, I know myself, my name is this, and I live here, and so on and so forth.” Truth be told, most folks really don’t know themselves, they know of themselves.

Most people act in a mechanical nature following their programming, not unlike the animals that trod the sod or fly in the air above us.

The sea turtle comes ashore at a certain time and lays its eggs and leaves again for the eggs to hatch and for the hatchlings to head to the water where most of them will be food.
Some birds know to head south in the winter and north in the summer but they don’t know why? What we don’t know for sure is how?
Some butterflies migrate as well; do they really know what they are doing?
Primates learned to make, and use tools to achieve an end result.
Whales communicate and we suspect Dolphins do as well.

What we don’t know about this world, and the creatures that are on it would fill entire libraries.

The same can be said about ourselves.

Start with this simple exercise, each time you are moved in some way by someone or something ask yourself why. What about that book did you like or not like. What about that movie did you appreciate or detest. Than, ask the magic question of why…

If I talk with you about late term abortion.

I mention that the doctor pokes some scissors into the base of the Child’s skull making a small incision, clipping the brain stem from the spinal cord, killing the child. From there he puts a suction device in and sucks out the child’s brain so when pulling the baby out, the skull will easily crush, not damaging the mother.

I know how I feel about it and why; how do you feel, and why?

What if you are looking at a painting of a lovely lady, sitting on a blanket under a tree, on a sunny day? She is wearing a light white dress that the wind blows up past her knees on occasion. She is sitting there with a picnic basket, some wine and a book. The sunlight pokes through creating small silhouettes of light on her, here and there as the breeze blows the leaves on the tree. In the distance there is the ocean and a beach with families at play. The seagulls are dancing in the wind while a young man approaches the tree from behind with a rose in his hand.

How does that picture make you feel, why?

It is not simply good enough to hate something or like something, you must know why!

Every time your emotions are plucked, know what plucked them. When you are moved, know what moved you.

With Star Trek it was simple for me to appreciate Gene Rodenberry’s vision of a Utopian world where we had evolved past greed. Truthfully, I think Next Generation did a much better job of this however; I never understood what drove people to do anything if they could have anything that they wanted by simply getting the replicator to create it. So, is greed a motivator? Why “Boldly Go,” if getting something in return was not a motive?

What drives you to do what you do? With most of us it is some form of remuneration for our efforts. Let’s face it; we live in a dystopian society currently, with a hint of 1984 looming over the horizon. We have a government that fabricates the narrative as they go along, to suite some agenda. We have smart phones that may very well be spying on us through some NSA covert initiative that was put in place by the same folks who developed the porn scanners at the airport. We have drones that the government can fly over a mile from your house and look through an open window and count your freckles!

We have a percentage of the masses that believe whatever garbage comes out of Washington as the gospel. These folks are truly lost and victims to their own programming and failure to think outside the box. These folks are the kinds of folks that need that box so they understand the boundaries and try to live within them, or figure out a way to take advantage of the structure as they understand it. You will not catch them asking why they “like” or “hate” or do what they do, as according to them it is their nature, it simply is. It is simpler than that, it is their programming and all they know, and want to know. Please don’t confuse them with the facts!

The Ferguson riots are a perfect example of emotion overrunning common sense or the programming. Darren Wilson by the laws that everyone accepts was cleared of any wrong doing. The young man that was shot was seen on video robbing the convenience store and roughing up the owner. Before he left you see him once again come back and come after the store owner in a threatening manner.

Now he continues on with this behavior with a cop. I don’t know how high he was or how far out of his right mind that he was but, you don’t screw with a cop! They have all the cards. With a cop it is yes sir, no sir here are my hands in plain sight sir! Anything else is well, stupid!

A grand jury clears the cop of all wrong doing so the people of the town burn down their own town and vandalize their own shop owners etc etc.. Is that programming, or nature?

Governments around the world understand people, the way we think and how closely we mimic animals, and play to those facts. Functional idiots would be the ideal populous for any government, as they would do as they are told, and not question their leaders. They would work at some prescribed task and give a portion, or have a portion of their money taken from them to support those that “pull the strings.”

No, not wearing a tin hat, don’t fall prey to conspiracy stuff. I know technology and people and I am a science fiction writer. Many things written by science fiction writers become science fact. We think outside the box and leave the math to those that communicate with algebraic nomenclature and obscure symbols that only a scant few truly understand. I would maintain that math holds those folks back from thinking outside the box because their formula does not support it. It is only when one of them dares think that their formula may be wrong, do they look outside the box.

To be anything more than an automaton, takes work. People are naturally lazy and take the easiest path, or path of least resistance. Some however do not. Some ask, “why?”

What about you? Why ask why?

What kind of work does it take? First and foremost it takes getting to know that person looking back at you from the mirror.

Why do we do what we do?

Enlightenment consists of knowing yourself first.

Once you start analyzing why you do what you do, you can then begin to understand what might motivate someone else. Instead of blindly following your programming, you can choose a different path.

The folks in Ferguson were manipulated to do the bidding of some by using their emotions. It is so easy to manipulate someone with their emotions it is laughable. You know that you have been manipulated through guilt, into doing things that you did not want to do. I think some churches use guilt to get you to tithe more, or to come more often to church.

Your wife of mother in law may guilt you into doing something that you do not want to do. Guilt is a great emotion to manipulate you with. Another is hate.

“Hate is a poison that you take expecting it to affect someone else!”

We have a government for whatever reason is fomenting racial hate. No one alive today had anything to do with slavery yet we hear more about it today than twenty years ago. It serves a purpose to foment racism and I think it is to stir up the democratic base, when in fact the Democratic Party historically is the party that oppresses black people. When you don’t know history you are doomed. Americans have a short memory, and attention span and they know it and depend upon it..

Programming

I would proffer that it is natural to be bigoted against that which is different from you.

I would argue that part of your programming is to reject people of a different race in order to propagate your particular genetic line. I would also point out that the male of the species “whatever the species” will stick his “business,” into just about anything, including a knot hole, to achieve the end result. Again, programming and a reward system, which would lead to mutations in the gene pool of that species. That by the way is my argument for macro evolution. I don’t think that we just magically appeared as human one day, I think species intermingled and over time nature found a way to create viable species which too intermingled. That intermingling is still in progress as today we have inter species procreation much more than just a few years ago. People (some people) are thinking outside the box, and their programming and moving beyond differences of colour and race. There is hope!

One prime argument against this is, “Well why did evolution stop?” Who said it stopped? Firstly, we human beings cannot fathom 4.5 billion years. We have nothing to give context to that amount of time. We live an average of 70 years. That is not very much time! We see beds that our ancestors used only a generation ago and note how short they are. What we don’t put together is that we are much taller than they were. We know that the appendix is a useless organ and is shrinking because our diet has changed and it is no longer needed. If we look and are open minded we will see other signs that evolution of the Darwinian kind, is indeed happening. Is there a designer to this evolution?

While part of the programming in all animals is to reject that which is different, thinking people can look past those differences and indeed some do. Part of the programming consists of a pairing of people simply by physical characteristics. Things such as symmetry and physical build of the male as well as broad hips and large breast of the female. This is programmed into us and useful for successful procreation.

When we were cave folks wearing nothing but lots of hair, things were exposed. Women might have chosen to pair with men that were, well muscular and well hung, while guys most certainly looked at that which would better facilitate successfully bearing young. Sex back then would most certainly have been Pavlovian. If sex did not feel good and did not have a “reward,” I doubt that any species would be here. Let’s face it; sex at its basic level is work! If done right, lots of work! If you don’t think that there is some powerful programming at work, think again!

If you stop and think about it, there is really nothing attractive about genitalia at all. I am amazed that gynecologists have any type of sex life after working with genitalia day in and day out. My guess is that the reward system of procreation and the programming of that same “sub routine,” overrule that of the id, the super ego and the ego. While the super-ego may try to rationalize what you are seeing the id is strong thus the programming of the id seems to supersede that of the super-ego and the ego.

And speaking of genitalia, an interesting thing about the penis that puts it into perspective is the design of the tip or Glans is such, that if inserted after someone else, it will actually pull their seed out and make room for yours, if yours is larger then the previous occupant.

Design or evolution?

Men are typically visual people and as such can be easily stimulated by such. If we see someone in a bikini where do our eyes first travel to? …. No answer? … Coward…. They travel to the parts covered by the bikini. From there, some background subroutine kicks in and gets to imagining the rest. If that same person were nude, our eyes would most certainly travel there first but, the background subroutine would not engage, and I doubt that after a moment or two, the visual titillation would still be there. Our attention might then be only to the persons face and other visual queues or other folks that are around.

In speaking with nudist, I am told that genitalia and other parts become no different than an elbow or knee. I often wonder how the sex life of a nudist would differ from that of a person who is not. Maybe there is a government grant available for such a study? If I had to guess, I would guess it would parallel that of a couple that was in the same general age group that was not a nudist as again I think it would be centered around the reward or pleasure part of the brain.

I often wonder what affect the “Extreme Availability” of pornography; will have on this generation and those people of the next generation. We have children exposed to this stuff before they reach puberty. They do not have the maturity to deal with this subject matter so one has to wonder what outcome it will have. If it were simply nude people I think it would fairly innocuous. If on the other hand it is all sorts of pornographic situations and activities dreamt up by who knows who, they may very well take that as normal. I fear for their moral compass.

Hazarding a guess I have to think that it would lead more males to self pleasure… ok… masturbate, rather than go through the “trouble” to get a girlfriend and have a “normal” relation. Pornography could have a much more serious affect on society as a whole. I also wonder what if any affect it has on females.

Delineation between nudity and pornography is a must at this point, as there is ample confusion. As there is confusion between nudity and pornography, there is also confusion between being naked and nude. Semantics you might say but, a thinking person would disagree.

Let’s start with the later; if I am purposefully around other folks without clothing, I am nude. If I were to say go into a spa where there were people without clothing and that was the accepted behavior than I and they would be nude. If I had someone posing nude for me while I painted them, and it was consensual, “consensual being the key word” then they would be nude. While we here in this country are way too hung up on nudity, trust me, it is not that big of a deal and healthy.

If on the other hand you are secretly watching someone undress, or you walk in on someone who expects privacy, and they are without clothing, they are naked. While naked can also mean “without adornment” or the naked truth, naked is being unclothed in a situation where you would like to have clothing on.

So that dream that you have about being naked at school; that is naked unless of course you are posing for an art class without clothes, than you are nude.

Pornography is someone or a group of someone’s in the act of sex or some other sexual situation designed to promote sexual titillation for the participants or the viewers.

One famous “movie star” in “adult movies” was once interviewed. She was asked how she felt about people looking at her naked, and pleasuring themselves. This person who had a rather inauspicious start to life, also sports a 138 IQ. Her answer was simply this; “than I am doing my job.” It was very easy to tell from the interview that she was “smart” and chose this line of work as a way out of the normal 9-5 work world, that so many of us fall into. Her bright and bubbly personality along with her IQ is quite frankly what I found attractive about her but, I actually did read Playboy for the articles, and maybe checked out where that staple hit…

Is nudity healthy?

I mentioned earlier that it is “in my opinion” and here is why. Let’s say you have children and they never see you naked. The only nude folks they see are themselves or possibly their siblings until puberty. Now we have the internet with more porn than you can shake a stick at. Your young men start “peeking” at porn and expect that all women will look like that. You, under your garments have a poochy belly, possibly with stripes all over it from stretch marks, you breast have sagged or were never a perfect perky what have you, and your butt well, its not a Kardashian butt. Your mate accepts you as you are but, your kids have unreal expectations and once they tie the knot, a rude awakening is headed their way which could end up with ruptured nuptials.

I don’t think that you have to live in a nudist colony to get the job done but, I think having your children seeing you as you are, from a young age, as they grow up is healthy not only for them, but for you. You must be ok with your body, and you need to do what you can to feel sexy and alive. Your kids must know that not everyone looks like a porn star and once they have babies, everything changes. Even you dads out there with the beer belly. You too need to be ok with who you are in order to live a healthy life into your golden years. Setting your children’s expectation from very young will not only help them to keep things in perspective but, hopefully it may go a long way towards young men not objectifying women and indeed seeing them as something besides sex objects. An added bonus may very well be that if you don’t hide underneath baggy shirts you may make a little extra effort to keep excess weight off, as obesity often adds to your chances of diabetes and other health concerns. If your kids are older you can’t obviously start walking around naked but, you don’t have to hide the belly either. If you are a young couple with young kids, by all means, don’t hide.

If you have any questions about this, speak with a counselor or professional or two. This last generation has gone way off target with our kids, we incarcerate more today than ever before. Something is wrong and we need to be looking for reasons why. I think it has to do with Hollywood, the internet, violent video games, and dysfunctional families looking for that brass ring, but those that get paid $150 an hour might have a different idea.

Speaking of nudes, as an artist I can tell you that I prefer to paint those that are full figured much like the masters did of years gone by. These women today who are bags of bones covered by a little skin are not attractive to me; as an artist or a man. The bottom line is that you must be happy with who you are. That my friend starts by looking in the mirror and loving yourself, bulges, stripes and all. Start from the inside out, as first you have to know “who you are.”

The simple facts are that we are wired for sex. From the time we reach puberty and maybe before until we are pushing daisies up, sex is on the brain. We cannot totally escape our programming, at that age sex is high up on the list of priorities. The difference between the human and the animal is that we can control our programming.

During puberty, hormones are being introduced at levels we are not used to. Our inner animal may come out and want to play and not always in a constructive manner. It takes a special kind of “teacher” to work with us at that age, as we become impossible. We say things that we certainly don’t mean. We are mean to anyone that loves us and just beside ourselves. You add into this cornucopia of hormones, drugs, you trigger the release of more hormones and drugs from the brain which can make us suicidal. It is most important to understand what is going on at this age as there is no rational explanation for behavior most of the time. Keeping all recreational chemistry out of this system is a must!

In the animal kingdom the animal may desire sex from one of its harem and be threatened by a young male. This Bull may have to defeat its young challenger in order to maintain its control over the harem. That becomes the order of business for the moment forgoing anything else.

A Human may desire sex but there are many hoops to jump through just to have a chance at sex, and unfortunately at certain ages for certain people, fighting is not off of the table. Other rather stupid actions come into play as well. Lacking any morals and education our sex lives would most certainly emulate the animal kingdom. A parallel between human and animal could easily be drawn where sex or procreation is concerned. If we could examine the “code,” we would no doubt find that the subroutines look very similar.

Programming must come from the double helix, and I submit that programming can be modified by changing the behavior of a species, and having that species propagate its behavioral modifications through its DNA. This would necessarily prove that evolution through behavior modification is not only possible, but probable.

Back in the day there were people who studied eugenics. Their reasons were fairly malevolent in that they were after the “perfect race,” and hated Jews. Eugenics could be a reality and I think that the answer for such is programming the DNA not artificially, but by altering the behavior of the subject and then using that DNA to inseminate the subject. Because all of this takes time, as it is really a function of evolution; they should try this with some short lived creature like the fruit fly and see if they can’t program its DNA in some fashion, possibly only eat a certain type of fruit.

My theory is that our programming is a series of learned behaviors that somehow make their way back into the DNA that we pass on to our progeny. For this reason it might be a real good idea to procreate late in life or, donate sperm to a sperm bank when you are old, and wiser than when you were as a teenager and not so wise.

It is no secret that we stand on our forefathers shoulders where our technology and knowledge is concerned. Some of that knowledge and wisdom gets passed down before we too procreate but, much is learned late in life.

You can either believe that “god” creates you the way that you are or you can believe that Darwin was correct and indeed evolution explains “ooze to youze.”

To reject the later simply because of religious mores would be just as foolish as to dismiss the possibility of a spiritual being that uses evolution to create. Who is to say that some “god” for lack of a better name, is not using evolution to create what we see today.

It is necessary to think outside the box. If you allow your preconceived prejudices to “box in your thoughts,” you can not learn.

Once I was talking with a guy who believes what he reads in the bible. He professed to be open minded. “So, you would be open to talking about evolution?” “As long as it does not conflict with the bible, sure!” Sadly, he cannot learn. His potential is limited by his ideology.

Me personally, I want to know the truth. I don’t care what it is, that is what I want to know. The truth will set you free. We need to look for and learn the truth. Once learned, that truth needs to be embraced, and then spoken about, Boldly!

While we build on the past we must be ever so open to the future and all of its possibilities. If there is a being that creates worlds, and all the life thereon then he or it must certainly use math as its language! Science would be the common denominator and that would explain a lot of things.

There is a dichotomy between religious folks and science, not all, but most. The dichotomy precludes either subset from learning the truth. In order to seek the truth, one must first be open to any and all possibilities. Is there a grand creator, great! Is it all evolution and random chance? Cool! Is it a combination of a creator using physics to create what we have today? Awesome!

Share your thoughts. -Best