Wil's Rant

Everyday the reports seem to gather speed and seriousness. They are now predicting the end of Polar Bears in the wild in less than twenty years. Perhaps there are people who don't care about the bears, maybe the loss of all the worlds glaciers might get their attention, no.... then maybe the loss of all the land areas associated with the new sea level might be noticeable. Of course, there are people who will still refuse to take some responsibility for the destruction, perhaps the lack of ability to go out in the sun anymore will get their attention. This will be, actually is, the result of ever increasing ozone depletion, new records to be set this year. Alas, I suspect that even this will not persuade those who will continue to refuse to see the truth and start demanding that our governments take action. When faced with such a large portion of a world populace that chooses to believe that the world was created 6000 years or so ago despite the enormous amount of evidence to the contrary, what hope can the more enlightened few have that they are going to be able to change this type of thinking. People have to start recognizing certain things. They might start by understanding that their holy scriptures have been written by humans, whether under the guidance of God or not. Humans make mistakes, sometimes deliberately, and these mistakes make their way into the texts. Is it so hard to imagine that some person in history may have erred in fact or understanding when transcribing the words of God? This question I put to the religious persons out there who refuse to believe some of the evidence of science. I don't have to be a Muslim in order to recognize truths within the Koran. The same can be said of all faiths. Instead of focusing on the differences among our faiths could we not instead focus on the similarities. There are a great many. Enough for us all to come to an understanding of each other and respect the independent views of our neighbors.

The ability to sit down and write things like this is the greatest freedom in the world. A freedom that I wish all nations would allow. The first step on the path to a better world is dialogue. Free intellectual discourse on all subjects is likely the peak of evolutionary progress. The terrorists in Iraq do not represent the Iraqi people. They do not even represent the Sunni, from whom many of which come. Yet they get the loudest voice because of their actions. I can't blame anyone for not wanting to sign up for American style democracy, or Canadian for that matter. The capitalist democracy we enjoy here is highly flawed and unjust to say the least. It is however the best the world has to offer at the time. The simple act of voting, which we here oft take for granted, can have an extraordinary affect on a people who have not has this right for some time. I witnessed this fact over and over when watching the interviews at the polling stations. This definitely has to be a very good result of the American intervention there. Hopefully they have the freedom to create a non-multinational corporation based capitalism unlike that which we have here. I suspect that the American business machine would not like this one bit and will work very hard to make sure that the Iraqi democracy that will evolve out of this mess will be one in which they will be free to wreak their havoc.