A World built on Quicksand
Origin and Consequences
Patrick Quanten
It is difficult not to get carried away with the achievements of the human race. We live in, what we ourselves have determined, ‘modern’ times. The word ‘modern’ refers to anything that relates to the present time. This of course means that the Neanderthal was also living in modern times, his modern times. But we are, not surprisingly so, very proud of our own modern times. Look at what we have achieved. We point at space exploration. We point at engineering. We point at medicine. The most excited of our fellow human beings may even go a bit further and say things like:
- We have cryptocurrencies and they reach new highs!
- We are sending people to Mars for colonising that planet!
- We have self-driving electric cars!
- We are building quantum computers and they are super-efficient!
- We are creating human-like robots and they are working for us!
Modern medicine is hailed as our greatest achievement because we are pushing back the boundaries of disease and, with it, the limits of life. We are extending life, and not just for the few, but for everybody. We are waging war on all kinds of diseases and we know we are going to win. Nothing will remain a secret to us. We are unveiling all the intricacies of nature, of health and disease. It is just as well that it is the medical profession itself that is providing us with this information because what people currently observe in their lives is that the incidence of cancer is increasing year by year. The same goes for heart disease, for diabetes, for autoimmune diseases, for allergies, for depression, for dementia. Less and less people within the work force are able to work throughout their vital years. But modern times, driven by modern medicine, is, so they tell us, extending life and taking great strides forward in making life disease-free.
Take a look at some of the ‘medical scientific’ publications (italics are mine):
- The cause of lupus is a molecular abnormality and this could be reversed.
- Scientists have found a way to repair brain cells impaired by a rare genetic disorder. This same approach could potentially be used to treat other genetic disorders.
- Menstrual blood can potentially be used to measure blood sugar.
- The first cellular therapy for aggressive forms of melanoma has been approved. The treatment is ‘designed to fight off advanced forms of melanoma’. The treatment won't work for everyone.
- Scientists may have found a way to calm immune responses for those with autoimmune disorders using an ‘inverse vaccine’. The experiment was performed on mice, adding that "we don't know” whether this approach is applicable to human disease.
- Scientists have finally sequenced the entire male Y sex chromosome. Understanding the Y chromosome can possibly help with a number of health issues, including fertility, or the prevention of cancer and cardiovascular disease.
The list of publications on achievements within the medical field is endless. And it all shows the same format. Every discovery has the potential to cure diseases, to reverse disease processes. In ‘medical science', this is being presented as truth, while in science this is known as a theory. But medical authorities present it as if the step from potentiality to reality is just a formality, just a matter of a little time. However, when antibiotics appeared on the scene the medical profession declared the end of infectious diseases. Now, almost a century later, the medical profession declares that infectious diseases ‘are making a comeback’. The truth, of course, is that they have never been away! And as antibiotics have not been achieving the promised outcome, which was the demise of infectious diseases, and as they want to continue producing and selling antibiotics, the attention has now shifted to another unseen predator, called a virus. Now we can happily declare pandemics, caused by a virus. They can happily continue telling us that, on the one hand, antibiotics conquer bacterial and parasitic infections, even though resistance stops the medication from working, and, on the other hand, that vaccines conquer viral infections, in spite of the fact that there are increasing problems with serious side-effects and that outbreaks of ‘new’ viral infections, of ‘modified’ viral infections, occur very regularly, indicating that there is no victory in sight. Furthermore, we have a resurgence of ‘old’ bacterial infections.
Maybe one of the greatest achievements of our modern times, not one that our leaders are talking about, is the complete control this medical system holds over an entire population. And here we are not talking about one country or one ethnic group. We are talking about the entire world, irrespective of creed, culture, and colour. How has it become possible that we, human beings, only believe one explanation of diseases and of life? Surely that would mean that we have proven that all other theories about life are definitely wrong.
In modern times, it seems easy to dismiss everything that went before as ‘primitive’. It is all presented as human beings who were simply drifting around in nature, without having the slightest inkling what life is all about and how to achieve anything at all. This dismissive attitude is maintained, without any blushing whatsoever, in the face of great human achievements all around us, from ancient times onwards. Even though our modern buildings struggle to stand for more than a century, we are surrounded by structures, made by humans, that have been standing for many thousands of years. Some of these achievements our wisest men are looking at, scratching their heads, and uttering the words “We have no idea how they could have done this”. Some of these constructions we have been unable – and good Lord, we tried! – to reconstruct with all of our modern technology and skills. We wonder how ‘primitive’ people managed to achieve this. Rather than acknowledging that maybe these people were not as primitive as we think, we are working on finding a plausible explanation. - Maybe nature was different back then. – They must have used thousands of slaves. What kind of society comes up with the suggestion that anything extraordinary that has been achieved can only have been accomplished by the oppression of its own people, by cruelty, by punishment? Modern psychologists tell us that the only way to accomplish a major feat is through reward, not punishment. Maybe this could also be applied to our view of human history!
This dismissive attitude towards the primitives, the dumb people, people deprived of any knowledge, is also apparent in the modern version of healthcare, in the way we approach diseases. Ancient cultures, as well as current nature communities, are being portrayed as incapable of dealing with diseases at any level. We think of it as being laughable and sad at the same time. Imagine, there was a time when bloodletting was a valid method to cure diseases! How cruel can you be! Never mind, God will forgive them, because they didn’t know any better. When I ask the question, ‘Did it work?’, I am met with glances of disbelief. How can any rightminded person ask such a question? Truth is that nobody has shown me any evidence it doesn’t have the potential to help an individual to recover from certain diseases. However, I understand there is no need for that discussion, because our researchers have better things to do, are busy with the real stuff.
Do you not find the following things strange?
When a doctor tells you that it will take six weeks before the antidepressant really shows its positive effect, you accept that. When a doctor tells you that the treatment will never get you healthy again, as is the case in diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, arthritis, and other health problems, but that you will have to continue the treatment for the rest of your life, you accept that. But when I tell you that the natural healing process will take some time, maybe even a few weeks, to make you better, you panic after two or three days.
When a doctor tells you that the treatment will make you ill, feeling terrible, you accept that. But when I tell you that the natural healing process may put you through a clearing-out period, which may not be pleasant, you discontinue the process, because there must be something wrong.
When a doctor tells you that your disease cannot be cured but it can be ‘contained’, you accept that. When I tell you that the natural healing process knows exactly what to do to heal you, to get rid of your disease for it never to return, you dismiss that as ‘a primitive superstition’.
But then again, I am not a doctor!
Or am I? Does it make a difference that I have a medical diploma and that I have worked as a doctor for eighteen odd years? It would make a difference if I was telling you the same thing as the entire medical profession is telling you. If I tell you something different, it means I am not a doctor. I have drifted into a state of premature dementia, into a state of primitive foolishness, into ignorance. I’ve lost my marbles! The medical profession cannot and will not identify with stupidity. Hence, I am no longer a doctor.
Even though modern medicine is only just over two centuries old, human beings have walked the earth for a few million years now and even though we may perceive them as being ‘primitive’, deprived of any knowledge whatsoever, diseases must have been something they all were confronted with. I find it hard to believe that they completely ignored it, that they never asked themselves any questions about it. Maybe they thought, ‘Oh, we’ll wait until modern men will solve this problem’. But then again, we have, just as is the case with the buildings, proof that they indeed were thinking about life and health. Even better, they have a theoretical, a philosophical, structure of life and they have come up with suggestions that possibly can help to maintain health within that structure of life.
Philosophy is the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. The I Ching (China) has served for thousands of years as a philosophical taxonomy of the universe, a guide to an ethical life, a manual for rulers, and an oracle of one’s personal future and the future of the state. Ayurveda (India) means ‘the science of life’. Ayurveda is part of the Veda, all-inclusive teachings that considers humans, nature and cosmos as one. Both of these ancient philosophies lead to guiding principles for human life and human health, and interestingly enough they do not differ that much in their basic approach. They detail a vision on the structure of the universe, on the structure of human life, and they make suggestions as to how to keep the balance between one individual and his or her environment. The complete works! And here is something remarkable about this. The documented Ancient Traditional Chinese Medicine as well as the Ancient Ayurvedic Medicine are respectively seven and ten thousand years old and today they are still being practised by a large number of people in the traditional way. But here is something else remarkable about that. Unlike our modern Western medicine, that says it needs to change its treatments every five to ten years because of its advancing knowledge, these ancient methods have not been changed for many thousands of years. Bearing in mind that people rely on advice and techniques for their healing and that they want to see results, there can only be one possible explanation for this. It serves people well. If it didn’t, people would have abandoned it a long time ago or changed its fundamental insights. And even in our modern era, with so much ‘scientific’ proof available, people still adhere to a traditional way of approaching life, health and disease, because it still serves them well. There has not been any need to make major changes to the ancient traditional philosophical systems, which their health advice is based upon, because, on the whole, they are right and all observations, made by humans over the space of many thousands of years, simply confirm its accuracy. You may dismiss it as ‘primitive’ or as ‘superstition’, but that is simply your opinion and someone else may hold a different opinion. One cannot ignore the fact that this ‘old’ opinion has held its ground for many thousands of years.
The Ancient cultures had an understanding of life, which gave them guidelines for the preservation of it. These guidelines seemed to have been useful way back then, in fact, so useful that in many thousands of years they never had ‘to revise’ their philosophy and consequently never had to change their guidelines to maintain health. This is very different from our own history of proposed philosophies and changing medical treatments.
To give you an idea of the changing thoughts that have ruled and are ruling Western civilisation over a very short period of time in the history of humanity.
- Ancient Philosophy: This period encompasses the philosophical traditions of ancient civilizations, including Greek, Roman, and Indian philosophy.
- Medieval Philosophy: This period covers the philosophical developments in Europe between the fall of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance.
- Renaissance Philosophy: This period saw a revival of interest in classical learning and the development of humanism.
- Early Modern Philosophy: This period is marked by the rise of modern science and the emergence of rationalism and empiricism.
- 19th Century Philosophy: This period witnessed the development of various philosophical movements such as German idealism, utilitarianism, and existentialism.
- 20th Century Philosophy: This period saw the rise of analytic philosophy, phenomenology, existentialism, post-structuralism, and other influential movements.
A few things need to be pointed out here.
- In the West, ‘ancient’ begins with the Greeks (12th to 9th century BC), at the most three thousand years ago, whilst the main roots are located much later in Roman history. Various earlier civilisations (Sumerians, Akkadians, Babylonians, Assyrians) in Mesopotamia are not getting a mention at all. Not ‘ancient’ enough?
- Modern philosophy is based on modern science. This is strange as the definition of philosophy reads: the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. Nothing in there to say that this study is a scientific study in the sense of our understanding of science.
- This opens the way towards a philosophy of ‘rationality’ and of ‘analytical thinking’.
- If you study philosophical disagreements you will find that most of them arise from one or more of the following factors: different beliefs, vagueness of language, fallacies, conjecture and plausibility. So, either one puts equal value on different philosophies arising from different beliefs and fallacies, or one studies life and existence, as it is, not as some of us assume it to be, which is as stated in the definition of philosophy.
Modern philosophy is divided into a number of different types such as Renaissance philosophy, Rationalism, Empiricism, Political philosophy, Idealism, Existentialism, Phenomenology, Pragmatism. This simply leads to the conclusion that we, modern times, do not have a philosophy about the nature of reality, about the nature of our existence. We have plenty of different opinions about it but the West doesn’t have a theoretical explanation for life, for our existence. There even exists such a thing as ‘the philosophy of medicine’, which is defined as ‘a field that seeks to explore fundamental issues in theory, research, and practice within the health sciences’. A field of philosophy within the health sciences! A philosophy restricted by science. Furthermore we should take note of the fact that the medical profession claims that ‘the science of health’ is different than, is separated from, science. The definition of science is: ‘the systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories’. So science studies the physical, the natural, world and philosophy is the study of knowledge and of existence itself. Let’s be clear about this. Science does not study the existence. It only studies the physical manifestation of the existence. Hence, philosophy must be the larger framework in which science operates. But what has happened in the West is that science has captured, and restrained, philosophical thinking and study. Here, the West has lost the ability to have a wider view on life as a whole, in which the task of science is to prove what the philosophical concept of existence is manifesting. Science is a method, a working protocol, to underpin or reject the philosophical ideas we hold about life. Does the physical reality we experience fit into the philosophical concept that we are adhering to?
This is exactly what ancient cultures have done. They have come up with a theory about life and they have managed to fit their observations of the physical reality of life into it. Once you have got it right, it remains right, as nature doesn’t alter its ways over time. What we, all of us, observe fits into the reality of life. Our observations need to confirm the philosophical concept we hold about life itself. Modern medicine has taken charge by insisting that our philosophical concept needs to explain what the medical science proposes about life. We have allowed the power of modern medicine to turn everything upside down. First, they insist that philosophy needs to provide answers to questions posed by science. Then they divide science into different areas, each been allocated a very distinct field of work. Now there is no overall concept of an understanding about life, about nature, about the cosmos, anymore. It is all divided into different ‘fields’ of research and the overall picture becomes completely obscured. Hence, philosophy becomes divided into small separate branches, each busying themselves to try and explain what medical science is claiming life to be about. By making science the ultimate truth, to which all other aspects of life must bow, everything else, including philosophy, must fit into the scientific framework. Science is always right, as proclaimed by the medical science.
This means that medical science is always right and personal observation becomes a useless tool in terms of health and disease. They can now tell us that what we don’t observe, cannot see or notice in any way, is a constant threat to our health, and that the harm we do observe is not dangerous. When you tell the doctor that your body is rejecting the treatment, he will be looking for a way to suppress the rejection reaction. He is right, nature is wrong. When you tell the doctor that the old medication you were on worked well and the new one, which is supposed to be the same, makes you feel ill, he will tell you the new medication is much better because the latest research says so. He is right, nature is wrong. When you tell the doctor that your elbow spontaneously swelled up, got hot and is painful to move, he will tell you to cool it down and to keep moving it. He is right, nature is wrong.
Advice from one degenerate doctor to other doctors: ‘Listen to your patients instead of to the industry’.
The medical profession freely admits that they do not know how life operates. They are researching the subject! They do not have a philosophical context in which their thinking operates. They tell us that their research reveals more and more of life’s secrets to them every day. This is research they do within the restricted fields they have organised themselves. Results from one field do not mean anything in another. Laboratory research is valued higher than observations made in many doctor’s offices. If certain chemicals in the laboratory produce a certain effect in brain cells, for instance a greater production of specific neuropeptides, then the tested chemicals will make you feel less depressed. And even worse, when clinical observation shows that depressive people on that medication have a much higher suicide rate than those without it, it is just something they will keep an eye on. It doesn’t make them rethink, because the laboratory research is right. If one laboratory gets results they are excited about and others get results that are potentially dangerous, they will ignore the latter ones. The explanation is that those laboratories have not done their research ‘right’.
But if you don’t know how life operates, if you have to go by ‘theories’, by ‘philosophies of medicine’, how can you then know what is going to improve someone’s health and what is going to make it worse? When asked what the cause of a specific illness is, the answer the doctor may give you is, “We don’t know”. Fair enough. I don’t expect them to know everything in life. But then there is the addition, “But we do have a treatment for it”! How can you have an effective treatment if you don’t know what has caused the disease? And how can you assure me that your treatment is the only one that really works and none of the ‘alternative’ treatment forms will do any good whatsoever? How do you know all of this, if you do not know what you are talking about?
The lack of an overall view of life, nature and the cosmos leaves us without a framework in which to think, to research, to evaluate. Lots of different opinions do not help. Lots of different theories about life, different philosophies, mean that we don’t know. And what is even more interesting is the fact that our modern society is not looking to create a workable framework. They are quite happy to simply accept all opinions as equal possibilities. To the point that one is not allowed to criticise and to undermine an opinion for not including known observations, for not explaining simple observations. Furthermore, what isn’t allowed, is pointing out that medical science cannot be separate from science. Either a working method is scientific, including everything that is already been discovered, or it isn’t. Either you use the scientific method of research, which is aimed at disproving a theory, or one uses research to try and prove a theory. The latter is not a scientific working method. Depriving humanity of an overall concept of life installs confusion and a dissociation between the experiences of an individual and his understanding of these experiences. Not understanding what is happening to you leaves you confused, but more importantly, it leaves you scared. You are a constant victim of ‘bad luck’. If you don’t know where danger is truly going to come from, if you don’t know what danger truly looks like, if you don’t know what truly is dangerous, then the only thing you can do is to be afraid, always.
Humans living in communities that are obviously dependent upon nature and the natural forces observe how life, how nature, is. These observations are then puzzled together, by human beings, in a picture of nature that can be comprehended by people. Everybody is capable of putting their own experiences and observations within the story of nature, of life, they have been told. This gives them an explanation for what is happening to them, and it allows them to work out a coping strategy. For as long as the picture covers their own experiences and observations it is a useful, an essential, tool in their lives.
Science is about taking an intrinsic look at those individual experiences in order to establish which parts of the picture needs to be changed, needs to be adjusted to a slightly different understanding of life, of nature. Hence, the picture, the philosophical framework, that tells us how life has been structured and operates, exists first and forms the basis on which humans respond to the nature of things. Science comes later to verify some aspects of that framework and to weed out definite misbeliefs.
And then we need to ask the question: ‘What is your picture of how life is structured and operates?’ An answer is essential if you want to begin to understand what is happening to you. And such an understanding is absolutely necessary for you to be able to respond appropriately to nature, to life as it is happening. It is such an understanding that turns ‘bad luck’ into comprehending what happens. Once you have such a concept, based on that understanding, you should be able ‘to predict’ some of what is heading your way. Knowing how something operates allows you to foresee some of the unavoidable consequences, but also allows you to make a distinction between ‘real’ danger and danger ‘born out of ignorance’. What happens next depends on what is happening now. Not knowing how one thing leads to another leaves us blind to our future and scared for what we can’t see coming.
In order to evaluate our personal experiences, one requires a set standard, a set of beliefs, to which one measures the experience. Without an evaluation system one cannot learn anything. Either one keeps being amazed at what is happening or one keeps insisting that one is right and the experience is nothing, just ‘coincidence’, just ‘bad luck’. An evaluation system of life is a set of beliefs of what life is and how life functions. One set of beliefs. One has to have an idea about what life is and how it operates, which one then uses as the set standard. This way one can ‘see’ what appears to be right about the belief system and what needs adjustment. Over time, one learns to move one’s ideas about life closer to reality. But it all begins with having an idea about life. Traditionally we have been provided with ideas via religion and philosophy. However, the more fragmented these ideas become and the less impact we allow them to have on our lives, the more confused and lost we, as individuals, become. When a group of people, a society, insists that all ideas are equally valid and that we shouldn’t adhere to any, we remove the evaluation system we require in order to learn more about life. Indeed, in scientific terms, all theories are valid and should not be discarded out of hand. However, a scientist works within a theory, within a belief, and keeps exploring and evaluating experiences within that belief. Hence, as a group, people need to determine what their idea is about what life is and how it functions, and they need to build their lives upon that belief. Leave others to differ in opinion, but pursue your own investigations based upon one set of beliefs, one philosophy, one religion. Mixing it all up puts the lives of people on quicksand.
Instead of continuing to argue over who is right and who isn’t, each of us could simply busy ourselves observing nature, observing the reality of life. Based on what we experience and observe, we can build ourselves a picture of how nature operates. To help us create such a picture we can use a framework that has been set up in the past and work within those beliefs. However, it is absolutely essential that all other theories, opinions, are disregarded by one group of people. Within the group all should agree on the basic outline of what that picture is, so the entire group can then begin to evaluate their experiences together.
Only by knowing how nature works will we be able to make accurate decisions about our future actions to maintain life, to maintain health. Study nature as you experience it, and know that people have been doing this since the beginning of human life on earth. So rest assured that none of your thoughts or visions will be new. It has all been here before. It has all been used before. And if you want to build your picture more quickly, you can study what others have made of their study of nature. Potential study material goes back ten thousand years, and remember that the closer people’s life are linked to nature the more truthful their experiences and evaluations will be.
In conclusion, as a person, one does not have to allow all different ideas about life, about nature, about humanity, to be ‘integrated’ in your life. It is actually essential, to health and to the balance of life, that each person chooses a way of life and grounds that choice on one set of beliefs. Then that person needs to live within a group of people who essentially believe the same things and that group needs to keep out all disrupting influences, disturbing ‘foreign’ ideas. Wherever you start your learning process, by constantly evaluating experiences against the beliefs you hold, you will be able to learn, to expand your knowledge about life and nature.
By removing that evaluation system and insisting that every person should open himself up to all ‘possibilities’, one is unable to follow a path in life. Hence, one doesn’t progress, one doesn’t move forward, one doesn’t learn anything. A society without comprehensive guidelines about what to believe in life is filled with uneducated people. You can only become educated when you follow a specific curriculum and then test what you have learned against the reality of life.
What do you believe life is all about? What direction is the evolution of nature taking? What is its goal? What is human life all about? Why are we here? What is nature’s plan for humanity?
No idea? Then your life is urgently in need of some solid ground beneath your feet. If you have no idea what you are doing here, you are simply drifting around in an environment you don’t understand. If you don’t know where you are and you don’t recognise any landmarks, there is no way you can find your way home. And if you have no way of finding your way home, you are constantly frightened and lost. Your system will be totally unsure of itself, completely confused, and that will result in you becoming ill. Direction and purpose in life are essential to health and balance.
Nature is not random. It follows a set of reactive responses, which form the basis on which nature is built. Every part of nature has its basic pattern that lies beneath everything that happens. Humans are part of nature, so they have their own basic natural pattern on which their existence is built. As our conscious mind is still learning what nature and life is all about, we cannot know what this pattern exactly is. However, in order to learn we need to construct one basic ‘possible’ outline for such a pattern from what we have learned so far. Then we can follow that belief, execute the predictions that plan suggests and evaluate the outcome by comparing it to the reality of nature. Without such a conscious construct of what we presume life is all about, we have nothing to evaluate our experiences against. Without such a conscious construct we have no plan to execute and no expected outcome to evaluate.
And once again, it isn’t about being right or wrong. It is about making firm choices about where you think you are going, about what you think you are doing. Having a line to follow in life allows you to evaluate the road you are taking, which can be evaluated against the direction life, nature, is showing you it is taking. That way you can find your way ‘home’. Your choices, your experiences, your evaluation, as opposed to blindly following what everybody else is saying. A thousand voices all shouting different advice. A thousand fingers all pointing in different directions. And you, having been told that all of them are right and should not be ignored.
We all require a philosophy in life, a religion, a belief, that will set us on our way in a specific direction. Only by knowing which direction you have chosen to go into can you use your personal experiences to compare your expected outcome to the real outcome. Those are the essential road signs we all need in order to adjust our life in the direction of the pattern nature is deploying.
Provide your life with solid foundations, with mental stability. Put your nose firmly in one direction. Talk the talk and walk the walk. Don’t digress. Follow your nose. Follow your instinct. And look at what nature shows you as the result of your chosen path, your chosen belief.
Avoid the quicksand of modern times.
August 2024
