From time to time, I spend some time lurking on a public forum of the Kansas Citizens for Science. It is a rather good forum as it draws a more intellectual crowd than some forums. The link is http://www.kcfs.org/forums/.

Today someone posted this link to a study on global warming: http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article1786829.ece.

Here is how I responded:

Back in the early '60s when I was at KU, I wrote a series of articles for the UDK (I was a Journalism major) about what I thought was an impending disaster from overpopulation and how it would result in mass starvation. I thought the disaster would have already happened by now.

Well, science has enabled agriculture to more than keep pace with the population and most of the hunger problems today are related to distribution and political problems. Nevertheless, I still think that there will come a day when our population will outstrip our ability to produce enough food.

What hardly anyone says in these studies is that having half as many people on this planet would really help out; and, if we continue to increase our population it is only compounding the problems.

Granted we in the U.S. produce a disproportionate percentage of the pollutants that are causing global warming, but we must also recognize that world population growth is not helping out at all.

Also, what is normally not mentioned is that superstitions, religious and otherwise, are at the heart of much of the population growth. Whether it is a village peasant that believes that many boy babies are desirable or George Bush advancing only a "just say no" policy toward sex, the overall effect is devastating.

Of course, if the equatorial part of the planet becomes uninhabitable, then one would assume that the more northern uninhabitable regions would become habitable. But how do you move a population from one region to another when territorialism, regionalism and tribalism runs rampant and those needing to be moved are generally the poorest.

From time to time, we will be asked if the United States can be compared with the Roman Empire. Will the U.S. come to an end like the Roman Empire?

Actually, it seems to me that the wrong question is being asked. The real question is whether the United States will face the same fate as the Roman Republic. While the Roman Republic was not the perfect democracy, it was built upon many democratic principles which emerged in Rome and in Greece 2500 years ago or so. Yet, the Roman Republic fell to the autocratic rule of multiple emperors - a system that lasted nearly 500 years. The Roman emperors were followed by multiple smaller autocratic rulers and autocratic religion; and, it was not until the 17th century that democracy began to creep back into the affairs of humans. Even now in the 21st century, democracy is far from secure in much of the world.

So how did the Romans lose the democracy that they did have?

I think a strong case can be made for the proposition that out of fear of external military forces, they gave up what democratic rights they had, until they no longer had any democratic rights.

An op-ed piece entitled "Pirates of the Mediterranean" by Robert Harris appeared on in the September 30, 2006, New York Times which provides an excellent example. In the fall of 68 B.C.E., Rome’s port at Ostia was set on fire, the consular war fleet destroyed, and two prominent senators, together with their bodyguards and staff, kidnapped. According to Harris, "the world’s only military superpower was dealt a profound psychological blow by a daring terrorist attack on its very heart." The act was perpetrated by pirates and "[l]ike Al Qaeda, these pirates were loosely organized, but able to spread a disproportionate amount of fear among citizens who had believed themselves immune from attack." As a result, Rome gave absolute control over the Republic to one man - Pompey. The Republic never really recovered from this ceding of power.

I am no historian of Rome, but I believe that the actual process that lead to the demise of the Roman Empire involved much more than this one incident, but I think it is illustrative of why we need to be exceedingly wary of politicians who ask us to give up essential human rights in the name of fighting terror. If we lose our human rights, then the terrorists have won a de facto victory.

Someday, I hope to develop this history in depth on my main web site, but for now I would recommend the reading of the op-ed piece at http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/30/opinion/30harris.html?_r=1&oref=slogin.

Bill Tammeus, one of the religion writers for the Kansas City Star, maintains a blog to which I post every now and then. He is a Presbyterian and is not at all skeptical. Every day and once over each weekend, he posts things of interest from a religious standpoint. Some of the people that comment are devote religious sorts, some are skeptical and there are a very few atheists. As with many blogs, a few people are the main commenters - I guess they have nothing better to do. You can take a look at http://billtammeus.typepad.com/my_weblog.

Anyway, today one of the topics was a tour Tammeus conducted of some churches in the Kansas City area. One was the Rime Buddhist Center which is located in an very old church in near downtown Kansas City; it is rather spartan or austere. Another was St. Mary's Episcopal Church which, also, is located near downtown; it is rather plain on the outside, but is moderately ornate inside. The third was the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, an extremely ornate and richly decorated church. He posted a picture; and, since it does not appear to
be copyrighted, I am posting it here.

Here is what I posted to Tammeus' blog:

I have been in Rime and St. Mary's, but not the Immaculate Conception (I'll go with the picture). What I am about to say does not apply too much to Rime, because it is much more spartan than the other buildings.

I have often wondered, however, whenever I see these ornate structures that obviously cost huge amounts of money and resources, how many children might have starved to death while these buildings were being constructed and as they are being operated.

I do not believe that there is a god; but, if there were a loving god, how could he possibly be happy? Though technically not graven images, it seems that these gaudy and extravagant monuments to wealth, should be equally repugnant to any decent god.

The author of Doubt: A History (Jennifer Michael Hecht) will be giving two lectures in Kansas City on Oct. 7 and 8, 2006. For more details on the talks, go to http://www.kcfreethought.org/hecht.htm.

A reception will follow the talk on Saturday evening and an inexpensive church luncheon will be served after the Sunday talk.

Dr. Hecht is being brought to Kansas City by the various free thought groups in the Kansas City area and All Souls Unitarian Universalists Church.

The lectures are FREE and anyone interested in the subject of doubt or free thought in general should attend.

I have created this blog as a companion to my Age of Reality web site in order to be able to add some thoughts quickly that I do not have time to post formally to the web site. I find myself adding thoughts to other blogs and in order to save them for myself, I intend to copy the thoughts over to this blog, so they are all in one place.

I do not expect that it will become very popular, but one never knows.

Feel free to add whatever comments that you wish; and, if you are really interested, become a formal member.

So, Truth, Love, Justice and Peace to All!

Greg Swartz