Welcome to My Mind

By Abné M. Eisenberg Ph.D.

This is the perfect book for an intellectually bored individual. In it, the author shares a serendipitous collection of his thoughts on a wide variety of conventional and unconventional topics.
Professor Eisenberg has spent the past six decades challenging his students to think outside the proverbial box.
Whenever he would ask them a question, and they answered, I dont know, he would say,I know that you dont know, but what do you think? Using this Socratic Method opened their minds and encouraged them to take risks.
Convinced that a good question outweighs a hundred trite answers, the author has included a section of the book in which he asks himself a question and then proceeds to answer it. His favorite question is, What one word best describes your life? His answer was, Creative.
The reader should come away from this book with a deeper understanding of why he chose the title, Welcome to my mind. He enthusiastically agrees with the following quotation.

Whatever we possess becomes double value when we have the opportunity of sharing it with others.
Jean-Nicholas Bouilly (1763-1842)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trafford Publishing
• Release date: Feb 4, 2013
• ISBN: 9781466979468

Abné M. Eisenberg Ph.D.

Professor Eisenberg was born in New York City and served in the US Marine Corps in World War II. His career consisted of teaching interpersonal/intercultural communication, public speaking, organizational communication, nonverbal communication, group dynamics, and persuasion at four major universities. His publications include fifteen textbooks on various aspects of communication. He has a relentless reputation of asking his students, and often perfect strangers, thought-provoking questions. One of his earlier books was titled Questions That Challenge the Curious Mind. It consisted of seventy-nine choice questions. After each question, he would briefly describe how various people answered it. His favorite question is, “What one word best describes your entire life?” He presently resides with his beautiful and multitalented wife, Marianna, a former operatic star with the New York City Opera at Lincoln Center. His zodiac sign is Scorpio, and his favorite hobby is asking questions.

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Copyright 2013 Abné M. Eisenberg, Ph.D.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

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Contents

OTHER BOOKS BY AUTHOR

DEDICATION

FOREWORD

YOU ARE WHAT YOU REMEMBER

SIN

MY STRUGGLE WITH INTELLIGENCE

WHAT’S WRONG WITH MAKING

A MISTAKE?

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE ALIVE?

APOCALYPSE

WHY I DON’T BELIEVE IN GOD

THE END OF THOUGHT

PRAYER

SKEPTIC’S VIEW OF HOPE

FACT OR FICTION

KNOWING vs DOING

WHEN WORDS FAIL

THE UNWINABLE ARGUMENT

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

COMPASSION

DOUBT

EGO

HELPLESSNESS

HERESY

HUMANITY

METAMAN

MIRACLES

MORTALITY

AS IF I WERE DYING

STAYING IN LOVE

BELIEVING IN BELIEF

COMPASSION

WISDOM

YOU’RE RIGHT!

CAN PEOPLE CHANGE?

WHAT I BELIEVE?

HYPOCRISY

PRONOUNS RULE THE WORLD

NEED

ACADEMIA

IMAGINATION

APOCRYPHA

WHAT MAKES SOMETHING

SCHOLARLY?

NOTHING IS SOMETHING

RELIGION DIVIDES, ATHEISM UNITES

DANGER OF TRANSLATION

RACISM

DECLINE OF EXCELLENCE

WHAT REALLY MATTERS?

RETIREMENT

REQUIEM FOR CONVERSATION

ADVERSITY

CONSEQUENCES

TERRORISM

CONNECTED

CELIBACY

VALUE OF RELIGION

LYING TO MYSELF

DOES WORRYING HELP?

THROW THE BABY OUT WITH

THE BATH WATER

MOTIVATIONAL IMPERATIVE

DEALING WITH DOGMA

CARING

MANAGING YOUR MIND

REFLEXIVE TEACHING

YOUR REARVIEW MIRROR

COLORING OUTSIDE THE BOX

ASSUMPTIONS

A THIRST FOR APPLAUSE

LANGUAGE OF DREAMS

HUMAN FODDER

WHEN DOES A HOBBY BECOME

AN ADDICTION?

DEALING WITH FACT

LONLINESS IS NOT A CHOICE

KNOW-FEEL-DO

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

RESIDUAL STRENGTH

TIME

DENIAL

MAKING A DIFFERENCE

REVENGE

VIRGINITY:

A misogynistic hoax

AUTOEROTICISM

HEAVEN, HELL, and DISNEYLAND.

QUALITY OF LIFE

A WORLD WITHOUT JEWS

THE WORLD AS I SEE IT

NOURISHING THE THIRSTY MIND

WHY?

RHETORIC OF TRUST

SLEEP

THE MEANING OF LIFE

YOUTH

HOOKED ON THE STATUS QUO

APOLOGY

BOREDOM

THE ELUSIVE TRUTH

SILENCE

FAILURE

DISSENT

PROFILE OF A TEACHER

J’Accuse!

CONFRONTING THE IMPOSSIBLE

INTIMACY

SLANDER

HAPPINESS

WAR

LET’S MAKE A DEAL

INDIFFERENCE

THE DEFINITIONAL CIRCUS

CONTEMPLATION

UNLEARNING

BALANCING IDIOSYNCRATIC

BEHAVIOR

GET BY GIVING

PIVOTAL PERSONA

MY WAY OR NO WAY

METAMORPHIC FACE OF

AN AMERICAN

IMMIGRATION

GREED

PROFILE OF CONTROL

EXCREMENTAL COMMUNICATION

HIDE ’n SEEK

SOCIAL PROMOTION

THE MYSTERY OF HISTORY

THE LAST STRAW

THE HYPOCHONRIAC

TOUCHING

WHAT IS THAT SMELL?

WORLD IN TECHNICOLOR

APOSTOLIC GANG

INVISIBLE COMMUNICATOR

DO PEOPLE LIKE YOU?

PURPOSE OF PURPOSE

SEGREGATION

ADULTERY

FAULT-FINDING

QUO VADIS

(Where goest thou?)

CARPE DIEM

PORTRAIT OF A JUROR

SIGNS OF SENIILITY

IT’S THE LAW!

CLEAR ONLY IF KNOWN

(C.O.I.K.)

INEVITABILITY

IMPEACHMENT

WHAT GOOD IS RELIGION?

BIRTH OF AN IDEA

WHY DO I WRITE?

CURIOUSITY

SYMBOLISM

STUPIDITY VS IGNORANCE

LUCK

REINCARNATION

POTENTIAL

LOST

SMILE

PARALANGUAGE

EYE CONTACT

LISTENING

PEDEGOGIC SUBJECTIVITY

NARCISIM

SELF-IMAGE

REHEARSING MY IGNORANCE

TEMPTATION

SURVIVING A RELATIONSHIP

BEHIND THE CURTAIN OF SOLITUDE

REJECTION

PERSEVERANCE

OMISSION

MAKING A MARRIAGE WORK

FACT VS CONTRA-FACT

PORTRAIT OF AN ENEMY

PERSPECTIVE

SPECULATION-ASSUMPTION-PRESUMPTION

IF JESUS DIDN’T DIE ON THE CROSS

THE INFALABILITY OF LOGIC

THE PAST IN DISGUISE

DYING WORDS

CONTEXT

COMPULSION

STRENGTH & COURAGE

PRESS ONE, PRESS TWO… .

VALIDITIY OF DREAMS

TABOO

MY PHILOSPHY OF TEACHING

JUMP-STARTING YOUR SELF-ESTEEM

HUMILITY

MULTICULTURALISM

COMPROMISE

INNER VOICES

HAS THE INTERNET

REPLACED PARENTS?

INTUITION

21st CENTURY—OIL PEDDLERS

SUPERSTITION

MEMORY IS A TRICKSTER

WHAT YOUR NOSE KNOWS

WAITING ROOM ANXIETY

GENDERLECT

THE TITLE OF DOCTOR

WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO

GOOD MANNERS?

A SECRET LANGUAGE

THE TESTING FRENZY

DISEASE

PROPHYLAXIS

WHAT MAKES SOMEONE

GOOD COMPANY?

REQUIEM FOR PEDEGOGIC

SUBJECTIVITY

WHAT GOOD IS A COLLEGE DEGREE?

PARADOX

LOVING vs LOVING

ASKING MYSELF THESE QUESTIONS

MY APHORISMS

EPILOGUE

OTHER BOOKS BY AUTHOR

Nonverbal Communication (Bobbs-Merrill, 1971)

Argument: An Alternative to Violence (Prentice-Hall, 1972)

Living Communication (prentice-Hall, 1975)

Understanding Communication in Business and the Professions (Macmillan, 1978)

Job-Talk (Macmillan, 1970)

Argument: A Guide to Formal and Informal Debate (1980)

Painless Public Speaking (Macmillan, 1983)

Questions That Challenge the Curious Mind (Asti, 1994)

Call of the Restless Mind (Astik, 1997)

Speechmaking: An Ancient Art in a Modern World (Astik, 2000)

Anatomy of Communication (Author House, 2004)

Command the Argument (Trafford, 2005)

Correlative Rhetoric (Trafford/Astik, 2009

Mind-Walk (Astik, 2009)

Prescriptive Communication for the Healthcare Provider (Trafford, 2012)

Creative Rationalization (Trafford, 2013)

DEDICATION

To my incomparable wife, Marianna, my guardian angel, the holy grail that gave my life meaning and purpose.

FOREWORD

IN THE FOLLOWING PAGES, the reader will find a lifetime collection of my thoughts on a wide variety of topics. They are presented in a serendipitous manner and have occurred randomly in time. Their importance or relevance have not been prioritized. Hopefully, readers will find what I have to say meaningful.

AME

YOU ARE WHAT YOU REMEMBER

NOTHING COULD BE WORSE than not remembering—remembering absolutely nothing from the past. Everything we think, feel and do at this very moment is directly or indirectly linked with the past. The amount of information stored in our brain is staggering. If we were ever able to retrieve, at will, all of that information, our level of consciousness might be seriously disadvantaged. Such an improbable phenomenon could be similar to being able to hear everything—all of the sounds that surround us. Fortunately, are senses are selective and, like a semi-permeable membrane, permits only certain stimuli to enter. This mechanism is what creates a biologic condition called homeostasis.

Since levels of awareness will differ from person-to-person, it is the ability to recall past events that also varies. As a result, awareness and memory are inseparable. Total amnesia is a prime example of the role memory plays in a life. The individual suffering from amnesia has absolutely no memory of his or her prior life, virtually a tabula rasa—a blank slate.

Needless to say, there are things going on, both past and present, of which we are unaware. Psychologists refer to this deeper level of consciousness our subconscious. Although the mechanism by which our behavior and thought processes are influenced by our subconscious is poorly understood, it is only our conscious mind that facilitates our environmental awareness.

Memory is the underpinning of such things as personality and character. It is our memory of right and wrong, appropriate and inappropriate, good and bad that shapes our behavior and how we are perceived by others.

But what has all this to do with the title of this essay, You are what you remember? Well, at the admission process at any facility, either medical or psychiatric, it is how a patient responds to a battery of questions that determines a tentative diagnosis; a starting point for the healthcare professional. In this process, the physician is somewhat limited by what the patient can or cannot remember. In some cases, a memory might be so disturbing that the patient’s mind has buried it in their subconscious. It, then, becomes the physician’s task to unearth this information so that it can become accessible to treatment.

On an interpersonal level, most relationships are built and shaped by what each person remembers and is willing to disclose. Some information will be chosen to remain private, while other information will be deemed appropriate for public disclosure. No matter where one looks for clues to why people say, think, and do certain things, all roads will lead one back to memory. Quite possibly, it is the lynchpin of evolution. History, both oral and written, depends entirely upon someone’s recollection of the past.

Memory also prioritizes the information it collects. It assigns certain events a very high priority and others a low priority. It also quantifies. If it detects an evil or extremely disturbing event that has repeated itself a great many times, its psychic status will be greater than an occasional less disconcerting event.

For a governmental agency to work properly, it must categorize people in such ways as racially, financially, educationally, geographically, and religiously. The question is, How are differences determined? Certainly, by simply observation, but more importantly, by their belief systems. What, for example, differentiates a democrat from a republican, an atheist from a theist, a criminal from a law-abiding citizen? The sine qua non is, invariably, their behavior. But what determines their behavior? Their memory. If your memory tells you that the earth is flat, you stay away from the edge. The development of a child will depend upon the guidelines set down by its parents and, subsequently, its teachers. The extent to which these guidelines are remembered and functionally determine daily life will, again, depend upon the child’s memory.

It will by difficult for any reasonable person to come up with a counter-argument against the notion that, You are what you remember. One certainly cannot say, "You are not what you individual’s memory trail. Before written history, elders would tell their families of how things used to be—an oral history. In only this way has civilization be able to grow, evolve, and transcend the mistakes of its predecessors. In closing, everything is a matter of memory. Imagine your inability to remember the title of this essay or remember what memory is? When you awake tomorrow morning, not remembering how to dress yourself, have breakfast, and go to work could be devastating. Memory, in all probability, is the skeleton key to our humanity.

SIN

IN THIS ESSAY, I shall be going into an unknown place, a Terra Incognita. Jewish, Christian, Islamic, and Hindu religions all share a belief in something they refer to as sin. Because of its multi-religious nature, it is known by several different names. In Hebrew, the generic word for any kind of sin is aveira. In Strong’s Concordance, 2398, the word is translated as khate—a crime or fault. The word sin in the New Testament, translated from Greek, is hamartia. Literally, it means "missing the target." Islam refers to sin as dhanb-Ê»—anything that goes against the will of Allah. In Hindu, the term sin, or pavam, is used to describe actions that create negative karma.

Many years ago, the word SIN was submitted to a computer to discover its meaning. In seconds, an answer appeared on the monitor saying, There is now! Once something, real or imagined, is given a name, it immediately acquires a state of negotiability and enters the mainstream of language. Edward Sapir and Benjamin Whorf’s hypothesis states, Labels shape the world in which we live. Semanticists insist that there is no meaning in words, only in people. Hence, the word sin, in whatever language, or by whatever name, is meaningless. How people interpret its meaning, and how they behave in relation to it, is all that really matters. The word, itself, is an abstraction. There is nothing in the real world for which the symbol, sin, stands; that is, nothing that we can see, touch, or measure. Another equally abstract term is reification. It, likewise, refers to something that doesn’t materially exist as if it did; e.g., heaven, hell, ego, subconscious, love, etc.

It is interesting to note the extent to which people will go in the name of sin. Christianity attributes original sin to the Garden of Eden and its tenants, Adam and Eve, plus, of course, the villain in the form of a serpent. Catholic subservience to the moral imperative dictated by this myth laid the foundation for centuries of inhuman conduct. The Spanish Inquisition is a prime example.

Heresy, regarded as a sin by the church, resulted in the torture and murder of thousands, perhaps millions, of people whose ideas or behavior was declared a sin.

Throughout recorded history, there have been various despotic world leaders such as Nero, Idi Amin, Stalin, Hitler, and Sadam Hussein who decided what was right or wrong, good or bad, sinful or righteous. Most governments do the something, but ostensibly in a less self-serving and more human manner. Laws are designed to control social behavior. But, as the popular adage goes, Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. It is mind-boggling when one is confronted by the various types of sins the clergy has invented. Paramount culprits are menial and mortal sins. According to Roman Catholicism, menial sins are regarded as the most innocent and easily excused. Innocuous behavior such as gossiping, rudeness, cursing, and a display of bad temper might constitute menial sins. Mortal sins are much more serious. To be found guilty of a mortal sin, the sinner must have deliberately committed the sin, know that it is a sin, and be fully aware that it is a serious and grave religious offense.

Any student of human nature should realize that the entire notion of sin is designed to deliberately search out a wide variety of human foibles and declare them a sin. If anything, this is a well orchestrated form of thought-control. A close relative of sin is guilt. Once an individual has been accused of committing a sin, and declared by the church as a sinner, it usually takes a rather strong-minded individual to resist feeling some degree of guilt. Psychologically, in this writer’s opinion, the entire concept of sin is antithetical to the establishment of a healthy self-image. It is destructive, not constructive.

An apologist might reason this way: By making sinners aware of their wrongdoing, and imposing some form of consequential penitence, future sinning will be discouraged. While such a philosophy does have some marginal validity in theory, reality teaches otherwise. One of the behavioral characteristics of most sinners is that they tend to become chronic sinners. Ironically, a great many sinners rationalize what they do and, to their way of thinking, their behavior is completely justified. Ideally, how the church deals with sinners should, at least in theory, cut down on the number of sinners in society. But does it?

Few things are more traumatic to the human ego than to be ignored. The number of people who feel alienated, disconnected, and abandoned is staggering. Each of us seeks ways to be noticed. This can usually be achieved by our words, deeds, or the opinion of others. Although sinning is not an acceptable way to get noticed, it usually gets the job done. Paraphrasing Shakespeare, We take the good things we do with us when we die. The bad things we do lives on after we are gone. Sinning is a surefire way of getting attention; especially from the church. Aside from some rules of social etiquette, secular laws completely ignore menial sins.

What would the global consequence be if the notion of sin were to be completely eliminated? Would there be total anarchy? Is labeling every human being from birth a sinner a good idea? Perhaps by allowing sin to play such a prominent role in society, it encourages, rather than discourages. Abraham Kaplan’s Law of the Instrument states: Give a small boy a hammer and, before you know it, everything needs banging." Once the idea of sin came into being, it was seen everywhere.

The only thing positive that can be said about the word sin is that it is a symbolic marker, an indicator of certain kinds of behavior. How a society manages that behavior deserves more attention than simply calling it a sin. Consequences are more important than causes. Is this essay a sin? If so, what are its consequences?

MY STRUGGLE WITH INTELLIGENCE

WHEN I COMPARE MYSELF with an amoeba, or any other single-celled organism, the difference that immediately comes to mind is the mind or the psyche. Scientists, for centuries, have sought to understand just how evolution brought humans to their present state of being and left the amoeba behind. However, let me put aside this unending question and explore how my intellect controls my mental and physical behavior.

Given the fact that I am severely handicapped when it comes to a knowledge of cognition, I will now work with my existing awareness and level of consciousness. These two elements display an adversarial posture; i.e., what I think and how I feel. Despite my continued effort to reconcile or coordinate the internal messages I receive from each system, feelings seem to exert the greater influence. A perfect example of this dominance is seen to occur with phobias. While people may fully understand their behavioral dilemma, an inability to ride in an elevator or fly in an airplane, the fear persists. All the logic and persuasion in the world seems unable to penetrate the phobia’s tenacious grip. Depression is another case in point. How is it possible for someone with a brilliant mind to become a victim of depression? Why is the intellect so often dominated by the emotions?

Psychotherapeutic sessions often consist of making subjects more aware of how and why they feel and behave the way they do. Theory argues that once an understanding of the deep seated reasons underlying a problem are realized, symptoms will abate. While this approach certainly has its measure of success, the psychodynamics still remain somewhat of a mystery. From another perspective, we have the Pharmacogenic approach which advocates the administration of specific medications that disrupt the neural circuitry believed to facilitate or cause a given problem. Mood-altering drugs are currently a popular choice.

A simplistic definition of the mind is: "Mind is what the brain makes possible; e.g., reasoning, consciousness, imagination, thinking, perception, conception, and emotions. It is interesting to note that none of these phenomena possess a physical form. Unlike other body parts such as the liver, spleen, heart, and lungs, the mind or an individual’s intelligence is inaccessible to the most gifted surgeon in the world. Perhaps that is why textbooks on the subject of mind or intelligence are dominated by theory rather than fact. A recognition of this dilemma brings me back to my personal struggle with intelligence.

In a lifetime, I have collected a great deal of information which, collectively, represents the template from which my mind derives guidelines for living and being. How all this information is administered and/or manipulated by my brain dictates the nature of my thoughts and behavior. Unlike a simple reflex arc, like the conventional knee-jerk, most of my responses to external or internal stimuli are mediated by my forebrain, the crowning gift of evolution.

Before sleep comes, my brain is usually busy exploring or re-exploring things that have happened or I think will happen in the future. I prefer to call this brain static or brain noise. No matter what credence I assign to this psychological grumbling, it remains something with which I must deal. I can either choose to ignore these seemingly random messages or treat them as constituting a secret yearning or an ominous foreboding. No matter how I choose to regard or disregard these byproducts of my intellect, they remain issues with which I must deal or, as the title of this piece suggests, struggle.

On an even more personal note, let me describe the nature of my ongoing struggle with a fear. It is the fear of being alone. While I can intellectually rationalize and even describe the illogical nature of this fear, it remain an inimical component of my consciousness. Using the full benefit of my intelligence, I can glibly articulate the pros and cons of being alone. In fact, I can impressively describe the various aspects of the solitary life with comparative ease. And yet, when I apply this rhetoric to myself, my emotions override my intellect and I experience some anxiety and apprehension.

As an aside, let me tell you about my car. One day, the little yellow alternator light went on so I checked it out with my mechanic. After tracing the source of the light, I was told that my alternator was fine. Still complaining about that little yellow light, he solved the problem by simply loosening the bulb and out went the little yellow light. I find it fascinating to realize that my entire gestalt, everything I think and feel, derives from a specific configuration of neural circuitry in my brain and, by simply interrupting or blocking one of these neural pathways, symptoms or syndromes cease to exist. That yellow light in my brain has been disconnected.

In the 17th and 18th Centuries, anatomists were map makers when it can to the human brain. A long standing contention was that every human behavior was mediated by a specific sector of the brain. There were even phrenologists who assigned significance to various bumps on the skull. These notions have since been abandoned and replaced by a more holistic view. Neuroscientists now believe that the brain both plastic and adaptive in nature and that it can compensate for areas of the brain that are insulted by either trauma or disease.

A most interesting example of how the mind can be tricked occurs in hypnosis. A subject under hypnosis can be told that they possess x-ray vision and that they are able to see through people’s clothing. There is even talk about dentistry, performed under hypnosis, where bleeding can be minimized. While the dynamics are not understood, the results are verifiable. Since these visual and vascular phenomena can be achieved by posthypnotic suggestion, I should be able to conquer my fear of being alone by training my mind to reconfigure my conceptions of what is mentally involved in this phobia. The operative word here is should. But, will I be able to win this struggle with my intellect? My wife, Marianna, gets a publication called, Guideposts. It’s pages are filled with examples of how people have overcome dire physical and mental challenges. Perhaps the adage, While you are trying to find out who shot a man, treat the wound. The advice I should now give myself is to pay a little less attention to how and why something works and a more attention to the results.

WHAT’S WRONG WITH MAKING

A MISTAKE?

IT IS DIFFICULT TO imagine the world would be like if no one ever made a mistake. Whatever task one chooses to undertake, there is a special kind of satisfaction that comes after a mistake has been discovered and successfully corrected. Picture an athlete who is trying to execute a particular gymnastic move and, after several unsuccessful attempts, finally succeeds. Successes like this, in whatever form they happen to take, invariably energize the most undernourished and anemic ego. To regard a mistake as irreversible is to suggest a loser mentality.

Whatever the challenge, most people confront it with either a positive or negative attitude. Since practically all attitudes are learned, not inherited, they are usually developed from how past experiences were managed. A series of failed

The man who never made a mistake, will never make anything else. (George Bernard Shaw)" Sensible individuals make mistakes learn from them, and move on. Those who are excessively preoccupied with the mistake they make are often so paralyzed by guilt that they end up doing nothing.

Failed attempts have the capacity to create a self-fulfilling prophecy—what you were afraid would happen, or expect to happen, actually happens. A success-minded approach tends to produce just the opposite effect; a win-win outcome.

Most mistakes cannot be explained through the use of good old fashion logic or common sense. Although most of us know better, we continue to make the same mistakes again and again. Perhaps this is due to the fact that mistakes are often the result of how we feel, not how we think. Most mistakes are driven by our emotions, not by our intelligence.

It is always important to separate the mistake from the person who made the mistake. Was the mistake intentional or accidental? Was the mistake due to something beyond the individual’s control? Whatever the reason, the outcome is what counts.

Human evolution is riddled with and crippled by a long line of mistakes. It was once a mistake to think that the world was flat, that blood did not circulate, that the Earth was the center of the universe, and that germs did not cause disease. Today, we look back on what people used to regard as fact as pure nonsense. Imagine someone in the year 1885 saying that he had landed on the moon. Such an individual would probably have been considered insane. Today, the astronaut, John Glenn, could say that he walked on the moon and we would simply smile and be proud to meet someone like him.

It is unfortunate that today, people are often discouraged from making mistakes. We learn more from our mistakes than from what we do correctly. Adding insult to injury, we are usually remembered for what we did wrong than from what we did right. Do ten things right and one thing wrong and people will zero in on the mistake.

How can our attitude toward making mistakes be changed? Should children, for example, be encouraged to view a mistake as something positive, something from which they can learn, something that will improve their chances of future successes? Or, does mistake-making produce some form of indelible stain on a child’s self-image?

Of one thing the reader can be certain. Mistake-making will be with us for eternity and unless we can learn to live with them in a more constructive and meaningful way, our future maybe seriously and irreversibly damaged. How we are currently managing our environment is a dramatic case in point.

If what we are doing, or not doing, is a mistake, future generations will have to suffer the consequences. A variety of other issues, aside from our environment, also stand to suffer if mistakes are made. They include such disciplines as medicine, include such disciplines as medicine, economics, psychology, politics, education and science. Actually, doubt and mistakes are the ingredients that make all humanistic and technological growth possible

How we make excuses for our mistakes is extremely important. Those who make a mistake and refuse to correct it, are predisposed to making it again. This, of course, will depend upon whether the mistake is correctable. If it is, and the individual is willing and able to make the correction, a favorable outcome is possible. Unfortunately, old ways have deep roots and are not easily erased. That explains why so many people are threatened by changes of any kind. Why? Because change often runs the risk of making a mistake.

In closing, may I suggest that we should all develop a willingness to accept the fact that we may have made a mistake and display a willingness to correct it without feeling guilty. In and of itself, that will be a giant step toward making our relationship with others more pleasant and significantly more meaningful

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE ALIVE?

RENE DESCARTES WROTE, I think, therefore, I am. What do you think he meant? Perhaps he reasoned that we never can confront reality directly. If it weren’t for our senses, how would we become aware of the world in which we live? If, one by one, we were to lose each of our senses, how would our consciousness re-evaluate reality. Those who are blind experience one form of aliveness, those who are deaf, still another. Once all of our senses shut down, are we still alive? Our unique biological equipment is our lifeline, our only connection with the world we inhabit.

When a patient is medically confirmed to be brain dead, in what way and on what basis should that patient be considered alive? Is all that is necessary to be classified as being alive a beating heart? The question being posed here is, by anyone’s standards, riddled with diverse possible answers. The clergy might define being alive one way, the physician another, and the philosopher, still another. Each discipline would bring to the question its own unique bias. And, ironically, in some way, they are all right.

If we now set aside all the speculation advanced by professional and gifted thinkers, past and present, each of us is left with our own private way of explaining what it means to be alive. We look in a mirror and someone looks back that we recognize and confidently label it as, Me. But, is it the same me that other see? Everything we see in that reflection, we identify as the body we inhabit every day. But what happen in the mind of someone with amnesia who fails to recognize his/her face in the mirror? Or, even more disturbing, the person with multiple personalities. Do any of these people perceive themselves as being alive in the same way that we do?

All this talk about being alive is simply an exercise in futility unless one can find some practical application for such awareness. For example, one wonders in what way Descartes’ aphorism, I think, therefore, I am made a difference in the way he lived his life. There can be little doubt that one’s self image can make a difference. The self-fulfilling prophecy principle illustrates how a given mind-set can significantly alter human behavior. Perhaps, inasmuch as we cannot, at this moment in time, arrive at a satisfactory definition of what is really means to be alive, we are all destined to fulfill Shakespeare’s admonition that Life is a stage and we are but players. Perhaps, for now, living an as if life will have to do—at least, until a better explanation is found.

As I sit here at my computer, pondering this question of aliveness, I wonder why I am doing it. What is the quid pro quo? Will it in some way help provide me with a sense of being alive. The mere fact that I can share these thoughts with a reader nourishes my soul. And although I intellectually do not believe that there is such a thing as a soul, I elect to behave as if it exists, has an appetite that I choose to satisfy, and, by so doing, validate my being alive.

People validate their aliveness differently. Some by raising a family, others by succeeding in business or a profession, and still others, by accumulating either property or wealth. Whatever the method, the end justifies the means. That, of course, should be something constructive and be a credit to the human race.

A closing thought: We come into this world alone and leave it alone. That private and personal self you claim is you is all you’re got. Care for it, nourish it, respect it, and render it your unconditional love.

APOCALYPSE

IN THE PAST, COUNTLESS predictions of the world coming to an end have surfaced. So far, we are still here, but today, the playing field has changed dramatically. We now have a weapon of mass destruction that can literally extinguish all life on the planet Earth—the nuclear bomb. Although several countries now have the nuclear potential, their leaders are well aware of its potential consequences. There is one country’s leader, however, to whom this admonition does not apply—Iran. It’s supreme leader, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, openly declares his intention of wiping Israel and America off the face of the map. What makes his threat so off-putting is his belief system. Death, by whatever means (especially in a military sense) is the road to a better place called Valhalla where the souls of slain heroes are lavishly rewarded by a gift of virgins. How does one dissuade people who believe such things? If tunnel vision were ever applicable, it is in this case. The world is currently in serious jeopardy and, if nothing is done to constrain these terrorists, the biblical apocalypse may well become more than an idle form of saber-rattling.

A learned philosopher once wrote, If we do not learn from the past, we are destined to repeat it. Obviously, we have not learned the lesson and, because of this chronically stubborn attitude, we may soon have to suffer mortal consequences. It appears that the United Nations is totally impotent when it comes to offering a viable solution. President Bush, likewise, is acting irresponsibly and the American people are becoming increasingly uneasy about the direction his leadership has taken us.

An epidemic of disbelief and complacency among so many Germans during the rise of Adolph Hitler in WW II should be regarded as an omen of what may be in store for us if we do not act now. This begs still another question. Exactly what kind of action can or should be taken to neutralize Iran’s potential threat? Should we go into this country like we did Iraq? Dialogue appears to have failed. Israel’s patience is growing thin and, if backed into a corner, has the capacity to launch a nuclear attack capable of destroying Iran’s entire nuclear arsenal and bomb-making facilities. If the situation escalates to such a boiling point, we could find ourselves confronted with dire results. Evolution could come to a screeching halt and mankind could suffer the same fate as the dinosaurs.

In a book entitled, Irrational Man by William Barrett, he suggests that we nothing to fear from crazy people. It is the rational ones that will lead us down the path of no return. The president of Iran is not crazy in the conventional sense. His brand of rationality simply differs from ours. While the promises made to martyrs in Valhalla may sound analogous to the rewards promised by the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus, we are not willing to die for these rewards.

Societies, both ancient and contemporary, have always had to deal with insurgents, individuals who entertained views conflicting with the status quo. Till now, however, such individuals have been controllable. That now has recently come of age and has dramatically challenged the international community. Questions abound, but viable solutions are few. Despite all the contemporary technical know-how, our emotions have not kept up with our advances in science. For some arcane reason, evolution of the human species has ill equipped us to successfully manage our differences.

Given the existing situation, my hopes for the upcoming generation are bleak. Something called the future may become little more than a metaphor for another metaphor, the APOCALYPSE; the extinction of the human race. It is a sad state of affairs when certain leaders turn a deaf ear to peaceful solutions. Perhaps, in the final analysis, the pen is not mightier than the sword.

WHY I DON’T BELIEVE IN GOD

I AM A DOUBTING Thomas. I doubt what my senses tell me, what I see on television, what I read in the newspapers, and that endless source of information spewed out by my computer. Frankly, I am lost for words when I ask myself, What do you believe? Words such as good and bad, right and wrong, truth and fiction all provide me with continual frustration. Ever since I began my studies and teaching of communication forty years ago, all I find myself confronted by are questions, questions, and more questions.

If I could somehow shut down my cerebral cortex temporarily, and live my life on the basis of my primal brain, my perception of reality would be uncomplicated, essentially reflexive in nature. Every weekend, when I visit the local shopping Mall, I encounter a group of severely retarded youngsters and a few older ones. Watching them, I see that their world seems immediate and uncomplicated. When the counselor says stop, they stop; when the counselor tells them to sit, they sit. At no time do I get the impression that their minds are contemplating the things that my mind contemplates. I wonder in what way their reality is different from mine.

Since we homo sapiens acquired a language system permitting the use of metaphor, inference, reification, and personification, an entire new dimension of reality was born. It enabled us to talk about things that didn’t materially exist as if they did. A supernatural entity chosen to be called God was invented. Along with this invention came such things as angels, heaven, hell, sin, shame, and guilt—none of which exists in the animal world.

It is my fervent hope that the reader will not be getting the impression that I regard those who believe in God as being misguided. Quite the contrary. If such a belief system provides the believer with such indispensable psychological constructs as hope, courage, faith, peace of mind, patience, and tranquility, how can any rational-minded individual deny their value.

I do take exception to any a belief system that encourages similarities and discourages differences, or that vehemently espouses a dogmatic point of view that clashes with all others. Historically, in defense of such dogma, rivers of blood has been shed. It is that form of religious fervor that I find unacceptable.

Central to my thinking is the notion that a perfectly normal and spiritually sound lifestyle can be experienced without subscribing to that metaphysical abstract called God. For example, the one commandment I feel supersedes all the others is, Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Faithfully adhering to that one axiom alone should, in my opinion, qualify me as a worthwhile and valuable human being without any subscription to a deity.

As I sit here at my computer, allowing my mind to figuratively step back from our mutual humanity, I find myself rather pessimistic as well as being a doubting Thomas. I am very disappointed in the way we have evolved. We have been killing one another since time immemorial. If those who believe in a loving God can explain to me why such a God has permitted his children to engage in such inhuman conduct, I might be inclined to re-evaluate my impression of his worth. I am well acquainted with the rationalizations that attempts to justify are current state of affairs, but their arguments, in my opinion, fall short of the mark.

Here are some of my closing thoughts on the question of a God figure. The word consequences: is the lynchpin of my mind-set. Whatever people believe, especially in terms of religion, the bottom line should invariably be its consequences. Only by looking closely at how people behave toward one another, as well as to themselves, should the worth of a religion be judged. All the rest is pure rhetoric, window-dressing. I seriously doubt if the world could survive a strict adherence to religious dogma. The cliché, Love thy neighbor" would be a global mockery.

Yes, I do believe what my senses and my intellect tell me. Why? Because I do not have an alternative. But, as I have said throughout this essay, what I believe is far less important than what I do as a result of that belief. I have been teaching communication for the past four decades and, hopefully, what I have been doing all those years will serve to make a difference in the minds and hearts of those who sat before me in class. That is what I believe!

THE END OF THOUGHT

IS THINKING BECOMING OBSOLETE? Are more and more people living automated lives? We used to open a garage door by hand, wash clothes by hand, turn a crank to start a Model-T automobile. The list of things we used to do manually has grown exponentially. Presently in the works are cars that will drive themselves; simply punch in your destination, sit back, and relax. Cooking is rapidly becoming extinct. Put prepared food into a microwave oven, press a START button and, voilé—supper!

All of this automation has commandeered the cognitive and sentient human brain. Ideas have become commercialized. Aggressive college students now have access to pre-written term papers on every conceivable topic; for a price, of course. Computers have become surrogate parents, teachers, and pen-pals for those who are lonely. In the next generation, an individual will probably be able to conduct an entire computerized life. Whatever decisions need to be made, it will be available by pressing a computer key and have it pop up on a monitor. The act of pressing a computer key itself has already been replaced by voice-activated technology. A million questions, a million answers—instant feedback.

The medical profession is also yielding to automation. Not only are robots now performing certain surgical procedures, extremely delicate and sensitive laboratory tests are now available that enable the neighborhood general practitioner better able to quickly diagnose acute and chronic forms of a disease without having to wait days for a report. Perhaps the physician’s art is surrendering to biological engineering. Today, doctors are never faulted for ordering too many laboratory tests. However, if they fail to order a particular test that is consistent with standard medical procedure, they open themselves to a malpractice suit.

Euphemistically, brainwashing now wears the mask of political correctness. Thoughts have become readily programmable and, as such, highly predictable and controllable. In future, an increasing number of people may find talking less and less necessary. The world is on the verge of competing with mind-reading machines; i.e., Big Brother. Once we have been completely stripped of our privacy, and governments are privy to our inmost secrets, thought will be little more than a vestige of human evolution.

The science of yesteryear has become today’s Space-Age technology. While the film version of Buck Rogers was fantasy in the thirties and forties, it is commonplace today. Children grow up not knowing there was a time when there weren’t any computers, T.V. sets, radios, computers, refrigerators, telephones, and fast food.

Civilization is rapidly being taken over by technology. Every day, the validity of a computer printout has seemingly preempted human credibility. Human opinion can seldom win when pitted against computer data. During computerized college class registration, if a computer mistakenly identifies you as a Sophomore, you are a Sophomore until proven otherwise. If the Internal Revenue Service says you owe them $10,000, the onus is on you to refute their claim. If a bank’s computer wrongly reports your balance to be $5,742, it is incumbent upon you to prove that it is wrong, not the other way around.

This blind faith in computer accuracy takes on an even more sinister role in hospitals. A computer error can result in serious clinical consequences when a wrong prescription is administered or a wrong surgical procedure is performed. Medical malpractice court cases are replete with such instances. Rationalizing such errors by simply saying, It was a computer error does little to assuage the grief of a surviving wife or husband whose spouse needlessly died on an operating table.

Stop and ask yourself to what extent your daily life is taken up with deliberate thought. Your alarm clock tells you when to get up and your coffee-making machine starts automatically at sunrise; all with little or no thought. Getting dressed usually requires little or no thought, driving your car or taking a bus or train to work is comparatively thoughtless. Most jobs are pretty much routine. The notion that there is absolutely no thought associated with these daily behaviors is not being suggested here. What is being suggested here is that the quality and quantity of such thought is minimal and, for the most part, on a collision course headed for gross marginalization.

It is entirely possible that, by the end of this Century, brain implants will be an everyday occurrence; implants that will regulate both thoughts and behavior much like a cardiac pacemaker regulates heart rhythm. A wide range of mental and physical disorders will be correctable via such implants.

If what has been said in this essay is true, how will it alter the kind of civilization the next generation will inherit? How will future historians describe life without thought?

PRAYER

PRAYER IS A PETITION made to God, or another object of worship. The popularity of prayer is reinforced by those prayers that are answered. Unanswered prayers rarely get any attention. The objective of this essay is to explore the psychodynamics of prayers and the role they play in the interpersonal and intrapersonal communication.

A fitting way to approach the subject of prayer is to ask why people pray. The root of this practice appears to reside in the desire to acquire or repel something. In religion, most prayers seem to center upon forgiveness; an effort to expiate or atone for a sin. Other prayers address subjects such as illness, personal relationships, business or professional conditions, finances, or environmental disasters.

Those who choose to pray are endowed with faith in the power of prayer. Without such faith, prayers would be meaningless. If a worldwide statistical analysis of prayers were possible, it would be interesting to discover what percentage of prayers are answered either in part, or completely. Granting the impossibility of ever conducting such a study, the idea does spark interest in why people continue to pray when so many of their prayers go unanswered. It would appear that faith and logic are incompatible. Establishing a stimulus-response connection between a prayer, and what is prayed for, surrenders to the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy; i.e., whatever came before was responsible for what came after.

The benefit of prayer has gotten the attention of certain physiological researchers; studies have shown that the very act of praying is capable of triggering altered blood pressure, adrenalin flow, respiratory rates, muscle tone, and moods. These findings strongly suggest that, regardless of whether or not a prayer is answered, it does have some biologically redeeming qualities.

The downside of prayer is that it may encourage the person doing the praying to ignore elements of reality. Praying that a particular surgery won’t be necessary may not be in the patient’s best interest. Prayer should not be a substitute for sound judgment, but a supplement to it.

A prayer may take more than one of two forms: overt or covert. An overtly expressed prayer is one that is articulated out loud. A covert prayer, conversely, is silently conceptualized and ideated in the mind. Both, equally, qualify as legitimate prayers. Then there are individual and collective prayers. A solitary prayer involves a single person, whereas collective prayers occur when more than one person prays for the same thing; i.e., mass praying.

The notion of a prayer having a separate existence outside and apart from the person doing the praying still remains a mystery. The fact that a prayer is not materially demonstrable should not negate its existence. Such human traits as courage, patience, sympathy, kindness, and tolerance all lack a tangible form, but the way they impact on the human condition cannot be denied. Emotions do not exist in a vacuum; they have physiological analogs that can be measured.

The human mind has an insatiable appetite and knows no quantifiable boundaries. Dreams are a perfect example of the mind’s plasticity and inventiveness. It can go, with incredible ease, where logic cannot go. Logic, by its inherent construction, sets up imponderable walls.

The role of intelligence, when it comes to prayer, makes for interesting speculation. Are more intelligent people less inclined to pray than less intelligent individuals? Or, perhaps, it is the other way around; i.e., more intelligent people pray more because of their superior level of intelligence. Does a lively imagination play a role in prayer or is it a more simplistic phenomenon solely designed to fill needs?

Hypothetically, if all prayer were eliminated from the consciousness of mankind, what would be the consequence? Would the human race be better or worse off? Common sense would say, Worse off. Prayer appears to provide humans with a readily available portal of entry to the realm of incontestability, a place where there are no constraints, obstructions, or annoying negations. All are welcome to the outer limits of prayer, the Twilight Zone of unlimited potential.

There is one serious pitfall when it comes to prayer. It concerns people who spend entirely too much time praying and not enough time doing. There is a story about a prizefighter who, on the night of a championship fight, was on his knees praying for victory. A reporter passing his dressing room saw the fighter on his knees praying and shouted, Hey Mac, that praying only helps if you can fight! Surely you have heard the expression, God helps he who helps himself. Prayer, without action, falls on deaf ears. Prayer, reinforced by supportive action, is an incredibly powerful tool.

A final thought. Since the inclination to pray is an unavoidable human tendency, doubters in its efficacy should reexamine their reasons for rejection and, by so doing, keep an open mind. Why? Because only an open mind is capable of growth and, with it comes an understanding that transcends all mechanistic constructs.

SKEPTIC’S VIEW OF HOPE

THE MORE I LEARN about life, and the history of the human race, the more disappointed I become. There is so much pain and suffering in the world that, for me, an optimistic view of the future seems to be an exercise in futility—something that produces little more than a false sense of security. Words such as coincidence and fate frequently provide me with a satisfactory excuse for why bad things happen. Every day, the nightly news grinds out an endless stream of death, murder, theft, earthquakes, fire, and a host of other familiar forms of adversity and human misfortune; and, with each of these phenomena, I am convinced that hope is invariably part of the picture. I strongly believe that if all of the hopes ever advanced in this world were tallied, and weighed against the extent to which they were fulfilled, hope would be the loser.

For the most part, people are inclined to be rather unrealistic in their expectations; they hope for things that conflict with existing circumstances. People hope to win the lottery, to find the man or woman of their dreams, to overcome deeply entrenched and long standing habits. I am reminded of a woman who visited a psychiatrist and, after the session, the psychiatrist said, Madam, you do not have an inferiority complex. You are inferior. Reality is a hard taskmaster and it often clashes, head on, with hope.

The words I write are, indeed, very negative and truly symptomatic of a full-fledged skeptic. While I am very comfortable rationalizing my negative belief system, I have recently begun to rethink my long-standing mindset. I am presently trying to discover the positive aspects of hope. In my search, I discovered that Pavlov’s teacher, A Sechnov, was right when he suggested that with every thought, there is a concomitant muscular reaction. The phenomenon of hope does not exist in a vacuum; whenever it surfaces in a person’s mind, it simultaneously occurs with a host of physiological changes. This means that a hopeful thought is capable of producing a multitude of physiological changes involving blood pressure, heart rate, blood sugar levels, adrenaline output, and respiration.

Yes, thoughts do have biological consequences. If this is true, self-help, augmented by hope, can have a catalytic effect upon the body. It is important to realize, however, that limitations frequently complicate things when what is hoped for lies beyond the reach of the person doing the hoping.

If I were to hope for a sunny day tomorrow, I seriously question