Robert Norris

Recent Activity

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  Honoring César Chávez--and His Call to Stop Eating Animals

  Zack, not having knowledge of the options available already IS a massive sacrifice on your family's nutrition.

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  A National Movement for Drug Law Reform

  Its incredible isn't it... the legal substance allowed in society makes people unaware of boundries, destroys livers, makes people loud and often rude and you wake up and don't remember all the bad stuff you did. Legalise that, while making it illegal to do the one that has inspired artists for centuries, helps people relax, heal and learn new things, expands the mind and makes people more receptive. Its hardly fair and makes little sense.
  
  I thought Obama smoked it up in his younger years as well? If it made people crazy, then people who have had it would barely be able to climb to the top, and in america, many prez's smoked it up. By the stance it makes u insane, then that would not be possible to reach the most sophisticated and powerful position. To assume that we the people are unable to know when is enough is just putting out a pessimistic view onto everybody that we are stupid and would wind up bound to couches, watching slapstick movies with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
  
  I thought the symbol of this victory of barack was like... anybody can crack through the stereotypes... a black man can be a president... just like a marijuana smoker could be an intelligent thinker and able to provide value to society. Barack winning the election to me, is a symbol of our strength as a people to break stereotypes. We'll keep pushing and show that just as we choose who governs the country, we also choose what is legitimate activity. Its not somebodies to grant you... its your birth right.
  
  I love what you said Cris G... how can this be a God country when we ban the very things apparently created by God? I guess thats where the 'devil' comes in... the perfect irrational scapegoat put in place to conveniently justify anything 'we' think is bad. I've heard people say mushrooms and marijuana are the devils spawns. Its interesting, because for those who do some research into ol' mate Moses, it seems pretty clear to me that b4 coming up with the Mosaic law, he and his Dad were inducing magic mushrooms. The israelites were instructed to collect the 'manna' in the 'morning dew grass' that 'goes celestial blue to the touch'. There's nothing else in nature that does that other than psylocybin mushrooms. So to say shrooms are bad is like saying Moses was infected by the Devil.
  
  There's a very 'logical' explanation for a lot of the things which we intelligently advanced beings have now written as 'myths'. Oh, Moses was just walking along one day and a bush started burning. Of course there's no chance he was on some sort of shamanic brew having psychedelic experiences. Nooooooooo.... thats outrageous.

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  A National Movement for Drug Law Reform

  I would agree with this. It must be a massively huge balancing act being Obama right now. For all we know, the day he was signed in was told that if he did X Y and Z he would be capped by the Fed Reserves cousins.
  
  Remember on his acceptance speech, he asked us all to be a part of this. Maybe there's more to him than most people realise. Maybe he's aware of the untolt powers of the elite and lobbyists and the mega companies payrolling them? Maybe he knows how hard it is to change something... and I heard him invite us to rally up and demand what we want. He is just a man... incredible at that, but still a man inside a matrix. He might be able to push a few things over the tipping point, but ultimately will rely on massive demonstrations where the people prove it to themselves first that a change is required, and then he can sign the line to say its legally valid.
  
  You know?
  
  This is the optimist inside me speaking and I hope I am right.
  
  Don't give up folks on this guys... just consider the massive parties involved here.

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  Yes, Fish Suffer, and No, Vegetarians Don't Eat Them (On Singer vs. Cowen)

  *edit - tarh = that
  
  Long story short, if a tree can work out to make a fruit which tastes good to an alien like creature like a humans then if it wanted to, it could work out how to run away. This was the conclusion old mate Da Vinci came up with as well in regards to the difference between eating animals and plants and why we should feel ok about it.
  
  Just as easily as a plant can create sweet nectar is it able to produce toxic poison.
  
  Interestingly, when you kill an animal, its blood fills up with a toxic poison rendering it useless to eat by most creatures (unless its gutted and artificially cared for with fridges). Fridge or no fridge, the cells in dead flesh send out rotting decomposition messages and not nutritional ones to the consumer.

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  Yes, Fish Suffer, and No, Vegetarians Don't Eat Them (On Singer vs. Cowen)

  As a grower myself of spinach, chillis, paw paws, celery and tomatos, I take fruit and leaves from these often. Now, there is no way intelligence of my level could evolve and just leave the tree world behind. We are from the earth.. whatever intelligence we have inherited, the structure for that was provided to us from tarh from which we were born.
  
  Alan Watts says something like just like an apple tree apples, the earth animals. And its a supreme arrogance to think that we somehow miraculously invented intelligence and that the rest of reality is stupid. Actually if you think about it, that is quite stupid. Were there apples just laying around on earth one day that sprouted into trees? Or was there a tree that eventually learned to create sweet apples? Think about it.
  
  Evolution has not just gone in one pathway as much as us humans would like to think so. We like to think that we are chosen or special and that reality devotes all its resources to our mental masturbations when beyond the veil, everything has been evolving alongside us. By now, this point in time when humans have reached this level of evolution, to think plants have not been equally working out their methods of survival, methods of reproduction, attraction, repulsion... to think they haven't got that sorted is the most naive and arrogant bunch of god complex philosophy ever. To think the apple is sweet by chance which we advanced humans simply worked out to steal is bollocks. The fruit tastes sweet because trees worked out that in order to continue growth they need to make their goods tasty so that other creatures would eat them and pass them at another destination. That is symbiosis and symbiosis is a result of advanced co-creative intelligence - not random haphazard chance.

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  Yes, Fish Suffer, and No, Vegetarians Don't Eat Them (On Singer vs. Cowen)

  There's a book I read written in the late 70's I think called "The Secret Life of Plants". Quite fascinating. In it, studies are conducted by IBM (among other advanced companies) to test the receptivity of plants. Not only did they find plants do infact feel pain, they found they could also predict when pain would be inflicted.
  
  In one test, 2 plants were sat in a room, and one was brutally destroyed by a person. The other plant was left beside it simply to observe. They hooked up the plants to electromagnetic analysers to observe changes in the plants overall state of being. They could tell if a plant was stressed or feeling happy.
  
  A lineup of men were asked to simply walk into the room, one of which was the murderer of one of the plants. Monitoring the witness plant responses... can you imagine what happened? They recorded a massive spike on the plant when the murderer simply walked back into the room, while there was virtually no response for the other 9 men.
  
  This test was also tried in other ways, such as burning a leaf with a lighter. On burning the living leaf, the plant would recoil and its nervous system would send out stress responses. Whats even stranger though, is that after a while, the plant would send the stress responses purely from the flame being sparked again. They took it even further, and found plants have a type of E.S.P. which could have them tell if the burner would actually burn the leaf, or was just lighting the flame to generate a stress response. The conclusion was that somehow, plants could tell the difference between fact and fiction, threat and volition.
  
  This has stuck with me for many years, these experiments. What really stuck with me however was that plants that were having their limbs / leaves removed with care didn't send out the stress responses the same way they did when they were violently ruined. It appears that plants are well indeed able to tell the difference between nurturing and mindless destruction and react entirely differently depending on that volition.
  
  So if we're going to start saying plants have intelligence, lets not limit it at the convenient cap to prove our own point. Lets then assume plants know exactly what is going on and choose to do what they do. They knowingly have evolved fruits and leaves that are visually attractive, but also provide immediate feedback in our mouths which tell us that we are chewing on something we are supposed to eat. Funnily, you don't see anybody sucking on the teets of cows (i'm not even sure if thats legal or a form of animal sexual misconduct) and nor do you see people drinking blood juices from blended bovine. Only after massive modification can you eat most animal products. Surely that is an obvious sign of disconnection from the natural way? Throw in the fear of a creature who is freaking out getting its throat sliced, or its children taken away to be milk raped... farout, I cannot believe this is even something that is still a debate.
  
  I am certain that in the future years to come talking about your mcmeatie days will be about as proud a discussion as talking about being involved in the genocide chambers that killed the jewish. Lap it up now while you can!

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  Yes, Fish Suffer, and No, Vegetarians Don't Eat Them (On Singer vs. Cowen)

  Personally I don't own or care for any pets as much as I would love to have a cat friend, I just couldn't buy its meat. I would like to be open to the idea however that humans did not randomly pop out one day as advanced creatures with advanced communications and morals and philosophies, with evolution, we probably may have once apon a time been totally carnivorously designed, like lions.
  
  For whatever reason, some carnivores have learned to evolve a digestive system to handle other foods. Its not a hard leap to make. Somehow mammals returned to the ocean and turned into dolphins which is far more radical then a simple enzyme engine shift which occurs when you change what you eat.
  
  What if cats could become vego? What if due to natural environmental conditions of today i.e. cities and cement that leaves cats no choice but to evolve in time? Why do we hinder the concepts of animals ability to make massive steps in evolution, when we scientifically believe we came through basically the same route?  To deny animals ability to evolve through similar means to us is like invading a country with guns blazing and setting up stringent immigration laws based around stature and intelligence. Not really fair... and I don't know, but it doesn't seem like good thank you vibes to be sending out to earth for whatever reason, letting us get to the 'top' first.
  
  The extent I do is speak out for a vegetarian planet.

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  Yes, Fish Suffer, and No, Vegetarians Don't Eat Them (On Singer vs. Cowen)

  This is hardly the issue here Chris... if you have grudges against people with pets, abstaining foods from them, then you acknowledge that withholding something from a living creature is a fallacy. So how does withholding food from an animal, even begin to compare with removing its life entirely?
  
  Its funny, because your icon has a darwin fish and stuff in it, but your commentary actually shows you don't believe in evolution. You must believe that we have reached the peak of evolution, but 'peaking' in itself denies the very concept of evolution. You believe animals are carnivores, and that is a fact, a peak in evolution, therefor, from this point forward, carnivore's must eat meat and that is that. Unfortunately, if reality took this stance you have a long time ago, not much evolution would occur, would it?
  
  You take evolution and turn it into a stagnant idea which you use to conveniently justify your temporary supremecy.
  
  How about, like you suggest people find pets that are suited to their diet, you go and find a forum that is anti-pet and anti-vegetarian? You're basically ranting on about stuff you're against... seems kinda pointless and well, boring, and nothing innovative. You should probably let go of this place in life you're at and let your avatar kick in some of that evolution into your head so you make some progress.

• 

  Robert commented on the article | almost 3 years ago

  Yes, Fish Suffer, and No, Vegetarians Don't Eat Them (On Singer vs. Cowen)

  Hey Lisa!
  
  I once believed fish didn't feel pain and for a while many years ago continued eating fish under this convenient illusion.
  
  It occured to me eventually, with common sense, since everything in nature serves a function that fish however do feel pain. If they didn't feel pain, they would not run away when you try to catch them. Clearly fish attempt to escape captivity. Whether we acknowledge their nervous system as being similar to ours in the sense that pain to them feels the same as pain to us is debatable, nevertheless the fact remains: they run away.
  
  Leonardo Da Vinci once made commentary of a similar nature.
  
  Tyler Cowens comments are supremist type views and his argument is severely flawed in that if I apply the same utalitarian strategy to whether or not I decide to kill him. From my supremist perception, he doesn't look like he is living joy, and so following suit with his approach, its my choice now to kill him to save him from living in delusion, contradiction and supremecy. Either that, or he'll probably die from a heart attack or colon cancer, so I'm essentially, by his logic, doing him a favour by cancelling his life on earth early.
  
  I think if Tyler is going to make arguments like this, he then waivers his own rights to life as well.
  
  Of course, I'm playing devils advocate here but this is something to consider. As it is above, so it is below.
  
  Bobby

• 

  Robert commented on the article | about 3 years ago

  They Connect. They Love. And They Mourn.

  Awesome post.
  
  Yes, all of the empathatic feelings humans developed were long installed in us before we could speak tangible words with complex society systems. All of our humanely higher evolved qualities were in us while we were all still 'animals'. The desire to care for family is embedded in us the moment we grow a heart.
  
  And its true, 3 times a day, you have an enormous opportunity to save a life. To save a family from being brutally slaughtered. 3 times a day, you have the choice to affirm peace and equality, and not genocide. You don't have to do anything more to have more empathy and be more peaceful being, just do less, and say no to the disconnected death diet.