Human by Design by Gregg Braden

With his new book, Gregg Braden had me with this line:  "Modern humans arose suddenly on earth approximately 200,000 years ago." The few traces of evidence we have suggest the ancients were no different from us. Intrigued to hear this view from a scientist, I was more intrigued by the proof that we didn't descend from Neanderthals. This came to light in 2000 at the University of Glasgow: a 30,000 year-old Neanderthal infant yielded mitochondrial DNA.

The Human Genome Project yielded a further blow to the old Darwinian surmise that humans evolved gradually. Here's a recent finding. Shared by chimps and humans, the FOXP2 gene suddenly and rapidly mutated in humans. This gene is located on Chromosome 2 and implicated in organ development and brain growth. It's also essential for the human capacity to feel compassion.

Moreover, we are creatures of irreducible complexity: this means a whole host of complex organs, systems and functions need to co-exist in order for our bodies to function. Increasingly, scientific evidence suggests that our species arose suddenly "with no evolutionary path leading to our appearance." Our crucial capacities for emotion, empathy and compassion connect us to one another and to other life forms in a unique way. We are separate neither from fellow-members of our species nor from other life forms. In old age, Einstein hypothesized a unified field, "an underlying order of information...in the universe," likening this to a distant and mysterious piper's tune that causes us all to dance.

Astronomer Fred Hoyle and mathematician Chandra Wickramsinghe have calculated the likelihood of our species having evolved through accident based on the number of enzymes necessary for life and the chance of their appearing randomly. They came up with a ludicrously small number: 1 to the power of 40,000. Hoyle suggested that this is about as likely as "a tornado sweeping through a junkyard and assembling a Boeing 747 jetliner from scattered debris."

Our thought process is hampered, says Braden, on the one hand, by the baggage of creationist religious doctrine, and on the other, by that of scientific "zealots clinging to fundamentalist evolutionary theory," unproven and even discredited though it may be. We must open our minds to new possibilities.

The brain filters its assessments through past memories and ego considerations, but "the heart knows immediately." Many of us have experienced this in moments of critical decision-making, when we receive the sudden compelling heart guidance to make the right choice. The Heart Math Institute, HMI, has researched the mechanism for this. Deep and conscious breathing creates coherence between heartbeat and brain waves; this leads to optimum cooperation between head and heart, balancing and maximizing human powers of discernment.

Many of us seek to evolve and experience a life of purpose. According to Einstein, "our task must be to free ourselves from this prison [the illusion of separateness] by widening our circle of compassion to all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty." This lofty goal, shared by mystics from ancient times, may be unattainable. Yet in striving towards it we find liberation and inner security.

Long a student, proponent and practitioner of heart math, Braden offers exercises, including the Heart Math Institute's set of five simple steps to be used by those who wish to ask questions and receive the wisdom of their own hearts. We need to become more aware, he says, that we affirm or deny our life force through the myriad choices we make daily about food, exercise, words, thoughts and beliefs.

Key to vital longevity is the health of the telomeres that protect our chromosomes. It is within our power to nurture these vital elements of life force, thus maximizing the number of times our cells can achieve the healthy division that keeps us alive.

To heal the problems we see around us today, says Braden, we must give up our basic disrespect for life. Contemporary societies believe in scarcity and competition. Many see difference as a threat, and act on this belief. Economies too. But we must change our thinking and go another way -- the path of cooperation and collaboration. Braden considers growth in the sharing economy, exemplified by Uber and Airbnb, to be a hopeful sign that such a change is taking place.

As individuals, we all matter deeply. We can and must make positive changes, says Braden, and to change our erroneous thinking comes first. "How," he asks, "can we make room for the new world that's emerging if we are clinging to the old world of the past?"

As Einstein knew, and as spiritual practitioners from many ancient traditions have long been aware, one important answer lies in cultivating compassion, which is "both a force of nature and an emotional experience that connects us with nature and all life."

A Long Way from Home by Peter Carey

With this new Booker-winning novel, Australian-born author Peter Carey has gone off the map. This story hinges on maps. After all, how could Mr. and Mrs. Bobs compete in the 1953 car rally around Australia without them?

After fifteen years of marriage and two kids, Irene is still in love with her natty Titch. After the race, she sees her "born salesman" husband another way. As he poses with companions "dressed like criminals and racecourse touts," his teeth seem "a perfect echo of the Holden's grill."

Willy, the next door neighbour, is a schoolteacher and radio show quiz champ. While he believes he's German, a "phantom homesickness" lends his soul "a distinctive colour." Finding out his true identity evokes "a searing pain" of panic that washes over him "like sheet lightning."

Having just lost both his jobs, Willy agrees to be navigator for Mr and Mrs Bobs in the Redex race, and he does so for a time. The revelation of his undreamed-of origin takes place in remote Quamby Downs, where he's arrived apparently by chance. Finding himself related to "a mob of Aborigines," Willy too must learn to think another way. He does his best to understand and befriend his aboriginal relatives, though he's not yet confident Lochy (aka Dr. Battery) "would not hold me responsible for the sins of my biological father."

Willy is kept a virtual prisoner in Quamby Downs, all but forced to accept the job of teacher there. The school board pays him "twenty pounds a week to erase the past, to...make [the Aboriginals] as white as possible in the hopes that they would grow up as stock boys and house lubras and punkah wallahs." Instead, unbeknownst to his distant employers, Willy learns how to enter the map of the "blackfellahs." Even so, he wants nothing more than to escape back south to town life. Instead, a desperate bid to help someone else get away from Quamby brings trouble down on his own head.

By the end of the jaw-dropping story, the reader too must reassess, and think in new ways. Early on, certain details are dropped to prepare the way for the revelations to come. Where the sheep graze over vast tracts of land, once the plains were covered in shoulder-high kangaroo grass. As well as foreshadowing the Willy's discoveries on the road, this was for me a chilling echo the Canadian prairies before and after the buffalo were wiped out, the people displaced and subjected to brutal attempts at assimilation, and the land plowed up for farming.

Told alternately through two engaging voices, this story rings with the deep truth that the best historic fiction can convey. Irene, the feisty 1950s housewife and mother who remains supportive of the vain and egoistic Titch came fully alive for me. She refuses to internalize the sexist and racist frontier society values that surround her, and her natural sympathy for the tragic figure of the shy and gentle Willy Bachuber brings her into conflict with her husband, who grows in confidence until he resembles his destructive and boastful father, whom Irene could never stand.

As Titch takes pride in his slick radio ad fame and devotes himself to earning more money through car and tire franchises, Irene finds herself unable to ignore Willy's tragic family situation. Also, she can't forget the horrific discovery she made about Australia's history of colonization during the rally. In her own way, she comes to terms with her heavy knowledge and takes appropriate action.

This book is an excellent choice for anyone willing to open the lid on the violent history society has a way of keeping hidden. In the era of Reconciliation, the first and most necessary act is to witness the past on which our lives are founded.

I found this portrait of 1950s Australia chillingly evocative of the same era in Canada. As a young child in a prairie town, I felt the bewildering sting of knowing that adults around me disrespected people they didn't know for reasons of race and background. They spoke and behaved in ways I recognized instinctively as wrong.

The China Song

On our Culture Path tour in China, we heard other choirs and learned The China Song. Audiences knew this and sang along, and a children's choir joined us onstage to belt it out. Looking at the translated lyrics, I was chuffed to see what wasn't mentioned. No swords borne aloft, no crosses, no battles or bombs bursting in air, and no pleas for God to save the monarch on the throne. Just lot of stuff about being happy to be part of an enormous country, working together in spite of challenges. But then it's just a folk song, not a national anthem.

Symbolism in the Forbidden City of Beijing

Today tourists pass through the imperial gate, once exclusive to the Emperor. His wife was allowed to use it on her wedding day, a special exception to the rule. Represented by rows of brass studs, the number nine means power.

Along the eaves of the numerous palaces within the forbidden city, we see animal figures. Their numbers reveals the building's function and importance. A roofline displaying five animals signified use by civil or military officials, who regularly petitioned the emperor.

The garden pot above contained not plants, but water. In the absence of a mechanical system to fight fire, the palace grounds contained a number of these in strategic locations. The practice arose from feng shui (literal translation: wind water), and the placement of pots of water at strategic locations was believed to prevent fire.

Below we see other examples of symbolism. The lion on the left is an expression of the ancient Chinese idea of yin and yang, which combine in a balanced harmony. Representing yin, a sleeping cub rests beneath the paw of the female lion. On the other side of the doorway, a male lion (yang) rests his paw upon a sphere. The high threshold that must be crossed to enter the palace is a symbolic (and practical) reminder to bow the head humbly before going in.

 

Chinese virtues and "the Mao Dynasty"

The shot is poor as I took the picture through the window of a moving bus. The virtues and ideals are Prosperity, Democracy, Civility, Rule of Law, Harmony, Freedom, Equality, Justice, Patriotism, Dedication, Integrity, Friendship.

Modern China, like any other society, is founded on its past. Yet I was surprised to hear Chinese use the phrase "The Mao Dynasty." Below, the palaces of the Forbidden City and the remaining portion of moat that runs behind it stand as reminders of earlier times. 

Today Mao's picture is prominent, above the Imperial Gate that was once reserved for the most august emperor.

Better city, our duty

Before I visited, I knew China, I knew it had a gender imbalance, a consequence of the one-child policy and an earlier historic preference for male children. I wondered whether any effects of this would be apparent to a casual visitor but saw none. In the five cities I visited, the people I met and those I observed seemed calm and happy. I saw no evidence of crime, homelessness, bad driving or drug abuse.

The slogan on this truck expresses the value Chinese place on group social responsibility.

Sadly, in the background, the sky beyond Mao's tomb is seriously polluted, something I witnessed not only in Beijing, Shanghai and Shijiazhuang, but from the train window as we passed through the countryside between those cities, and from the air as we approached Xi'an, a "small" city by Chinese standards, though it contains the equivalent of the population of Sweden. [Combine the populations of Shanghai and Xian, and you get the equivalent of the Canadian population.] China has 160 cities with populations over a million, and the struggle to reduce pollution is ongoing.

Initiatives include obliging new drivers in Beijing (and possibly elsewhere) to enter lotteries and compete for the privilege of car ownership, and banning licence holders from driving on more than four weekdays, based on the final digit of the number plate. There are also many motorcycles, scooters, and bicycles on the road. Nobody wears helmets, but these smaller vehicles have their own dedicated sections of road to drive on. Hordes of yellow and orange bicycles in the cities can be rented with the simple swipe of a phone app, and left anywhere the user finds convenient.

Seeing silk at the source

I love wearing silk. Made of strands of protein, a layer of this queen of natural fibres provides warmth in winter, and maintains coolness in summer. Light in weight, silk, especially when knitted, is flexible and easy to care for. Using complex looms, it can also be woven into light or heavy fabrics from raw silk to the most intricately designed and colourful brocades.

On a recent visit to China, I learned a lot more about silk. Production begins by feeding silkworms on the leaves of a special type of mulberry.

Cocoons are then produced on frames made of plastic or straw. Once complete, they are heated with water and to kill the worms and make the silk easy to harvest, then graded for quality. The most symmetrical white ones are destined to become yarn, while the less perfect ones are formed into silk batting for clothing and blankets. A single silk thread is made by simultaneously unwinding together several unbroken strands of thread. To accomplish this, the cocoons float in water while unreeling under the watchful eyes of factory employees, who introduce a new strand to replace each one that runs out.

Once the thread is formed, it is re-reeled into skeins as seen above. This re-reeling helps to dry the thread while ensuring consistent elongation, strength and elasticity. Below we see silk brocade being woven on special looms, and a picture embroidered on silk with silk thread.