The Best Thought Provoking Collection From The Internet

The Best thought provoking collection from the Internet
It has always been the case that some philosophers and scientists have used scientific
conclusions to attack Christianity, and religion in general. There are men at various ends of the
spectrum that deny miracles but allow the existence of God, and others who are completely
naturalistic and deny any “god” whatsoever. To a certain extent, the theologians who reply to
these attacks are at a disadvantage. When a scientist or philosopher argues against religion, he
almost never has enough information about that religion, and knows little about it. It is not as
though a scientists has made a life-long study of all the world‟s religious beliefs and then says
that science rules them all out. Rather, he simply uses science as a sounding board for what he
believes is right. The theologians, on the other hand, must know quite a lot. He is supposed to
have enough knowledge to discuss space, time, motion, energy, the solar system, natural law,
quantum theory, relativity and other scientific ideas. However, when dealing with the refutation
of a naturalistic science, really, one does not need to go into all of that. Rather, a person only
needs to be able to prove how science cannot explain the simplest of things – like a marble
rolling across the table, or the fact that when one picks up one end of a pencil, the other end
comes along with it.
Science begins with a study of motion. If there was no motion there would be no need for
science. Nothing would materially exist. Everything, in one-way or another, in this universe has
motion. Plants grow, birds fly, volcanoes erupt, the earth rotates, and motion is seen all over the
planet.
Zeno begins scientific history with a quaint little puzzle about motion. If point “A” to
point “B” is five feet, and a person was going to walk from point A to point B would this be
possible? Is movement an illusion or is it real? Suppose the distance is divided in half? It
should be self evident that the person walking must get to the halfway mark before they reach
the end. But what if we divided each half into quarter, and then each quarter into eights and so
on? How could the person walking actually move through an infinite number of points before
getting to the end? Is motion illusionary? Well, the answer to the puzzle is a bit more complex
than some think. How could a person pass through each point and actually move from one
point to the other? Think about that for a moment. After thinking that through the reader
should make the connection that none ever passes through one point at a time, rather, they pass
through them all in one step. It is not that each point is considered, rather, they are all
considered. Zeno confused a collective “all” with an individual “each.” The puzzle actually is a
logical fallacy.
How does Zeno‟s puzzle help science? It really does not. It only serves to state that
motion has always been contemplated. If all things change and are in a constant state of
change, then what follows this change? Is there anything? Does science have an answer?
Aristotle said, rightly, that if all things are changing, then nothing really exists and knowledge
would be impossible. Thus, going back to a first cause, Aristotle came up with the unmoved
mover. All motion requires a subject that remains unchanged while that which is affected
moves. Motion presupposes an unmoved substratum. But, how does one know that there is
motion and that there is an unchanging substratum? Motion must be defined if the truth is
going to be known. Aristotle used the undefined terms “potentiality” and “actuality” to define
motion. Something not actual is potential, whatever that means. Aristotle actually says
potentiality cannot be defined (it seems he is going in a vicious circle). Motion is never really, or
helpfully defined.
During the Renaissance the scientific method emerged. Hopefully the scientific method
can use some of what Aristotle came up with, but give a helpful definition of what motion is
really about, and for that matter, what life is about. Newtonian science emerged to help
Aristotle understand why a falling body falls. Why does motion happen? Bodies fall because
they are heavy. Is this adequate? Bodies fall faster when they have more time to fall. Now there
are more problems to consider. What makes them fall faster? This is where Newton‟s laws of
inertia came into play. Planets move. This was not denied by anyone. Some, like Copernicus
said that certain planets move certain ways – like the earth revolving around the sun. But it
really makes no difference which plant revolves around any other since the question remains as
to how planets move at all. What makes the planets move? It seems that Newton‟s “discovery
of gravity” was the answer. But then, what causes gravity? Because in looking at the universe
through a telescope, there are these anomalies called comets that zig zag about the universe with
no path, and no rotation. What makes them move? It may be that all this seems a bit confusing.
But think of this way: if someone says “Why does this rock fall to the ground when I let it go?”
And another answers him by saying “Gravity,” has that person really answered him? What
makes the stone fall to the ground instead of it just sitting in mid air? This is where science
meets philosophy. The scientists can say how a stone falls – thirty-two feet per second – but
cannot tell anyone why it falls.
Whenever one asks “why” to a “how” they are asking about significance. Science must be
able to offer significance to its claims if it is to be trusted at all. This is where scientific
philosophy must take over. Science must have a philosophy of life. If it does not, then it cannot
furnish anyone with any real information about anything at all. A statement of fact is not an
explanation. It is the very thing that needs to be explained. In this way, science explains
nothing at all.
Scientists have attempted to rid themselves of the dilemma that science explains
nothing. Some embraced the mechanistic model to cover their tracks. This taught that the
universe worked a certain way and as a result of this “mechanistic” model, universal laws could
be established. However, can science establish the truth of anything? W. K. Clifford said, “it is
wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.” If
this is true, then how can science possibly ascertain the sum total of a given “thing” (whatever
that “thing” may be) in order to verify it? If science is contained in a laboratory setting, how
can it possibly give universal laws of nature an absolutism? How can they possible describe
how nature works as a whole? Actually, the scientists knows he cannot, but he gives his best
guess. Guess? Yes, just a guess. Theories. Even in mathematical equations about a given “fact”
the actual weight of an object or length of a measurement is never perfect. It is always plus or
minus some amount, no matter how small that measurement may be. So science is never
working with a perfect environment, not a universal environment. Can science tell men
anything? Not really. Scientists simply choose from an infinite number of possibilities what
they think is best for the situation at hand. If mathematical equations alone could describe
nature, for instance, the chance that the scientist will choose the correct formulation is one in
infinity (or zero). Therefore, in reality, all the laws of physics are false.
Because of this great conundrum of absolutes, science does not claim to have “absolute
truth.” This is especially true of the 21st century secular thinker. If earlier scientists would have
claimed to found absolute truth, and it was verified in some way, then science today would not
continually be revamping laws and ideas to suit new information. Einstein‟s law of relativity
now replaces Newton‟s law of inertia. Mechanistic determination, then, is not, nor ever was,
based on scientific observation, but on some other a priori idea. This sounds more like
philosophy 101 than science 101.
So science attempts to creates laws that are not really true to justify itself while it
investigates the universe. Yet, even in these temporary ideas, the laws of physics, for example,
do not describe how nature goes on. It just supplies men with some facts (some guesses) about
what is going on right now. Operationalism attempted to prove the laws of nature and to erect
scientific principles of nature and religion upon them. But as the mechanistic theories
collapsed, so does Operationalism under the hard facts of guessing science. Really, all science
does is lead to skepticism about everything.
Science leaves men guessing about the nature of the universe, and as a result, the
philosophy of science collapses immediately. Operationalism is offered as the best guess science
can offer. But this is nothing more than asking people to believe what some hope to be true, and
cannot prove it, or ever prove it. Science, then, can never determine its own value because it
cannot make any universal judgment about ultimate reality. Science does make “things”
possible. Men have nuclear missiles to blow up other men. That is possible. But science
cannot offer any explanation on why one should blow up other men or not. Can science
determine that life should be extended as something good? Not at all. The only answer that is
really available, since no empirical scientific conclusions can be made about anything, is to turn
to a Christian philosophy of theism.
Even in the early Genesis narrative, culture has adopted agriculture, the arts, and
industry. This is part of the cultural mandate to dominate the world for the glory of God.
Science has its place in Christian theism, but it is subservient to the goal of humanity which is
the glory of God. God demonstrates His power in the world through the message of His word
and its affirmation in the miracles surrounding the ones He sends to proclaim that word.
Science, offers no refutation, no satisfactory refutation, to exclude miracles. There is no
scientific basis for the rejection of miracles at all. Any anti-Christian sentiments that rely on
science will in a few years or decades be discarded for new one. This demonstrates the
irresponsibility of science in its attempt to simply overthrow the Christian faith. If scientific
laws really overthrew the Christian faith, then those laws (like Newton‟s) would not crumble,
ever. Whether or not science believes something now does not mean it will ever believe it in the
future. How can science possibly be trusted? Anything that scientists find are not findings at all
but simply formulations. Formulations mean nothing without objective truth behind what the
formulations are trying to prove. Experimentation, then, never discovers how nature works.
Einstein rightly said, as a secular scientist, “We know nothing about it [nature] at all. Our
knowledge is but the knowledge of school children…We shall know a little more than we do now.
But the real nature of things-that we shall never know, never.” From this point alone, Einstein
would be right in stating that science can never disprove Christianity as false; never. Since
science is always tentative, it has no basis for ultimate reality. Why do people hold to science
then? Science, for secularism, attempts to fill a void that can only be spiritually filled by faith
with something that they think is provably tangible. That is because most scientists are not
philosophers and do not take time to figure out that science has no answers. Regardless of what
science can do, it has no justifiable cause to do it. If it creates something that aids in human life,
it has no reason, no basis at all that it should be used. Or if it synthesizes something that would
be the destruction of mankind, like a super virus, it has no justification as to why it ought not to
be used first on the inventor, and then on the rest of the populace. Science can never speak
about ethics. They are putting the cart far before the horse!
Is science helpful? To those blessed by divine revelation who have all the non-
contradictory and consistent answers to ultimate reality, of course it is. Laws do not need to be
completely true in order to be useful. Newton‟s laws gave birth to other laws. Newton‟s laws
were ultimately overthrown by newer “laws”. They were helpful, but in error.
Science is forever incapable of producing valid arguments against the existence of God. It
is simply not in a secular humanist, or secular scientists power to do so. They have no valid
arguments for arguing against miracles, supernatural revelation, or life in heaven or hell.
Science is always false, but is often useful.
You will find them everywhere in everything
If you search for divisibility, you will find it everywhere in everything!
If you search for comparability, you will find it everywhere in everything!
If you search for connectivity, you will find it everywhere in everything!
If you search for sensitivity, you will find it everywhere in everything!
If you search for transformability, you will find it everywhere in everything!
If you search for substitutability, you will find it everywhere in everything!
If you search for satisfiability, you will find it everywhere in everything!
Doesn‟t science search and study the divisibility of atoms, molecules, ions, cells, organelles,
tissues, organs, guilds, words, numbers, equations, instruments, and other entities? Yes, science
searches for it everywhere in everything!
Doesn‟t science search and study the comparability of atoms, molecules, ions, cells, organelles,
Doesn‟t science search and study the connectivity of atoms, molecules, ions, cells, organelles,
Doesn‟t science search and study the sensitivity of atoms, molecules, ions, cells, organelles,
Doesn‟t science search and study the transformability of atoms, molecules, ions, cells,
organelles, tissues, organs, guilds, words, numbers, equations, instruments, and other entities?
Yes, science searches for it everywhere in everything!
Doesn‟t science search and study the substitutability of atoms, molecules, ions, cells, organelles,
Doesn‟t science search and study the conditions which could be satisfied (satisfiability) by
atoms, molecules, ions, cells, organelles, tissues, organs, guilds, words, numbers, equations,
instruments, and other entities? Yes, science searches for it everywhere in everything!
What will you do if nothing has divisibility, comparability, connectivity, sensitivity,

transformability, substitutability, and statisfiability?
What would your knowledge be if nothing has divisibility, comparability, connectivity,

sensitivity, transformability, substitutability, and statisfiability?
Oh, beloved men and women, you will never have the knowledge which excludes the universal
laws of nature. Can you refute?
I have heard… a Zen anecdote…
A young student goes to a master of martial arts and says “Master teach me martial arts.” The
master question‟s “Why do you want to learn martial arts?” “I want to learn self-defence” replies
the student. The master says “Show me your „Self‟ first”. The student is blinded by his
preconceived notions, he does not understand the significance of the masters statement. The
student persists and says, “ I want to learn to fight and defeat my enemies”. “Go find „the self‟
first”, says the master….and the quest of the beginingless beginning begins.
According to me the womb of all meditative arts lies in the teachings of the Buddha. Within my
understanding of these ancient sciences I am trying to present in brief the roots of martial arts
to the Buddha. Thereby clarifying the distorted image of martial arts in present times. I also
realized that the essence of the science of Dhamma was essentially the same in Martial arts.
Martial Arts, like any other art is an expression of the self, the path through which a person can
realize no-self and understand the laws of nature within and without.
“Self” is the basis to understand “No-Self”. The intangible cannot be grasped without the aid of
the tangible. Awareness of gross to subtlest is a natural experience.
The Roots
Since man was born during the process of evolution, he instinctively knew how to fight, at all
levels. So, fighting was very natural to him to survive. Fighting does not need to be taught.
Therefore martial arts is not fighting systems as it is understood and taught today in most parts
of the world.
What are you going to defend? For those majority of people who think martial arts is all about
violence and/or fighting to defend, they are greatly mistaken. Most people are anyway fighting
either physically or verbally all the time and suffering. If we observe closely this attitude of
fighting we realize the stupidity of the logic of „self-defence‟. We are only defending our „Ego‟.
There is nothing to defend.
The „martial way‟ teaches rediscovering the Self. This does sound paradoxical, but the truth of
the essence can be expressed only through pointers. On the path to rediscovering „the self‟ the
experience of „no-self‟ dawns. “No-self” is an experiential wisdom., whereas “the self” is an
intellectual expression. When the experience of „beyond‟ happens the duality disappears. But in
order to attain its benefits; the practitioner must try to be completely free of any egotistic feeling
and persevere.
The self is an outer manifestation of the inner suffering and the ego. The realization of „no-self‟
comes through the discipline of the martial way. This discipline is not forced suppression as is
generally understood. Rather it is like the bloom after the unwanted leaves (defilement‟s) falls
off on it‟s own. It is because of this discipline that this path came to be known as martial art.
For the outer world the self is needed just as an expression of language and of utilitarian value.
From Buddhism To Bushido
The term “Religion” is derived from the Latin word “Religere”, which when translated
means “to bind back” or “to relate”. Religion in the true sense of the term implies that science
which examines the link, which exists between Man, and the Cause from which he originated.
The Buddha clearly explains this science of causal relations in his doctrine of
“Paticcasamuppada”.
“Bushido” is translated as, Bu--martial (arts); Shi--warrior; Do - pronounced „doe‟ - the

way. Thus „Bushido‟ means „the way of the warrior‟. The Warrior not in the sense of the one who
is fighting wars with others, but the Warrior who is at war with all that is ugly within. Bushido,
the way of the warrior, grew out of the fusion of Buddhism and Shintoism. The “Way” is
practiced and expressed by the essential principles of Buddhism that has strongly influenced
Bushido.
The basic elements of Buddhism found in Bushido are five: Pacification of the emotions
(kilesa); tranquil compliance (equanimity) with the inevitable; self-control (non-reactive mind)
in the face of any event; a more intimate exploration of death than of life (anatta); pure poverty
(non-attachment).
I would say that Zen and the Martial arts had the same flavor and were the same thing.
And in both Zen and the Martial Arts, practice counts for a great deal. In fact very few are even
aware that the roots lie in India, specifically in Buddhism.
Bodhidharma a buddhist monk and also a prince from south India is known as the first
patriarch of Zen. Bodhidharma was born fifteen centuries ago. He traveled to China to spread
the science of Buddhism. A woman who was enlightened initiated him. Her name was
Pragyatara. It was she who asked Bodhidharma to go to China, to teach the Dhamma (Dharma),
to spread the message of the Buddha.
Bodhidharma took three years to reach China. He taught the monks the science of
“Dhyan”. With the migration of these methods to China, the Chinese pronounced it as C‟han. As
the trade links expanded between China and Japan, especially the Ryukyu Islands to the south
of Japan, exchange of traditions also took place. These sciences, in Japan was pronounced as
„Zen‟.
Buddhism had already reached China six hundred years before Bodhidharma.
Pragyatara told him to go to China because the people who had reached there before him had
made a great impact, although none of them were enlightened. When Bodhidharma reached
there six hundred years later, there were already thousands of Buddhist temples, monasteries,
and monks in China.
At this point a very striking question arises in the readers mind, that why would
Bodhidharma travel all the way to China to teach arts of fighting to the monks of the Shaolin
temple? Was he so stupid to travel so far to teach them violence? Of course not. Bodhidharma
traveled all the way to China to spread the science of “Dharma”. He went there to teach the
science of universal truth that the Buddha discovered within the three and half hand length of
His body. He arrived to teach the science of liberation from the cycle of birth and death.
When Bodhidharma reached there he found the monks were not in good physical
conditions to experience the subtle realities of the Dhamma within the three and half hand
length of the body. To eliminate the deep rooted defilement‟s of the mind and fighting the
soldiers of mara within. Understanding that the body also, is gross mind accumulated through
millions of years of evolution.
The gross body (matter) as an instrument needed to be fine-tuned to experience the

subtle mind. Becoming an Arahant- The Liberated one- is possible in the human existence.
Bodhidharma taught them what the Buddha taught along with the physical training
methods which were gave birth to all those arts of meditation and focusing, which, with the
passing of time were transformed into Martial Arts. The physical training helped the monks to
regain the strength needed to meditate for long hours.
The training was based on the laws of nature, studying its harmony, its simple flow into
new, ever changing circumstances.
Progressively as wars became the sustaining pillars of history, the martial arts moved
further and further away from their true origin and became tools for asserting violence and
aggressiveness.
Now the question arises, how is Buddhism related to Martial Arts? How is Dhamma or
the laws of Nature connected to Martial Arts? The answer lies in the experiential understanding
rather than intellectual knowledge. To experience the laws of Nature the understanding can only
be within and not outside. Within this three and a half hand length of the human body the entire
experience of Mind - Matter can be observed.
When these monks experienced the interaction of mind-matter, as a by-product, the

science of acupuncture and other healing arts were designed.
The budo (the martial way) is known as an art. The budo is a miniature cosmos. There
you confront your worst enemy – your-self. There you tune yourself to awareness. There you
reflect your behaviour in the outside world. In the art the ego has to be dropped. In Budo, you
have to practice until your last breath. Practicing different movements and the awareness of
body, breath and mind in different postures, is a part of martial art training. Not only in motion
but also in stillness, the awareness remains.
The Martial Arts approaches the study and rediscovery from the point of view of their
being rooted in the laws of nature (Dharma). Thus, the Martial Arts find their way back to
meditation. In other words they return to their very core: awareness in movement, in working,
in relating with other people and remaining grounded and centered.
In this way the student learns to experience his own potential as a meditator and a
watcher, enabling him to be more detached and tranquil while fully participating and conscious
in everyday life. From activity of the movements the passivity is experienced, and in that
passivity the subtle interaction of mind-matter activity is experienced. This is the nature of law.
The Greatest Martial Arts Warrior Of Human History.
The Buddha was a scientist in understanding the mind-matter phenomenon. He

experimented for six years with various techniques and meditative methods to explore the inner
reality and finally leading to the path of Nirvana. One of the most widely practiced techniques
taught by the Buddha is Vipassana.
Based on the same principal the martial arts is not for fighting outside with others but
transformed for the War you are going to fight inside yourself with the darkness, with your own
ego, with all that is ugly in you.
The Buddha had many enemies. There were many who were envious and jealous of his
followings. His greatest personal enemy was his own brother-in-law Devadutt. Devadutt
conspired many unsuccessful attempts to kill the Buddha. Once after infuriating an Elephant,
Nalagiri, with intoxicants, Devadutt dispatched the animal against the Buddha. The Buddha
was unaffected by the charge of the wild elephant, which was rushing to trample him. The
Buddha‟s compassion and his surrounding energy were so full of „metta‟, that the beast was
subdued without any fighting or resistance. Isn‟t this an example of the greatest martial art
development ?
The ferocious is conquered by fearlessness, the ruthless is overcome by compassion, and

raw destructive power is subdued with one pointed awareness. The is the understanding of the
Martial saying, “fighting without fighting”.
The Warrior, who has won the war within is the greatest warrior, isn‟t that the Buddha?
Isn‟t Buddha the conqueror who had attained to the destruction of defilement‟s and all its
conditions?
Getting attached to “non-attachment” is also an attachment. Let us understand this at a

basic level. Even the Buddha has said, „Once you cross the river, you have to leave the boat on
the banks.‟ It would be unwise to carry the boat on the head just because it is instrumental in
crossing over to the other side of the river.
I have come across a majority of people who are obsessed with training only the mind,
and there are an equal percentage of people who are fanatic about training the body. Both are
extremes. There are very few people who understand and train both Mind-Body as a totality. I
personally am of the opinion that the body is mind and the mind is body. Both these
phenomenon are like 2 sides of the same coin. The body has to be trained and used as a tool to
understand the mind – tame the mind to use the body and mind.
The science of the mind-matter as realized and taught by the Buddha is so pure that
nothing can be added or deleted. But, the fact that we tend to forget is that the lifestyle of people
then, and the times now are very different. So to apply the science to get benefits, we have to
adapt ourselves to the norms of the science. We have to fulfill the conditions that the science
demands. “The Middle path” is what the science demands and the Buddha prescribes.
“The Middle Path” is not a static state. In fact, it is a state which requires constant
“awareness”. The middle path is a constant flux – very dynamic in nature. It is like a tight rope
walk. As you must have seen a tight rope walker, he/she is constantly aware of imbalancing
forces. Trying to maintain the balance from one shift to the other. The two qualities which help
balance are – “Awareness” and “Equanimity”. The tight rope walker needs to develop
equanimity as well as awareness to walk the “Middle Path”.
We must realize that when we talk about the Buddha, we are not talking of a particular
person or following a particular person or a sect.
Buddha means “the Enlightened One”. Gautam - the Buddha, taught the Dhamma,
which came to be known as Buddhism. Each one has the seed to become a Buddha, provided he
treads on the path of the laws of nature. We are talking about the qualities of a person who is
enlightened.
In fact, the Buddha was not a Buddhist, nor did he preach Buddhism. Buddhism
followed the Buddha. He taught only “Dhamma”- the universal laws of nature which apply to
one and all. The laws of Nature cannot be a dogma, it is not a sect of beliefs, but it is universal.
To experience the subtle energies the gross body has to be in tune with Nature, has to be
healthy.
Thus the understanding of the ancients was diluted at the hands of the people who did
not fully understand the roots.
My sincere apologies if this article seems incomplete or disconnected. I would have liked
to elaborate more on the science of practice, but due to constraints of space I will conclude this
by saying that Dharma by any other name will remain unchanged. The one who walks on the
path of the Laws of Nature will liberate one and all from the cycle of birth and death. Whether it
is Buddhism or Bushido, finally the path has also to be dropped and transcended.
The Universal Laws of Nature
By Christopher Walker There are five unique, but interconnected laws that describe and define
the creation, maintenance and transformation of all of life. To really know these laws requires
that you step beyond the conventions of your culture and reach out to a bigger perspective.
There is no chaos, only a circumstance we cannot understand. These universal laws take you a
long way to the understanding you may be searching for. The fifth law. The law of the one and
the many. There is one universe, and many religions that describe it. There is one spirit within
you, and many ego personas that express it. There is one leader in any organization, and many
people who are employed to manifest it. There is one love in the human heart, and many
emotions that come to express it. There is one humanity on earth, and many diverse cultures
that fragment their uniqueness to celebrate it. There is one sun in our sky, and many planets
that are obedient to it. There is one government in our country, and many laws to govern with.
There is one ocean on our planet, and many rivers to feed it. There is one earth, and many
mountains to divide it. There is one creation, and many people to evolve it. We live beneath an
umbrella. We can rise to the top of one heap, only to find we are now at the bottom of the next.
We are always humble to the law of the one and the many. You have many personas, many ego
identities. Some you hide, and some you display – characters you play. If you add the characters
you hide, to the characters you display, to the characters you live in virtual reality, to the
characters you express in reality, you will find you are the one. We are the sum of the parts, and
the sum of the parts is one. We are not different to anyone. We are all the same. Expressed
uniquely in the way we demonstrate our fragments, but completely identical if we add those
parts to become one. The ego thinks it is the one, but it is a mere fragment. An emotion. The ego
thinks it is separate to others, and therefore, unique. The ego thinks it can change, but it cannot.
The ego is a fragment, the spirit is the whole. Spirituality is to know that you are whole, one total
being with many fragmented parts. Each of them incomplete, each of them worthy of love. The
fourth law. The law of appreciation What you appreciate gets bigger, what you dont appreciate
gets smaller. Appreciation builds, evolves and creates harmony. Lack of appreciation motivates
self-consciousness, self-depreciation and self- destruction. There is nothing to change, only
something to appreciate. You cannot change, you can only appreciate yourself as you are.
Appreciation is an attractive force, depreciation is a repulsive force. From the vantage point of
the one, we see ourselves as many parts. Pain and self-consciousness causes us to lose the
perspective of the one, and fall into the many parts. Then, we cannot appreciate who we are, so
we try to change it. Anything we try to change has power over us, anything we appreciate we
have power over. If you appreciate your lover‟s faults, they are not faults, but beautiful assets. If
you criticize and try to change someone, you are below them, they have power over you. You
have no fault. You are not broken. Neither is the world or your lover. There are some things you
might not appreciate. The problem is not the thing itself, but your inability to appreciate that
thing. Once you appreciate things, they have no power over you. You are free. This is the talent
of a great lover, and the talent of the greatest Gods. They appreciate you. The third law. The law
of Abundance There is nothing missing. It just changes in form. You have every character trait,
some you express at work, some at home, some in virtual reality, and some in reality. You are
everything you see and everything you dream. There is nothing missing in you or your beloved.
Your judgements are false, they are your ego. To separate yourself from others means you can
criticize and blame them. But there is no them, there is no you. You are everyone you see,
nobody outside of you is doing more to you than you do to yourself. You are not unique, you are
like everyone else. You have every trait, every characteristic. Delusion tells you that you can
change or be different. Maybe you think you can be better than others, but in this one thought
alone you prove that false. You are everything, and connected to everything. There are five
elements – ether, air, fire, water and earth. The universe is made up of these five elements. So
are you. There are varying degrees of each that cause individual differences, but they are one
soup. They are just energy in different states, different forms, and you have them all in varying
degrees. You are like the universe, complete. Matter evolving from earth to ether. Nothing is
ever missing, it just changes in form. We are all shy. Some at work, some at home, some in
regard to money, and some in regard to change. We are all shy, nothing is missing. The second
law. The law of growth. Chaos causes change. Chaos stimulates challenge and confronts the
status quo. Chaos breaks deadlocks and promotes change. Order on the other hand rests us,
gives us time to absorb, digest, take it all in, to master our space, and become good at what we
do. Too much order and we stagnate. Too much chaos and we burn out. Growth occurs at the
border between the two. The purpose of love is growth. Love is both chaos and order. Growth
means to convert chaos to order. Chaos is what we dont appreciate. Therefore, growth means to
convert those things we dont like, into those things we do like. That is how we get more love. We
take things we dont appreciate (chaos) and turn them into things we do appreciate (order) In a
relationship there is a perfect balance of support and challenge. Challenge is chaos (things we
dont appreciate) and support is order (things we do appreciate). When we first meet our lover,
there are more things that we appreciate than dont appreciate. This is called infatuation. After
some time there can be more things that we dont appreciate (challenges) than we appreciate
(support). Then we resent our partner and want to leave. The truth is, there is always a perfect
balance of support and challenge in life. We were just blinded in the beginning. The first law.
The law of balance There are two sides to every coin. This is how we convert issues we dont
appreciate into issues we do appreciate. We turn chaos to order by seeing the other side of the
coin. There is always a silver lining to every cloud. There are always two ways to see any one
thing. One way is to see the dark, the other way is to see the light. The wise person sees both, but
then focuses their mind on the light. The emotionally disturbed person tries to eliminate the
dark, thinking it will go away. For every thing we move from dark to light, a new balance is
created. So the more light we see, the more happiness we have, the more fun, and the more
peace, then, the more dark, the more sadness, the more misery, the more drama we have.
Duality is the cause of emotion, and there cannot be an upper without a downer. To break the
mould means to see two sides. For example, in our western culture we might say laziness is bad.
But in the Spiritual Culture, laziness may be exactly the same as mindfulness or contentment. In
the west, we see inspired and enthusiastic as good. In the Eastern language, we might call those
same behaviours running away, unable to be in the moment, lacking stillness. There are two
sides to everything. Re-label those things you dont appreciate. Find the blessing in them. They
cant be eradicated, only appreciated. Extract from my new book, Sacred Love. Chris Walker.
The Laws of Nature - Lifting Gratitude
The more thankful you are, the more wonderful your energy. To be thankful, you have to be
judgmental. Can you feel a moment coming on here? Most people tell you not to judge but how
can you be thankful for anything if you don't judge it? That's why so many people who turn all
hippie and spiritual have about the equivalent personal magnetism as a potato. They try not to
judge and then become all dumbed out.
More gratitude means more judgment. You need to have so much judgment that you see duality
in everything. In other words you see the good and bad in everything. That's a Jesus, a Buddha,
or a Mohammed. Someone who judged everything and saw the balance (the hands of God - both
left and right).
Gratitude means seeing the duality of the world, even good in bad but then saying "thanks" for
both. Gratitude is not dumb. Dumb is thinking there's good without bad or bad without good.
Using the laws of nature you can see that dumb is "human instinct" and this is the lowest level of
thought imaginable. (fundamentalism) Dumb thinking is thankful today and pissed off
tomorrow.
So, thankfulness is a discipline. Everything is blessed, so everything, even the Tsunami has good
and bad. There's no magic formula, just duality. That's the will of God. And you don't have to
wear a specific uniform to experience it. In this paradigm, men and women are two halves of the
same coin. There's no discussion about that topic. Men are good and bad, women are good and
bad, and we are thankful for both. As Mae West said "When I'm good I'm very, very
The Laws of Nature Creating Greater Personal Presence.
The laws of nature share that there are only three time zones. The past, the present and the
future. Emotion can only exist in the past and the future. When people totally arrive in the
moment they are in what is referred to as "inspiration" total presence.
There are a great many people on this earth, but have you ever wondered why only a few of them
have achieved extraordinary public attention. Princess Di for example; a quite ordinary human
with no particular talent except choosing a well placed husband, was totally loved by millions
and millions of people. For no good reason?
If you split a second you get half a second. Split it again, you get quarter and so on. Split and
split and split a second and all it's bits and you get finite time. An immeasurable interval of
space - time in which nothing exists. Yet, we are in that finite moment of time, all the time. So
people pass through it without noticing it. Some people avoid it and jump over the top. The art
celebrity is in that moment. The more a person drills down into the finite moment of time in
their art, the more famous they become.
In the laws of nature we call this the art of stillness. First your mind goes empty, which is spooky
enough when you are on stage or live to camera. Then your heart stops. That's amazing. Then
you hear yourself doing something, and finally you hear clapping. Millions of finite moments of
time that cannot be detected, added up, and that was the performance.
I recently met with Carlos Santana. He described performing onstage as "one long orgasm" I
think that says it all.
The Laws of Nature Help you Be More Present
You have to know yourself quite well because most of the time, when we are not turning up, we
don't even know it. So, lets define presence so you can test yourself.
Are you worried about something? If so, the likelihood is that this is surreptitiously creeping
into all your communication with people. Therefore, YOU, are not turning up, your worries are.
Are you fearful about something? If you fear, you are not here. Fear comes from the past but
what it does is projects itself into the future. You can't fear being here, because you are already
here. But you can fear the future. What you can fear can come near but it isn't here. So, fear
means you are not here. You are in the future somewhere.
Are you beating up on somebody (judging or angry at them)? Like your ex, yourself, your friend,
your partner, your milkman, your neighbours, your country, your other country. If so, you are
living in the past because all the judgments you have right now, come from the past. Things that
happen right now don't carry any real weight unless some issue from your past is lingering
around waiting for a peg to hang onto. The past is not here, so, if you are angry or missing the
past, you are not here either.
Lazy. When the pace slows down, at some point (different for everyone) your mind starts to
wonder into fairyland. Now, some people love this fantasy-land because reality to them is hell.
But staying there is very detrimental. Because people in fairyland aren't here either.
The Laws of Nature - Creating Certainty
It is my experience that false expectations of life, work and relationship cause us to become
confused. Why me? Why did that happen? Why did my wonderful business fail? Why did he
have an affair?
The laws of nature explain the order in the chaos. When people are traumatised or blocked in
life it is because of doubt. There are many causes of doubt: self doubt, other doubt, life doubt,
global doubt. But in the Laws of Nature we say "let the doubt be cleared"
Doubt is a confusion. The main cause of it is that we cannot understand the dynamics of a
certain circumstance and therefore we feel, uncertain about the outcome. Nearly every negative
human emotion stems from doubt: anger, violence, fear, greed, envy, malice, jealousy.
The Laws of nature are the one and only way to cause certainty. They provide the answers to the
questions that cause doubt. They are different to religion or spiritual practices because those are
created to "cause" certain behaviour. To cause goodness or peace. The laws of nature do not
have a motive other than to run the universe.
Let your doubts be cleared. If you apply the laws of nature to any circumstance in the universe
you will see order in chaos. Always. There is nothing that can happen outside the universal laws
of nature. So, even though you might not like it because it upsets your humanitarian wish list,
the laws show cause and effect as it really is, and because of this, there is certainty.
Building Certainty of the Future - the Laws of Nature - Clearing Doubt.
Doubt kills. Confusion sabotages. Insecurity triggers avoidance. Two conflicting messages spin
people in circles. Unproductive relationships and business are filled with doubt.
The laws of nature say "let your doubts be cleared"
The law of Balance will predict the rise and fall of stock markets, real estate prices, emotional
wellness, seasons.
The law of growth will predict war, tsunami, avalanche, volcano, earth quake, stock market
crash, business success, health, and relationship futures.
The law of interconnectedness will predict the difference between what people want, hope for
and wish and what is actually happening.
The law of Harmony will predict the rise and fall of business, relationship, nations,
governments, products, services, fads, fashion.
The law of Hierarchy will predict human differences, conflict, love, structures, organisation,
evolution of the specie, extinction, environmental change, global warming, science, technology,
internet, and the future.
The laws of Nature for More Love
According to the laws of nature, love is the balance of support and challenge. This defies the
natural ambitions of the body and our emotional thinking both of which want pleasure without
pain.
Love is natural. We love without force or education. We can love even if we are a vegetable,
blind, deaf and dumb and unable to move, we can love. In fact, the less we can move the more
likely we can love more.
With computers, internet, iPods, TV, cars, buses, planes, advertisements, elephants, colonics,
health food, mobile phones - all of which makes us think more - love can become a rather
synthetic conglomeration of sexual attraction, obligation, contract commitments and
convenience. The head rules.
But synthetic love is not happiness. No matter how much of all those things we get in our life, we
would not have more love. Even a plasma, 2000 inch wide screen TV, doesn't make people more
loving.
In fact, more love comes from less trying. It is one of the most radical departures from modern
day pathways of life to think that if you want more of something, you have to want it less. The
N.L.P teachers and US self help gurus would squirm at their income sheets.
The less we want love - the more of it we have because support and challenge are always there.
The Laws of Nature Unblocking Locked Love
There is really only one thing that can block love and that is "emotion"
That seems easy. The hard part is dealing with it. 50% of all emotion comes from subconscious
stuff and this is the meat and potatoes of your meditation practices.
The other 50% you can witness in daily life. What we normally say is that "expectations block
love" so, really, if you are committed to happiness for yourself and others, you'll find yourself
continually adjusting your expectations.
That's theoretically easy. When someone does something you don't like, just say "what did I
expect" shrug your shoulders as if to say " oh, well" and smile. The problem with this is running
a business without clear standards, or a home without boundaries. You are goind to have no
control whatsoever, and in both those situations, work and family, if you lead, it means control
at some level at least.
The trick is to have two minds. One that loves everything. The other that doesn't. Blocked love is
just caused by listening to the wrong one.
HUMAN AGENCY IN HISTORY
For most of human history, the reach of human agency has been short and feeble. With the
advent of hydraulic agricultural societies some 4000 years ago and then industrial capitalism
some 400 years ago, human agency has been greatly extended in terms of raw power in many
realms of human activity. However, modern science with its penchant for 'totalizing' theory,
reduces human agency to compliance with universal laws of nature and society. Much
postmodern reflection on human agency accepts the presumptions of modern science about
totalizing 'laws' of nature or society and thus, remains pessimist (Rosenau 1992, p.81).
In those postmodern critiques which speak against the possibility of human agency, the data
they marshall are convincing. Most human beings were subject to the blind forces of nature:
drought, disease, storm, and starvation. For them, life is short, brutal and nasty. Even in the face
of the great increase in human agency for those who are captains of industry or leaders or well-
armed nations, human agency has been assimilated into elite theory. Some of that elitism
focussed upon Natural law as understood by Thomas Aquinas and some focussed upon natural
law as understood by Comte, Laplace, Pareto and others. For Aquinas, freedom is collapsed into
compliance with divine Law. For Laplace, freedom is encompassed by natural law; in both,
structure has precedence over volition.
Structuralism Since the publication of Novum Organum by Bacon in 1620 and Principia
Mathematica by Newton in 1687, there has been a quest for the deep and enduring structures
which pre-form natural and social behavior. In the Enlightenment, the search entailed discovery
of universal laws of biology, physiology, psychology and sociology with which to guide public
policy. Rationality and freedom were the icons of modern science but freedom was limited to the
use of theory to design society. Rationality meant that, in order to be a fully active subject, one
had to confine one's action to that which was compatible with those natural structures as
revealed by universal law. To act in ways not compatible with natural structures was to be the
fool, the idiot or the psychopath; to waste one's time and that of others.
Structuralists see permanent, natural and universal structures everywhere. Greek and Roman
thought began structural analysis with its use of the human body as metaphor for society
(Polkenhorne 1983, p.135). Hegel gave structuralism a powerful impetus when he posited and
published a coherent map of the structures of history and social life in which a 'Spirit' of orderly
Reason emerged to give pattern to art, religion, philosophy and science as well as to mind, soul
and society. Movement in history is the movement toward Absolute Spirit by which Hegel meant
a state governed by and governing surely and forcibly with knowledge of universal laws of nature
and society. This made a lot of sense given a Newtonian world view and a stratified political
economy which privileged people and peoples. All else was only 'becoming' and could be
dismissed as 'imperfection.'
In anthropology, Lévi-Strauss posited deep structures in mind and society which preorganized
thought and action. Wertheimer, in Gestalt theory, posited four grouping structures which
organized human perception. Kant posited 12 natural categories which guided empiric research
and did not contaminate pure reason. Husserl posited deep structures which constituted and
preshaped human grasp of natural and social 'facts.' For Husserl, human beings did have a
creative role in the knowledge process but that role was presumed to be based upon such natural
and essential structures (eidos) that objective knowledge was possible (Polkenhorne 1983, p.42).
In moral development, six natural stages posited by Kohlberg preëmpted moral theory. In
sociology and in economics, a variety of modernists posited a single set of social functions
toward which all structural change was a becoming.
Deep structures, if linear in their geometry, are inimical to human agency. Linearity implies that
that which exists in the present fully determines that which shall exist in the future. This is a
view which informs much neo-fascist social philosophy in that it tends to privilege the present as
necessity and the future as inevitable. Chaos theory, of course, delegitimates that view. There are
no inevitabilities in nonlinear dynamics of natural and social systems. Instead what is found are
three generic forms of change within which there is more, or less, room for human agency. This
essay tells the story of these kinds of change and explores their meaning for a theory of human
agency in a time of great uncertainty.
Fractal Structures: Natural and Analytic Chaos theory offers a view of 'structure' which
reconciles the insistence of reductionists that such totalizing entities do not exist yet accepts the
insistence of structuralists that there is a whole from which the behavior of the parts is given
both meaning and direction. In Chaos theory, nonlinear dynamics produce natural structures,
the fractal geometry of which varies, depending upon their dynamical state; there are five such
states discussed below. The geometry of such structures also varies with scale of observation:
that which is a solid object from the point of view of a human scale of observation becomes
almost completely empty space when viewed at sub-atomic scales. At scales of observation
between, there is an interesting self-similarity in structure but there are qualitative differences
as well--in the very same object.
In all this Chaos theory grounds a philosophy of science and knowledge very different from that
of modern, Newtonian metaphysics and thus renders much of the postmodern critique of
modern philosophy of science moot since it decenters modern science and relegates its
presumptions to just a small portion of the actually existing natural and social systems. It is not
that modern science and its project is to be rejected; only that it is to reserve its claims to those
very simple natural and social systems which behave linearly and predictably. There remains
much that is valuable in modern science but, as a grounding for a theory of human agency, there
is much to criticize. Chaos theory offers a beginning which answers most of the objections of
post-structuralism.
HUMAN AGENCY IN MODERN PHILOSOPHY In the Enlightenment version of modernity, in

order for human agency to exist, several prerequisites are necessary. For some expressions of
the Enlightenment, such as those who follow Nietzsche, only superior individuals have the
intelligence and the will to impose their desires on lesser people. For others who follow Hegel,
the state is the repository of both Reason and Will. Still others such as Bacon or Comte thought
that a collegium of scientists could advise the state. Still others such as Marx thought a far
reaching democracy could link reason to otherwise intractable problems of life. More
demanding modernist theories of human agency require:
1) an emancipated subject who would have goals above and beyond those activities
preprogrammed by genes, or by 'primitive society' or by those mapped by preëxisting norms,
laws, customs and morés common to the society in which the person was socialized. To take on
preexisting goals is not, in modern understanding of agency, an act of autonomous Will.
2) a knowing subject who would have precise and positive knowledge about the dynamics of that
part of the natural and social order s/he wished to shape in their own interest.
3) a creating subject who would be able to provide self with all the tools essential to a task. Use
of others as instruments of one's own will is permitted.
4) a rational subject who would have to use instrumental reason with sufficient skill such that
the probability with which goals are achieved routinely surpasses chance.
5) A 'principled' subject who would apply scientific or moral principles rigorously and uniformly
over the raw material at hand. And finally,
6) a willful subject, some would say ruthless, others would say goal oriented, who would not be
deterred by sustained opposition, adversity or defeat.
For many postmodernists, it would be fair of modernists to posit human agency only if the
acting person embodied these most stringent standards above. But few can meet these
standards. The operative question is whether these standards are fairly set. The argument here
is that those who demand these standards for human agency are more interested in control and
compliance than in principled behavior founded upon 'rational social philosophy.' As we shall
see, Chaos theory instructs us that natural and social systems are stable and survive precisely
because they are 'unprincipled,' i.e., they behave nonlinearily. More generally, Chaos theory
rejects the clock-like dynamics upon which modern science is based and from which modernist
theory of human agency is drawn.
Many would argue that these criteria are too stringent; that the test of human agency is met
when one acts with insight and enthusiasm in the embodiment of existing norms; that human
agency is found when one is creative and innovative in existing institutions and that human
agency can be seen in efforts to reform and extend foundational concepts and practices in an
otherwise good and decent society. There is much merit to this position but I am considering the
ways in which Chaos theory speaks to a theory of human agency which meets even these most
rigorous tests.
Post-structuralist Critique Skeptics in the postmodern camp take their lead from Nietzsche who
questioned the facticity of these deep structures. They question the preoccupation of modern
science with truth, natural law and objective theory without a human author immersed in a
political, constitutive process. For postmodernists, all knowledge about structure is a quest for
power more than for truth (Foucault, Derrida). Saussure, in his work on general linguistics,
1915, led critique at the level of thinking and knowing (Polkenhorne 1983, p. 152). Lyotard and
Hassan gave the same treatment to the grand narratives of modern science and modern religion.
When one deconstructs any such narrative about language, mind, perception or politics, one
finds a politics and a poetry which presents itself as universal truth.
HUMAN AGENCY IN AFFIRMATIVE POSTMODERN THOUGHT

Human agency has a more optimistic future in both critical theory and in American social
psychology. Predecessors of critical theory in Europe, Vico, Droysen, Windelband, Rickert,
Dilthey, Wundt, Husserl, and especially Weber set the human sciences outside the reach of
natural law and thus provided space for human action. Marx had insisted that, in capitalism,
one could see the possibility of collective human agency; of the end of the 'idiocy' of prehistory.
Given good theory and good politics, a universal subject could be brought into being. Critical
theorists today argue that there is a shifting and complex connection between economics on the
one side and ideological hegemony on the other which, along with other structural constraints
such as patriarchy and racism, shapes the possibility of human emancipation (Held 1980).
In America, social psychologists from Mead to Cooley to Blumer saw the possibility of human
agency even against the putatively iron laws of nature and society. In their reading of the social
process, human agency was not captive to natural law. Rather human beings constructed the
social life worlds in which they lived out their lives. Given the human hand in such construction,
there are any number of ways to create social realities. Anthropology confirmed the great variety
of social forms by reporting data on the 3 to 4000 societies which sentient human beings,
collectively, in their wisdom and with their own agency have constructed.
Postmodern Phenomenology The postmodern phenomenology offered here differs greatly from
Husserlian phenomenology. In it, there are no preëxisting and natural categories which shape
thought and action. There are, however, linguistic categories which do preshape thought and
action but these do not predate culture nor are they located exclusively in the mind of the single
acting individual. Mind, self and society emerge continuously within an ever-changing symbolic
envelope. Foucault has laid out, in a wide-ranging series of books, the changing categories with
which we grasp the dynamics of madness, crime and human sexuality. Marx has laid out the
changing principles with which one can grasp the larger economic factors which preshape
thought and action. Gilligan showed the political nature of Kohlberg's rendition of moral
development and its preference for linearity. Feminist theologians and others have noted
changes in the god concept in religion.
In all this, the human being is very visible as author of the categories of thought and action. In
all this, one can see political agendas, legitimated as universal truth, inside the knowledge
process. Postmodern phenomenology building upon the work of Husserl, Sussure, Wittgenstein
and others offers a much broader field to human agency in the invention of reality and all
sciences which purport to describe that reality than do modernist phenomenologists who follow
Husserl and assert universal and natural categories of experience or analysis (Young, 1992b).
Postmodern phenomenology grounded upon the new sciences of chaos and complexity, offers a
view of human agency which concedes that there are 'structures' in the human mind and human
culture which preshape thought and action but insist that these structures are themselves
historical and ever-changing.
Whatever one's views on human agency, Chaos theory offers insight and guidance into the
delicate and shifting relationship between order and disorder in ways not permitted in modern
science nor imagined in more traditional knowledge processes. It is in those dynamics that one
can find a theory of human agency which is at once, affirmative and realistic. The realm of
necessity and the realm of freedom are not mutually exclusive nor does the dominate the other
in all dynamical states; they are always found together. There is never a time in a nonlinear
system in which there is no order; never a time in a stable system when there is not disorder.
Human agency and human determinism dwell in the same theoretical house.
CHAOS AND NONLINEAR DYNAMICS Edward Lorenz, James Yorke, Mitchell Feigenbaum,
Stephen Smale, Benoit Mandelbrot and many others developed the theory, math and the
sequences of nonlinear dynamics in natural systems (Gleick, 1988). The work of Mandelbrot is
central. Mandelbrot worked for the Thomas Watson laboratory of IBM and was charged with
solving the problem of interference in electronic transmission of signals. Mandelbrot found that,
at all scales of observations, electromagnetic dynamics were fractal rather than integral. From
that insight, Mandelbrot (1977) went on to generalize that the ontology of all natural systems
was fractal rather than integral.
Given the nonlinear behavior and fractal geometry of almost all natural and social systems, one
might first think that, in such an irrational world, human effort and human purpose is pointless.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Human agency is possible; the operative question is
when and what is possible. It is the changing ratio between order and disorder; between
harmony and disharmony; between linearity and nonlinearity which answers such questions. At
time, human interests warrant a preference for order but for most human purpose varying
degrees of disorder are most helpful.
Human Action in a NonLinear Social Life-World In this section, I invite the reader to look at the
various dynamic states which social systems can take and to think with me about the degree to
which human action and agency is possible within each and between all of them. We will look at
the first four dynamical states in some detail and explore the fifth state a bit later. Figure 1 offers
two views of four equilibrium regimes. One view is that of the familiar time-series; the second is
that of the fractal geometry of systems dynamics in phase-space. It is explication of this fractal
geometry which opens up profound implications for the philosophy of science and, in this
application, human agency.
The first form, 'A,' in Figure 1 is called a point attractor and the second is called a limit attractor.
These two forms describe a dynamics in which there is little space for human agency. There are
also two semi-stable attractors; the torus and the butterfly attractor. The latter two are called
'strange' attractors since a system is attracted to a particular region of phase space. These
attractors provide space for human agency in ways not possible in those dynamics privileged by
Newtonian physics, Aristotelian logic, Euclidean geometry and the linear causality they
presume.
For Box A in Figure 1, the realm of freedom collapses into a single point. For Box B in Figure 1,
the realm of freedom is tightly confined to a single repeating curve. If one were to base a theory
of political agency upon these linear dynamics, one would hold that rational human agency
involves the discovery of necessity and compliance to that which is necessary. However,
nonlinear dynamics are far more common and far more open to choice among uncertain futures.
The first such attractor, Box C, is called the torus. Social dynamics which take the form of a torus
have some limited room for human agency. It is Box D, the butterfly attractor and its close
cousins (with 4n, 8n, and 16n outcome basins) in which one finds significant human agency
possible. A fifth kind of dynamics, full chaos, is discussed later since the human agency it offers
is qualitatively different.
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Figure 2: First Order Change: The Torus
For all such systems whose key parameters produce a torus, human agency is limited but it is
there. In this first order trans-formation, the regularity found in the point attractor or limit
attractor gives way to some uncertainty. We know that a given system will end up some where
within the torus but we do not know just where to find it.
Think of the single line in Figure 2 as the dynamics of a family, a firm, a fellowship or a college
class over the course of some given time period, say a year, on any given variable of interest to
the researcher. If one is interested in say, number of children, employees, members, or
attendance patterns, one would see that such values would stay within given limits over the
course of a year but do vary. If a couple needs at least ten children to be certain that five would
live to provide social and economic security in old age, human agency is a complex process
limited by such exogenous factors as food supply, health care practices, religious values and
personal vigor.
If the third set of lines in Figure 2 were, say, a large set of families, firms, fellowships or classes,
one might see sufficient pattern to call that behavior a 'structure.' However similar, no iteration
of a family or a firm is ever precisely the same as that of another family or firm. Similarity-but-
not-sameness is the quintessence of the torus and of first order change. In any environment in
which the key parameters produce a torus, one has latitude to move within the confines of the
torus. Larger freedoms are difficult. For instance, one does not have the 'freedom' to choose to
produce no children else one is bereft in one's old age. Nor may one choose to have ten healthy
children if such numbers exceed the carrying capacity of the political economy at hand.
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Second Order Change There is one feature of the torus in Figure 2 which does not sit well within
the logic of modern science. It has great import for a theory of human agency. Chaos research
shows when an attractor is about to bifurcate into two (or more) outcome basins. If parameters
increase linearly, outcomes change linearly. Not so in Chaos dynamics. Figure 3 shows a
Poincaré section of a torus in which a small change might make a large difference. Figure 4 show
that cross section in more detail.
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Figure 3: Poincare' Section of a Torus

If one looks carefully at the cross section of the torus, Figure 4, one can see two tongues; the first
at the extreme left which if expanded more, would expand human agency. This feature of a torus
tells us that a new attractor is about to be born. Something is going on with the key parameters
in a dynamical field which makes existing ways to do family (or business, religion or education)
difficult or undesirable for some portion of the families (or firms, churches or schools) at hand.
That tongue alerts us to the nonlinear emergence of, say, new gender relations or new
opportunities for business expansion or to imminent sectarian schisms in a fellowship or new
programs in a university.
Figure 4: Second Order Change
In modern science, there is one and only one outcome basin in an outcome field; all systems of a
kind are required to behave alike for a given set of conditions (or at least remain inside the
geometry of a torus). All else is random error, faulty research design, inadequate
instrumentation or just bad theory. Modern science tolerates variation around a mean with the
concept of the well known 'normal' distribution for 'adequate' theory. Penrose (1989) uses the
term, 'superb' for theories which have a precision approaching 1014. In Chaos theory there can
be two or more outcome basins to which similar systems with similar initial conditions can go.
The precision with which one can chart those outcomes varies depending upon the complexity of
the outcome basin. Weak correlations may be not a product of weak theory or of poor
instrumentation but of actual indeterminate dynamics. Moreover, what is a strong correlation in
one region of phase-space may be a weak correlation in another for such similarly situated
systems.
Postmodern science grounded upon Chaos theory conceives of structure as a loose and
everchanging form, the solidity and reality of which is variable depending upon scale of
observation and upon dynamical state. In that difference is a major insight for a theory of
human agency. Social structures have a fractal value which might be very loose or very tight
depending upon the key parameters above. There is never a time in which causality is so tight in
Chaotic regimes that human agency is impossible. There is always some room for Will and
Desire to combine to move to a different region in an outcome basin, even in a torus.
What is process at one scale of observation can be seen as structure at another scale. It is the
pattern of social action which, over countless iterations, produces structure as Figure 2, above
suggests. It is the changing ratio between order and disorder in a given outcome field which is so
very different from the ontologies of modern science. These differences force rethinking of our
idea of structure and, indeed, of our philosophies of human agency. In brief, for any nonlinear
system, there is space for human agency. That space opens up as a torus expands into phase
space. At crucial points, key parameters change and new attractors can be and are invented by
human agency. In their wisdom or folly, human beings act and in that action expand the causal
field into two, four, eight or more outcome basins. In any semi-stable field under stress, a causal
basin can explode to fill the space available and thus expand the scope of human agency.
The generic point is that small changes in key parameters can force open a monolithic causal
basin to accommodate still more outcome basins thus increasing both the range of choices and
the regions of uncertainty in which human agency might play. The term used in Chaos theory to
denote such moments at which causal basins expand is bifurcation. The first bifurcation
produces a butterfly attractor.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Butterflies, Bifurcations and Human Agency

Figure 5a, upper right, presents a very puzzling view of the butterfly attractor shown in Figure 1,
in the first section, above.
One will note that, in Figure 5b lower right, there is an 2n outcome basin rather than the unitary
basin in the torus shown in the Poincaré section in Figure 4, above.
Near the center of each region of a 2n attractor, outcomes are pretty certain and, thus, human
agency is limited as it was in the Torus (in fact, a butterfly attractor can be understood to be
comprised of two connected tori). At the edge of each causal basin and between the two basins,
certainty is lost; a moth or a marriage might end up in either basin or drift endlessly back and
forth between two outcome states. To the degree that a family or a firm has control over key
parameters, there are quite specific points at which small adjustments can produce large
changes. Human agency is greatly expanded given such conditions.
The Butterfly Attractor has, then, at least three major implications for a theory of human agency.
In the first instance, there are two options between which, as mentioned, a firm or couple could
chose given resources where before there was but one. Today, many couples live childless
without social onus or legal sanction and then, after some variable number of years, may
separate without legal obligation. The possibility of new forms of intimacy with or without
children opens up the realm of freedom, If one were to calculate the portion of phase space in
which human agency were possible, one would find that a Butterfly Attractor has more potential
available for individual action than does a torus.
A second theoretical point upon which to focus is that there is an area between outcome basins
in which dynamics and thus prediction is fractal. There is considerable stability, pattern and
predictability for, say, couples which dwell within either basin of a butterfly attractor; for those
couples at the margins, they may enter into a fairly stable relationship--or may not. This region
of uncertainty is a goodly portion of the total basin of outcomes and greatly expands human
choice if not human problems. If certainty is enemy to choice and human agency requires
uncertainty, one can determine with considerable precision what ratio exists and thus have a
reading on the room for agency.
Loye and Eisler have picked up on still another theoretical point. If one wishes to intervene in
near to stable social dynamics (in order to expand or reduce a range of options), one has the
benefit of improved forecasting which helps identify points of transition. As they put it (1987, p.
57), Chaos theory can be used to develop 'early warning systems' which can help forestall crises
or identify newly emerging routes out of disorder. When human agency requires both pattern
and variation, such warnings are most useful.
A fourth point upon which one might focus is that, in such a causal field human agency, hence
moral agency, changes its location from the individual acting firm, family or person, in part, to
the whole causal basin. Again, Chaos theory offers a most important point for a theory of human
agency since some of the parameters which structure the ratio between certainty and
uncertainty involves collective agreement as much as individual volition. There are grounds for
democratic political theory in this point.
2N+ Outcome Fields
If one bifurcation alters the ratio between freedom and necessity, the question becomes what
meaning do two, three, four and more bifurcations have for a theory of human agency. The most
general point one can make is that, up to a point, an increase in the number of attractors
increases potential for human agency. However, there is a caveat: while uncertainty may be
essential to agency, several overlapping uncertainties might lead to chaos. For example, a couple
might have the resources to handle one uncertainty or perhaps two uncertainties (say about
income or about work schedule) in their lives but three or more uncertain parameters (say
health, income, or work schedule) could push that couple into a chaotic dynamics.
The realm of human agency grows discontinuously as ever more outcome basins are produced
yet there is a very regular procession toward a fully chaotic regime. This procession is very
precisely choreographed by the Feigenbaum numbers below. We will find that freedom expands
up to a point, often enabling persons sufficient options with which to adjust to the disorder in
the larger society then, suddenly, freedom overwhelms human agency...and in the same instant
that coherence is lost, qualitatively new forms of order emerge. Those who cry freedom too
loudly call forth enough chaos to destroy the delicate balance between creativity and rationality.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Figure 6: Creation out of Chaos
Figure 6 sets forth the entire series of transformations from order to disorder across the five
dynamical states found in Chaos research. At each of four points (identified by 'Feigenbaum
numbers'), more bifurcations produce more outcome basins in regular succession--until the
fourth bifurcation. It is a remarkable feature of nonlinear dynamics that 2n, 4n, and 8n outcome
basins are relatively stable, given nonlinear feedback loops, but with the next small change in a
key parameter, full chaos sets in.
One will note that stability and certainty are fairly tight in region A (that of the butterfly
attractor). In region C, that is the region in phase-space where 2n, 4n, 8n and 16n outcome
basins are found, there are variable ratios of necessity and freedom. In Region D, full chaos
reigns. One cannot predict the fate of a student, a family, a firm or a society in such a social
milieu. However, one will note that, in Region D, there are bars and spots of white interspersed
in the darker region of fully chaotic dynamics. These white regions are regions of order; entirely
new forms of order emerge out of chaos.
Chaos is a source of discontinuous change and renewal in both natural and social systems. As
bifurcations proceed toward deep chaos; the illusion of freedom increases...yet paradoxically,
human agency dimenishes with each bifurcation beyond the fourth bifurcation.
A fourth source of freedom has to do with the contest between order and disorder in these new
regions.
It was Prigogine's explanation of how order emerged out of disorder which won him a Nobel
prize in 1977 (Prigogine and Stengers 1984). Prigogine and countless others knew that the basic
assumption of thermodynamics was in error; there is no tendency for the universe to
disassemble into 'its most probable state' as the second 'Law' demands. More complex forms of
organization have developed in both natural and social systems; the question is how? The
answer Prigogine gave was that energy dissipated from disintegrating systems can be used to
build new systems from the parts discarded. Out of the turbulence of change and disorder come
new forms of order.
POLICY IMPLICATIONS
The most encompassing point with which to fashion a theory of human agency and thus a
humanist sociology is that transformations from one chaotic regime to another arise from
changes in parameters of the whole system. It is bifurcations in key parameters of the whole
system which drive it toward an expansion of its outcome field. In studies of weather systems, of
gypsy moths, of heart muscles, of DNA or of molecular crystallization, the 'structure' of cells,
birds, insects, water or molecules do not change as phase transitions follow upon one another
(Holden 1986) but the structures qua patterns of dynamics most certainly do change. One
cannot appeal, in the first instance, to the characteristics of the parts with which to explain the
changing pattern of the whole. As Briggs and Peat note in their work, Chaos is a science of the
whole. In short, one cannot explain transformations in wealth, weather, bankruptcy, biology,
economic, medical or marriage forms by appeal to and only to the personal characteristics of the
persons affected. Given this insight, the first and most encompassing policy implication is:
I. Preservation of near-to-stable social dynamics requires identification of key parameters in the

whole system at hand and careful modulation of those parameters such that they do not cycle
beyond the Feigenbaum point of full chaos.
Discussion: The Feigenbaum numbers suggest that there is some ratio of variety in income,
social status or social power which a creative society must exceed and another ratio beyond
which a just society (and thus stable) does not exceed. Chaos theory implies that when effective
income inequalities remains but 2, 4, or 8 times that of one sector of the population over
another sector, a society can be stable. If effective income bifurcates beyond 8, 16, and 32 times,
the secondary and tertiary needs of the first group tend to drive the economy and to price the
poorer group out of the market for primary goods. In such a case, one can expect human agency
of those excluded to create new outcome basins; some of which may be most congenial to the
human project and some more hostile. In like fashion, given a group with 8, 16, or 32 times as
much political power as another group, the more powerful group tends to make social policy in
public and private sectors which give preference to its own welfare at the expense of minorities.
II. Nonlinear feedback prevents destabilizing amplification of system periods and cycles.
Discussion: Only Chaos can cope with Chaos. Conferral of social status may be the most
significant stabilizing tactic with which to limit the amplification of deviation in the parameters
above. The essence of social status is that the person to whom it is awarded may participate in
the construction of all relevant kinds of social reality and that the person has access to the
resources with which to do so apart from merit or income. One gets what one needs to be a full
person irrespective of any linear, quantifiable input the person makes to the occasion at hand.
Market dynamics tend to be rational; hence ultimately destabilizing as wealth and power
amplify. Social justice, in its irrationality, tends to be stabilizing. Absent status, even social
justice programs tend to be cheap, mean-spirited and degrading...this form of social justice
amplifies the very bifurcations meant to be constrained by policy. Absent status, the giving
group tends to intrude into the personal life of the recipient group exacerbating resentment and
escalating costs.
III. Efficacy of social control institutions as well as the utility of cybernetics varies with
equilibrium state.
Discussion: Social justice is preferable to criminal justice as a solution to the problem of order.
Pattern and predictability fade as phase transitions cascade toward full chaos. In social terms, if
a system passes the fourth Feigenbaum number, social control tactics fail entirely. Policies
oriented to law and order; recourse to criminal justice, civil suits, monitoring and sanctioning,
private security systems and other control systems tend to become ineffective as uncertainties
escalate. Criminal justice tends to be counter-productive on several scores; it tends to increase
the amount of pain and resentment in a society and thus encourages conflict. It tends to be
linear while social justice tends to be nonlinear. Being linear, criminal justice amplifies status
inequalities; being nonlinear, social justice tends to damp inequality.
IV. Small changes in key parameters can prevent large changes later on.
Discussion This point will be very welcome to the ears of those who like minimal intrusion of the
state into the economy and private life. Small changes in rental rates, interest rates or tax rates
can produce large increases in affordable housing, sustainable agriculture or energy effective
transport if made at strategic points. These strategic points are given by the Feigenbaum
numbers; if one wishes to double affordable housing, the Feigenbaum number for the ratio
between income and housing costs must be at least 3.0; if one wishes to quadruple affordable
housing, the Feigenbaum number is 3.5. At both these points, a small increase will push the
system into the next phase transition while a small decrease in that ratio (by taxation or
adjustment in interest rates, for example) will, if Chaos dynamics are instructive, pull it back
from the abyss.
V. Personal freedom on the one hand and social order on the other can be harmonized by some
attention to the number of outcome basins offered in any given sector of the social order.
Discussion: From the sections above, one can see that differing configurations of outcome basins
affect human agency. There are many important dimensions of personal choice in all near to
stable outcome fields; the torus, the butterfly attractor as well as 4n, 8n, and 16n basin fields.
The costs and risks of 32n outcome basins may not be worth the gain in personal freedom for
some few persons, given the loss of pattern and coherency for the whole system. Chaos theory
thus suggests that social policy can be formed which satisfies our interest in stability and
continuity on the one hand together with creativity, spontaneity and flexibility on the other.
VI. Full Chaos tends to produce new order; not complete disorder.
Discussion: This is that third order change within which human agency is severely limited. The
task for a democratic political philosophy is to observe new forms of politics, new forms of
economics, new forms of religion or family and explore their potential for the human project.
The events in Eastern Europe lends itself to this kind of research.
There well may be times and realms of social life in which full chaos is beneficial to the system.
Given unresponsive institutionalization of social practices which amplify inequalities, full blown
chaos with its destructive/creative dialectics may serve to unfreeze existing power/class
configurations while producing innovations, some of which may be most congenial to the
human project. There may be times when revolution is more congenial to the human project
than is the slow and gentle evolution of mediated social change.
I would be remiss if I were to fail to point out that it is precisely in such situations one finds both
the ugliest as well as the most emancipatory social engagements. This is the time when wisdom
and judgment is best deployed and when the ancient teachings of the Buddha, the Christ and
Mohammed remain most valuable to the human enterprize.
MANAGING CHAOS
There is an emerging literature in both natural and social science about the tactics by which low
order chaos can be managed. A. Hübler (1992) of the Beckman Institute at University of Illinois,
and Stephen Guastello, (1992) Psychology, Marquette University offer papers to that possibility.
In brief, one manages chaos by determining its dominant chaotic regime and adding enough
matching chaos to maintain the desired balance between order and disorder. There are several
advantages to nonlinear regimes for ordinary biological, physiological, psychological and
sociological processes. The fact that Chaos can cope with chaos is embedded in all these
advantages. In population dynamics, in heartbeat, in thinking and in talking, nonlinearity
permits at once of pattern and predictability and, in the same moment, of flexibility and
creativity. Without nonlinearity, life would be chancy indeed and communication most
primitive.
CONCLUSION As we expand from a knowledge process oriented solely to the linear dynamics of
newtonian mechanics, space is opened for reconsideration of the nature of human agency, the
concept of deviancy, the utility of stability and the efficacy of authoritarian structures such as
bureaucracies and centrally planned economies. Political and ethical implications of Chaos
theory await exploration as do its implications for the philosophy of science and the
development of the research tools with which to pursue the knowledge process and to evaluate
the validity of what we discover.
It is good to keep in mind, in all of this, that the scope of human agency varies with scale; at the
scale of direct, real time interpersonal interaction, there is never a time when one cannot change
one's own immediate journey through life. One is always responsible for what one does; given
2n+ attractors, one has more choice and becomes more responsible. It is true that there are
larger social processes within which one must live and within which one must fit oneself if one is
to survive the moment, however variation, change, creativity and surprise are always found in
nonlinear social dynamics; the operative questions are how much change and surprise is
available and how such whatever agency available contributes to equity and social justice. A
central point in this essay is that, at every level of social organization, there is some level of
freedom; with that freedom comes responsibility. Unless we develop a politics with which to
constrain that science to human values which transcend a given moment or a given class or a
given society, human agency might not always be congenial to the human condition.
Disclaimer:
None of the statement in this document is mine. It is not an offence in sharing what I thought is
best!

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