Worldviews.
The power of grand stories has inspired humanity for millennia, although Scientism is suggesting that they are but fictional myths. Historic views of utopian or dystopian futures are being displaced by increasingly nihilistic trends. Is there a symbiosis to be found between the flow of physical and spiritual energy? The relentless search for meaning and purpose distinguishes humans on this multicultural planet, despite political discord. Will the quest continue for the next 4 billion years or is there a finite narrative unfolding, written into the annals of time?
What is a worldview?
The relentless search for meaning and purpose distinguishes humans on this multicultural planet. Will the quest continue for the next 4 billion years or is there a finite narrative unfolding, which has been written into the annals of time? Yet we regularly live - or act out our lives - as if we have no worldview. What is a worldview, and how do we acquire or identify one?
My fear and loathing - part 1
In memory of Alexei Navalny.
(4th June 1976 - 16th Feb 2024)
August 2023 - Alexei Navalny (47), opposition leader and political prisoner in solitary confinement, expresses his views regarding the Russian political system, elite and wider influencers. Fighting for free elections to enable the transfer of power, an independent judiciary and freedom of speech, he espouses a ‘European path and democratic development’. Aspects of his worldview are clear as he bears his soul in this, his last major post, serialised in 2 parts. He also speaks with a prophetic voice…
My fear and loathing - part 2
In memory of Alexei Navalny.
(4th June 1976 - 16th Feb 2024)
August 2023 - Alexei Navalny (47) received an enhanced prison sentence of 19 years, while in solitary confinement in a Siberian Gulag. Born near Chernobyl, in Ukraine, an ardant Russian nationalist, lawyer and patriot, he became the first politician to canvas using social media. He exposed and campaigned against corruption and sought to dismantle Putin’s unassailable grip on power, espousing a ‘European path and democratic development’. Aspects of his worldview emerge as he bears his soul in this, his last major post, serialised in 2 parts.
[Photo by Nikita Pishchugin on Unsplash]
Navalny – A modern day Jeremiah?
The apparatus of Government created in the Soviet Union, following the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, applied the principle that ‘the end justifies the means’. Elimination of effective opposition through State sponsored terror was at its core, carried out by the ‘Cheka’, forerunner to the KGB and FSB. The same principle continues to this day, silencing voices of dissent. Alexei Navalny, former lawyer and leading opposition figure discovered that as he grew in prominence (eg gaining 28% of Moscow’s mayoral vote in 2013), intimidation, spurious accusations, isolation and assassination attempts followed. Consigned to prison, like the prophet Jeremiah who was thrown into a well to die, Navalny used courtroom appearances in 2013 & 2021 to affirm his faith and speak out against the corruption of the Russian State. His words live on.
The air we breathe.
The Australian Glen Scrivener opens; “Goldfish don’t see water. Goldfish see what’s in the water, they see what’s refracted through the water, but I assume (yes, assume – I haven’t done the proper investigations) that goldfish don’t see the water itself. And yet there it is. It’s their environment. Universal but invisible. It shapes everything they do and everything they see. But they don’t see it” (2022, p.11). Read the book review here.