I saw an article yesterday that caught my attention:
"At a casual glance, the recent cascades of American disasters might seem unrelated. In a span of fewer than six months in 2017, three U.S. Naval warships experienced three separate collisions resulting in 17 deaths. A year later, powerlines owned by PG&E started a wildfire that killed 85 people. The pipeline carrying almost half of the East Coast’s gasoline shut down due to a ransomware attack. Almost half a million intermodal containers sat on cargo ships unable to dock at Los Angeles ports. A train carrying thousands of tons of hazardous and flammable chemicals derailed near East Palestine, Ohio. Air Traffic Control cleared a FedEx plane to land on a runway occupied by a Southwest plane preparing to take off. Eye drops contaminated with antibiotic-resistant bacteria killed four and blinded fourteen.
"While disasters like these are often front-page news, the broader connection between the disasters barely elicits any mention. America must be understood as a system of interwoven systems; the healthcare system sends a bill to a patient using the postal system, and that patient uses the mobile phone system to pay the bill with a credit card issued by the banking system. All these systems must be assumed to work for anyone to make even simple decisions. But the failure of one system has cascading consequences for all of the adjacent systems. As a consequence of escalating rates of failure, America’s complex systems are slowly collapsing.
The core issue is that changing political mores have established the systematic promotion of the unqualified and sidelining of the competent. This has continually weakened our society’s ability to manage modern systems." The rest of the article is posted
here.
I agree with everything quoted above, but unless this is the first post you've read here, this should not surprise you.
Complexity is a race condition, where innovation has to occur at a geometrically increasing rate in order to keep pace with the new problems it creates. It's just another way of describing entropy. Complexity outpacing innovation is one reason why societal collapse is and has always been guaranteed. It's a huge explanation of what is coming and why.
Why do I bring up the article, beyond reminding you of this point? I am not known by a lot of people, but most people who know of me do not think highly of the things I say. The value people perceive in what I say follows the Pareto distribution, reflected both in the rate of consumption of what I produce (many have heard a little, some have read or watched a bit, and very few have read and watched it all) and the amount of donations across individuals (most donate nothing, some give a bit, very few give a lot). One of the reasons the people who underappreciate what I say do so is that they confuse the concentration of what I say for random ravings. Those paying attention will notice something very different, namely:
- Many of the things I say are echoed by really smart, highly specialized, rich, or famous people.
- These people usually only echo the ideas long after I said them.
- These people usually only have one or few, and they are typically their life's work.
What does it mean when there is a person who is emitting valuable ideas that cross many domains, equalling or surpassing the value of the most valuable people in each of those domains, and doing so at a rate that exceeds what a normal person can produce in effortless smalltalk?
I am not saying this to draw attention to myself, but to draw attention to the other ideas you've heard me say that you may not appreciate yet, and even more importantly, to induce you to seek to develop the same from the same source, "If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, and might save some of them." (Romans 11:14)
To condense what is a large topic into a more concise treatment, I will share the following by limiting myself to one reference and by ambiguously merging distinct topics such as intelligence, understanding, the spirit of God, and spiritual gifts.
The spirit of God is the source of all understanding, and it is experienced to varying degrees. The choices we make are what dictate the degree to which we receive God's spirit.
8 Wherefore, beware lest ye are deceived; and that ye may not be deceived seek ye earnestly the best gifts, always remembering for what they are given;
9 For verily I say unto you, they are given for the benefit of those who love me and keep all my commandments, and him that seeketh so to do; that all may be benefited that seek or that ask of me, that ask and not for a sign that they may consume it upon their lusts.
10 And again, verily I say unto you, I would that ye should always remember, and always retain in your minds what those gifts are, that are given unto the church.
11 For all have not every gift given unto them; for there are many gifts, and to every man is given a gift by the Spirit of God.
...
30 He that asketh in the Spirit asketh according to the will of God; wherefore it is done even as he asketh.
31 And again, I say unto you, all things must be done in the name of Christ, whatsoever you do in the Spirit;
32 And ye must give thanks unto God in the Spirit for whatsoever blessing ye are blessed with.
33 And ye must practise virtue and holiness before me continually. Even so. Amen. (D&C 46)
There are a diversity of manifestations of his spirit (see D&C 46:12-26), and each of these manifest in different intensities and different frequencies. When you see someone manifesting more of them more often and more intensely than others, you should confidently deduce that that person is fulfilling the aforementioned conditions ascribed, for "when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated." (D&C 130:21)
It is one thing to take these things lightly, and another to take them lightly precisely because of the abundance of evidence that you are given not to take them lightly. Consider, for example, the condemnation that fell upon the Jews because they persecuted Jesus precisely because of the abundance of evidence he provided that he knew the Father much better than they did and was much more like the Father than they were.