Science, Poetry, Politics and Religion Found in a Delicate Balance

The numbers of people who believe the problem isn't real or, if it is, can be easily solved continue to overwhelm efforts of well meaning educators, political and religious leaders, and reporters to make clear the real scope of the problem and the real scope of the solution.   The economic troubles are only the symptoms.  There are ways to forestall economic troubles, but the underlying causes must be addressed.

It can be difficult to explain that various agencies; educational, governmental, religious and social have important and perhaps dissimilar roles to play in the solution.

Making the solution so much more difficult is the fact that many of those leaders themselves have confused their roles and succumbed to doctrinal and procedural errors.

It can be obvious, for example, that the current leadership of both major political parties in the United States is having particular difficulty finding solutions together.  This is a small voice, as of this writing anyway, and currently represents other small voices who would explain that difficulty naturally follows from the fact that the problem has not been correctly identified.

It might owe in large part to the fact that the problem is difficult to confront.

And it might well serve here to address the pieces of the problem one at a time, however much the solution requires all the pieces.

Quite much passing as science is no science.  Quite much passing as religion is no religion.  Very little the government of the United States has attempted lately is correctly within longstanding definitions of the role of government.  Many so called artists lately are actually artless.

Adding to that confusion is a new player with an uncertain role.  Although the internet certainly has the potential to connect more people with more truth, it has so far seemed to miss.  Students with a propensity to use words improperly can find their own definitions on the web.  The wrong answers have long been protected in the United States by the First Amendment, in good order, it would be assumed, to better ensure whether they are indeed wrong or perhaps right.  But the internet has turned wrong answers into overbearing monsters.  If a book tells you everything is true all at one time and place it is comparable to telling you nothing is at any time or place.  The marketplace of ideas has become a wilderness of pandemonium, for the current time anyway.  That condition might improve later.

Web page hit counts and other web based counts and polls are still undependable because proxy servers, tunnels and other interconnectivity technology is not coordinated well enough to pass along correct counts.  Even should the counts be made technologically correct, there are other factors.  There is usually little chance sites have representative samples of any population.  Much of the internet is an amalgam of competing privately owned technologies.

Although it might change later, people are still required to put too much of their lives and property in the hands of the programmers, a few self interested programmers, to participate in most internet activities.

The old newspaper-like format of The Town Voice is chosen for its familiarity and ease of readability and use.  It is also intended to identify it as something designed for the general public.  Whether or not much on the internet was intended for the general public there is a good question whether it is actually suitable for that.  The Town Voice strives to be, but there remains much confusion on other sites and systems how public or private things are.

The relationship between the "internet" and "news" had a very rough start.  The definition of "news," as generally followed by professional "news" media before the internet, included that it was of concern to, and for use by, the public as might be needed for the operation of democracy.  Copyright and libel laws apply differently when there is a genuine, strong public concern involved.  Widespread misunderstanding of the meaning and practical application of the First Amendment, combined with inexpensive and easy access to the internet lead to the wilderness of pandemonium discussed earlier.

Every attempt is made here however for a well schooled journalism.  That includes the following.

Any participation with The Town Voice requires no fees at all beyond your existing internet connection costs outside this site.

No special software is required.  This site is designed to be available to users of the oldest equipment possible across the internet.  This site does not accept fees from software developers to promote their software.  Because the servers used are hired, the equipment used to access them will need to be modern enough for those purposes.  If you're reading this online then whatever equipment you're using obviously must be adequate.

The site building techniques used here are available to the public.  You can build your own town voice if you don't like this one.

It is still not possible for just anyone to write just anything here.  Even sites with enough staff to answer erroneous and troublesome posts with immediate correct ones, and approach that popular ideal, no longer allow totally unlimited access.  The confusion over what should count as news in earlier days of the internet will be avoided here, just as the success of social networking technologies with more control over access has proved them needful.

The oft refrain of many professors of journalism is that news writers should avoid advocacy.  Over time their meaning has become twisted and lost.  There is indeed an important difference between fact and opinion.  Professional journalism has on the whole kept the separation clear with special pages for opinion and editorial comments.  However, all facts are just opinions for which some strong case can be made that they are the indeed true.  Lately some less responsible journalists have rejected as opinion things for which strong cases should at least be examined.  They have indeed silenced those strong cases with noisy opinions as though that should be counted fair.  An inordinate and misguided avoidance of "bias" has resulted in the incapacity to learn anything ever.

In avoiding "advocacy" of any opinion they have lost sight of their very purpose, to be advocates of one thing and one thing only, advocates of the truth.

The raison d'être of The Town Voice is to be an advocate of the truth, such as it is necessary for the operation of society generally, just as all professional journalism ought to be.

These are times truth needs to be rescued from the morass of opinion and counter-opinion.  Decisions have to be made, and more today than ever the public needs to make them, but it requires a methodical determination of the truth of the matter.

No opinion will end the gridlock currently in Congress.  The time has come for a determination of some facts.  It is no simple process.  There are several lengthy articles on the nature of truth, debate, and resolutions here.

However much the wild west of the internet contributed to the problem, it did not cause it.  Careful study of this site should reveal the history of a rather complex problem long before the internet.  The mechanisms by which the truth was lost and the means to restore it are examined.

While it is slowly becoming more clear there truly are serious economic problems around the world, there are other problems in the queue also more serious than many realize.  As previously noted, economists and regulators are readily capable of forestalling a problem, unless however the underlying causes are addressed and corrections made their repertoire will be exhausted.

The science and art, the politics and religion, of those underlying problems is addressed here, and the truth not otherwise confronted is given a voice.

The articles here are longstanding.  They remain the news much like a book or more artful work often does, because the depth of the problem requires much more than the cursory examination ordinarily allotted the "news." For example this article, Gun Control and Abortion, was written years before this web site was ready.  It had its beginnings when I was using Compuserve Bulletin Boards before the cost of internet came down.  Although gun control and abortion debates resurface from time to time, the article still has the final analysis of the issue from a thoroughly studied perspective.

See how I came to you in 2012 with my little journalism project that has the appearance of a newspaper? I don't claim to be a prophet because I didn't have many details.  People who do claim to be prophets usually shouldn't since they don't have many details either.

I did not predict in 2012 the troubles Greece is having now in 2015.  Their troubles were already in other news in 2012. I did however mention that they would not likely be solved with the understanding current then and apparently still.

I did not predict that same sex marriage would become legal in the entire United States.  I did not know that would happen until it did.  I have however maintained on this website the arguments why homosexuality is a mental illness.

I should mention other internet journalism projects and how they compare to this one.

Wikipedia is an internet success story.  It is a convenient and dependable source for what, where and when.  It is recommended that those be checked with other sources, but ordinarily even the most sophisticated sources will agree with Wikipedia on what, where and when.

Who, how and why are different.

For example, consider the Crusades.  What happened, where and when are "facts" not in any significant dispute.  Why the Crusades happened is not a fact, it is an opinion.  Wikipedia generally avoids opinions as good novice journalists should.  When Wikipedia does attempt to explain why, it is usually wrong.  Never use Wikipedia as a source of why.  It will likely result in a failing grade on your papers.

Answering the question why requires an art of debate and journalists ordinarily defer to "experts" rather than engage in debate themselves.  Debate is generally not taught at all in the first few years of elementary school because students there have no foundation from which to debate.  Although many students learn to debate in high school, others often do not and go through life with difficulties distinguishing fact and opinion.  Much trouble in the world today, as I described in 2012, is the result of people mistaking their majority opinions for "scientific facts."

Examiner.com is another attempt at "news" rather than presenting an encyclopedia of data.

A good question is whether anyone needs "news" if they have an encyclopedia that is updated everyday.  Who, how and why are usually significant in most political concerns.  The examination of opinions is essential to politics and unlike science and other "news" in that regard.  Newspapers, radio and television usually have an abundance of "experts" who engage the current debates.  They are generally presented separately from the other news.

When it first began, Examiner.com attracted several "experts" with longstanding careers in journalism, and experts in various other fields.  It has not met expectations so far in contributing to anyone's credibility, and it is struggling with its identity and mission.  It doesn't add much to the facts provided by more established news sources.  Rather than experts it now depends on click counts to settle issues, and that is leading to significant errors.  It is a problem generally.  Internet technology contributes to, rather than reduces, the problem so far.

I wrote for Examiner.com from June 2009 through the June 2015.  Some of the articles here are similar or identical to articles I posted there.  I wrote as an "expert" because some of my engineering and journalistic accomplishments are documented.  When I post an article to Examiner.com they become by prior agreement co-owners of the copyrights to those articles.  I never posted my article on Intelligent Design, my most valuable one, to their site because they have no understanding of its value and would fail to compensate me appropriately.  As of this writing they have blocked my articles because of the truths in them that Democrats do not want to hear and Republicans do not want me to get any credit for.  Cheating me of credit is probably a violation of my co-ownership rights, but I kept my most valuable work here and safe.  And as you can see I have my own website like other experts who left their employ.

There have been several attempts to provide average citizens an internet presence without them needing to learn to design web pages.  The internet is a more interesting experience if you have your own voice and others can click on your comments, photos, and artwork.  When the internet first began, the service providers usually offered their customers space for personal web pages.  Customers could design their own if they learned the computer codes, but could use templates from the service providers for standard designs.  Few average citizens found that experience worth the trouble.  Rapid changes in code and different code for competing browsers and the operating systems that use those intimidated most people who simply didn't have the time for that.  They also did not like that their web presence was in the hands of their ISP, and changing ISP's was more difficult.

As it turns out, most average citizens have little use for their own presence on the internet.  Facebook found a niche that gives them most of what they will ever really use.  That most people have so little to say to the general public works out great since the general public wouldn't have the time to read it all if there were more.

Those people who have a lot to say to the public, in pages rather than sentences, might still find personal web pages the best way to present those since by learning rather simple codes they can design pages that better address a public audience and better organize their several pages of ideas.  They can use other social media like Facebook for links to such an audience.

Because I often think in pages rather than sentences, and because those thoughts are of a public nature and concern I maintain this website.  I recommend this practice to others because it is nearly impossible to make yourself clear in chunks of less than fifty words scattered all about by disinterested engineers and a disengaged public.  Part of the blame falls on politicians and other leaders who don't create any image or profile that we can simply select by one click or campaign button.  My sincere and continuing hope here is to provide thinking people an easier means to identify their more complicated positions.  The arguments here are more complete and a simple link can prevent prolonged, tedious, and confused bickering.  For example if someone you know develops a concern over your position on the liar's paradox, you can simply link to this page Meditations on Resolution.  Several confusing issues can be untangled by one page.  Facebook tries to offer their customers special pages for projects similar to ones here, but I think you'll find theirs are still too scattered.  It is no simple matter organizing the several entangled issues in science, poetry, politics and religion.  I do the best I can.  I believe you'll find it a refreshingly scientific as well as a refreshingly religious approach, just as the mission statement promised so many years ago.