Just finished reading Deano and Troll Maria. Two, one supposedly working for one of the top telecoms and the other for a Fortune 500, both insist for some time now that their respective companies have done end to end testing with regression, etc and are 100% compliant. Neither of these two people will say who they work for, nor give specifics.

I got to thinking about them and those who mount logical arguments for their disclosure of their company's names. Then I dazed a bit and began wondering if we are looking at the whole y2k thing in the wrong light. That is to say, perhaps all of the reasons (real tho they are) normally cited about why and how y2k came about are just reflections in an already distorted mirror.

If we can talk about a Collective Unconsciousness, Collective Consciousness, perhaps we can talk about a Collective Insanity. It would seem that mankind's overall world sanity level index rating has been on the fall for several centuries now, with the 20th century ratings in particularly steep decline.

In this light one could suppose that the very large scale social and personal structures are brilliant yet flawed. The ability to create massive world wide systems of Agriculture, War, Communications, Electricity, etc. do not specifically indicate that the cultures in which those are created and used be necessarily sane cultures, nor even that they be particularly civilized.

So anyway, I was thinking that maybe the world is more of a reflection of our Collective Insanity, specifically in regards to y2k, a reflection not just of networked systems at peril, but of the very breakdown of the ability of the individual human mind to abstract a meaningful existance from the Collective Progressively More Insane World Culture. Prozac Nation isn't quite as funny then.

Martial Law, Panic, Bank runs, shortages, NWO, etc., nominally the grist for the y2k hard hit scenario mill, could be symptoms of a deeper Psychological Malaise of Collecive Humanity. In that case, will Humankind have a nervous breakdown or will it pull itself together and deal with its own dark side? Y2k, largely, for individuals, for sometime now, has been characterized by polarized religious fervor. Religion, "to tie back", is one of the basic devices humans use to ground themselves when external perceived reality inputs maintain a level of near chaos or chaos for too long of a time. As individuals we are not Insane, but as HomoSapiens, yes, and the individual works with the split for as long as the individual's constitution is able and then basic survival mechanisms kick in. Under sustained external pressure, even the individual's survival mechanisms eventually fail, the the Collective Survival Mechanisms rear their heads. And that is where I think we are moving into now, timewise, and will probably continue.

On one level, y2k doesn't even make a difference, it just happens to be coming along just now too. Yet, because of its intense numinosity, it will influence everyone's thoughts and actions at an ongoing level of intensification - rendering in part, y2k moot. Y2k as one of many symptoms outlining a high and increasing level of Collective Insanity.

Just some half-baked thoughts not really leading anywhere, just me trying to make sense of something I saw.

-- Mitchell Barnes (spanda@inreach.com), February 18, 1999

Answers

Hi Mitchell! We have a microcosm of collective insanity here with the recent squid devolution ;-)
Polarities in society are increasing, definitely getting schizoid and far removed from natural living, and this in EASY convenient infrastructure-purring-along times. It can't go on along this out-of-balance track indefinitely ...

xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxx

-- Leska (allaha@earthlink.net), February 18, 1999.

Depends on what kind of mood and mental state I'm in to be collectively unconsciousness, and collectively consciousness. Most of the time though I am collectively insane! Like people who drive 10 miles an hour in a 45 mile hour zone...makes me go insane! Then I have to collectively collect my consciousness again until the next episode of insanity. Since I haven't dealt with Y2K and all the insanity it's suppose to bring me, I'll cross that bridge if and when it get's here. In the meantime, I'm with you, that is, "the Collective Survival Mechanism will rear their heads." Are you sure your from Butte County....you have too much sense!

-- bardou (bardou@bardou.com), February 18, 1999.

Mitchell,

Some good ideas here. Another good view of a facet of the world today.

Consider also that our cunture can be considered to have. like one of those aberitions in individual, multiple personalities. It seems usefull to group some of these subset types together and look at their colective traits. How will the individualists react. How will the collectivists react. How will the sheeple react.

You approach to examining the collective aspects is good for a thumb nail sketch. This ol Bear has spent too many years studying the problem with the power turned up to high. You've provided, at least, me with a refreshing break and a usefull "big picture" approach.

-- Greybear, the nearsighted

- Got Perspective?

-- Greybear (greybear@home.com), February 19, 1999.

Mitchell,

Not so half-baked. My 40+ years of observation and some intensive study of human behavior in the last 20 or more years of human behavior bring me to some similar conclusions. This is not a new phenomenon. Human beings throughout modern history have demonstrated that they operate rather like lower life forms, amoeba, in particular. They react and don't think much. They base thoughts and actions on "belief systems", and seems like the prevailing sentiment of humankind is: "if I believe (think)it, it MUST be so." The veneer of civilization is very thin and largely mythical. Appearance is valued over substance, and those who profit from all of this absurdity of thought egg it on, encourage it.

It behooves us all to see, and hear what is really there, rather than what is propagandized, or what has been taught us from cradle days.

Ain't consciousness grand? I'm every day more appreciative of it. (she says with a grumble, sheet-flapping in the wind)

Thought-provoking thread. Thanks.

-- Donna Barthuley (moment@pacbell.net), February 19, 1999.

Bad computer code does not care.

-- Jack (jsprat@eld.net), February 19, 1999.

Kinda off-course, but...

Speaking of populations reacting in collective thought and reactions and Y2K, what is it about the sheeple and lemmings?

Somewhere in the make-up of lemmings there's a pre-disposition for the majority to engage in the self-destructive behavior of mass migration with no obstacle being seen as a stopping point, be it the ocean, sheer cliffs or whatever. But something in the make-up of some lemmings makes them shy away from this destructive behavior when the majority of the population goes off to its doom. These lemmings stay alive and procreate the next generation of lemmimgs.

Then we have a reverse picture of the human species. In the face of a threat we have a portion of the population which recognizes the danger and behaves in a manner to maintain its safety and to hopefully procreate a new generation of humans. At the same time we have the majority of the population (the sheeple) who are blindly following each other on a path that will lead them metaphorically off sheer cliffs and into oceans come 01/01/2000. And their survival chances are about as good as lemmings on their migrations.

Makes one wonder if humans and lemmings don't share a common bit of genetic marterial.

WW

-- Wildweasel (vtmldm@epix.net), February 19, 1999.