Feminist Demand Respect

If someone demands something from you than you can be sure they're incapable of earning it. I have never once in my life heard a man demand respect from someone. The concept seems so alien and bizarre to the men I've met that the concept could never be considered. Respect, like trust, must be earned.

Let's talk about thieves, crooks, and any other type of people who sets out to deceive someone. If a thief sat down next to you on a bench and demanded that you trust him and hand over your money, would you? Even if you didn't know the person was a thief. Let's assume they dress nicely, look clean, and speak well. Would you now be willing fork over your wallet? Some people may but most would be highly suspicious of someone they barely knowing demanding money no matter how nicely they asked.

What do you think would happen if you started questioning the thief? The last thing he's going to do is admit he's a thief. He wants to talk about anything but stealing and theft. What he most likely wants is spin the blame onto you. "What you don't trust me?" By that question, he assumes that trust should be given to everyone all the time. He is also implying that you're the way not worth or willing to trust.

And the reason is simple. Trust is earned over time through continuous acts of trustful behavior. In other words trust is a consequence of action. By the thieves demand of trust he is implying that he cannot earn it because if he could earn your trust than he would. The same is true of respect. Respect is earned through continuous acts of accomplishment, achievement, and presentation. Respect is a form of love and admiration for another.

Now imagine a strange woman walks up to a man and demands that she fall in love with him. How absurd would that sound? Even if they slept together and got married there's little chance that either of them are going to love each other. Love doesn't work like that and they would only fall in love by chance.

What someone does gain from demanding respect is not respect but fear. There is a subtle threat of violence to someone demanding respect. Respect me or else! You can be sure that whenever someone demands something that cannot be given that they're doing it for one reason. They're incapable of achieving it and because respect can only be earned they will never have it. By their inability to earn respect they reveal both their inability to earn and their fear of not having it.

Demanding respect is as absurd as demanding love.

Continue Reading: The Littlest Feminist 2

Hierarchy Works: World of Warcraft Edition

I started playing World of Warcraft in 2008 during college. Then the new expansion Wrath of the Lich King was just released and the game was still on its amazing rise into cultural fame. There were new players joining all the time, guilds started, friendships formed, and a world to explore, but over time it changed from the game I started out playing. 

I've always been into fantasy (though I've never played D&D because I wanted to have sex) and would treat it like my dorky side hobby that I didn't tell too many people about. And while I played other games besides WoW, when I first set foot into Azeroth, I was amazed at what I found. The environment, the details, and all of the character intrigued me from the start. 

From the beginning I heard things about the higher levels. There was something called a raid and guilds and they would compete for whoever was the best guild. I used to see characters in amazing looking gear with mounts and fancy sounding guild names like Equilibrium and Brotherhood. People would chat about the server first dragon kill or some player claiming a rare mount. I knew from the start what I wanted. I wanted to raid, to be the guy with the amazing gear and cool mounts. I had a goal, a dream, and motivation to pursue it. 

The fact that my gear sucked and that I died often made it better not worse. I knew there was something to strive for. I could improve if I worked at it enough. The separation between the top players and the average player was strong and everyone knew it. It was the hierarchy of it, not equality, which gave purpose to playing the game. 

Then the complainers started winning. They complained and moaned endlessly on the forums. And complainers complained about the complainers which I saw as redundant and useless. And the collective bitching of the player base reached a high water mark and the developers started to listen. Not only did they listen but they started to make the game more fair more equal.

A popular term started to be tossed around. Welfare epic. At one time wearing a piece of purple gear meant you put in an inordinate amount of time to get that gear. Any purple epic was amazing to have and really separated the players out. Not only that, but a lot of players never had the gear to even do a raid. They didn't have the time or they weren't skilled enough to make it. Instead of giving up or just enjoying the game for what they could do they went to daddy Blizzard and demanded fairness. They demanded everything be made equal to their level of failure. Instead of dedicating themselves to improving their situation, which they could do with a quick google search and some practice, they wanted to make the distinction between the great players and the average player much less noticeable.

They won and got what they wanted and epic gear was handed out just for showing up. Every aspect of the game was carefully laid out for everyone to understand. Bosses were made so easy it took little coordination to kill one and get those epics. And the thing about epics is that when everyone has one they feel much less epic than before. The prestige was gone. The feeling of the game being mysterious was gone. Having something to strive for, work toward, and obtain was gone.

And the subscriptions fell with each passing year as the game was toned down to the worst, laziest player's level. No scaling. No hierarchy. Just endless equality and boredom. And the complainers didn't miss a beat. They didn't become pleased with what they were given. Instead they demanded more and more. While I can't blame all of the loss in popularity on the lack of prestige within the game, I do believe it deserves a fair chunk of it.

I learn wherever I go and from whatever I see. I'm always trying to find the lesson in things and that discerning eye for wisdom doesn't stop at something that lacks intellectual content. The lesson that I took from WoW is that equality produces nothing but mediocrity. And as the pitch of cries society-wide for more equality reach a crescendo that's all I expect to see it produce. The mediocre.

Continue Reading: A Video Game Rant

Can Robots Feel?

What are emotions? Forget any idea that emotions are mystical in nature. They are not magic. They are biochemical responses to stimuli. Emotions derive from our need to foster and care for children. The human infant is born helpless, unable to care or defend itself. It is totally dependent on its parents to provide for the child. By necessity we developed powerful emotions to bond us to children and to each other to better facilitate our survival and the survival of our species. The fact is that if humans were born self-sufficient we would not have powerful emotions if any at all because nature does not create superfluous things. Reality asks only one question. Does it work? Or more succinctly, nature declares only one dictate. All things must serve reason.

So when we ask whether or not robots will feel we should be asking another question. What reason would a machine, a system programmed to operate under a rational pretense, have for emotion? The answer is that it would have little need.

But not zero need. So long as machine and humans interact a machine would have a need for emotions. Or to put it bluntly, to mimic the same behavioral responses as sufficient emotions would generate in order to better engage with humans.

Continue Reading: What Penis Envy Looks Like

The Cure For Boredom

A man speeds down the road in top gear on the back of his Ducati 1100. His palms clutch at the throttle while the wind slams against him. His heart pounds but his eyes are steady. To his left is death. To his right is death.

ADD they said. The boy couldn't focus they said. And he believed them until he bought his beautiful cherry red Ducati. "I know what life is," he thinks and in that moment when all he knows is the road, and the wind, and the feel of all that speed, he realizes that there was no ADD. Not for him at least.

A person can learn to obtain that same level of focus demanded from highly intense activities through mindfulness. Through studying a candle flame. Through counting ones breath. Difficult at first but rewarding over time.

Equality Doesn't Work

Does the motor run?

That's the question with which we should address social problems. Too often the rational is sublimated by the emotional. So instead of changing the spark plugs they ask how does the motor feel.

Of course, people are not machines. They're social creatures and because they form bonds with each they develop emotions. The emotional careens into the moral and it is when operating under a supposedly moral blanket of decision in which failure arises. Of course, that's not to denigrate the moral or the emotional. Each holds its place. But no matter how much morality is applied to the motor it won't run if it's out of fuel.

Operating a society should be treated as a science. They called it political science in college only it's not science. Political mechanics would be much more appropriate. A new study of politics which by the necessity of applying that theory to reality it must ask the most important question. Does the motor run?

Even if we ignore any group differences and focus only on individuals we can see that equality fails. If individuals aren't equal and can never be equal than why treat them that way? There's a place to test these things out. It's called business, the free market. What works thrives. The motor of business is not driven by morality but efficacy and it is in business in which we see the failure of equality lay bare for everyone to see.

How long would a business last if every employee was treated as equal? Would the janitor be able to make the correct decision on a complex sale? Corporations have completely rejected the idea of equality and instead operate under a model much more similar to a dictatorship. They prosper because of it.

The submissive is driven by uncertainty. Unsure of his place and what is the proper course of action he will become nervous and anxious left to himself. Through guidance and an understanding of his role he will develop a sense of peace and through effective performance within that role he will develop confidence.

Within a family well defined roles allows for each members of that family to understand their place and what's expected of them. It's under presumed ideas of equality where the mother bucks the father for more control and the children ran amok without discipline or guidance. Conflict, fear, anxiety is the result. The family stilts.

And yet we shirk away from the idea of hierarchy, standing perplexed as we watch the carburetor fall to pieces and think, "I don't think the motor's happy."

Continue Reading: Can Robots Feel?

The Slaves of the Free Market

If we're to divide people into natural masters and natural slaves, the free market allows for both to prosper. But with further nationalization, that becomes impossible. Everyone is forced into wage slavery. The democrats hide behind the poor, blaming everyone and everything except their own socialist policies which are the source of the problem. The state always has a paradoxical effect. Whatever they touch is the opposite of the desired intent. The war on poverty increased poverty. The war on drugs increased drugs. And the leftist answer is always the same. More left, captain!

So the natural master gets to start his own business and be his own king. While the natural slave gets to serve a master and earn a paycheck. No one ever points out that if democracy is so great than why don't businesses use the same model. In fact, a corporation looks an awful lot like a monarchy or *gasp* fascism. Democracy doesn't work. If it did the free market would utilize it. The same goes for relationships. Someone needs to be the boss.

Any time a business is made public it enters into stasis. There is no need to compete and corporations known for innovation stagnate. They make poor products sold at high prices because they can or they lose money and are a drain on everyone.

In a free market a monopoly can only exist by providing a superior product at the lowest possible price. Inevitably, the company hires some doofus who doesn't innovate and the company faces a young upstart company who is hungry and eager to make their mark.

This is the danger of the professional lobbyist who goes to washington. A car manufacturer goes to congress and says we need more car manufacturing laws, licenses, and regulations.  Lobbyist fight for MORE regulation, not less. They know that the cost of the new codes and licensing will be less than that of the competition. That's what we have today. Basically, a corporate democracy which is culturally marxist. The slaves all get to believe they're equal and the natural masters get depressed, angry, turn to crime, or game, or try and start revolutions.

Same problems as before under the old Roman system. Natural masters are the dilemma. So most of them are kicked out of school. They reject education as being lame. Some think they're stupid. Some actually are. Others get doped up on ADD meds until they're brains are mush. Only a few make it to adulthood intact, educated, and not broken by a system which strives daily to break their will.

Vending Machine McDonalds.

The future is a vending machine. The craze has already swept over Japan and as time goes on more and more things turn into vending machines. Look at what happened to Blockbuster. It's gone. It's been replaced by Red Box, an entire store that hired several dozen employees is now a vending machine. Corporations are basically stagnate. If it wasn't for them, McDonalds could easily be turned into a vending machine. But then the economy would collapse.

I think its foolish to deny technological unemployment. I won't even debate it. What job can't be automated? The only reason we don't see all the public sectors jobs turned into vending machines is because there is no will to do that yet. There would be massive amounts of jobless, unemployed people running around. The fight for the jobs that would exist would increase. You'd need a PhD to be considered for any job at all.

A libertarian president would fail

The average female voter is a moron whose voting strategies probably consists of who has the shiniest button or smiles the most during his speeches. But I can see a Margaret Thatcher style woman with Libertarian ideology winning the White House. Small government. Free markets. Gun rights. And if she was anti-feminist men would line up to lick her boot heels. Most men are beta and just want a pat on the head from the women before being sent off to serve her.

But anyone who is a Libertarian in today's world will fail. They've had zero success. If Ron Paul won the election it would be a catastrophe. As much as I love what he says, I have to concede the truth. He'd try to downsize .gov and the people would protest, turning to rioting, and the national guard would be sent in within months of his inaugural address. He would be forced to resign and everyone would say "never again" to anyone like him.

That's the danger of libertarianism. We've crossed the rubicon into state dependence for too many people to turn it back without calamity.

Gay Marriage

When speaking of marriage as it exists today, it is a state run, or least a state mediated, institution. The state operates under a principle of coercion, violence, and kidnapping. So any relationship which is a marriage has an added element to it. That element is the violence which one or both parties may wield by proxy. This changes the entire dynamic of the relationship. It is now an enforceable contract. Enforced by violence. Denying this fundamental element does not change its nature.

Instead of asking if gay marriage should be allowed or not, the question that should be asked is how much violence is acceptable in a marriage? To me the answer is none. And that extends to either party involved in the marriage contract or to any other parties enforcing that contract. Removal of state mediation within marriage ipso facto legalizes gay marriage.

A Review of "Enjoy the Decline" by Aaron Clarey

Socialism fails. It's a repeating story throughout history. The rise and fall of empires can be traced back to the ever incessant push in the increase in state power. And yet we never learn. Whether by hubris or ignorance we fall to the same machinations that generations past fell to and Aaron Clarey's book "Enjoy the Decline" documents the rise of socialism in America and the fall of a nation.

The title is perfect. It's one of the best titles for a book on the economy and America that I've read. It's catchy and fitting to the subject. Clarey's book can really be seen as a book in two volumes. The first volume is the economic. The second volume is the personal. Both have their merits.

The book lays the tracks for the future of the US economy. Not good. But never dwells there and never strays into hopelessness any more than it needs to. This is the decline. The math is there. There are a few charts to read and some numbers to understand but there's no prerequisite in economics needed to understand everything. Clarey did a great job of making all the material easy to understand for the majority of people.  

The book makes a clear case what is happening in America. Vast amounts of government spending, entitlements, the increasing debt, social security, and medicare are destroying the economy. The american dream is finished. It was destroyed by keynesians, socialists, and corporations.  But the book is not a lamentation over the death of the world's greatest nation. The tone of it is one of hope. It's no macabre prophet to point to the storm clouds and shout rain. There is no anger in this book. No resentment over what's happening. Clarey writes like a man not enraged by the decline of his country but one who is saddened by it.

The second half goes into detail about personal issues. This is the "Enjoy" part of it. The author makes a breakdown of what's likely to happen during the decline and how people can best to prepare for it. He details some of the aspects of the destruction of the family. He covers why most degrees are worthless and then helps the reader chart a course to help them navigate today's America.

The second part is practical. It's there as a guide to help the reader understand that many of their beliefs are false. The things they grew up believing they should work for:  career, family, community, are not possible or much more difficult to obtain than before. Instead, Clarey gives a guide on how to live and be happy without those things. He covers how to live with less, how to reap some of the benefits the government offers while they're still available, and how avoid a lot of the dangerous contracts laced throughout society. Hint: get out of debt and avoid most marriages.

The decline is likely to get ugly. Part of the book talks about the need to prepare yourself and anyone around you to be self-sufficient for a disaster scenario and it goes into detail on how to do that and what you'll need to survive. This is the most practical part of the book as it ventures into survivalism and disaster recovery. It covers all the basics, goes into detail on what you'll need and plans you should make.

The book is part economics, part career councilor (the one you should have had in high school), and part survival manual to aid and inform its readers to the many pitfalls they may face in their lives. It's unfortunate but America as a whole has denied reality for decades and continues to do so. However, as "Enjoy the Decline" points out, while denying reality might offers some temporary comfort the consequences of reality can only be ignored for so long.

Enjoy The Decline available on amazon.

Continue Reading: Get Social Security Disability

Is the ego the hamster?

Freud's structural model .

The Id is instinctive, impulsive, neotenous. It demands constant satisfaction, craves instant gratification, and has little future time orientation. The Id is impulsive and shallow concerned mostly with sense fulfillment.

The ego is considered to the be intermediary for the id. It rationalizes the ids constant desire for pleasure, it's poor impulse control, and it's constant desire for more. Anyone familiar with the rationalization hamster  might think that the two sound similar. Most likely, they are. The hamster is the ego. The ego is the hamster. The hamster is driven by emotions which is driven by base desires. Logic only comes to a factor in rationalizing the impulsive behavior to assuage any uncomfortable feelings of guilt.

The Holy Trinity In Your Brain

Paul D. MacLean created a theory of the triune brain  where he subdivided the brain into three functioning parts each built from one another in an evolutionary timescale. One brain atop another. Three distinct brains. I'll briefly go over these and cover why they relate to the Holy Trinity in Christianity.

The oldest and most ingrained is the reptilian complex which deals with elements of aggression, violence, and instincts. Next is the paleomammalian complex, otherwise known as the limbic system, which deals with many things but chief among them is emotion.

I've written before that humans are social animals and we form emotional bonds and have emotions because they serve some function. There is a reason we have emotions. The limbic system is largely responsible for these emotions and for the pair bonds we form. It can easily be termed the emotional nest of the brain.

Lastly is the newest brain and what some might consider the best brain. This is the neomammalian complex, otherwise known as the neocortex. It's the part of the brain responsible for science, technology, and philosophy. It deals with logic, reason, and abstraction. The development of this part of the brain has given rise to nearly all of technological progress.

The Father is often portrayed as God Almighty. He is in Heaven and passes judgement on others. Cold, remorseless calculation could be another way to describe the Father. This is the neocortex, the father. While all brains might be equal, some brains are more equal than others. The neocortex is more equal.

Jesus is the son.  He's the second part of the trinity. This is the part of God heard about in today's church. He is endless, boundless love. God is love. You don't need to dig too deep in a church to hear this message. It's broadcast nearly every sunday and people line up to hear about it. It's no wonder that church pews are packed with women especially when the message is often centered on the God is love meme. This is the part of the trinity which deals with the paleomammalian complex, the amygdalae, and emotions.

Last, we have the Holy Spirit. Even in the Christian Community this is a nebulous, abstract concept. There are multiple theories of what this is. I've heard some state that the Holy Spirit is the church or that the Holy Spirit is the world or that the Holy Spirit is the essences of God's love instilled in people and spread when they perform charity and compassion. It's most related to the reptilian complex not because the holy spirit is seen as violent but because of its mystery. Instinct is behavior we exhibit that was never taught to us. We just do it as a babe suckles to a teet without bein shown how. We imbibe these instinctual behaviors without really knowing or understanding where it comes from. The Holy Spirit just takes over, as they say.

Continue Reading: My Tumble Down the Rabbit Hole

The Red Pill: My Tumble Down the Rabbit Hole

In college I was a liberal, feminist, full of white guilt who empathized with the underdog. I genuinely thought things would be better if we gave all the power to women because I saw them as compassionate and loving. Irrational and controlled by their emotions, yes. But they loved more and would take care of everyone like a mother tends to her babe.

Then I met reality. I was never exposed to the fact that women aren't the compassionate, loving sex that they say they are. Now I see female empowerment as enslavement. They compromise freedom for security because they're comfortable being well-kept slaves. But I would have happily drifted through my beta life had I not seen the hate that feminists, and to a lesser degree, women have toward men. It shocked me. I woke up in the most jarring, disturbing, trauma-inducing way possible. All my dreams of a nice house and a beautiful, loving wife and family were shattered. I swallowed the red pill and tumbled down the rabbit hole.

I had always related to rebels, to fighter, and revolutionaries. As a kid I loved the Revolutionary War. I loved to learn about fighting and triumphing against tyranny. I thought that one day I would fight in a war like that against the government. Even as a kid I was a future revolutionary. So it was easy for me to relate to conspiracy theories.

Alex Jones lead into David Icke and he led into various New Age conspiracy theories and then to the Zeitgeist films. I remember watching them when they first came out and was amazed. But a part of me was disappointed. All of this stuff I had watched on the internet for years and nothing ever happened. Nothing changed. There didn't seem to be some great awakening and I thought the same thing with the Zeitgeist films. Fun to watch but nothing more than that.

I was wrong though. Zeitgeist is on netflix and is being watched by millions of people. Agree or disagree with the premise of the film, it's getting attention and has some devoted followers. Change, big change, real change, and not the Obama-laced-poison change, is coming.

Now the statements of Zeitgeist are being echoed all across the web. People are aware of technological unemployment, robot revolutions, and a drastically changing society.

Eventually, Zeitgeist led me to Stefan Molyneux and to the ideas of anarcho capitalism.  Molyneux was exactly what I wanted. He had it all. He could explain everything in clear, logical reasoning. He had so much of the philosophical work on the subject done. It was a joy to sit back and listen to him extol the virtues of anarchy with perfect logic.

I signed up at his forums and started posting. Years ago, I had taken my first draught of the red pill but I had rejected it. I couldn't face the truth about women. I didn't know where to turn or what to do. But one day on Molyneux's forum, someone linked a heartistse article and with much caution and some fear, I dared to take my first steps into the manosphere.

I was shocked. Everything was much more advanced than I thought. Everything was laid out. Game. Hypergamy. Attraction. Philosophy. Society. It was so much more developed than I thought it would be. My assumption was that it was a tiny community, a few blogs and nothing more. Eventually, it lead me to MGTOW, to the reactionaries, to the PUAs, and onward and they all seemed to vibe with my anarchistic sensibility.

But this wasn't just a community I wanted to observe.  I had things to say. I had spent a big bulk of my life picking up bits of wisdom, studying religion and philosophy, and trying to understand as much of human behavior as possible. I felt I needed to share that information with others. I had some insights into things that others lacked and I wanted to join a community of like minded people, so I began this blog.

Originally, it was only intended to be a blog on philosophy. I wrote a few pieces, read some more writing, and then abandoned it for several years while I struggled with isolation and depression which followed my post-college years.

Now that I've spent some months in the manosphere, I no longer feel the need to read any of the feminists blabber. I don't read much of any mainstream media sources. They are all wretched hives of intellectual dishonesty endlessly spouting statistics and studies which only further their cause while conveniently ignoring anything to the contrary.

So I don't feel the need to contribute to disseminating the feminist claptrap. That's already been done. For me, I focus on a holistic approach. For example, when someone asks if I support gay marriage, I rebut with a question. "Do you know the long term consequences involved with making marriage gay?" The change will not only affects individual but marriage as a whole.

Taking a holistic approach, instead of individualist, to its extreme is to ask the BIG QUESTIONS. And that's what I do. I let others deal with the details. That's not my forte and that's what I hope to contribute to the manosphere.

Continue Reading: The Future Is Small

The Future is small

It is a decentralization of information that's happening today. The mainstream media becomes less relevant year after year. It is a decentralization of education as massively online open courses (MOOCs) replace higher education. As khan academy makes a classroom redundant, parents must question the validity of sending their children off to public school. As homeschooling and unschooling grow in popularity, the eager tax slaves of the state diminish in number.  Bitcoin is the decentralization of currency.   Out and away from the central bankers.

The next stage is 3D printing. The state recognizes the threat of 3D but is limited in its scope. Just as it couldn't predict the destruction of its state run indoctrination farms known as schools, it can't predict the effects of 3D printing. It goes beyond printing guns. In fact, if it were only useable to print guns than it would have far less scope. Instead it is the destruction of the industrialized world.

Taoist thought goes like this: all that rises must fall, all that expands must contract. Cycles. Up and down like the tides of the sea.

Why do I believe we'll be leaving cities? I know demographics do not favor this idea. Most cities in the US grow every year. They're not shrinking. One of the reasons the city will shrink in the future is because most people living in a city aren't happy. Cities mimic prisons and the people often exhibit behavior similar to animals in captivity.

Why I'm a misanthrope

Ever notice that billionaires always seem to support the status quo? Why would they want to change a system they've been so successful i?. If things changed they might not be on top. Therefore, it's only logical to assume that the majority of misanthropes will come from the lower classes. If more become broke than more will hate the system that broke them.

Why am I a misanthrope? Everything is terrible.

1. Music terrible
2. Movies are terrible
3. Books are terrible
4. women are terrible
5. men are terrible
7. my math skills are terrible
8. marriage is terrible
9. the government is terrible
10. the media is terrible
11. education is terrible
12. the economy is terrible
13. the food is terrible
14. religion is terrible
15. atheism is terrible
16. Health is terrible
17. Laws are terrible

Quick, try and think of something that isn't terrible or broken. Anything come to mind?


To make this fair and balanced which I always never strive for let's consider what isn't terrible.

1. Technology is great
2. everything else sucks

Why does anyone think the future is going to be any better?

Terrible doesn't make not terrible. It just produces more terrible.

If you aren't irritated by the state of things today you are either.

1. doped to your eyeballs on medication
2. retarded
3. a billionaire
4. Intentionally ignorant. I envy you.

Why Women Fail at Dating Advice

How many articles and dating advice do women need to give before men realize that their advice sucks? Ask your mom how to get a lady and she'll tell you something along the lines of be nice. Which is why we see women line up to have sex with the nice guy. Some women at this point have abandoned this notion after men pointed out that they don't date nice guys. Women caught on about themselves after men did.

So why this disconnect? I don't believe a mother is giving her son bad advice. She wants her genes to spread as much as he does.  And I don't believe women are intentionally misleading women. Who would benefit from that? No, I believe it's because of a problem women have with how they view men.

My theory is this. When a woman gives dating advice she assumes that the woman is already attracted to the man. She assumes attraction. To a woman a man is attractive. The women do want nice men but they're not attracted to nice men behavior.

That's the crux of it. That's why they fail at dating advice: assumed attraction.

Of Love and Reason

Unlike many new age thinkers, I do not agree that ego is a bad thing. Ego exists and everything exists for a reason. Knowing that ego must serve some function we can then begin to try and understand what that function is, where it is derived.

As children we have very little ego. We also possess very little in the way of a defined sense of self. Instead we attach to a parental figure in our dependent state and draw from them a sense of self. According to this parent we are either good or bad, strong or weak, loved or unloved, alone or attached. While there is no doubt a vast and complex amalgam between ego creation, environment, genetics, and personality, it is beyond the realm of this writing to explicate fully on the subject.

We are born weak and formless into a world of threats and danger. So once this attachment to parents take place, or a lack of attachment to them occurs, we begin to form a defense against threats. Real or perceived, the threats do no matter. As we interact with our parents and the world around us, the basis of these threats are often founded on the decisions our parents made in rearing their children. "Don't eat those berries," the mother says, shows a stern face, becomes angry with the child. "Don't pull that lion's mane," the father says, warding his child from danger. And so the ignorant child learns of danger from the disapproval of the parent. The more firmly attached to the parent, the more likely the child will be to survive in a world of constant danger. The formation of ego is a necessary defense mechanism against threats to our survival.

In modernity a lot of our behavior and the threats we perceive have few real consequences. "You're stupid," one child says to another. And while this statement has no true life-ending threat behind it, the reaction of someone to that insult is often one as if their survival were imminently threatened by it. All fear is based on the fear of death and the need to survive. How ironic that so much bullying and belittling will often drive a person to suicide when the basis of  the feelings of worthlessness are derived from the fear of death itself.

This brings up the complex problem of emotions. Too much of humanity is possessed of mystical thinking or the idea of something from nothing. It is the idea of random, unfounded occurrences somehow springing into being from an absolutely logical universe. It's impossible. Emotions are not magic. Neither is the mother of all emotions, love.

We are social animals. A social animal develops emotions to form pair bonds. The emotions we feel are drawn from others not ourselves. If humans were autonomous creatures free of the dependency from each other, we would have no need for emotions or feelings.

Nothing in nature better exemplifies the theory that all fear is the fear of death than the hummingbird. This animal is one of the most spectacular in existence. It has no fear. It had no need to develop a sense of fear since it knows no natural predators. Hummingbirds, with their fearless nature have been seen to scare off hawks.

If fear is a derivative of death than where comes loves? Understanding the law of sufficient reason means love did not spring into being from nothing. The most obvious reason for love is to establish pair bonds between parent and child. Love is derived from the parent-child bond. The closest a person can come to agape is the love they feel for a child. In certain cases, such as Francis of Assisi and other religious leaders, or generally anyone who loves their enemy, they can also express this love to others.

Eros, or romance and sexual attraction, is largely a derivative of two things. One being a biological imperative to mate with the most fit partner. Two being the formation of mate selection as derived from sexual imprinting onto the parent figure. The details of sexual imprinting are complex and won't be discussed here.

Now comes the child into adulthood and the ego is strengthened through years of perceived threats. They are protected behind a barrier of ego, isolated against the world of danger, unable to allow anyone to see them as less than perfect. Their ego, instead of a defense to protect them, has now become a suit of armor crushing their ability to know and love another person. They cannot know another person because they cannot lower their ego built walls they established early in life to protect them.

Love is a state of vulnerability and anyone with a well constructed ego will have difficulty loving anyone. To be seen as vulnerable and accepted in that state, the same way the parent accepts the vulnerability of the child, is the deepest intimacy. To be an adult, full of the awareness and consciousness that the child lacks, and to both see and be seen in this state of vulnerability is true love.