Focusing on Context

 by  Shaun A. Lawton (writing for The Oscillating Oculus in his own words) 

   Originally written in 2021, this reflection on context seems newly relevant in light of recent debates in quantum physics over whether reality can be meaningfully described apart from the conditions under which it is observed.  In a sense, it extends the idea from Many Worlds or One Cauldron: reality isn’t just "out there"—it emerges through our participation, shaped by the specific conditions that make both observation and life possible.

    If the future represents death (and there's no doubt that it does) then a re-examination of the present becomes necessary for us to gain a better understanding of the actual context of our position among the stars.  

   Now that we've outlined time as having necessarily produced a myriad pockets of equilibrium by virtue of the revolutionary actions of solar systems either functioning independently or in tandem (depending on whether or not they belong to a larger cluster of stars), we've identified the galactic region in which we dwell as being located within a barycentric zone where time achieves an equipoised stability or composure that effectively produces the era in which we are sustainably permitted to live out our lifespans. 

   It's this epoch of counterpoised stabilization generated by the massive gravitational flux from either our own individual Sun or quite possibly including the cluster of related stars which should be seen as being tantamount to a sort of pool or reservoir, if you will, which is to say, a temporal body or zone of the spacetime continuum in which we are nestled. An area of sufficient harmony to have produced the serenity of life as we know it.  

   As a collective species, and despite all of our significant advancements in science and technology, I am left with the distinct impression that we are still psychologically trapped within the limited subjective scope of our view into having mistakenly projected our inherent (and indigenous) sense of three dimensions onto the canvas of what we consider to be "outer space." I suspect this may be the point at which we lose focus of our actual condition in the Milky Way galaxy. (It can be duly noted that we've even gone so far as to implement the word "space" as the primary noun we've modified with the word "outer".)  

   If we are to facilitate our progress moving forward in terms of continuing to discover the true context of our existence here on this planet on a scientific basis, it will become necessary for this newfound insight into the actual nature of our condition to become more commonly understood.  The reason for this is because the very point of our divergence from what's actually happening begins with our false presumption that the whole of space follows the same guiding proportions and measurement as does the vacuole of our atmosphere on Earth provide.  

   These are entirely distinct phenomena from each other while remaining parts and parcel of the whole. This pocket of air we breathe on Earth generated from our planet's spin and rotation about our central star resulting from the complex interaction of the fungal and vegetable kingdoms with elements such as light and water producing photosynthesis and generating life as we know it all happens within the more or less sealed or semi-impermeable bubble shielded from radiation by the interactive magnetic fields from both our Sun and home planet.   

   A better comprehension of these life-sustaining dynamics would perforce allow us as a species to discard whole reams of spurious thought which have been leading us on toward impossible pipe dreams and excess wastes of time, energy and money chasing our dreams in the wrong direction.  For example, we don't waste our precious reserves of time and energy trying to "seek alien life" or "expand space exploration" through the portals of hot springs, do we?  Perhaps we should...

   ...But of course not, because not only is the very notion absurd, but that's because we have an inherent understanding about hot springs and their limited function for us. We may immerse our bodies into them to relax in the heat and enjoy the benefits of soaking in their minerals, and that's about the extent of it.  I've come to the inevitable deduction that similarly, the deep fields--or ocean, if you will--of time represented by the vast distances between stars remains more along the lines of something we can certainly on occasion "go for a brief dip into the surface of" (as has been proven repeatedly by our stalwart astronauts) but by all means may end up quite likely being the case that going too much further (for example heading into interstellar space as the Voyager crafts have been remotely sent into) may remain the very antithesis of what we should aspire to do. (Speculations such as these serve as bookmarks. We should really remain open to changing our minds.)  

   I am not saying that this is certain. If anything, the expanse delineated by that zone in our region of space defined by our "temporal barycenter" has its own limits which may serve as the boundaries which we would no sooner think of crossing than we would (for example) surgically implant a foot on the side of our head. What would be the point of that? Certainly there's a possibility that our entire solar system should be open to our expansion:  just think of all the dwarf planets orbiting the gas giants, including Ceres which NASA recently discovered has more water on it than all of Earth's oceans combined.  We just need to keep the underlying context of our exploratory missions tempered with a foundation of solid reasoning, if you ask me.  

   In my opinion, we really need to get a better mental grip and gain a renewed objectivity by focusing our perspective on the context of our position in the galaxy before we waste too much more money, time and energy pursuing endeavors that may end up fruitless but for a shot at profiteering. It's a matter of getting our priorities in the right order. Why should we focus an extraordinary and unprecedented amount of money, time and energy trying to terraform Mars to make it hospitable for human habitation when that same money, time and energy could be shifted toward cleaning up and making our own planet once again hospitable to continue sustaining us with a renewable biodiversity? 

   But then again, we can't really advance that far as a species without trial and error. There's absolutely something to admire in our audacious exploits to the Moon and Mars, make no mistake about it. After all, they say you can't cook an omelet without cracking a few eggs. I really do believe nothing's impossible. Mainly because the prefix "im-" may be interpreted as meaning "before," which reveals a significant understanding of the word as simply indicating something that is "not yet possible." Perhaps our excursions into the surrounding neighborhood of our solar system will only serve to strengthen the conviction of the boundless nature of our own worldly parameters right here on this mysterious living organism we call home. 

   If our imaginations may conjure such apparent miracles as the dawn of aviation and space flight to the Moon and make them tangible realities, then let this serve as a reminder that it can work both ways, which is to say that we may also conceive of the true significance and context of such mysteries as the cosmos yet holds in store for us, so that we may be more optimally prepared to both confront what's necessary and to avoid what isn't expedient at too much cost. It's time to hedge our bets and gain new focus and objectivity. What are we here for in the first place if not to make things better for all mankind, instead of worse? 

   

    

   

Many Worlds or One Cauldron: Singularity in Fluctuation

 by roving reporter Shaun Lawton  (written without AI)

"I believe that if the development of physics has taught us anything, 

it is that we must learn to think more subtly."   Neils Bohr  to Werner Heisenberg

 After reading the article by Amanda Gefter called  Reality Exists Without Observers? Boooo! that just appeared in issue 65  of Nautilus, and considering the quote at the end of it, from Bohr to Heisenberg, I thought, if I were to think more subtly about how to describe our observer-with-universe dynamic, I came up with the following description today: 

A singularity in fluctuation   

   like an infinite cauldron 

   It's the best I could do, given the circumstances. Allow me to venture an explanation.  The dilemma has been only exacerbated by our ordinary insistence to separate the observer from that which we observe, so it follows we should perhaps try to avoid that.  What I got out of Amanda Gefter's article, is that contemporary physics has split into two interpretive camps. The Many Worlds view preserves objectivity by multiplication, proposing that every possible outcome occurs in a branching universe where nothing ever truly collapses. The Copenhagen interpretation, following Bohr, preserves coherence by limitation, refusing to describe reality apart from the conditions under which it is observed. 

   What follows here is my attempt to think more subtly still, while taking a lead from Bohr.  I consider that reality remains something which somewhat branches out, yet does not collapse, and instead continuously engages us to participate—and not a collection of finished worlds, but an ongoing process in which distinction and observation arise and evolve together over time. In what follows, interconnection is not meant as metaphor, nor separation as illusion, but rather as functional aspects of reality—useful for navigation and survival. This distinction is not intended as an ontological denial of reality, but as a reminder that separation describes how we operate within the world, not how the world is ultimately composed.

   Let's try an experiment that allows ourselves, with our brain's countless neurons and synaptic pathways, sending and receiving electrical and chemical impulses, in this mysterious and constant state of tracking our environment, to help us navigate through our complex continuum. Whether we are in the simple state of relaxing in a chair and reading a magazine, or at the steering wheel of an automobile going seventy miles an hour following the flow of traffic, driving home after work during rush hour, use that imagination we're allegedly in possession of (or potentially in a position which allows us to be possessed by it) and do our best to conceive of this notion. Consider the blood coursing through our veins as being part of us, just like we think how our limbs and fingers and bones are components which assemble into our unique individuality.  Note how it follows that the electrical impulses flowing along our central nervous system and brain's intricate networks of axons pass along signals to stimulate the muscles of our arms and legs and feet and hands.  See how this electrical flow remains analogous to the blood coursing through our veins and arteries. We understand there exists positive and negative ions down into the molecular and submolecular structure of our bodies, just as they do deep within the clothes we wear, and the cars we drive; not to mention the streets themselves, and trees as well as the ground of being here on this planet. We can easily surmise how this electrical current remains enmeshed throughout the entire tapestry of our world, extending from our bodies and beyond; indeed going further to connect as far as our Sun and its entire planetary system.  For all we know, this electromagnetic webbing extends through all the gravitational wells threading through every star in our galaxy; connecting somehow farther than our current understanding, until it threads through all galaxies in a cosmic tapestry bound together by black holes, quasars and quantum forces which exist on a macrocosmic level our scientists have been marveling over and studying ever since the day we and all our ancestors were born.  

   It's not difficult to imagine; or to make it even more clear, we're not imagining it at all, but rather picturing the actuality of the total interconnection of our universe, which we like to think of as reality itself.  Even while we can also imagine things that aren't real, like bat-winged unicorns with serpentine eyes and the chromatic scales of a dragon, let's not forget we've already invented a word for this, which is the word fantasy.  Meanwhile, the reality of our existence remains obviously wholly interconnected together to the point we've dubbed another word for it; singularity.  And even though many words can have multiple meanings, there are some whose meaning mostly has a singular definition, and this word, despite having a potential host of different applications to which it may be used, nevertheless also remains with its one initial meaning that could be ascribed to everything, in singular fashion, after itself.  It's just that we're typically not occupied with this sort of conscious endeavor of thinking of everything, because we necessarily are focused on those aspects which we rely upon to navigate our way around a table, or getting into bed each night, so we may lay ourselves down to sleep and enter that mysterious state of rest that can bring dreams to mind. 

   We've become so accustomed to thinking of ourselves as separate from the rest of creation, that we don't usually give the matter much thought.  If we did, we might start to come around to concluding that thinking such things may be more accurately described as an aberration, becoming more synonymous with the idea of fantasy, and we couldn't have that, because after all, we're hard wired to believe in reality, aren't we?  Here's where the words we've become accustomed to start to shimmer and waver and become pliable, softening before our minds as if they were silly putty, only to be shaped into things temporarily, to lull us into a sense of false security, leading us toward the idea that this line of thinking simply will not do.  Not when we have to rise up in the morning, dress ourselves once again, to put our shoes on, and tie our laces, and prepare breakfast and eat so we can have the energy to head out the door and get to work on time, or whatever it is we have on our daily agendas.  

   It's almost as if this condition we've come to think of as being hardwired remains some sort of default, automatic setting like a passenger jet having an autopilot.  Yet if we stop for a moment and set aside whatever automated daily ritual we may be in the midst of, and think for a minute about how we are actually not just interconnected with the universe but integral aspects of it, sort of like the aforementioned scales on a reptile, well it can become disconcerting, to say the least.  It's somewhat analogous to the curious phenomenon of how we rarely stop to think about the way we're constantly breathing.  Yet consider this.  In meditation, we are reminded of this connection to the universe, when we become consciously aware that we are in fact breathing, and then join in with creation by taking in deep breaths and slowly exhaling them, just a few in a row may be all we need to gauge that constant and rhythmic interconnection we have with nature, which after all remains all about us, in the form of the land and blue sky and the moon and everything that appears to lie beyond.  

    This exercise becomes one of the few times where we abandon fantasy altogether to become enraptured by the revelation that we may not be a part of everything so much as an inherent aspect of the entirety of creation itself. When we're welcomed into this reality, we liberate ourselves from being caught up in the trap of having falsely assumed we were separate from everything. Whether this may reveal we've been periodically lulled into thinking we're parts of a fantasy manifested in the ever so gradually fluctuating cauldron of eternity, I cannot say with any convincing degree of certainty, but I may offer a not uncommon insight that seems to feel right, when I think it aloud in my mind:  The universe feels like it remains alive. 

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Focusing on Context

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The Oscillating Oculus

CAN THE DEATH OF A BABY OCELOT, RESCUED FROM THE JUNGLES OF HONDURAS, SAVE THE LIFE OF A SEVEN MONTH OLD BABY GIRL?

A True Story by Debbie Plowman

     1969

   We had been living in Honduras for three years – New Englanders who had come south to start a business and a new chapter of life. The jungle was never far from our door, and one day it brought us an unexpected visitor.

   A baby ocelot had been abandoned in the jungle.  We rescued him and brought him home, naming him Lancelot. He was tiny, with oversized paws and solemn eyes, but when the chickens scratched in the dirt nearby, they scattered in every direction. They new he was no ordinary kitten.

   One day when I was home alone, I noticed that Lancelot was lethargic and weak. His playful energy had vanished. Unsure of what to do, I placed him gently in a small box and took him to the local doctor.. After examining him, the doctor said he appeared to have dysentery-a common and dangerous illness, especially for babies and small children.

   He told me something that would stay with me forever: Dysentery could kill a baby within forty-eight hours. Many parents, too poor to seek medical help, believed the child would recover in a few days. Often, the doctor said, they were wrong.  Medical care was urgent – within 24 hours – or the child most likely would not survive.  Sadly, for Lancelot it was too late. He died shortly afterward.

   In Honduras it is the custom to have a maid, no matter how poor we were ourselves. We had a lovely young woman named Virginia, who had three adorable children. When her last baby was born, we were able to find an old crib for her, and let Virginia bring the baby to work each day.

   Our house had no glass windows, only wooden shutters, so we draped mosquito netting over the crib. The baby’s name was Ana Bessie. She had big brown eyes and a cheerful, peaceful nature. I grew fond of watching her from across the room as she lay beneath the netting.

   One mild October day, I noticed she seemed unwell. I asked Virgina what was wrong. She told me the baby had been having diarrhea for more than a day. I told her Ana Bessie needed to see a doctor. Virginia shook her head. She said the baby would be fine in a day or two – and she could not afford medical care.

   Suddenly, Lancelot came back to me. The doctor’s words echoed in my mind: Forty-eight hours. Twenty four hours to survive. Time was of the essence. I insisted we go immediately. We traveled to the public hospital in the capital city, only to find a long line of patients waiting.  

   And here is something I confess with embarrassment: as an American I went straight to the front of the line with Ana Bessie in my  arms. The staff took her in at once and began treatment.  She had dysentery. The doctor later told me that if we had waited even one more day, she would not have survived.

   Ana Bessie lived.

   I truly believe the lesson I learned from Lancelot saved her life. He came into our lives for only a short time – but he left behind something far greater than himself: a living, breathing baby girl.

   Lancelot did not survive the jungle or the sickness, but through him, Ana Bessie did.

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Singularity in Fluctuation in 

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Pulse and Packet: Common Circuits in Synchronicity

 by our roving reporter, Shaun Lawton (written in his own words) 

    I feel we must be living up to our necks in an unprecedented era of misguided disinformation and disgusted suspension of disbelief.  It's not the time to duly note and disclose the nitpicker's reign, but rather, to acknowledge quite the opposite.  We've slid into an oil slick of proponents and supporters of disparate ideologies which, were they each to be examined under the proverbial microscope, would not so much fly apart at the seams, but reveal there are no seams in smoke and mirrors as much as distracting and dazzling displays of pure illusion. 

    There yet remain a plethora of natural phenomena that our modern minds have long been conditioned against even noticing anymore, much less deciphering.  And we can owe it to a peculiar and relatively recent development among human affairs the world over known as the internet. What got its innocuous start as a U.S. Department of Defense project in the late sixties intended to link a small number of military and university research computers into a secure, limited area network ended up becoming the one true proverbial "Genie in the  bottle," or if one prefers, a veritable Pandora's Box whose lid got blasted right off its hinges.

    It's because of the fact our military geniuses resorted to packet switching (breaking data into smaller, independent packets intended as backup to reroute information if parts of their network were damaged) so communication could be ensured during a crisis.  In a nutshell, this became the prototype which, after adopting common transmission control protocols, that system evolved into today's world wide web. 

    Please feel free to take a moment and let that information sink in to your own biological neural network that processes, transmits and stores electrochemical information.  Consider our situation from an objective position, if you can.  Think along the lines that indicate how the global internet connects each of us disparate individual human beings together, in a way.  Now consider how our own brains operate with their independent neural networks, and how they somehow manage to reach out to one another (across time and space whether within distant or intimate proximity of each other).

    It's enough to beg several questions competing for our attention.  First, I'd like to take this moment to ask you all to consider the irony of a worldwide network that routes, processes and stores digital information across interconnected systems, yet for reasons that may perhaps remain unfathomable to us, nevertheless appears to have failed to unify humankind towards alleviating our problems of poverty, disease and war, and in some most extreme cases (such as might be represented by our own nation here in the United States of America, currently) seems to have possibly even backfired, or achieved quite the opposite effect, resulting in a divisiveness that greedy politicians have taken advantage of the opportunity to seize the moment by the throat for their own political and personal gain, and that of their limited group of peers, rather than for all mankind. Some things seem to never change. 

    Now, I ask you all to simply do the one thing that our global internet, despite all of its sophistication and tangled up, re-routed and crisscrossed networks could never in a million years do.  I want you to consciously take in one big long slow deep breath, hold it for a second or two, and let it out in a steady exhalation for as long as you are able to.  Remember that with each breath you take, oxygen enters the blood to nourish the body, and carbon dioxide is reclaimed and carried out of your system to be expelled as a waste product, a cycle that has maintained our lives since the day we each were born. 

    I have made my point, for packed into this one thousand and one word article, every necessary bit of information required for each of us to put 2 + 2 together to equal 4 remains implicit.  Yet I don't mind reiterating it to spell it out for you nevertheless.  We make assumptions about not only the clothes we wear, or the room we happen to be in, and the buildings we travel between during the daily course of our lives, but we have a tendency to project these conjectures and expectations onto our neighborhood block, our city, county and state, and so on and so forth; but we don't stop there, we make these postulations and hypotheses about our own nation and every country on Earth, without ever really bothering to fact check anything.  And if it comes time for us to do so, well we can easily log onto the great world wide web, and be led directly to self-affirming sites that stroke our egos and reassure us that what we were positing can be readily corroborated by like minded individuals out there, after all. 

    It's not so much a dilemma as it remains a tricky situation.  When we begin to crouch down to examine the scintillating minutiae at the heart of it all, silently racing along information channels at microscopic levels shuttling to and from explosive information centers processing everything from daily stock exchanges to communal societal events ongoing periodically for anyone to participate in, we begin to notice that there yet remains a superabundance of high yield potential energy stored across our global networks that may yet kick into hyperkinetic overdrive at the drop of a hat, or clink of a dime.  For when disinformation gets accidentally misguided, it may backfire on its proponents. 

    Entropy may continue while our momentum pushes our lives forward, yet both mind and machine trace and reflect hidden harmonies in sync with one another.  Think about how networks of thought and ongoing circuits of data constantly converge into larger patterns that we can individually comprehend. One glance at our situation contains enough information to remind us that even against the apparent chaos of our online views of the world, the greater order of things in this life periodically regains equilibrium over time and settles into focus, while the trees continue to shine and the Sun grows older. 

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The Origins of Image

      Writing + photography / synthography = digital articulation by Shaun Lawton 

  

    The image above, to me, seems to represent perhaps some old, weathered piping deep underground, polished over time by running water beneath the topsoil, of what's left of some ancient ruins stemming from a subterranean Dwarven fortress.   Perhaps it's the locking mechanism from an ancient gateway that once separated the cavernous realm of Dol Guldur from the rest of middle-Earth.   Or maybe it's the remains of an old carburetor or the twisted wreckage of an ancient Aztec sculpture, it's difficult to pinpoint, exactly.   

   Now that we're deeply nesting within the continuum referred to as the 21st century, with its deep fake images receding into the darkest corners of a world wide web having taken on a life of its own, we are at least mentally equipped enough that we might recognize such an image as being itself fabricated from any variety of source images, rendering the final form of it in some manner to be counterfeit.  Yet is not that the very precinct of art itself?  If we assume that the word art may serve as the prefix for artifice and everything "artificial," then yes, but when we lean back and relax on the thought that beautiful artworks, from abstract sculptures carved out of marble to vivid paintings which reflect through light startling images to our eyes, we do get a sense of the inherit value in such contrivances.   The image above should hardly be thought of as counterfeit, considering there remains no real precedent to which it stays attached, at least not one which could effectively substitute it.  

    From a teaspoon of spilled water on a countertop to the above image, I am here to trace the random lineage of appearance and its endless forms of similitude.  Right off the bat I should introduce the above image as having resulted from my uploading a source image  (the photograph I snapped of our kitchen counter top with some water spilled on it you see at the very bottom of this post) into an online free photo editor  (befunky, my random choice of freely available and easy to use photo editors) and messing with the brightness / contrast / colors until achieving a darker and more interesting look.  Then I uploaded that resulting image  (a .jpg) into Deep Dream Generator and after pairing it with a separate image and making some minor adjustments, the image morphed into several different forms (see two of them below), made possible by my switching out some of the "style" images in DDG for experimentation, until it resulted in the top three iterations you see posted here.   

    

     How are these variants of the original photo so alluring and interesting looking?  My guess is that the source image must've been rich with visual cues and elements which lend themselves in highly volatile ways to the VQGAN + CLIP programs that enable AI algorithms to generate random iterations of two separate images fused together like this.  There must be a plethora of scintillating color cues embedded within the light captured in the original photo reflecting from the gleaming countertop and off the curved surface of the water spill itself to produce a myriad different combinations of possibilities, resulting in an incalculable number of potential iterations, when you consider that there's no limit to the style images you might choose to utilize in crafting these deep dream generative artworks.  

    I love this last one a lot. There's something about the feathered, scaly textures that evoke not just obsidian refractions, but some sea-shell like aspects, reminiscent of Mother of Pearl, with some interesting suggestive effects blending in, as if it were at the bottom of a cavernous river, or perhaps somehow reflected off volcanic glass in a rainforest lagoon.  These evocative hues and patterns which can be elicited from tweaking certain source images, taken with a smartphone, and then run through a basic online photo editor, before being paired with any given stylistic images, from analog to digital, to generate countless disparate iterations and variants, will continue to keep me occupied and inspired on my new mission to conjure as many of these Rorschachian portraits I can manage, which appear to reflect a cornucopia of pareidolia enhanced visual representations, that regardless of anyone else's opinions, I would nevertheless like to frame and call "art."   Doubtless to say, the future remains such a gallery.

  Here's the original source image, the snapshot taken from my iPhone of our modern kitchen counter top, with some water spilled on it.  I remember intently focusing on the water spill from just the right angle, in order to capture the light from the ceiling in a certain way, so it would reflect off the misshapen puddle itself, to the point it somewhat resembled a dragon's head, as I imagined it after closely examining the snapshot.  Pleased with the results, little did I know then that this singular image would evolve into the even more interesting and mystifying synthographic images depicted above, all of which resulted from my introduction to the world of VQGAN + CLIP art.  The secret which makes this particular mundane photo so effective at having been decoded and rearranged, I would guess, lies in the very fact that it depicts  water  atop a bright, reflective counter top, with the added bonus of having light reflected off both the water and surface underneath.   Art may be seen through a variety of different perspectives and lenses.  It's been mentioned that it may be defined as shorthand for "artificial," but I've come to appreciate a better definition, that I learned from my brother, perhaps the most brilliant artist I've ever had the stunned pleasure to have known in my life. He told me that if art remains shorthand for anything, it should be articulation.  As far as I'm concerned, that's the perfect definition for it.

    This article was originally published in the blog EYESEAT, on February 8, 2022. 

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The Pathogen Nursery

 by Shaun Lawton     (written for the Oscillating Oculus in his own words, without AI). 

   Arthur Blair could not have foreseen the actual consequences of the world he seeded. Though instrumental in providing the necessary fertilizer for autocratic dynasties the world over to subsidize their ultimate power over a hapless humanity, Arthur was quite convinced he'd done a bit of good for the future of the world. 

   Mr. Blair was a writer, you see. He came from a lower-upper-middle class English family, raised in a British territory at the start of the twentieth century in an eastern state of India. The middle child sired in between two sisters, with five years in between them, Arthur dreamed of being a famous author someday. 

   As a child he wrote poetry after the fashion of his idol, William Blake. Little did he suspect the seething cauldron of infectious agents at work, suspended throughout every nodal point of the human race, germinating with potential at every crook and turn, during the time of his upbringing. 

   Had he anticipated this morass of fermentation and suspected how it would eventually come to fruition historically over the next few decades of his life, he may very well have seriously considered abandoning his little book project, and forthwith undertaken another profession altogether. 

   Alas, during this particular burgeoning moment of the human species, following in the footsteps of the likes of H.G. Wells was considered a noble endeavor by many. Young Arthur studiously wrote in his journal every day, intent on capturing the vision which danced behind his eyes. 

    How could the young Mr. Blair have considered the ultimate consequences of attempting to warn the world of the disheartening direction their legislature and internal affairs seemed to be working themselves toward? 

   At the time of the writing of his final and most famous novel, a period during the late forties which culminated his career as an author and put the golden capstone on his dream of becoming a famous writer, precious few individuals were in a position to contemplate the complete and adverse effects of such a critical work. 

   The human beings of Earth were embroiled in their second world war. Propaganda on all sides of the war effort was generated in pamphlets, newspapers, and on the radio.  The truth was that no one alive–much less the gifted and starry eyed Arthur–at that time in history could have possibly foreseen the long term consequences of any of their ongoing activities. 

   Such is the near sightedness of our species throughout our daily trials and tribulations. Whether we be professor or sergeant, doctor or critic, farmer or lawyer, working with our fingers stained dark brown by the land, or typing on matte black plastic keyboards with immaculately manicured hands, or middle-aged dropouts, philosophy students, retail clerks or gardeners. 

   What we're all in the process of engendering remains a far greater sum than its millions of remotely oblivious parts could ever dream.  But young Arthur dreamed harder than anyone around him.  He could see just where the machinery of the state was leading the human race.  It wasn't a pretty sight, and he'd be damned if he didn't write about it. 

   Or maybe, we'd be damned if he did.  

    

   

 

 

  

The Politics of Fear and the Erosion of Democracy

by roving reporter Shaun Lawton  (written with minimal AI support under reporter's direction)

Poster design by Indika Entertainment Advertising 

Fair use, wikipedia.org/w/index.php 

    What we are experiencing in the United States is not simply disagreement, nor even ordinary political polarization, but a systematic distortion of shared reality. In an environment shaped by algorithmic amplification—documented starkly in The Social Dilemma—fragments of information are stripped of context, magnified beyond proportion, and redistributed as symbolic proof of moral failure on the opposing side. 

    This process is driven less by ignorance than by motivated reasoning and confirmation bias: we do not evaluate facts neutrally, but select and exaggerate those that protect our identities. Cognitive dissonance then seals the lens in place, ensuring that contradiction is felt as attack rather than correction.

    The result is a form of epistemic tribalism in which truth itself fractures along group lines. Each political camp peers through a differently ground lens—one that sharpens threats, blurs nuance, and bends reality toward pre-chosen conclusions. 

     Context collapse ensures that a sentence, image, or headline can no longer be understood within its original frame; instead, it is refracted outward, acquiring new meaning as it passes through partisan filters. 

    What might once have been a point of debate becomes proof of existential danger, and disagreement hardens into affective polarization—an emotional divide rooted not in policy, but in mutual distrust.  And the standoff between the two camps, liberal and conservative, democrat and republican, becomes set and solidified.  

     The Oscillating Oculus exists to examine this distortion, at the point where perception becomes belief. If we are to repair a shared civic reality, we must first recognize the lenses through which we look—how they are shaped, who profits from their curvature, and why we so rarely question the clarity of our own view. 

     Until we do, we will continue to mistake magnified fragments for the whole picture, arguing not over what is true, but over which version of reality is permitted to exist. That's not the USA any of us signed up for.   

     We don't need to ask our parents about this.  All we need to do is ask ourselves.  Do we really want to sit back behind the safety of our screens while our great, diversified country gets ripped apart, while the rest of the world begins hedging their bets?  Perhaps we should ask ourselves, just what percentage of American voters do We, the Online, actually represent? 

      One thing remains clear, despite the gross distortion of our reality we get from viewing things from being on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Bluesky, etc.  And that's the fact that our nonvoting contingency grew to roughly 36% in 2024 (from about 34% in 2020).  In 2016, it was at the unacceptably high rate of at least 40%.  

     We at this digital daily digest urge every American to not just vote, but to cut through the thickening cynicism and get as many other young people to exercise their civic duty and vote, as well.  This great, unyielding LENS through which many of us are filtering our information from here online cannot care one way or the other.  

     It's up to us, human beings, the people of this country, to bring that nonvoting contingency to below 30% in an effort to bring our country back, where we can continue setting aside our differences and governing without fear for the wide variety of people we have sworn in to being our fellow American citizens.  

     Remember the warning FDR gave us, all those years ago, after we got out of the Great Depression: "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." Fear is now being weaponized to excuse lawlessness. Franklin Delano Roosevelt warned in 1933 that fear itself was the enemy, and his response was pragmatic reform—not socialism. That reality is now denied by much of the modern conservative and MAGA movement.

     As true and loyal patriotic Americans, what are we going to do now to ensure our administration follows the rule of law to keep every American safe, and resume running things in solidarity with all our allied nations in the world?  It's time we sat down with ourselves and our loved ones and reexamine our individual roles in living up to our civic duty.  And  #VOTE. 

Click below to read 

The Pathogen Nursery

a flash faction tale

by Shaun Lawton

available on the

Oscillating Oculus