Maudlin on Monday

The past weeks since the reading of the budget here in Australia has NOT been uneventful but still despite the furore and shock from previous devoted LNP supporters I just can’t quite feel as glad as I should.  I think the reason for that is – Australia voted this man and his government into power in the first place.

Now they are shocked when he acts as he has always acted, with steadfast denial to current events, the desire to return to a time which never truly existed anyway and with disregard to all who he sees beneath him, and trust me he thinks most of us are.

It doesn’t mean that I don’t believe people can change it is more that we seem so disinclined to learn and when I saw this quote by Douglas Adams on IFLScience it struck me that this is what was bothering me the most.  We are not stupid yet we continually avoid using the cerebral cortex and rely solely on the hind brain response which really isn’t the best method of going through life or making decisions.  I am encouraged by the amount of debate and ongoing effort that is being put into changing the situation and the fact that it grows each day rather than fading away over time.

However I fear that given enough time and suitable rhetoric people will forget the danger of listening to those who say only what wishes to be heard and we will be facing another similar situation in the future. I hope not, I hope that upcoming generations have lost enough, learnt enough and are aware enough to look below the surface of things.

If you wish to predict how something/someone will behave you need to understand it and that means before making a decision look into the past actions/behaviors of the person in question, evaluate how they have behaved and why [as the why can make a huge difference] and from there it is usually possible to extrapolate future actions in similar situations.  It was Marcus Aurelius the Roman emperor  famous for his treatise on First Principals which is still taught today that first [that we know of] penned these thoughts.