It's proven beyond doubt in my mind that the human species is not the superior form of life on the planet. No one other than mankind still kills its fellow beings for reasons of emotional anguish. Or spite or chemically induced instability. Or financial and economic issues. Individual killing individual or a mass genocide, we are the only ones pursuing this style of survival.
Other animals including birds and dolphins and salmon are taking immense pains to simply ensure survival of their species. They do so by performing amazing feats in travel planning and execution covering continents in their annual migrations.
Ants and multitudes of insects build amazingly eco friendly colonies for inclement weather and all without resorting to man made silliness like higher education and subsequent student loans.
With all our so called advancement and improved life expectancies there are bunch of us worried about after life and other abstract ideas like heaven and hell.
So curious that I am I decided to investigate how one could get a sneak peek at either. After checking with Sergey at Google to see if he had any lat long or address to destination to key in my GPS and finding he did not I set out in a pensive mood. After dozing off a few minutes stuck in traffic I woke to find myself staring at nothing and hearing silence.
Walking around I realized I had stumbled into heaven. There was nobody there. Miles of white light and nothing else. Apparently the most pious amongst us had also failed the drug test to get in.
Finally I see this red sign glowing in the distance. I approach cautiously toward it and all it says in bold red letters is an arrow pointing right and the letters 'GO TO HELL'.
I press the sign and next thing I know I am staring at the red light in front of my car - on Earth.
I attempted to read this book by author Chuck Klosterman backward to forward but it started hurting my brain so I decided to stop and do it like any other publication in the English language. Start from page 1 and move to the right. Witty, caustic and thought provoking this is a book you want to read if you believe that the status quo might, just might be wrong. At times bordering on being contrarian about most things around us it tries to zero in on the notion of what makes anything believable and certain in our minds. The fact that there is a fact itself is ironic. Something analogous to the idea that you can never predict the future because there is no future. Many books and movies have tried to play on this concept - best that I recollect (I think I am) was 'The Truman Show'. This book by Klosterman attempts to provoke the reader to at least contemplate that what they think they know may be wrong. He uses examples like concept of gravity, and how it ...
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