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Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
Just a couple more points to dance around this and related subjects.
I did have an experience in childhood that I had absolutely NO memory of whatsoever. However, the effects or proof of damage were still quite real, just unexplanable. Then one day, when I had entered a particularly safe and wonderful position in my life, memories started popping up. I was able to identify a person I hadn't thought of for many years from these memories and when I did a little research, found out that he was in prison for life for molesting his daughter!
So, even though the memory was temporarily inaccessible, the effects were still very real and at least some of the memory, although not complete, was still available for recovery.
Also, a certain kind of 'mind control' would be a positive kind, such as visualization, wherein people reduce tumor sizes and calm body functions.
I do believe the mind is somewhat controllable, depending on the will if the subject because there is NO WAY that I'm buying an X-box!
Very interesting thread.
Originally posted by E_Pluribus_Unum
I sure don't hope that something tragic happened to you to make you forget that event in your life. It is very possible that you forgot because it seemed unimportant to you.
Originally posted by vuoto
At what point does the effect of modern media, advertising, pervasive viral marketing become mind control? If you believe that mind control requires the submission of the will of a person to another you are missing the far more insidious version we are all bombarded with daily.
Last week, we saw shoppers in SEVERAL Wal-marts in America, in different regions of the country, rioting violently just to buy products. This is the ugly underside of the consumerist culture that we are told is what makes America great. In light of the original sentiment behind Thanksgiving, I think it can be safely said that consumerism reflects the most un-American of behaviours. Forget what you've heard about the emergence of Evangelical Christianity in the US, it's CONSUMERISM that is the new Religion of America.
Which brings me to the second most pervasive element of mind control that is at work in the United States: the emergence of an absolutist religious belief that practically demands violence (and I'm not talking about Islamic fundamentalism). In America today, there is an absolutist pseudo-Christianity at work that has relatively little to do with the teachings of Christ, and is being manipulated by people in power to make the populace easier to govern. When your faith is the "only true faith" and all non-believers are doomed to burn in hell for eternity, it makes it a lot easier to see them as less than human. When it comes right down to it, if your neighbor isn't raising their children to be "good Christians" isn't that child abuse? And if they are endangering the immortal souls of their children (and yours), aren't you doing God's will by "taking them out"?
By putting foreign policy, environmentalism, education, especially politics in the realm of "good vs. evil" we create a population that is easy to bend to a certain way of thinking. Preachers are telling willing believers that it's a SIN to vote Democratic, that not supporting a war in Iraq is against God's will, indeed that George W. Bush has been anointed by God to rule America.
What a one-two punch this crypto-fascist pseudo-Christianity and the religion of Consumerism have had in this nation. Like shaven-head marine recruits we are being broken down, screamed at by religious leaders, talk-radio hosts and television commercials, giving up our individuality, our very wills to those whose only goal is power and/or wealth.
Mind Control? Sounds like it to me.
Originally posted by E_Pluribus_Unum
*Your mind couldn't recognize or concieve this tragedy as possible, thus shunning it from your mind, and deleting it from your memory.
Originally posted by vuoto
At what point does the effect of modern media, advertising, pervasive viral marketing become mind control?
Originally posted by Zaphod58
The mind truly is fascinating. I've been trying to follow things going on with research into brain function for years.
Has everyone here heard the stories of Phineas Gage and more recently the firefighter that has been in a coma for 10 years? Talk about incredible. I'm sorry that I can't remember all the details about the firefighter, but things were a little hectic with all the major medical emergencies going on around me at the time it happened.
Phineas Gage:
On September 13, 1848, Phineas Gage was working outside the small town of Cavendish, Vermont on the construction of a railroad track where he was employed as a foreman. One of his duties was to set explosive charges in holes drilled into large pieces of rock so they could be broken up and removed. This involved filling the hole with gunpowder, adding a fuse, and then packing in sand with the aid of a large tamping iron. Gage was momentarily distracted and forgot to pour the sand into one hole. Thus, when he went to tamp the sand down, the tamping iron sparked against the rock and ignited the gunpowder, causing the iron to be blown through Gage's head with such force that it landed almost thirty meters behind him.
Life cast and skull of Phineas Gage
Life cast and skull of Phineas Gage
The three foot (1 m) long tamping iron with a diameter of 1.25 inches (3.2 cm) weighing thirteen and a half pounds (6.12 kg) entered his skull below his left cheek bone and exited after passing through the anterior frontal cortex and white matter. Whether the lesion involved both frontal lobes, or was limited only to the left side, remains a matter of controversy. Remarkably, after such a dramatic accident, Gage regained consciousness within a few minutes, was able to speak, and survived a 45-minute ride back to his boarding house sitting in a cart.
en.wikipedia.org...
More recently, there was the story of the firefighter on CNN.
He had been in an accident where a building collapsed on him. His children were 2 and 3 years old. The last 10 years he has been in a coma, with the doctors saying he was in a Persistant Vegetative State, and would never recover. One of his doctors asked his wife to try a new drug that has come onto the market recently. She gave her ok, and three days later her doctor walked in on a miracle. The dr walked into the room to see the firefighter sitting up in bed having a perfectly lucid, intelligent conversation with his wife and children. He was confused about his children, because he didn't realize that 10 years had passed. He sat up talking for 18 hours before falling asleep. He never woke up with that level of consciousness again, but there have been definate signs of improvement.