A link to an interesting "social" experiment conducted in the 70's with mice:
John B Calhoun set about creating a series of experiments that would essentially cater to every need of rodents, and then track the effect on the population over time. The most infamous of the experiments was named, quite dramatically, Universe 25.
In this study, he took four breeding pairs of mice and placed them inside a "utopia". The environment was designed to eliminate problems that would lead to mortality in the wild. They could access limitless food via 16 food hoppers, accessed via tunnels, which would feed up to 25 mice at a time, as well as water bottles just above. Nesting material was provided. The weather was kept at 68°F (20°C), which for those of you who aren't mice is the perfect mouse temperature. The mice were chosen for their health, obtained from the National Institutes of Health breeding colony. Extreme precautions were taken to stop any disease from entering the universe.
As well as this, no predators were present in the utopia, which sort of stands to reason. It's not often something is described as a "utopia, but also there were lions there picking us all off one by one".
The experiment began, and as you'd expect, the mice used the time that would usually be wasted in foraging for food and shelter for having excessive amounts of sexual intercourse. About every 55 days, the population doubled as the mice filled the most desirable space within the pen, where access to the food tunnels was of ease.
When the population hit 620, that slowed to doubling around every 145 days, as the mouse society began to hit problems. The mice split off into groups, and those that could not find a role in these groups found themselves with nowhere to go.
Read the full article here: https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/footage-shows-the-infamous-universe-25-experiment-that-turned-into-a-mouse-apocalypse/
Or watch the Video on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CXj0AGuh4c
And, yes, people have more complex wants and needs than mice, but - you can certainly some parallels in our society at the moment.
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Largely (but - not necessarily "Entirely") disproven by the Michelson-Morley experiment, the Luminiferous Aether was postulated to be the medium that permeated space and allowed electromagnetic waves and light to propagate across a vacuum.
Now - while we of course reject the earlier theories that - for example - the stars and planets are candles or lights hung up in crystalline spheres - we might have been I think a little hasty getting rid of this one. Call it intuition.
Links:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson%E2%80%93Morley_experiment
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminiferous_aether
While light can explain it's propagation by being both a particle and a wave - and electro-magnetic waves are explained away using "fields", it does seem that we have replaced the Aether with the term "Space", invented dark matter and a variety of other constants and equations to explain away - never satisfactorily - our relation to both space and neighboring celestial bodies. While the theory of relativity has held up for this long - the presence of an Aether, or medium - which slowed it down, or capped it's speed, would go a long ways towards overcoming it. Certainly the abundance of other planets, stars, celestial bodies in general suggests there must be some reasonable means for us to communicate - or traverse the voids - to them. Accepting the speed of light as an upper bound to the speed of our travels is not a particularly attractive option.
Anyways, the things that get me thinking far too early and never with enough coffee...
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So, going down the more esoteric listening rabbit holes of Theosophy and other such Biblical interpretations.
Noteworthy - and - occasionally cringe worthy - "Acres of Diamonds" by Russell H. Conwell - which takes the old folk tale of the Arabian who dreams of a buried treasure, travels far and wide, then returns to discover it buried in his own back yard. This - the entire narration - be a good neighbor, and you will be amply rewarded. The style of writing - more or less compiled from various of the authors travelling lectures - often painful, ridiculous, but - it's of the era. That said I would be curious to attend one of his speeches, if only to see how he presented his lectures, somewhat in the manner of an itinerant preacher I imagine.
Other books - "Your Invisible Power" by Genevieve Behrend, "The Game of Life and How to Play It" by Florence Scovel Shinn - classics - there are dozens in the same light - as ye think so shall ye become, the world is a manifestation of thought, etc. etc. Noteworthy uploaders include Master Key Society, Esoteric Tower, Psychology Library.
Now, just a quick note - every new age flapdoodle religion or belief has it's grounding in these books. "The Secret" is nothing more than old knowledge recycled and passed down time and time again. What is curious is that we need such an inane movie to readvise us of what is probably the closest reasonable interpretation of the Bible there is.
Other worthwhile listening comes in the form of Alan Watts - whom I'm not perfectly in accordance with, but I enjoy his lectures nonetheless.
And Carl Jung, his own readings or competent readings from his works - his theories on symbolism & psychology greatly embellished Freuds.
So, there, largely, lies my listening pleasures lately, some curious things online, if only you know how to find them.
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Now writing, now taking a break. Playing chess online against the bot "Sven", whom I should be able to beat with my eyes closed, only - for some reason, I don't.
Inaccuracies, Mistakes, Blunders.
Sven, he's a barometer of my mental wellness, 1100, my chess rating should be substantially better than this, only - it's not. My mistakes - blunders, are trivial, yet still they recur, there's no "long term strategy", merely move, move - ooops, the blunderbuss of my incompetence, inattention, keeps the game running to 20, 30, 50, even 150 moves.
Games I should win with my eyes closed.
There are days when I win - it seems that it is the day that decides, not my ability - some days, the games are short, victory is swift. Others - defeat inevitable and invariably prolonged far beyond what I should be comfortable with. There seems to be no common denominator - play drunk, hungover, sober as a judge - there's something else going on upstairs that decides even before I wake how the day will proceed.
Now - I know this game. I've played it - on and off - 35 years. My real ranking should be in the low 2000. Minimum. I used to play a friend, Milan, in the cafe's of Edmonton - we were evenly matched, meaning to say that both of us were bad - but I recall playing him once - he had me cornered - his checkmate assured, when somehow a light went on in the back of my brain, and I saw a full 7 moves ahead, my way out - an epiphany of sorts - and playing them through won the game.
For the record, chess masters only "see" 2 or 3 moves ahead - merely they know what moves are better, what moves are not - and so the game is built largely upon habitual responses to every foreseeable move.
But this is it - the game - it plays itself in the back of your mind, it's not playing the game that's so difficult, it's getting myself out of the way so that the light in the back of my head can play, me, I'm casting an incompetent's shadow on the board, it's not Sven, it's me defeating myself.
And this I am finding highly annoying.
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