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From our religion, metaphysics and prayers-- we offer the following Let's Agree acknowledgments which know only concurrence.
1. Let’s agree God is what Nature hath not made.
2. Let’s agree the greatest things of life are joys found, not appetites fulfilled.
3. Let’s agree attachments and pain always and only coexist.
4. Let’s agree the passing of Time can be the saddest of all human acknowledgments, especially when what we know does not square with what we do.
5. Let’s agree the opportunity represented by one’s lifetime can be expressed as a ratio: years lived as numerator, the denominator all eternity. It makes sense to consider death when this ratio is fully pondered. It makes more sense to love profoundly the lifetime contained within it--and by so loving experience its reciprocal.
6. Let’s agree what we know and the language we use to reflect such knowledge are often unaligned. It has been known for some time the sun does not set, and there is no up or down (only in and out), and impenetrable solids do not exist. (How else does a glass window permit sunshine to warm a room?)
7. Let’s agree water, and electricity, always and only pursue paths of least resistance.
8. Let’s agree winds are evidence of pressure differentials in the atmosphere and the result of high pressure moments emptying to low pressure fields. (Low pressure fields actually pull the air from higher pressure regions, winds do not blow.)
9. Let’s agree first impressions are lasting.
10. Let’s agree people are inclined to embellish their work. (The potter paints the pot with designs which in no way enhance its function as a vessel for cooking; the architect adds filigree and gargoyle which supports no ceiling.)
11. Let’s agree the loss of memory is the loss of one’s identity.
12. Let’s agree it may not be possible to directly experience another person’s subconscious.
13. Let’s agree hunger is nagging.
14. Let’s agree some sleep is necessary.
15. Let’s agree as of 1997 half of the people in the world had never made a phone call.
16. Let’s agree the land we use was stolen from someone.
17. Let’s agree little things mean a lot.
18. Let’s agree institutions, unlike people, do not have to die eventually.
19. Let’s agree Men and Women are not mortal--but the mortality of the bodies they indwell is a feature of Nature's design.
20. Let’s agree from time to time corporations export onto society some of their costs, and occasionally this behavior is inadvertent.
21. Let’s agree the nuclear power plant is primarily a fire box. The purpose of the fire box is to heat water--so the steam it produces may propel turbines to yield electricity as output to the grid. Let's agree the fire box of the nuclear power plant is fueled by way of unstable radiated chemical decay.
22. Let’s agree choices have both intended and unintended consequences.
23. Let’s agree Malthusian assumptions need to be challenged and reexamined continually.
24. Let’s agree all chemistry is of Nature and certain chemistries are healthful.
25. Let’s agree Time tends to concentrate resources and authority amidst the few until external processes (public policy revolution or taxation) redistribute them.
26. Let’s agree large institutions (government, corporations, churches, media) rarely distribute authority to their stakeholders as citizens, customers, catechumen. This is especially apparent in institutions where the leadership class is professional in contrast to short term volunteers.
27. Let’s agree all markets operate within the spectrum of human interests whether they are open, closed, parallel, black, gray or barter.
28. Let’s agree while it is possible for a roof to fall or a bridge to collapse, it is impossible for Nature to fail.
29. Let’s agree no engineer would design a door so that it must be slammed to close properly.
30. Let’s agree opportunity and resources flow to those who are deemed reliable, not as a certainty, but with increased likelihood.
31. Let’s agree pattern is the phenomenon of repetition.
32. Let’s agree education remiss in instructing one in the skills to understand contracts, how they may be created, fulfilled, amended or dissolved is no education at all.
33. Let’s agree the law of the jungle, while it is a condition sponsored by Nature, it is a condition of low appeal to human beings.
34. Let’s agree the Hudson River flows in two directions.
35. Let’s agree if the world were a village of 1,000 people, 3 would be Jewish and 600 would be inadequately housed (and approximately 2 would live in Ireland).
36. Let’s agree one gives twice when one gives quickly.
37. Let’s agree exceptionless-ness is an attribute of all generalized principles of science--and it is the spirit of acknowledgments found in "Let's Agree".
38. Let’s agree if God is love God is therefore a verb.
39. Let’s agree if what we call "solid" is not a fact but a state of relative motion, then the irony follows: each human being's body is a verb.
40. Let’s agree we have a limited ability to disbelieve what is seen.
41. Let’s agree it is hard to manage what we cannot measure.
42. Let’s agree the atoms and molecules comprising a stone and a human being are inanimate.
43. Let’s agree a foot and a hand of a human are comprised of the same musculature although very differently adapted.
44. Let’s agree if the first generations of humans can be numbered 1, 2, 3 et cetera, children today, generationally speaking, are older than their parents.
45. Let's agree nowhere in Nature does one = zero.
46. Let's agree some economic theory, many psychological assertions and most sociological maxims, are difficult to verify and more difficult to re-verify.
47. Let's agree the speed of light, while fast, is not instantaneous.
48. Let's agree human beings, as products of Nature, cannot fail by design.
49. Let's agree competition produces many losers for each winner.
50. Let's agree hard work and financial success, while they may go hand in hand, the relationship is not a principle of Universe. There are many hard working individuals.
51. Let's agree the minimum wage, the salario minimum, in Baja California Norte, Mexico in 1990, was US$3.80 per day.
52. Let's agree even St. Paul, as far as we know, never made up with Barnabas.
53. Let's agree children are inexpensive.
54. Let's agree the pursuit of unfair advantage is a notion consistent with Malthusian assumptions.
55. Let's agree changing one's IQ is difficult and improving one's emotional well being always possible.
56. Let's agree birthrate inversely correlates with electrification (and 2 billion people on earth have no access to electricity).
57. Let's agree skepticism and optimism are antithetical, the latter reason born of the imagination, the former a burden born of the capacity to rationalize.
58. Let's agree knowledge is metaphysical.
59. Let's agree knowledge is cumulative.
60. Let's agree the metaphysical wealth of human experience is ever increasing.
61. Let's agree current accounting rules do not require entities to recognize opportunity costs.
62. Let's agree Universe, as we observe it with telescopes, microscopes and rays, is largely inanimate except on this small spin of gravity.
63. Let's agree the arithmetic of the inanimate realm seems to require 1 + 1 = 2.
64. Let's agree, in the realm of higher animals, it takes two to make one. The arithmetic of this mystery seems to suggest 1 + 1 = 1.
65. Let's agree, in the vegetable kingdom, the mustard plant produces many seeds. The arithmetic of the vegetable realm seems to suggest 1 = 1,000.
Shalom.
End of Entries updated as of 2 Januar2006.
First published as of 2 February 2004.
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