Those of you unaware of the culinary delight of deep fried fresh frog legs may not know that if you don’t want them kicking and splattering grease about while frying in the pan you pulled the tendons. As a boy, I didn’t understand this but did as I was told. And to this day I recall with fond memory the gigging of frogs and the resulting platter piled high with golden brown fried frog legs; absolutely delicious, a gastronomical delight to the most educated palate of the most discriminating gourmet.

It would be some time before I understood things like pulling the tendons of frogs before frying. But my ignorance as a boy of things like electro-static charges and electro-magnetism, positive and negative charges, the movement of electrons that made things like batteries work and frogs jump enabled me to appreciate the ignorance of so many, the kind of ignorance that was, and remains the stock in trade of so many charlatans.

Like Leo Stein, I would not be so quick to question the wisdom of others if I did not question my own. It is when I confront my own appalling ignorance, an ignorance that confounds and denies wisdom, there is more than sufficient reason to be appalled by the ignorance of others, their obvious lack of wisdom, and I continue to be amazed that our species has survived in the face of such appalling ignorance and lack of wisdom. This is one of many mysteries that confront me, emphasizing how much there must be I do not know. And such things are the basis of my self-criticism, the basis of my critical view of many that claim to have knowledge about things despite their obvious ignorance.

Like some of you, I not only read the books and view the programs on TV about history and our universe, about the diversity of life, speculations about the many mysteries surrounding the ancients and even the supernatural, of Psi and the paranormal. Through my years of college and university studies of so many subjects there remained many things in history, literature, the arts and sciences mysterious and unexplained.

In conversation with a friend a couple of days ago I pointed out to him that if he should witness a lightning bolt strike a tree and it should explode and fire erupted from it that would simply be “nature.” But suppose he should see such a thing happen and there was no visible lightning bolt? It takes an atmosphere capable of making that raw energy of lightning to be visible, but remove what makes the lightning visible and how would you explain the sudden explosion of that tree? And so it is with many of the unexplained mysteries of our universe, our solar system, our earth, and life itself.

It is theorized the material universe composed of atoms is only 4%. This leaves the remaining 96% that we are not able to examine, unable to see, touch, smell, and as such is that part of energy like the lightning bolt we only see because of our atmosphere. But even studies in subatomic particle research do not explain the mysteries of electricity. We know what it can do, we know much about its characteristics, be we don’t know what it is. Anyone can go online now to argue, but it will still come down to so many things remaining mysteries.

I’m as fascinated as anyone about theories of our universe, and I could listen to those like Michio Kaku for hours as they delve into the mysterious world of speculation about things like wormholes, time travel, parallel and multiple universes; though in the end it remains speculation. We have the instruments and technology the Greek philosophers lacked, but we are just as far from answers as they were when it comes to the two greatest mysteries of all, those of life and death. In these, the mystery remains. And because these remain mysteries, all of our science deals with that “baryonic” 4% we can examine and work with, but that 96% “non-baryonic” remains the domain of speculation in its many forms from philosophy, religion, Psi, the paranormal, SciFi and even witchcraft. And throughout history there has been no lack of charlatans trading on the superstitions and gullibility of many. And I confess I am still entranced by electricity in its several manifestations including those in Dr. Frankenstein’s laboratory. I still wonder at the claims of electro-magnetic “cures” and so much more; I can still wonder at magnets having such a dramatic effect through some unseen forces at work, though we apply terms like “gravity” to things in lieu of understanding.

Because of my own ignorance I can be charitable of Thoreau’s comment about the pyramids of Egypt, that such tombs were built for “boobies” that should rather have been drowned and commending those that did not lend themselves to the enterprise of building such memorials to boobies. Comparatively little was known about those pyramids in Henry’s time, but these many years later there is still so much of mystery about them and the Sphinx I do have to wonder if Henry may have had a valid point; while at the same time wondering about so many monuments of stone and the various inscriptions that continue to confound the best experts.

It is cause for mourning, the loss of the great library at Alexandria. We can only guess at much of the learning and knowledge of the ancients that might have been available to us had it not been for such a catastrophic crime against civilization. But invariably it seems barbarism resulting from greed, corruption, ignorance, even calamitous necessities brought about by things like famine and plague, climatic changes trumps the best of civilization.

Right now, it seems the barbarians are once more threatening civilization as they did during the Dark Ages. And while those of us in America watch what is happening in so much of the world, the suffering and turmoil seeming to be reaching a crescendo we can only speculate what a real education could do to eliminate much of this. And in the face of so much appalling ignorance with its concomitant barbarism and suffering I am forced to acknowledge the same thing threatening America. However, as I wonder about so many things, about the universe, our solar system, the mysteries of life and death, the many mysteries right here on earth I am not so ignorant I do not know what the results of ignorance and want are.

In the England of Dickens’ time things were so barbaric for that “surplus population” of the poor he was moved to write of the threat ignorance and want posed to civilization. But even today here in America the same thing threatens us, the growing divide between the rich and poor, the privileged classes and those doomed to ignorance and want, growing largely from the poor that have children without a future as though they had some “divine” right to propagate wretchedness demanding unearned bread.

I’ve seen and experienced first hand what ignorance and want does to people. Right now, there are undoubtedly children in the ghettos and barrios of America that have the same dreams I had as a child, the same thirst for knowledge and possessing the same wonder about so many mysteries of the universe and of life. But these children don’t have the advantages I had as a child, an encyclopedia and works of great writers, adults that encouraged an education. Many of these children deprived of an education will face the cruel choices of life forced upon them, and many will reflect the words of Doc Holliday about Ringo wanting revenge for being born, something reflected by so many in the “entertainment” industry, even glorifying crime and violence, the dehumanizing of women and children.

Even as I wander about in my own thoughts about so many things, giving myself to speculation about so many things the reality of what all nations face when they are producing barbarians rather than civilized people looms before me. And it takes a civilization worthy of the name to give people hope; but where is the leader now that offers such hope in the face of increasing barbarism in America and throughout the world? It does seem after all is said and done we posses the knowledge to destroy ourselves, but lack the wisdom to prevent it.

In the meantime, the deconstructing of America as a civilized nation, an America without secure borders, without a common heritage, culture, language and led of greedy corrupt politicians and their corporate bosses goes on apace and few seem to believe what happened to Germany leading to Hitler’s power, what is happening in places like Pakistan and Kenya now can happen here. But it can. When you have to “Press one for English,” when people have to live in fear of walking on the streets of America or even driving, when crime is rampant and education is failing, when the non-productive begin to outnumber the productive and our own leaders flaunt the laws ordinary citizens are commanded to obey we are well on our way to becoming a barbarian nation.

Our own politicians give us a song and dance routine while those like Vladimir Putin understand reality and react to that. But the whole thing can turn on a dime, as history so well illustrates. No matter what the future holds, the leadership of America no longer encourages the best of civilization, but seems determined to give the barbarians every advantage that can only lead to more ignorance and want. And that can only lead to not even having telephones no matter what the language, to people killing each other for bread unearned or not. Only an educated and civilized nation can avoid such catastrophic events, and America is no longer going in the direction of an educated and civilized nation with the functioning institutions required for civilized living.

It would only take the loss of electricity, for example, to plunge civilized nations back into the Dark Ages and humankind once more forced to live like beasts. Thoreau may not have been correct about the pyramids, still the enormous number of laborers had to be fed and clothed. And when the laborers can no longer be fed and clothed, what monuments will be built to any civilization?