E. C. (Gene) Ayres Blogspot

This image represents perhaps the oldest, if not most powerful symbol in the world: the so-called 'All-Seeing Eye.' Whose eye, exactly, is this, and what is it they see? The most obvious and common assumption, of course, is that it sees all and therefore, presumably, it is the eye of God. But which God? The earliest representations of this symbol were the seven manifestations of the Eye of Horus, in ancient Egypt. Sometimes depicted as a falcon, Horus could literally see all and was considered by his Rosicrucian and Masonic descendants as probably the original named God in the human panoply. Later versions, adopting the pyramid, and later on a simple representational triangle, all have their historical basis in this original Eye. Christians converted this triangle as to represent the Trinity. In 1782, the Eye of Providence was adopted as part of the symbolism on the reverse side of the Great Seal of the United States. It was first suggested as an element of the Great Se...

What is it about belief, that compels us mere mortals to reject all reason, logic or common sense, let alone science, in pursuit of that which we cannot have, and yet must? Religion, of course, has served to fill this gap in people's lives, and role in their hearts and minds for thousands of years. Religion is a proven provider of sustenance to a certain kind of addiction that seems to afflict most, if not all humans. It is potentially beneficial, of course, as was the probable intent of the prophets and originators in terms of its more positive messages. And of course, like chemical addictions, it is also potentially destructive, and has in fact taken the lives of millions over time, as it continues to do so even today. Music and art also provide an escape into an alternate state, like religion, and to some (including yours truly) it is a better outlet. When I go to a top-level performance of a Beethoven symphony, or a Bach or Mozart sonata or a Rachmaninoff piano concerto, it...

In the winter of 2004 an old friend paid me a visit to my then-home in St. Petersburg, Florida, and made me an offer that, while I didn't refuse, took me four months to accept. It was an offer to come to China and teach for a year at a public university in Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, of the People's Republic of China. For those of you who are not of the Boomer generation, you may not recall a movie, based on a book, that was a mega-hit thriller in the 1960s: The Manchurian Candidate . Manchuria was a nation in and of itself prior to the British occupation, consisting of today's three northernmost (and eastern-most) provinces of China, of which Heilongjiang is the largest and northernmost of the three, the capital city of which is Harbin (pop. 7,000,000). The Manchu were the native race of this region, who had their own language, and also their own emperor who, not satisfied with their confinement to the north decided to expand southwards. This decision, by the future Q...