Those of us who enjoy history often sit back and think about how it would be to live in a different time. Until a few days ago it's only been a daydream for me. No, I haven’t discovered the secret to time travel (yet) but ran across what I believe is the next best thing.
I discovered the Early America YouTube channel during the pandemic and watching it is strangely relaxing and satisfying to me for some unexplainable reason. This weekend I watched the video posted above and was shocked to learn some little known facts about the Boston Tea Party and that you can purchase the exact teas that the American Colonists drank on a regular basis. These were the same tea varieties that were thrown into Boston harbor, one of the many acts of rebellion that led to the Revolutionary War in America.
The teas can be purchased here. I ordered the most popular variety among the Colonists, Colonial Bohea Tea. According to historical records there were more chests of Bohea Tea thrown into the harbor than any other kind of tea. Needless to say, I wanted to see what all the fuss was about.
Having owned a tea shop myself over a decade ago I’m a tea aficionado. I drink at least three cups of Clouds and Mist green tea every day and have for nearly thirty years.
This Bohea Tea is reported to be a very full-bodied and smoky black tea, bearing a close resemblance to coffee. In fact, many historians think this could be one of the reasons American colonists easily made the transition to drinking coffee in rebellion to the high tea taxes imposed by the British. My tin of Bohea Tea is on the way and I can’t wait to actually taste American history.
I’ve been meaning to buy a t-shirt to rep crypto for years now and finally found the one I’ve been looking for recently. You’d better believe this bad boy is going into heavy rotation this spring. The artist, CryptoStitch, will be getting a lot more of my business in the days and months to come.
Our goal to achieving artificial general intelligence gets a little closer every day. For over a decade now social media algorithms have been exploiting humanity’s natural tribalist tendencies, coaxing us to buy crap we don't need, manipulating our emotions, and pushing our fractured society further and further into the extremes.
We can find equally convincing information on both sides of nearly any issue now online based on our internet search terms. For example, type Benefits of Statins in your internet browser. Now do the same search using the term Dangers of Statins.
Take a few moments to casually scroll down the results page of each of the two to really get a good idea of all of the information supporting both sides. This is just one of an infinite number of examples. It’s almost as if the results are being generated in completely different realities and in some ways they are.
There is no denying there is structural evil at play in our world. If we’re paying attention, the knowledge of its existence can be a catalyst for our own transformation.
Now is the perfect time to decide exactly what your truths are, to develop a moral and philosophical framework in which to live your life. If you do this you won’t find yourself among those left wondering “what do I believe?”. The answer to this question will get exponentially more difficult once AGI is unleashed. We might, very well, be the last group of humans to have even the luxury of deciding the answer to this question.
Enjoy the day. Thank you for reading!
~Eric Vance Walton~
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