No brainer, er... Did animals' 'sixth sense' save them from tsunami?

Wild animals seem to have escaped the Indian Ocean tsunami, adding weight to notions they possess a "sixth sense" for disasters, experts said on Thursday. Sri Lankan wildlife officials have said the giant waves that killed over 24,000 people along the Indian Ocean island's coast seemingly missed wild beasts, with no dead animals found. "No elephants are dead, not even a dead hare or rabbit. I think animals can sense disaster. They have a sixth sense. They know when things are happening," H.D. Ratnayake, deputy director of Sri Lanka's Wildlife Department, said on Wednesday

Hardly a case, I think, of a 'sixth sense,' but rather the application of the existing ones in tune with the natural environment, something we humans have long since abandoned at-large. If animals can navigate by detecting differing magnetic fields, subtleties of light and the stars, and simply by sensing changes in the earth, than biologically speaking 'higher order' creatures must have the same talents. It's thinking too damn much, and intellectual over-analysis (versus sensual intuitiveness) of our surroundings that's made that a latent talent.

Stop. Breathe. Feel exactly what it is your hand is resting on. Notice the light that somehow illuminates your view. This is, suddenly, your world. Somehow, someway, you have arrived at this point to do just this... taking a second to be aware of your place in the Universe, to be enveloped by it, and it within you.

And yet, you may as well be afloat on the wind, a seed wandering and tumbling above the massive Earth. You can see only this right now; from your chair, do you really hear the temple bells of Kathmandu? From your eye, do you see that squalid slums of Rio? Is your hand sifting through the rubble of Iraq? The map of human life is incomprehensibly dense, and yet that itself is so much dust among the silent galactic roar and froth of timeless abyss.

This minute gone by is alive, a singular feat of sorcery in the unknown repertoire of a chancy magician. What will you do next? Where are you planning to go today? Such slight questions, such mangificently tricky answers. These words here are nothing, really; you are turning them, transforming them into your next thought, you make the moment alive. Feel the repercussions of your being. Breathe. Go.

Santa Claus and Mushroom Shamanism

Santa Claus and Christmas have a hidden secret: namely the powerful entheogenic mushroom, Amanita muscaria. Though perhaps challenging and difficult to accept, a close examination of this strange relationship offers deep insight into the nature of the human soul. This long forgotten key to the hidden meaning of Christmas helps to explain the very nature of the classic religious experience. And as we probe deeper into this mystery, it may even shed light on the widespread religious and political oppression that still dominates much of the world.

The most obvious connection between Santa and the fly agaric mushroom is their appearance; both are rather portly, bright and jolly looking. Moreover, both are red, white and black, three colors that resound throughout time with symbolic meaning. Santa, as we all know, wears a bright red suit with white trim and sports a long white beard. He is all covered in "ashes and soot" from sliding down the chimney to deliver his gifts on Christmas Eve, hence the black or dark color in the trio. Likewise, the fly agaric is bright red and white. The famous polka dots are actually the remainder of what is called the universal veil, a white shell-like membrane that protects the mushroom as it breaks through the ground. This fierce and sudden eruption through the earth also accounts for the additional black color, in this case bits of soil that cling to the mushroom as it emerges.