Jenny L. M. (2022-04-17 14:46:19), category: sami

Point taken. I can see how prioritizing can leave digging into the land of ago the short end of the stick. The daily bread first.

Having that said:

How would you say the science of epigenetic inheritance of the effects of trauma is impacting on the willingness of investigating these matters, granted the presence of a perception that this particular science is valid? On the condition, of course, that there is established at least some consensus that trauma is, in its different extents and variations, inflicted on the indigenous people (not necessarily all) in the era of the missionaries. I’m aware that there’s also been other events, like the attempts to eradicate both culture and language at the hands of the government later on that could be causing trauma.

Which is leading me to “Sannhets- og forsoningskommisjonen”. How would you rate their mandate and the chances of reconciliation? Is it a fair game or is it rather just make believe?

Best regards,


Jenny

Ove (2022-04-17 17:34:20)

The willingness of who? The Sámi people absolutely wants such an investigation to happen, so I don’t see the problem. It’s the Norwegians who are resisting it.

There’s still abundant racism against the Sámi, and they’re regularly harassed. But still, the chances of reconciliation seem it should be high anyway if Norway, and Norwegians in general, take the issues seriously. So I wouldn’t say this committee is either of those things yet. Rather, it’s a matter of whether the Norwegians are going to treat it as make-believe or not. If they do, then that’s what it’ll become, and reconciliation will become harder. If they take it seriously, then it will have the actual power to heal, and make reconciliation easier. This is one of those things where it matters less what something is, and matters more what people do with it.

Jenny L. M. (2022-04-11 20:58:03), category: shamanism

So you’re saying they’re apologizing, but that they don’t know, or won’t acknowledge, exactly what they’re apologizing for? Sounds like they, pretty much like U.S. authorities, are mighty afraid of admitting liability.

Ove (2022-04-12 15:23:26)

I suppose that’s one way to express it, but personally, I probably wouldn’t go that far. After all, the world of modern politics is all about moving money around, and they have to prioritize heavily. Anytime they spend money on something, there’s going to be less money for something else. So if they’re given a choice between, say, allocating money to take care of old people, or allocating money to investigate historical events where the overall picture of what happened is already pretty well known, then I can kind of understand the decision not to investigate. But from a justice perspective, it does kind of give a bad signal, yes.

Jenny L. M (2022-04-10 19:17:44), category: shamanism

Mr Kaaven,

Yes, “Læstadianism” is what I’m referring to, but also the impacts of “Finnemisjonen”.

I was not aware that Isaac Olsen was in possession of shamanic powers himself. I have read an article on Idunn.no written by Skjelmo and Willumsen “Isaac Olsen - Lærer og Forkynner”, but the text is partly quotations from Isaac Olsen’s handwritten texts and not very easy to get if you’re not well versed in 18th century Norwegian/Danish. Nevertheless, from what little I managed to comprehend, I got the impression that he knew a great deal about what the shamans was doing, where they performed their rituals and etc, but they did not say anything about him being a person who had shamanistic powers himself. From the context of the article that is maybe not so surprising. I’m not familiar with the authors, but my gut feeling is telling me that the piece is written from a Western perspective which is not emphasizing phenomenons from outside of that frame.

Would you say that the missionaries were treating the Sami people like Native Americans were treated by the Europeans? I know there’s a tremendous amount of differences between missionaries vs. the Sami and Europeans vs. Native Americans, but the creating of an environment of exploitation sounds somewhat similar.

I’m sorry about asking you all these questions, but my curiosity is oftentimes overriding my manners.

Best regards,

Jenny

Ove (2022-04-11 10:27:17, updated 2022-04-11 11:04:05)

There are of course similarities between the way the Sámi and the Native Americans were treated, but I don’t think they run deep. It mainly comes down to human nature — there have always been people who try to exploit others, everywhere, anytime, with any excuse they can find. So while exploitation may have happened in both cases, the nature of the conflicts were different.

For starters, the Sámi weren’t warriors. Unlike with Native Americans, there were no military conflicts, no peace treaties, and no reservations. Furthermore, in the case of Native Americans, white man was mostly interested in their lands and valuables found there. It wasn’t about ruining their culture as such, it was about material goods. Possibly a few missionaries may have been interested in changing their ways, but they didn’t have much real power over them. So the Native Americans were at least in a position to defend their culture, if not their lands. (Not that this makes it okay, of course. It was still very coldblooded and cruel.)

The Sámi were assaulted in a quite different, and more sophisticated, way. It wasn’t about territory, valuables, or power. It was only about destroying their culture, for various reasons. It may be obvious why the church was interested, but the secular authorities also had their reasons, namely “social darwinism”, the idea that some cultures are superior to others, and that progress happens when inferior ones die — with the implication that actively destroying inferior cultures is both ethically justifiable and a good idea. Since the Sámi people and culture were considered primitive, Norwegians authorities wanted to convert them to Norwegian culture “for their own good”, because, as they saw it, the Sámi culture was bad for the Sámi people. Essentially, destroying their culture was seen as an act of benevolence, of “uplifting” them. It had no other particular purpose, it wasn’t about money or land or anything (although some greedy people took advantage of it, naturally). It was only about people thinking their own culture is superior, and that this made it okay for them to destroy other cultures by any means necessary.

And, with secular authorities on their side, missionaries did have a lot more power in Sámi areas than they might otherwise have had.

In the latter half of the 20th century, Norwegian authorities finally started acknowledging that this was wrong. In 1997, the King of Norway made an official apology. However, Norway is still resisting a full public investigation.

Jenny L. M. (2022-04-04 10:55:11), category: shamanism

Mr Kaaven,

Thank you for the information about Johan Turi and Ailo Gaup. I will sure be studying their work. What you said about the missionaries persecuting and exterminating traces of shamanism sounds like a sad story. This also made me investigate the period when the persecution was taking place, and a friend of mine from Finnmark offered me an update on this whenever I asked her about it. Amongst other things, she particularly shed some light on what happened in Eastern Finnmark back then. She specifically mentioned one Isaac Olsen, he entered the scene in cooperation with Thomas von Westen. From what she said this here Isaac Olsen was literally using a wrecking ball to demolish the ancient Sami shamanism.

I have heard that there’s a presence of conservative Christianity in Sápmi. Could this be traced back to the missionaries or is it merely a consequence of social conditions during the 19th and 20th century?


Best regards,

Jenny

Ove (2022-04-04 19:34:26, updated 2022-04-04 20:14:09)

By “conservative Christianity”, do you mean læstadianism? If so, then probably both, but maybe not in the obvious way. There’s now a movie related to it, “Kautokeino-opprøret” (the Kautokeino Rebellion, IMDb), which says something about how this branch of Christianity actually inspired the Sámi people to fight back against Norwegian exploitation and systemic oppression (albeit with tragic results). The movie probably explains the social conditions and reasons for its adoption better than I could. But if you’re unable to watch it, I’ll say that it shows, among other things, how greedy Norwegian traders would, for example, encourage alcohol addiction among the Sámi in order to make them easier to exploit. Thus, Læstadianism, where alcohol abuse is a sin, was a way to stop this and give the Sámi people back at least some of their free will.

As for Isaac Olsen, as I recall, there were things von Westen wrote that suggest that one of the reasons Isaac was so effective at destroying Sámi religion, was because Isaac had special “insights”, i.e. shamanic powers, himself. Which may help explain how Sámi shamanism managed to hold on through hundreds of years of persecution before Isaac, but lost against him.

Jenny L. M. (2022-03-27 19:45:23), category: shamanism

Dear Mr Kaaven,

I have been reading your views on shamanism with great interest. For some time now I have been trying to educate myself on the matter, and I’m particularly interested in shamanism in a Sami context. Unfortunately, to me leastways, information regarding this is not always available in English. Now, I sort of read and understand Norwegian and even some Sami, but it’s not like I can be getting through a text somewhat more advanced than a news article and actually comprehend it in a sufficient way. I’m aware of google translate and stuff like that, but older texts tend to give electronic translation services a hard time on accuracy. Pretty much like my own rudimentary understanding of Norwegian and Sami. This is leading me to my question to you: is there any information about Sami shamanism in English written by people who have first hand knowledge about Sami shamanism? I have heard of Johan Turi. Would he be an author worth considering?

You also expressed that you have experienced things beyond the frame of western minds, if I got you correctly. I share that experience which is why I’m getting more and more devoted to looking into this.


Best regards,

Jenny

Ove (2022-03-27 22:33:07, updated 2022-04-04 21:47:50)

I don’t know of many English texts about Sámi shamanism specifically (although I know some English texts about shamanism in general do mention them). Before modern times, the Sámi people did not have a written language, and the Christian missionaries etc that did describe them, were of course very prejudiced, and were probably writing about it not so much to document it objectively, as they did it to justify the persecution and extermination that later happened.

Johan Turi (1854 – 1936) is generally considered the first proper Sámi author (meaning someone who wrote Sámi books). He wrote several books with stories about Sámi life. He was also a talented artist, and a (shamanic) healer himself. The book that specifically covered shamanism (“Sámit ja noaidevuohta”) was immediately translated into English, with, I think, the title “Lappish texts” (1919). Note that this was during a time that the Christians had already eradicated much of Sámi shamanism, although perhaps not yet all, and this affected some of the content. (It was also published in Denmark.)

Another interesting Sámi personality may be Ailo Gaup (1944 – 2014), a more modern shaman, who had the misfortune to live in a time when Christianity had won and Sámi shamanism was almost completely extinguished. Thus, his quest became to travel the world, visit other cultures, rediscover the roots of shamanism, and bring its essence back to Sápmi. Almost all shamanism that’s practiced in Sápmi today, now exists because of Ailo Gaup’s work. He wrote several books on shamanism, some of which have been translated to English (“The Shamanic Zone”, 2014).

Other books have been written about the subject matter, of course, but at the moment, these are the only ones I am aware of that have English versions, are about Sámi shamanism specifically, and were written by people who presumably knew what they were writing about.

(Edit: In case blogs may also be of interest, I probably ought to mention my sister and her shamanic friend’s blog, Beneath Northern Lights.)

Theodor (2022-02-23 07:14:16), category: media

Kjære Ove,

Hva synes om farmen i år?
Fra et etisk perspektiv: hvem fortjente egentlig å vinne?

Ove (2022-02-23 14:50:05)

Dessverre har jeg ikke sett på Farmen. Jeg er som regel litt for opptatt med andre oppgaver og prosjekter for tiden til å se TV. Av og til litt synd. Så, beklager at jeg ikke kan svare på dette…

Knut (2022-01-23 00:42:44), category: cosmos

Har du noen formening om det finnes noen form for Gud? Tror du på reinkarnasjon? Jeg respekterer om du ikke ønsker å svare på disse spørsmålene, enten fordi de er for private eller av andre grunner. Men det hadde vært veldig interessant å vite hva du tenker om dette.

Ove (2022-02-06 10:33:53)

La oss bare si at jeg har opplevd for mye rart til å kunne si at slike ting ikke finnes. I utgangspunktet har jeg jo ikke særlig lyst til å tro på slikt, men virkeligheten er som regel ikke avhengig av om man tror på den eller ikke. Man må bare erkjenne bevisene man har fått, og tilpasse seg det.

Allis Mind (2021-12-08 03:39:51), category: cosmos

What do you think about the hard problem of consciussness. How can zeros and ones in our brain compute feelings and suffering.

Ove (2022-02-06 10:22:09, updated 2022-02-06 10:57:31)

I could answer questions like this in two different ways, both of which might be correct and true.

The first way is the materialistic way, where I could explain that there’s no particular limit to what you could compute with zeros and ones. If a machine is Turing-complete, then it can compute anything that’s possible to compute, it might just take some time. The things we believe to be uncomputable involve things like infinities and paradoxes, not things like feelings. Feelings are reactions to inputs. You’re scared when you notice something potentially harmful, in pain when you’re damaged in any way, and angry when something violates your perception of what’s fair. In artificial intelligence, preferred outcomes are encoded as “utility functions”. An advanced AI might attach some kind of “feelings” to their utility function: they attach good feelings to high values, and bad feelings to low values of their utility function. This way, all feelings can be expressed as computations. (Note that in living beings, many feelings also have a chemical basis, as hormones and such, which can affect the brain’s computational processes in strange ways. Would still be possible to represent this as computations, though, just very complicated ones.)

The other way is the spiritual way, of course. Even if feelings can be computed, there might still be something that transcends the brain. Something that’s conscious, that has a sense of identity, “I am me”, and which is more than the body it’s in. No scientist has yet been able to pinpoint what causes this. They tend to assume, without proof, that it must be an emergent property of the extremely complicated system that’s the physical brain. It’s not an unreasonable assumption, I’d be inclined to agree with it myself. But from what I’ve seen, I’m not so sure it can really be reduced to that, as there are a number of phenoma that appear to falsify it. So, even if feelings might just exist in the physical brain, it seems your core consciousness (including some of your memories) could be rooted in a connection to something else in the universe. If the universe itself is alive, then our consciousnesses might be linked to its life force. (Although we still need our brains in order to exist physically.)

Jenny L. M. (2021-10-05 16:20:28), category: creativity

Mr Kaven,

How do you go about harnessing your stream of thoughts?

Jenny

Ove (2022-02-06 09:48:27, updated 2022-02-06 09:49:52)

I suppose it depends. Sometimes I’m not very good at it, so that the constant stream of thoughts just distract me. But I find it helps to try to facilitate “flow” as much as possible. To be rested and mostly relaxed, having something sweet to drink, put on some inspirational/energetic music, and telling yourself, it’s time to do this. And if my brain goes along with it, I can then get into that focused state, where the stream of thoughts stop being a distraction, and instead every part of the brain seem to synchronize and work together to accomplish whatever I need to do, whether it’s finding a solution to a difficult problem, learning something new, or creating something interesting. I can’t quite make this happen whenever I want yet, but when it does happen, that’s when I really can focus my thoughts and accomplish interesting things. (And sorry for the late answer.)

Mansika (2021-09-18 13:27:39), category: math

Hei.
Prøver du noen ganger å løse vanskelige utgaver av feks. Sudoku eller andre matematiske ‘utfordringer’ & hvor ‘enkelt’ er disse oppgavene?
Mener å ha lest at man kan se avtrykk av matematikk i det meste av dagliglivets små og store ting & tang. Hva tenker du om det?

Ove (2021-09-21 06:38:58, updated 2021-09-21 06:39:51)

Nei, jeg pleier ikke bruke tid på slike utfordringer. Det meste jeg gjør, handler om å prøve å skape noe, eller å få gjort noe. Noen ganger kan det være å gjøre noe kreativt, som å tegne noe. Eller hvis jeg prøver å lage et program, kan det hende at jeg må løse et matematisk problem eller designe en algoritme. Men det bør altså alltid være noe skapende, det er ikke noe gøy å skulle løse oppgaver som allerede har en kjent løsning.

Ja, matematikk kan finnes i alt. Hele universet kan beskrives med matematikkens språk, og noen synes akkurat det er veldig vakkert. Og det er jo faktisk den viktigste hensikten med matematikk – menneskene utviklet matematikk for å kunne forstå, beskrive, og forutsi alle slags ting i verden rundt oss. Og da er det kanskje ikke rart mange kan synes det er gøy å gjøre nettopp det.