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Saturday, May 14, 2011

The outsider

The outsider knows what he wants to do.
He wants to be a thinker, writer, teacher,
To do things that make sense,
What needs to be done,
What's proven to work.

He wants to work with people
Because he loves people,
He loves to listen to their stories,
And to teach the right way,
Based on scientific fact.

He loves the people aspect of his job,
Yet he's not allowed to think,
And not allowed to speak the truth,
Without becoming an outcast,
And without fear of losing his job.

He entered the paradigm with a fresh eye,
An ability to see what is and is not,
And he created a new paradigm,
That will make more sense for his job.
He is the paradigm shifter.

He knows how Copernicus felt,
When he proved the earth wasn't flat
And he had to keep it a secret
The last 30 years of his life
For fear that he'd be beheaded.

He feels like a pawn.
They place him where they want
And expect him to do his job
The way it's always been done
Even if what he does doesn't matter.

It's called a paradigm paralysis,
The greatest obstacle to progress.
The inability to see the truth
Or the refusal to see the truth,
Is the greatest obstacle of all.

It's a paradigm paralysis,
Not seeing beyond the current thought process.
It's not seeing out of the box.
It's being stuck in a pattern,
And not seeing a better way.

While your mind is shut, his is open.
He sees the foolishness of your ways.
He sees the observer of reality,
Watching you do that and do this,
Just as they've done for years.

"Why do you do it that way?" he asks
"That's how we've always done it," you say.
"Do you ever ask why?" he asks.
"Do you ever think to ask,
"Why do I need a bronchodilator?"

You'd think people would want the truth.
Yet for 2,000 years doctors studied Galen
And they did even after the truth got out,
That Galen never dissected a human corpse.
Instead he dissected an ape.

Galen described an eight segment sternum.
And even while the Galen passage was read,
While the chest was being dissected,
And a three segment sternum was revealed,
Nary a person thought to say, "Galen was wrong!"

Andreas Vesalius did say Galen was wrong,
And he proved Galen was wrong,
Yet he was called a liar and a quack.
"What Galen says is true!" his peers hailed.
They were stuck in paradigm paralysis

A paradigm is a set of assumptions
That helps us make sense of things,
Yet when something occurs that
Falls outside the pattern
It's called a paradigm effect.

A paradigm effect can be strong
As Copernicus and Galileo proved.
People refused to see the truth
Even when it was right under their noses.
They were trapped in paradigm paralysis.

That's why there's no cure for asthma,
Because all dyspnea is treated as asthma.
Hippocrates defined dyspnea as asthma.
And so we still treat all dyspnea as asthma,
Even though the evidence shows it's not.

Bronchodilators are bronchodilators,
Yet they are used to treat cardiac asthma,
And pneumonia, and collapsed lungs,
Lung cancer, kidney failure, croup,
And rickets along with bronchospasm.

It's called wasted medicine for no reason.
He's a respiratory therapist for 12 hours
And he sees bronchodilator abuse first hand,
He knows it has no effect on the patient,
And so does the patient.

Yet few patients question the procedure,
Because doctors have earned their trust,
And so few think to question,
Anything a doctor orders.
They just want to get better.

In fact, even most doctors know the truth,
Yet they have no choice but to order them,
Because that's how it's been done forever.
And doing it any other way would make sense,
Yet it wouldn't make sense to them.

Even if a doctor knows the truth he can't speak it,
Because he'd be an outcast among his peers,
He'd be castigated by the doctor clique,
And reminded that the truth doesn't matter,
Because bronchodilators are thought to cure everything.

The COPD patient was on 100% oxygen
For eight hours in the Emergency Room,
And the patient did not stop breathing.
Yet later he was ordered on 28% oxygen
Because of the hypoxic drive myth.

He watched as the patient's dyspnea worsened,
As his skin turned from pink to blue.
He called the doctor who refused more oxygen.
The patient suffered as a result,
Of the paradigm paralysis.

Yet even if the doctor knew the truth,
He'd have to accept the myth as truth,
Because the clique accepts the myth,
And the courts accept the myth,
And, hence, the myth becomes the truth.

He knows it and you may know it too,
Yet what is he, what are you to do?
You know about paradigm paralysis.
You know it from your observation.
You know it by scientific fact.

He doesn't' want to be the first to speak,
And neither do any of his peers.
So he keeps his mouth shut,
And you keep your mouth shut,
And nothing ever changes.

He knows we could probably cure asthma
Because the wisdom exists right here.
Yet it's just beyond our scope of understanding.
It exists just outside the box,
Just outside the paradigm.

Paradigm paralysis prohibits people
From seeing valuable information,
even what's right before our eyes.
Yet he sees it, and he remains silent,
Just like Copernicus did.

So progress is slow, even STALLED!
Morale among the workers is low,
And resources are wasted,
Money is wasted,
Time wasted.

He is a pawn riding on the wrong path,
Yet it's not wrong to anyone else,
Because they don't see path B.
All they see is the same pattern, path A,
The same rut we've been stuck in forever.

He knows what he wants to do.
He wants to be a thinker, writer, teacher,
To do things that make sense,
What needs to be done,
What's proven to work

He feels like a pawn.
They place him wherever they want
And make him do what they want him to do.
He knows what he wants to do:
He wants a paradigm shift.

Actually, he discovered a new paradigm,
and he's therefore the outsider.
He doesn't understand the current paradigm,
Yet he does understand the new one .
He's an outcast if he says what he knows.

He's the fresh eye and the hope
For everyone who wants to fix the system.
Yet he needs courage to speak up.
And he knows what to do:
He must make waves,

Yet he knows that's not going to happen,
Because he's got four young mouths to feed.
So he's going to have to suck it up,
And keep his mouth shut tight,
Doing what he loves to do.

He loves reading, observing and listening to new ideas.
He loves to question the things he's ordered to do.
He loves to draw a line from point A to point B,
And ask, "Why can't we do it this way?
He's the outsider.

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2 comments:

Owen said...

Wow you sound a little jaded. I've been their my friend, don't quit with questions, science and common sense. Here is another poem for you. One I have always loved.


The Calf-Path

by  Sam Walter Foss  (1858-1911)
One day, through the primeval wood,
A calf walked home, as good calves should;
But made a trail all bent askew,
A crooked trail, as all calves do.

Since then three hundred years have fled,
And, I infer, the calf is dead.
But still he left behind his trail,
And thereby hangs my moral tale.

The trail was taken up next day
By a lone dog that passed that way;
And then a wise bellwether sheep
Pursued the trail o’er vale and steep,
And drew the flock behind him, too,
As good bellwethers always do.

And from that day, o’er hill and glade,
Through those old woods a path was made,
And many men wound in and out,
And dodged and turned and bent about,
And uttered words of righteous wrath
Because ’twas such a crooked path;
But still they followed — do not laugh —
The first migrations of that calf,
And through this winding wood-way stalked
Because he wobbled when he walked.

This forest path became a lane,
That bent, and turned, and turned again.
This crooked lane became a road,
Where many a poor horse with his load
Toiled on beneath the burning sun,
And traveled some three miles in one.
And thus a century and a half
They trod the footsteps of that calf.

The years passed on in swiftness fleet.
The road became a village street,
And this, before men were aware,
A city’s crowded thoroughfare,
And soon the central street was this
Of a renowned metropolis;
And men two centuries and a half
Trod in the footsteps of that calf.

Each day a hundred thousand rout
Followed that zigzag calf about,
And o’er his crooked journey went
The traffic of a continent.
A hundred thousand men were led
By one calf near three centuries dead.
They follow still his crooked way,
And lose one hundred years a day,
For thus such reverence is lent
To well-established precedent.

A moral lesson this might teach
Were I ordained and called to preach;
For men are prone to go it blind
Along the calf-paths of the mind,
And work away from sun to sun
To do what other men have done.
They follow in the beaten track,
And out and in, and forth and back,
And still their devious course pursue,
To keep the path that others do.

They keep the path a sacred groove,
Along which all their lives they move;
But how the wise old wood-gods laugh,
Who saw the first primeval calf!
Ah, many things this tale might teach —
But I am not ordained to preach.

Owen said...

Appreciate your feelings. You sound a little discouraged. I was once told to follow my heart. It has been good advice so far. There is also another poem you might like.


The Calf-Path

by  Sam Walter Foss  (1858-1911)
One day, through the primeval wood,
A calf walked home, as good calves should;
But made a trail all bent askew,
A crooked trail, as all calves do.

Since then three hundred years have fled,
And, I infer, the calf is dead.
But still he left behind his trail,
And thereby hangs my moral tale.

The trail was taken up next day
By a lone dog that passed that way;
And then a wise bellwether sheep
Pursued the trail o’er vale and steep,
And drew the flock behind him, too,
As good bellwethers always do.

And from that day, o’er hill and glade,
Through those old woods a path was made,
And many men wound in and out,
And dodged and turned and bent about,
And uttered words of righteous wrath
Because ’twas such a crooked path;
But still they followed — do not laugh —
The first migrations of that calf,
And through this winding wood-way stalked
Because he wobbled when he walked.

This forest path became a lane,
That bent, and turned, and turned again.
This crooked lane became a road,
Where many a poor horse with his load
Toiled on beneath the burning sun,
And traveled some three miles in one.
And thus a century and a half
They trod the footsteps of that calf.

The years passed on in swiftness fleet.
The road became a village street,
And this, before men were aware,
A city’s crowded thoroughfare,
And soon the central street was this
Of a renowned metropolis;
And men two centuries and a half
Trod in the footsteps of that calf.

Each day a hundred thousand rout
Followed that zigzag calf about,
And o’er his crooked journey went
The traffic of a continent.
A hundred thousand men were led
By one calf near three centuries dead.
They follow still his crooked way,
And lose one hundred years a day,
For thus such reverence is lent
To well-established precedent.

A moral lesson this might teach
Were I ordained and called to preach;
For men are prone to go it blind
Along the calf-paths of the mind,
And work away from sun to sun
To do what other men have done.
They follow in the beaten track,
And out and in, and forth and back,
And still their devious course pursue,
To keep the path that others do.

They keep the path a sacred groove,
Along which all their lives they move;
But how the wise old wood-gods laugh,
Who saw the first primeval calf!
Ah, many things this tale might teach —
But I am not ordained to preach.