Just for a little fun, before I get involved in a serious meditation retreat, my wife and I read today that search engines like Google constantly update their fill-in-the-question-after-the-first-word box by surveying what questions are being most frequently asked today. It occurred to me that if you ask the five classic news questions, who, what, when, where, and why, you would get a quick look at what’s on the “planetary mind.” So, today, Thanksgiving day, when I type “who” into Google (followed by a space), I find
Who is
Who unfollowed me
Who is honey boo boo
Who vs whom?
When I type in “what,” I find
What is my IP
What to do in San Francisco
What is gangnam style
What does yolo mean?
When I type in “when,” I find
When to work
When is Labor Day
When is Thanksgiving
When is Easter 2013?
When I type in “where,” I get
Where is Chuck Norris
Where am I
Where to buy nexus 7
Where the wild things are?
And finally for the big why question,
Why is the sky blue
Why do cats purr
Why am I so tired
Why are manhole covers round?
And, inspired by what I read, I type in that deepest of all questions, “is?” I find the planetary consciousness is concerned with
Is shingles contagious
Is it down
Is Frank ocean gay
Is Jackie Chan dead
Okay, there’s the world report for today, I won’t even begin to speculate on what it means, and don’t know if I will ever assess the planetary mind again. But it’s amusing, so happy Thanksgiving to all!