Plato's dialog EUTHYPHRO. recall that a contradiction exists when the speaker makes two statements both of which cannot be true at the same time. Socrates asks Euthyphro : What is the meaning of the term "piety"? Euthyphro answers that an act is pious when the gods approve of it and impious when the gods disapprove of it. Socrates then points out to Euthyphro that since there are many gods (in the Greek pantheon) and since some gods will approve of an act and some gods will disapprove of the same act,then the same act will be both approved and disapproved at the same time.Therefore, if we use Euthyphro's definition of piety, the same act will be both pious and impious at the same time. Euthyphro, clearly, has contradicted himself.
WE live today in a small world of many gods, where no harmony exist between those many gods, on the contrary enmity and total disagreement is the rule. So every act is being nowadays, interpreted by any of the gods in a different way making some acts pious and some other impious.
One example lies in the way most Americans view anyone with a notion of socialism, or worse; Marxism. It's hate with all it's derivatives that govern this relationship. but let's look into a model of analogies between Marxism and Christianity, I believe Bertrand Russel was the first to call attention to the parallels in his "history of Western philosophy :
To understand Marx psychologically, one should use the following dictionary:
Yahweh = Dialectical Materialism
The Messiah = Marx
The elect = The Proletariat
The Church = The Communist Party
The second Coming = The revolution
Hell = Punishment of the Capitalist
The Millennium = The Communist Commonwealth
Every god and every creed, has its sacred texts, its saints, its heretics, its elect, its holy city, if Marx was communism's messiah, Lenin was its Saint Paul.
in the previous analogy, the terms on the left give the emotional content of the terms on the right. We are almost in unity of thought and meanings, yet so different when our different gods look at them. Many Muslims nowadays have their own god approving and disapproving so many acts, rendering some acts pious and some impious, some of these pious acts are indeed terribly crazy and barbaric. And some other gods are joining the game lovingly.
Simply too many gods.
Salamat.
Monday, December 27, 2010
Saturday, December 11, 2010
"ASSABIYAH"
This Arabic word means ; tribal solidarity, or social adhesion. Its meaning here is looked at from a perspective of societal dynamics and their rules of evolution.
The power-base of each state depends on its "assabiyah" or group solidarity based on family and small communities ties and lineage which is to be found mostly among new migrating people and emerging nations.
The power of each "assabiyah" extends basically to four generations. The first generation, driven by tribal expansionism or religious mission, would conquer the settled nations and establish a powerful state.
The second generation would consolidate and expand the state and build its institutions and would still enjoy strong attachment to its"assabiyah" due to its close connection with an original migrating tribal ethos.
The third generation would enjoy the prosperity of the state and provide support for arts, sciences, and culture. But would have less attachment to their "assabiyah" as a result of their urban upbringing.
The fourth generation would be the one to waste the achievements of their ancestors. Confined to a life of palace machinations and the pursuit of material gratification.
This generation would be mostly concerned with raising money to spend on their welfare and the preservation of their thrones. Which would lead to an intensification of the tax burden on the populace and the erosion of existing social welfare systems, the resulting injustices would lead to the dissolution of the state and the annihilation of its civilisation, and make it vulnerable to invasions of new ideas and social behavioral patterns from other migrating groups, the cycle then starts anew.
Are we at these times witnessing the completion of a full cycle in many places of our world ?? America, Lebanon, many of the rich golf emirates to name a few.
The core idea comes originally from the philosopher Ibn Khaldoun(1332-1406) who inspired the actual thought and opinion, salamat.
The power-base of each state depends on its "assabiyah" or group solidarity based on family and small communities ties and lineage which is to be found mostly among new migrating people and emerging nations.
The power of each "assabiyah" extends basically to four generations. The first generation, driven by tribal expansionism or religious mission, would conquer the settled nations and establish a powerful state.
The second generation would consolidate and expand the state and build its institutions and would still enjoy strong attachment to its"assabiyah" due to its close connection with an original migrating tribal ethos.
The third generation would enjoy the prosperity of the state and provide support for arts, sciences, and culture. But would have less attachment to their "assabiyah" as a result of their urban upbringing.
The fourth generation would be the one to waste the achievements of their ancestors. Confined to a life of palace machinations and the pursuit of material gratification.
This generation would be mostly concerned with raising money to spend on their welfare and the preservation of their thrones. Which would lead to an intensification of the tax burden on the populace and the erosion of existing social welfare systems, the resulting injustices would lead to the dissolution of the state and the annihilation of its civilisation, and make it vulnerable to invasions of new ideas and social behavioral patterns from other migrating groups, the cycle then starts anew.
Are we at these times witnessing the completion of a full cycle in many places of our world ?? America, Lebanon, many of the rich golf emirates to name a few.
The core idea comes originally from the philosopher Ibn Khaldoun(1332-1406) who inspired the actual thought and opinion, salamat.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
THE HAT OF DISAPPEARANCE !!!
My friend put on the hat and was immediately startled by what he saw; nothing. He had become invisible.
For the first few hours, he wandered around testing his new invisibility. Once, he accidentally coughed and found that in the ears of the world, he was silent too.
Once he became used to what it was like to live invisibly, my friend started to think about what he could do next, To his shame, the ideas that popped into his head first were not entirely decent, nor respectable or proper. He could, for instance, hang around in the women's showers or changing rooms. He could quite easily steal. He could also trip up those obnoxious people who speak so loudly in public places or those who shout into their mobile phones.
But he wanted to resist such temptations and so tried to think of what good deeds he could do. The opportunities here,however, were less obvious. And for how long could he resist the temptation to take advantage of his invisibility? All it would take would be one moment of weakness and there he'd be peeking at naked women or stealing money. Did he have the strength to resist?
It is tempting to see the hat as a test of moral fibre, how you would act under the disguise of invisibility reveals your true moral nature, but how fair is it to judge someone by how they would act when confronted by more temptation than most people could resist?? If we are honest, imagining ourselves with the hat may reveal that we are disappointingly corruptible, but that is not the same as saying we are actually corrupt.
Celebrities behaving badly, for example, bring our disapproval.But how can we imagine what it is like to have enormous wealth, endless opportunities for indulgence and psychopathic readiness to fulfill our every whim, can we be so sure that we too wouldn't end up disgracing ourselves?
It is one thing to confess that,one, might give in to the allure of clandestine voyeurism. it is quite another to think that the first thing we'd do is head off down to the nearest gym's changing rooms. The hat thus helps us to distinguish the difference between things we genuinely believe are wrong and those that only convention, reputation or timidity stop us from doing. It strips down our personal morality to it's essence.
With this mask of invisibility we probably wouldn't engage in random murder, but one or two hated enemies might not be safe, and many, would argue that far too many men would use the opportunity to rape. We may not turn into career thieves, but property rights might suddenly look less inviolable.
With the question of how would we behave and what about others, you would often find a sharp contrast, others would turn into not so moralists,while we would retain our integrity. When we respond in this way, are we underestimating our fellow human beings, or are we overestimating ourselves ???
My friend Julian had valuable and inspiring words even though he did not wear the hat himself, as usual salamat.
For the first few hours, he wandered around testing his new invisibility. Once, he accidentally coughed and found that in the ears of the world, he was silent too.
Once he became used to what it was like to live invisibly, my friend started to think about what he could do next, To his shame, the ideas that popped into his head first were not entirely decent, nor respectable or proper. He could, for instance, hang around in the women's showers or changing rooms. He could quite easily steal. He could also trip up those obnoxious people who speak so loudly in public places or those who shout into their mobile phones.
But he wanted to resist such temptations and so tried to think of what good deeds he could do. The opportunities here,however, were less obvious. And for how long could he resist the temptation to take advantage of his invisibility? All it would take would be one moment of weakness and there he'd be peeking at naked women or stealing money. Did he have the strength to resist?
It is tempting to see the hat as a test of moral fibre, how you would act under the disguise of invisibility reveals your true moral nature, but how fair is it to judge someone by how they would act when confronted by more temptation than most people could resist?? If we are honest, imagining ourselves with the hat may reveal that we are disappointingly corruptible, but that is not the same as saying we are actually corrupt.
Celebrities behaving badly, for example, bring our disapproval.But how can we imagine what it is like to have enormous wealth, endless opportunities for indulgence and psychopathic readiness to fulfill our every whim, can we be so sure that we too wouldn't end up disgracing ourselves?
It is one thing to confess that,one, might give in to the allure of clandestine voyeurism. it is quite another to think that the first thing we'd do is head off down to the nearest gym's changing rooms. The hat thus helps us to distinguish the difference between things we genuinely believe are wrong and those that only convention, reputation or timidity stop us from doing. It strips down our personal morality to it's essence.
With this mask of invisibility we probably wouldn't engage in random murder, but one or two hated enemies might not be safe, and many, would argue that far too many men would use the opportunity to rape. We may not turn into career thieves, but property rights might suddenly look less inviolable.
With the question of how would we behave and what about others, you would often find a sharp contrast, others would turn into not so moralists,while we would retain our integrity. When we respond in this way, are we underestimating our fellow human beings, or are we overestimating ourselves ???
My friend Julian had valuable and inspiring words even though he did not wear the hat himself, as usual salamat.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
DIVINE COMMAND !!!!
The Lord spoke to Abraham," I am the Lord thy God, and I command thee to sacrifice thy only son".
Abraham replied,"There is something not right here. your commandments say,"Thou shalt not kill".
"The Lord giveth the rules and the Lord taketh away", replied God.
"But how do I know you are God?" insisted Abraham, "perhaps you are the devil trying to fool me?."
"You must have faith,"replied God.
"Faith or insanity?."
"Me almighty!" exclaimed the Lord."what you're saying is that it is reasonable for you, a mere mortal, to refuse to do what I, the Lord thy God,commands."
"I guess so," said Abraham,"and you've given me no good reason to change my mind."
HA HA.. I wish it was so.
IN the book of Genesis, God found a more compliant servant in Abraham, who went along with the instruction to sacrifice his son, when, knife in hand, he was stopped from going ahead by an angel. Abraham has been presented as a paradigm of faith ever since.
What on earth was Abraham thinking? Let us assume that Abraham firmly believed in God and that God exists, and he receives the instruction to kill his son. Wouldn't he be mad simply to go ahead and do so?? It might not be God talking, but the devil; Abraham might be mad; the test might be to see if he refuses. All these possibilities seem more acceptable than the idea that God wants his son dead,since what kind of loving God would command such a barbaric act?
Faith sometimes needs the devout to go beyond the evidence and believe what is contrary to all they previously thought was right and true, consider for a moment the people who believe that God wishes them to become suicide bombers, to murder abortionists or gays or to persecute an ethnic minority. Before you say that God could never command such wicked things, remember that the God of the three Abrahamic faiths not only ordered the sacrifice of Issac, but also condoned the rape of a wife as punishment to the husband(2 Samuel 12),ordered the killing of followers of other religions(Deuteronomy 13)and sentenced blasphemers to death by stoning (Leviticus 24). I wouldn't even start enumerating other loving commandments from other books.
It seems there are no limits to what God might ask,and some people of faith will always faithfully do.
Abraham replied,"There is something not right here. your commandments say,"Thou shalt not kill".
"The Lord giveth the rules and the Lord taketh away", replied God.
"But how do I know you are God?" insisted Abraham, "perhaps you are the devil trying to fool me?."
"You must have faith,"replied God.
"Faith or insanity?."
"Me almighty!" exclaimed the Lord."what you're saying is that it is reasonable for you, a mere mortal, to refuse to do what I, the Lord thy God,commands."
"I guess so," said Abraham,"and you've given me no good reason to change my mind."
HA HA.. I wish it was so.
IN the book of Genesis, God found a more compliant servant in Abraham, who went along with the instruction to sacrifice his son, when, knife in hand, he was stopped from going ahead by an angel. Abraham has been presented as a paradigm of faith ever since.
What on earth was Abraham thinking? Let us assume that Abraham firmly believed in God and that God exists, and he receives the instruction to kill his son. Wouldn't he be mad simply to go ahead and do so?? It might not be God talking, but the devil; Abraham might be mad; the test might be to see if he refuses. All these possibilities seem more acceptable than the idea that God wants his son dead,since what kind of loving God would command such a barbaric act?
Faith sometimes needs the devout to go beyond the evidence and believe what is contrary to all they previously thought was right and true, consider for a moment the people who believe that God wishes them to become suicide bombers, to murder abortionists or gays or to persecute an ethnic minority. Before you say that God could never command such wicked things, remember that the God of the three Abrahamic faiths not only ordered the sacrifice of Issac, but also condoned the rape of a wife as punishment to the husband(2 Samuel 12),ordered the killing of followers of other religions(Deuteronomy 13)and sentenced blasphemers to death by stoning (Leviticus 24). I wouldn't even start enumerating other loving commandments from other books.
It seems there are no limits to what God might ask,and some people of faith will always faithfully do.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
TILL DEATH DOES US APART !!!
If we want to take seriously the words the minister, shaikh or judge would utter as we exchange rings, our lives are now joined in one unbroken circle. This means putting our collective interests first, and our individual interests second, if we could do that, the marriage would be better for both parties.
But we have seen too many friends and parents relations go so badly or end up in divorce, the calculating part of my brain reasons that, if I put myself second, and my spouse puts herself first, she would get a good deal from our marriage, but I wouldn't. In other words, I risk being taken for a schmuck who romantically fail to protect his own interest.
Most couples have similar thoughts. They even discuss the problem and agree that they really would not be egotistical in the marriage. But neither could be sure the other would keep their part of the bargain, so the safest course of action for both is to secretly look out for themselves. That inevitably mean the marriage would not be as good as it could have been. But surely it was the only rational course of action to take, or is it ???
Something doesn't sound right. Two people are trying rationally to decide what is in their best interests. If they both act in a certain way, the best outcome for both of them is assured. But if one acts differently, he or she secures all the advantages and the other is left worse off. And so, to insure against this happening, neither does what is best if both do it, and so both end up with an outcome which is worse than it could have been.
Our dilemma is so poignant, as our ability to trust and communicate has been eroded by long years of wrong assessments in our modern times marriages.
Who can blame us for our scepticism though ??
If there is a wider moral to this tale, perhaps it is that trust and better communication, though it involves a certain amount of non rational risk-taking, is required to get the most out of life. It is true that if we trust others, we have ourselves open to exploitation, but if we don't, we close ourselves off from the possibilities of what is best in life. Again putting our collective interests first, and our individual interests second, should be the guide to our frame of mind, of course till death does us apart, salamat.
But we have seen too many friends and parents relations go so badly or end up in divorce, the calculating part of my brain reasons that, if I put myself second, and my spouse puts herself first, she would get a good deal from our marriage, but I wouldn't. In other words, I risk being taken for a schmuck who romantically fail to protect his own interest.
Most couples have similar thoughts. They even discuss the problem and agree that they really would not be egotistical in the marriage. But neither could be sure the other would keep their part of the bargain, so the safest course of action for both is to secretly look out for themselves. That inevitably mean the marriage would not be as good as it could have been. But surely it was the only rational course of action to take, or is it ???
Something doesn't sound right. Two people are trying rationally to decide what is in their best interests. If they both act in a certain way, the best outcome for both of them is assured. But if one acts differently, he or she secures all the advantages and the other is left worse off. And so, to insure against this happening, neither does what is best if both do it, and so both end up with an outcome which is worse than it could have been.
Our dilemma is so poignant, as our ability to trust and communicate has been eroded by long years of wrong assessments in our modern times marriages.
Who can blame us for our scepticism though ??
If there is a wider moral to this tale, perhaps it is that trust and better communication, though it involves a certain amount of non rational risk-taking, is required to get the most out of life. It is true that if we trust others, we have ourselves open to exploitation, but if we don't, we close ourselves off from the possibilities of what is best in life. Again putting our collective interests first, and our individual interests second, should be the guide to our frame of mind, of course till death does us apart, salamat.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
INCITEMENT FOR CHANGE
Civilization is one of those big, stuffy words that may intrigue philosophers and historians but put most people to sleep. Unless it is used in a sentence like " our civilization is threatened" at which point large numbers of people prepare to load their AK-47.
Today many people do, in fact believe that their civilization is threatened, and that the United States is doing the threatening. IT IS.
But not in the way most of us think.
Around the world, critics of the United States point to its military and its economy as the main source of its predominance, maybe it is in part, however knowledge in the broadest sense and new technologies based on it, are the big threat that America constitute over the world.
The most extraordinary engine of power change in modern history is the accumulated bases of knowledge and the ensuing technologies,PCs,programing,Internet,etc..etc...
America is by far the leader in the world of export and distribution of this scientific knowledge and of popular culture,including, fashion,music,TV,programing,books,movies and computer games.In the meantime,however,the influence of all this is so powerful that other societies fear for the survival of their own cultures.
Many societies, are so different today from the present American youth and adult psyches and way of life. One example I'm going to site is this recorded conversation in a West African society.(And it could as well be in so many parts of the world.) So I ask why there seem to be no girls older than thirteen or fourteen appearing in public life or in the streets. "That's when their parents marry them off and they spend most of their time inside the house." I ask whether the girls choose whom they marry. "Of course not" the answer comes,"Marriage is too important for the girl or boy to make the choice; our parents always decide."
This conversation shows us why millions of parents around the world who see their cultures under attack. The United States, they feel, is seducing their kids.
While Hollywood sends its messages that freedom means unrestrained hedonism, Wall Street was sending a parallel message saying that unrestrained business and trade offer the best path to wealth. Washington, echoing this theme, chanted the mantra that unrestrained free trade benefits everyone. This was combined with a magic formula: Liberalization + globalization = democracy.
For several decades America thus told the world, and itself, that Laissez-faire(especially privatization and deregulation) would deliver democracy and prosperity, as though any one-size-fits-all formula would work everywhere overriding all differences in religion, culture, history, and levels of economic and institutional developments.
But America, arrogant though as it often seems, is itself shaken and uncertain as it experiments with novel ideas, social structures and values. In fact, the very variety that comes with knowledge-based developments ensures that other countries will adopt quiet different economic,social and political pathways for the future. They will not look like America. But ,then, neither will tomorrows America.
The real message that America sends,more important than its ideological, commercial or military rhetoric is an incitement for change. It is the dominant message now being delivered to billions of people in rigid societies around the world: Change is possible, and not just in some blue-sky future, but soon, in your own life time or that of your child. It doesn't specify whether change will be good or bad. That will be interpreted differently and fought over.
If and when the emergent generation world wide is inspired by the incitement for change,the changes to come will not necessarily please America and Americans. In the Middle-East,it could take the form of popular elected theocratic-fascist regimes duly voted into power, Hammas is one example,and the Iraqi situation as well, in Africa and Latin America, it might take completely different forms.
Still this is the message emanating from the United States. And is what, at the deepest level,disturbs the dreams, and triggers the nightmares, of billions of human-beings. The United States cannot help but transmit that message because it itself exemplifies changes.
That is why even present and former allies are increasingly troubled by America's role in the world. Even as they, too, undergo significant transformation, the recent enlargement of the European Union and the rejection by some countries of its proposed constitution, indicates that they are themselves slower and less revolutionary. As many struggle to build their own future, they see the United States pulling away, speeding into the unknown and pulling other cultures and countries in its uncertain and turbulent wake.
But if everything is in fact temporary, so is American power.
As usual many thanks for the inspiration brought by the Tofflers,helping me to compile these few words and ideas, salamat.
Today many people do, in fact believe that their civilization is threatened, and that the United States is doing the threatening. IT IS.
But not in the way most of us think.
Around the world, critics of the United States point to its military and its economy as the main source of its predominance, maybe it is in part, however knowledge in the broadest sense and new technologies based on it, are the big threat that America constitute over the world.
The most extraordinary engine of power change in modern history is the accumulated bases of knowledge and the ensuing technologies,PCs,programing,Internet,etc..etc...
America is by far the leader in the world of export and distribution of this scientific knowledge and of popular culture,including, fashion,music,TV,programing,books,movies and computer games.In the meantime,however,the influence of all this is so powerful that other societies fear for the survival of their own cultures.
Many societies, are so different today from the present American youth and adult psyches and way of life. One example I'm going to site is this recorded conversation in a West African society.(And it could as well be in so many parts of the world.) So I ask why there seem to be no girls older than thirteen or fourteen appearing in public life or in the streets. "That's when their parents marry them off and they spend most of their time inside the house." I ask whether the girls choose whom they marry. "Of course not" the answer comes,"Marriage is too important for the girl or boy to make the choice; our parents always decide."
This conversation shows us why millions of parents around the world who see their cultures under attack. The United States, they feel, is seducing their kids.
While Hollywood sends its messages that freedom means unrestrained hedonism, Wall Street was sending a parallel message saying that unrestrained business and trade offer the best path to wealth. Washington, echoing this theme, chanted the mantra that unrestrained free trade benefits everyone. This was combined with a magic formula: Liberalization + globalization = democracy.
For several decades America thus told the world, and itself, that Laissez-faire(especially privatization and deregulation) would deliver democracy and prosperity, as though any one-size-fits-all formula would work everywhere overriding all differences in religion, culture, history, and levels of economic and institutional developments.
But America, arrogant though as it often seems, is itself shaken and uncertain as it experiments with novel ideas, social structures and values. In fact, the very variety that comes with knowledge-based developments ensures that other countries will adopt quiet different economic,social and political pathways for the future. They will not look like America. But ,then, neither will tomorrows America.
The real message that America sends,more important than its ideological, commercial or military rhetoric is an incitement for change. It is the dominant message now being delivered to billions of people in rigid societies around the world: Change is possible, and not just in some blue-sky future, but soon, in your own life time or that of your child. It doesn't specify whether change will be good or bad. That will be interpreted differently and fought over.
If and when the emergent generation world wide is inspired by the incitement for change,the changes to come will not necessarily please America and Americans. In the Middle-East,it could take the form of popular elected theocratic-fascist regimes duly voted into power, Hammas is one example,and the Iraqi situation as well, in Africa and Latin America, it might take completely different forms.
Still this is the message emanating from the United States. And is what, at the deepest level,disturbs the dreams, and triggers the nightmares, of billions of human-beings. The United States cannot help but transmit that message because it itself exemplifies changes.
That is why even present and former allies are increasingly troubled by America's role in the world. Even as they, too, undergo significant transformation, the recent enlargement of the European Union and the rejection by some countries of its proposed constitution, indicates that they are themselves slower and less revolutionary. As many struggle to build their own future, they see the United States pulling away, speeding into the unknown and pulling other cultures and countries in its uncertain and turbulent wake.
But if everything is in fact temporary, so is American power.
As usual many thanks for the inspiration brought by the Tofflers,helping me to compile these few words and ideas, salamat.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
IT ALL STARTED WITH ADAM AND EVE !!!!!
"So the biblical story goes". If the apple really led to the " Knowledge of good and evil," then Adam and Eve did not know good and evil before sampling it. So it doesn't seem very fair to punish a woman for something she didn't know was not good, such as disobeying God telling her to not eat a piece of fruit. We don't morally judge infants for taking things from a friend's purse, but we do condemn older children, or praise them for not doing so. Plus, once Eve learned that her actions were not good, she immediately felt ashamed,which actually seems quiet commendable. It's not like she ran around the garden afterward bragging; How delicious those apples are.
And after all that, it seems unfair and excessively harsh for everyone else, especially people not living at the time,to be punished for what this dynamic duo did without their even knowing they did wrong in the first place. Imagine a principal punishing an entire school as well as all future enrolled students for two people caught doing something they didn't even know -couldn't know- was wrong. None of this seems anywhere close to what we currently value in an ethical system.
If God is all-knowing, why couldn't he find Adam after he ate the apple? And why didn't he also call out "Eve, where are you?" especially since she ate the apple to begin with.
In 2007, Nebraska state senator Ernie Chambers sued God for terrorizing humanity with widespread death. (the case was dismissed on grounds that God couldn't be properly notified, despite the senator's plea that God's omniscience should require that He knew of the lawsuit.) So couldn't God be put on trial for entrapment as well, by knowingly placing two people with no knowledge in a garden with a talking snake and a magic apple he knew they'd eat?.
After eating the apple,they both became ashamed of their bodies and invented the first fashion item, the fig leaf collection.
Now with a clear understanding of this particular story of creation,we can move on with our discussion. It's been suggested that same-sex marriage will tear down the fabric of the family, devaluing marriage,first of all this is coming from people in a country, the United States, where 45% of marriages end in divorce,and with most of the concern over gay marriage coming from the religious right, it should be somewhat of a surprise that their divorce rate is higher than that of non-religious atheists and agnostics.In contrast, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden have all allowed gay civil unions for at least a dozen years, and in each of those countries not only did the heterosexual marriage rate increase (by upward of 25% in Sweden), but the divorce rate dropped, This all might be part of the motivation for the harsh saying "Focus on your own damn family."
In like manner,in many parts of the US, only back in 1966, marriage was defined as "two people of the same race." ( of course man and woman) In a court case upholding this, the trial judge proclaimed, "Almighty God created the races...(and) placed them on separate continents...(which) shows that he did not intent for the races to mix." Interracial marriages remained illegal until a 1967 Supreme court decision ruled otherwise.
Even today, Muslem women are victims of so-called honor killings in which family members or others in the community kill them for such "crimes" as interracial dating, though also for infidelity, flirting, and in some extreme cases, such as the husband having a dream that the woman betrayed him. these are often carried out publicly and even celebrated, it is estimated by the United Nations that more than 6000 cases occur annually.
Though how soon and easily we forget about the story of creation, as told by no one who was there.
As usual, my thanks to MR.Bowen for his invaluable inspiration.
And after all that, it seems unfair and excessively harsh for everyone else, especially people not living at the time,to be punished for what this dynamic duo did without their even knowing they did wrong in the first place. Imagine a principal punishing an entire school as well as all future enrolled students for two people caught doing something they didn't even know -couldn't know- was wrong. None of this seems anywhere close to what we currently value in an ethical system.
If God is all-knowing, why couldn't he find Adam after he ate the apple? And why didn't he also call out "Eve, where are you?" especially since she ate the apple to begin with.
In 2007, Nebraska state senator Ernie Chambers sued God for terrorizing humanity with widespread death. (the case was dismissed on grounds that God couldn't be properly notified, despite the senator's plea that God's omniscience should require that He knew of the lawsuit.) So couldn't God be put on trial for entrapment as well, by knowingly placing two people with no knowledge in a garden with a talking snake and a magic apple he knew they'd eat?.
After eating the apple,they both became ashamed of their bodies and invented the first fashion item, the fig leaf collection.
Now with a clear understanding of this particular story of creation,we can move on with our discussion. It's been suggested that same-sex marriage will tear down the fabric of the family, devaluing marriage,first of all this is coming from people in a country, the United States, where 45% of marriages end in divorce,and with most of the concern over gay marriage coming from the religious right, it should be somewhat of a surprise that their divorce rate is higher than that of non-religious atheists and agnostics.In contrast, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden have all allowed gay civil unions for at least a dozen years, and in each of those countries not only did the heterosexual marriage rate increase (by upward of 25% in Sweden), but the divorce rate dropped, This all might be part of the motivation for the harsh saying "Focus on your own damn family."
In like manner,in many parts of the US, only back in 1966, marriage was defined as "two people of the same race." ( of course man and woman) In a court case upholding this, the trial judge proclaimed, "Almighty God created the races...(and) placed them on separate continents...(which) shows that he did not intent for the races to mix." Interracial marriages remained illegal until a 1967 Supreme court decision ruled otherwise.
Even today, Muslem women are victims of so-called honor killings in which family members or others in the community kill them for such "crimes" as interracial dating, though also for infidelity, flirting, and in some extreme cases, such as the husband having a dream that the woman betrayed him. these are often carried out publicly and even celebrated, it is estimated by the United Nations that more than 6000 cases occur annually.
Though how soon and easily we forget about the story of creation, as told by no one who was there.
As usual, my thanks to MR.Bowen for his invaluable inspiration.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
INTELLECTUAL HONESTY
Religion once offered answers to many questions that have now been ceded to the care of science. Many people have taken inspiration from Blaise Pascal and argue that evidence is beside the point and that religious believers have simply taken the wiser of two bets: if a believer is wrong about God, there is not much harm to him or to anyone else, and if he is right, he wins eternal happiness, if an atheist is wrong, however, he is destined to spend eternity in hell. On this view, atheism is the very picture of reckless stupidity.
While Pascal deserves his reputation as a brilliant mathematician, his gamble was never more than a cute ( and false) analogy. Like many cute ideas in philosophy, it is easily remembered and often repeated. A person can profess any creed he likes, of course, but to really believe it, he must believe that it's true. To believe that there is a God , for instance, is to believe that you are not just fooling yourself, it is to believe that you stand in some relation to God's existence such that, if he didn't exist,you wouldn't believe in him.
Everyone who has eyes to see can see that if the God of Abraham exists, he is an utter psychopath, as the God of nature is too. If you can't see these things just by looking, you have simply closed your eyes to the realities of our world. Your own consciousness is the cause and substance of any experience you might want to deem "spiritual" or "mystical". realising this, what possible need is there to pretend to be certain about ancient miracles, or for wine and virgins in heaven.
While Pascal deserves his reputation as a brilliant mathematician, his gamble was never more than a cute ( and false) analogy. Like many cute ideas in philosophy, it is easily remembered and often repeated. A person can profess any creed he likes, of course, but to really believe it, he must believe that it's true. To believe that there is a God , for instance, is to believe that you are not just fooling yourself, it is to believe that you stand in some relation to God's existence such that, if he didn't exist,you wouldn't believe in him.
Everyone who has eyes to see can see that if the God of Abraham exists, he is an utter psychopath, as the God of nature is too. If you can't see these things just by looking, you have simply closed your eyes to the realities of our world. Your own consciousness is the cause and substance of any experience you might want to deem "spiritual" or "mystical". realising this, what possible need is there to pretend to be certain about ancient miracles, or for wine and virgins in heaven.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
THE PROBLEM WITH MODERATE RELIGION
Whenever nonbelievers like myself criticize Christians for believing in old Biblical miracles or the imminent return of Christ, or Muslims for believing in martyrdom and or other Koranic contradictions, religious moderates declare that I am caricaturing Christianity and Islam, considering "extremists" to be representative of these great religions wrong, or otherwise overlooking an ocean of other nuances. We are invariably reminded and told that a mature understanding of scripture renders faith perfectly compatible with reason, and that our attacks upon religion are, therefore, "simplistic","dogmatic", or even "fundamentalist".
But there are several problems with such a defence of religion. First, many moderates (and even some secularists)assume that religious "extremism" is rare and therefore not all that consequential. But religious extremism is not rare, and is hugely consequential. The United States is now a nation of 300 million souls, wielding more influence than any people in human history,and yet 240 million of these souls apparently believe that Jesus will return someday and orchestrate the end of the world with his magic powers.There is no question that most Americans reliably claim to believe the preposterous, and these claims themselves have done genuine harm to our political discourse, to our public policy,foreign policies, and to our reputation in the world.
Half of the one point four billion Muslims at least believe that the jihad and the extremists carrying the godly jihad is compatible with there beliefs and with the holy message of the Qur'an and it's prophet.
Religious moderates also tend to imagine that there is some bright line of separation between extremist and moderate religion. But there isn't. Scripture itself remains a perpetual engine of extremism: because, while he may be many things, the God of the Bibles and of the Qur'an is not a moderate. Reading scripture more closely, one does not find reasons to be a religious moderate; one finds reasons to be a proper religious lunatic--to fear the fires of hell,to despise nonbelievers, to persecute atheists, and condemn homosexuals,etc. Of course anyone can cherry-pick scripture and find reasons to love his neighbor and to turn the other cheek. But the more fully a person grants credence to these books, the more he will be convinced that infidels, heretics, and apostates deserve to be smashed to atom in God's loving machinery of justice.
Religious moderates invariably claim to be more "sophisticated" than religious fundamentalists (and atheist). but how does one become a sophisticated believer? by acknowledging just how irrational many of the claims of scripture are,and thereafter reading it selectively, bowdlerising it if need be, and allowing it's assertions about reality to be continually mixed. There is a pattern here, and it is undeniable. Religious moderation is the direct result of taking scripture less and less seriously. So why not take it less seriously still? Why not admit that the Bibles and Qur'an are merely a collection of imperfect books written by highly fallible human beings?.
Compiled by me with special thanks to Sam Harris,salamat.
But there are several problems with such a defence of religion. First, many moderates (and even some secularists)assume that religious "extremism" is rare and therefore not all that consequential. But religious extremism is not rare, and is hugely consequential. The United States is now a nation of 300 million souls, wielding more influence than any people in human history,and yet 240 million of these souls apparently believe that Jesus will return someday and orchestrate the end of the world with his magic powers.There is no question that most Americans reliably claim to believe the preposterous, and these claims themselves have done genuine harm to our political discourse, to our public policy,foreign policies, and to our reputation in the world.
Half of the one point four billion Muslims at least believe that the jihad and the extremists carrying the godly jihad is compatible with there beliefs and with the holy message of the Qur'an and it's prophet.
Religious moderates also tend to imagine that there is some bright line of separation between extremist and moderate religion. But there isn't. Scripture itself remains a perpetual engine of extremism: because, while he may be many things, the God of the Bibles and of the Qur'an is not a moderate. Reading scripture more closely, one does not find reasons to be a religious moderate; one finds reasons to be a proper religious lunatic--to fear the fires of hell,to despise nonbelievers, to persecute atheists, and condemn homosexuals,etc. Of course anyone can cherry-pick scripture and find reasons to love his neighbor and to turn the other cheek. But the more fully a person grants credence to these books, the more he will be convinced that infidels, heretics, and apostates deserve to be smashed to atom in God's loving machinery of justice.
Religious moderates invariably claim to be more "sophisticated" than religious fundamentalists (and atheist). but how does one become a sophisticated believer? by acknowledging just how irrational many of the claims of scripture are,and thereafter reading it selectively, bowdlerising it if need be, and allowing it's assertions about reality to be continually mixed. There is a pattern here, and it is undeniable. Religious moderation is the direct result of taking scripture less and less seriously. So why not take it less seriously still? Why not admit that the Bibles and Qur'an are merely a collection of imperfect books written by highly fallible human beings?.
Compiled by me with special thanks to Sam Harris,salamat.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
CURSED WATER.....
WE know Nostradamus from his predictions, which are still hot tickets all over the world.
WE may not know that Nostradamus was also a physician, an extraordinary one who did not believe in leeches. For the plague he prescribed air and water; ventilating air,cleansing water.
Though filth incubated disease, water had a bad reputation in Christian Europe. Except in baptism, bathing was avoided because it felt good and invited sin. In the tribunals of the Holy Inquisition, frequent bathing was proof of Mohammedan heresy. When Christianity was imposed on Spain as the only truth, the crown ordered the many public baths left by the Muslims razed, because they were sources of perdition.
Not a single saint, male or female, ever set foot in a bath, and kings rarely bathed since that's what perfume was for. Queen Isabella of Castile, maybe, had a soul that was sparkling clean, but historians debate whether she bathed two or three times in her entire life. The elegant Sun King of France, the first man to wear high heels, bathed only once between 1647 and 1711 and that time it was only on doctor's orders.
Europe in general and Spain particularly did not like water, the devil's toy, a Muslim heresy.
Compiled through Galeano's mirrors. salamat.
WE may not know that Nostradamus was also a physician, an extraordinary one who did not believe in leeches. For the plague he prescribed air and water; ventilating air,cleansing water.
Though filth incubated disease, water had a bad reputation in Christian Europe. Except in baptism, bathing was avoided because it felt good and invited sin. In the tribunals of the Holy Inquisition, frequent bathing was proof of Mohammedan heresy. When Christianity was imposed on Spain as the only truth, the crown ordered the many public baths left by the Muslims razed, because they were sources of perdition.
Not a single saint, male or female, ever set foot in a bath, and kings rarely bathed since that's what perfume was for. Queen Isabella of Castile, maybe, had a soul that was sparkling clean, but historians debate whether she bathed two or three times in her entire life. The elegant Sun King of France, the first man to wear high heels, bathed only once between 1647 and 1711 and that time it was only on doctor's orders.
Europe in general and Spain particularly did not like water, the devil's toy, a Muslim heresy.
Compiled through Galeano's mirrors. salamat.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
ACCORDING TO EDUARDO !!
" What did the Chinese not invent ?
When I was a child, I knew China as a country on the other side of the world from where I was. You thought you could get there if you had the patience to dig a hole deep enough.
Later on, I learned something about world history, but world history was the history of Europe and it remains so today. The rest of the world lay, and still lies, in darkness. China too, we know little or nothing of the past of the country that invented practically everything.
Silk began there, five thousand years ago.
Before anyone else the Chinese discovered, named, and cultivated tea.
They were the first to mine salt from below ground and the first to use gas and oil in their stoves and lamps.
They made lightweight iron plows and machines for planting, threshing, and harvesting two thousand years before the English mechanized their agriculture.
They invented the compass eleven hundred years before Europe's ships began to use them.
A thousand years before the Germans, they discovered that water driven mills could power their iron and steel foundries.
Nineteen hundred years ago, they invented paper.
They printed books six centuries before Gutenberg, and two centuries before him they used mobile type in their printing presses.
Twelve hundred years ago, they invented gunpowder, and a century later the cannon.
Nine hundred years ago, they made silk- weaving machines with bobbins worked by pedals, which the Italians copied after a two-century delay.
They also invented the rudder, the spinning wheel, acupuncture, porcelain, soccer, playing cards, the magic lantern, fire works, the pinwheel, paper money, the mechanical clock, the seismograph, lacquer, phosphorescent paint, the fishing real, the suspension bridge, the wheel barrow, the umbrella, the fan, the stirrup, the horseshoe, the key, the toothbrush, and other things hardly worth mentioning.
When I was a child, I knew China as a country on the other side of the world from where I was. You thought you could get there if you had the patience to dig a hole deep enough.
Later on, I learned something about world history, but world history was the history of Europe and it remains so today. The rest of the world lay, and still lies, in darkness. China too, we know little or nothing of the past of the country that invented practically everything.
Silk began there, five thousand years ago.
Before anyone else the Chinese discovered, named, and cultivated tea.
They were the first to mine salt from below ground and the first to use gas and oil in their stoves and lamps.
They made lightweight iron plows and machines for planting, threshing, and harvesting two thousand years before the English mechanized their agriculture.
They invented the compass eleven hundred years before Europe's ships began to use them.
A thousand years before the Germans, they discovered that water driven mills could power their iron and steel foundries.
Nineteen hundred years ago, they invented paper.
They printed books six centuries before Gutenberg, and two centuries before him they used mobile type in their printing presses.
Twelve hundred years ago, they invented gunpowder, and a century later the cannon.
Nine hundred years ago, they made silk- weaving machines with bobbins worked by pedals, which the Italians copied after a two-century delay.
They also invented the rudder, the spinning wheel, acupuncture, porcelain, soccer, playing cards, the magic lantern, fire works, the pinwheel, paper money, the mechanical clock, the seismograph, lacquer, phosphorescent paint, the fishing real, the suspension bridge, the wheel barrow, the umbrella, the fan, the stirrup, the horseshoe, the key, the toothbrush, and other things hardly worth mentioning.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
EPILOGUE !! (6)
Essentially there are two fundamental and pivotal events in human history, the agricultural revolution, in which men passed from hunting to tillage and settled down to build homes, schools, and civilization, and the industrial revolution, which threw millions and millions of men, first in England, then in America and Germany, then in Italy and France, then in far away Japan and the ex soviet union now in China, India and Brazil,out of their homes and their farms into cities and factories. It transformed society and government by empowering the owners of machinery and the controllers of commerce beyond the owners of titles and land.
It transformed religion by generating science and its persuasive miracles and including many men to think in terms of cause and effect and machine. It transformed the mind by substituting novel and varied stimuli. It transformed woman by taking her work from the home and forcing her into the factories and the work force. It transformed morals by complicating economic life, postponing marriage, multiplying contacts and opportunities, liberating woman, reducing the family, and weakening religious and parental control and authority. And it transformed art by subordinating beauty to use, and subjecting the artist, not to a favored few with inherited standards of judgement and trained tastes,but to a multitude who judged all things in terms of power and cost and size.
ALL this and more,incredible as it may seem, Capitalism, Socialism, the Imperialism that must come when industrialised nations need foreign markets and foreign food, the wars that must come for these markets, and the revolutions that must come from these wars.
I know how partial and provincial all these lists must be. We are all born within frontiers of space and time,and, struggle as we will, we never escape from our boxes. To us, civilisation means Europe and America, and the orient, which considers us barbaric, seems barbarous.
I will let the reader, then, make his own lists, helping himself to what he likes in mine. Let him try to build for himself another perspective that shall clarify human development and progress for him.
Thanks again to MR. Durant, Little, et al.
thanks to all my readers for their patience in following my line of thoughts.
And finally salamat to all.
It transformed religion by generating science and its persuasive miracles and including many men to think in terms of cause and effect and machine. It transformed the mind by substituting novel and varied stimuli. It transformed woman by taking her work from the home and forcing her into the factories and the work force. It transformed morals by complicating economic life, postponing marriage, multiplying contacts and opportunities, liberating woman, reducing the family, and weakening religious and parental control and authority. And it transformed art by subordinating beauty to use, and subjecting the artist, not to a favored few with inherited standards of judgement and trained tastes,but to a multitude who judged all things in terms of power and cost and size.
ALL this and more,incredible as it may seem, Capitalism, Socialism, the Imperialism that must come when industrialised nations need foreign markets and foreign food, the wars that must come for these markets, and the revolutions that must come from these wars.
I know how partial and provincial all these lists must be. We are all born within frontiers of space and time,and, struggle as we will, we never escape from our boxes. To us, civilisation means Europe and America, and the orient, which considers us barbaric, seems barbarous.
I will let the reader, then, make his own lists, helping himself to what he likes in mine. Let him try to build for himself another perspective that shall clarify human development and progress for him.
Thanks again to MR. Durant, Little, et al.
thanks to all my readers for their patience in following my line of thoughts.
And finally salamat to all.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
AND MORE !!!! (5)
SCIENCE AND EDUCATION :
We progress only in knowledge.
More and more completely we pass on to the next generation the gathered experience of the past.It is almost a contemporary innovation, this tremendous expenditure of wealth and labor in the equipment of schools and the provision of instruction for all, perhaps it is the most significant feature of our time. Once colleges were luxuries, designed for the male half of the leisure class, today universities are so numerous that he/she who runs may very well become a PhD. We have raised the level and average of human knowledge far beyond any age in history. Education is the reason why we behave like human beings. We are hardly born human, we are born ridiculous and maladjusted animals, we become human through the mental and cultural inheritance, through humanity whose preservation,accumulation,and transmission place mankind today. In the perspective of history the great experiment of education is just began.
WRITING AND PRINT :
Again our imagination is too weak, we cannot vision or recall the long ages of ignorance, impotence, and fear that preceded the coming of the letters. Through those unrecorded centuries men could transmit their hard-won lore only by word of mouth from parent to child, if one generation forgot or misunderstood, the slow and weary ladder of knowledge had to be climbed anew. Writing gave a new permanence to the achievements of the mind, it preserved for thousands of years, and through a millennium of poverty and superstition, the wisdom found by philosophy and the beauty carved out in drama and poetry. it bound the generations together with a common heritage, it created that country of the mind in which, because of writing, genius need not die.
See you all tomorrow with the finale.
We progress only in knowledge.
More and more completely we pass on to the next generation the gathered experience of the past.It is almost a contemporary innovation, this tremendous expenditure of wealth and labor in the equipment of schools and the provision of instruction for all, perhaps it is the most significant feature of our time. Once colleges were luxuries, designed for the male half of the leisure class, today universities are so numerous that he/she who runs may very well become a PhD. We have raised the level and average of human knowledge far beyond any age in history. Education is the reason why we behave like human beings. We are hardly born human, we are born ridiculous and maladjusted animals, we become human through the mental and cultural inheritance, through humanity whose preservation,accumulation,and transmission place mankind today. In the perspective of history the great experiment of education is just began.
WRITING AND PRINT :
Again our imagination is too weak, we cannot vision or recall the long ages of ignorance, impotence, and fear that preceded the coming of the letters. Through those unrecorded centuries men could transmit their hard-won lore only by word of mouth from parent to child, if one generation forgot or misunderstood, the slow and weary ladder of knowledge had to be climbed anew. Writing gave a new permanence to the achievements of the mind, it preserved for thousands of years, and through a millennium of poverty and superstition, the wisdom found by philosophy and the beauty carved out in drama and poetry. it bound the generations together with a common heritage, it created that country of the mind in which, because of writing, genius need not die.
See you all tomorrow with the finale.
Monday, January 4, 2010
More on the same theme.... (4)
SOCIAL ORGANIZATION :
Here are two men disputing; one knocks the other down, kills him, and then concludes that he who is alive must have been right, and that he who is dead must have been wrong, a mode of demonstration still accepted in international disputes. Here are two other men disputing; one says to the other,"Let us not fight, we may both be killed,let us take our differences to some elder of the tribe,and submit to his decision." It was a crucial moment in human history! For if the answer was, "NO" barbarism continued, if it was "YES" civilization planted another root in the memory of man,the replacement of chaos with order,of brutality with judgment, of violence with law. Here, too, is a gift unfelt, because we are born within the charmed circle of it's protection,and never know its value till we wander into the disordered or solitary regions of the earth.
TOOLS :
We need not be ashamed of our prosperity, opportunities once confined only to barons and kings have been made by enterprise the prerogatives of all. We grow gigantic arms that build in a month the pyramids that once consumed a million men,we make for ourselves great eyes that search out the stars of the sky,and little eyes that peer into the invisible cells of life, we speak, if we wish, with quiet voices that reach across continents and seas, we move over the land and the air with the freedom of timeless gods. in flying we have freed ourselves, and now we may look the eagle in the face.
No these tools will not conquer or defeat us. These great inventions and future ones are clear and visible steps in our progress to a slaveless world. The menial labor that degraded both master and man is lifted from human shoulders and harnessed to the tireless muscles of iron and steel and fibers, soon every wind and every sun ray will pour it's beneficent energy into factories and homes, and man will be freed for the tasks of the mind. It is not revolution but invention that will liberate the slave.
to be continued, salamat for now.
Here are two men disputing; one knocks the other down, kills him, and then concludes that he who is alive must have been right, and that he who is dead must have been wrong, a mode of demonstration still accepted in international disputes. Here are two other men disputing; one says to the other,"Let us not fight, we may both be killed,let us take our differences to some elder of the tribe,and submit to his decision." It was a crucial moment in human history! For if the answer was, "NO" barbarism continued, if it was "YES" civilization planted another root in the memory of man,the replacement of chaos with order,of brutality with judgment, of violence with law. Here, too, is a gift unfelt, because we are born within the charmed circle of it's protection,and never know its value till we wander into the disordered or solitary regions of the earth.
TOOLS :
We need not be ashamed of our prosperity, opportunities once confined only to barons and kings have been made by enterprise the prerogatives of all. We grow gigantic arms that build in a month the pyramids that once consumed a million men,we make for ourselves great eyes that search out the stars of the sky,and little eyes that peer into the invisible cells of life, we speak, if we wish, with quiet voices that reach across continents and seas, we move over the land and the air with the freedom of timeless gods. in flying we have freed ourselves, and now we may look the eagle in the face.
No these tools will not conquer or defeat us. These great inventions and future ones are clear and visible steps in our progress to a slaveless world. The menial labor that degraded both master and man is lifted from human shoulders and harnessed to the tireless muscles of iron and steel and fibers, soon every wind and every sun ray will pour it's beneficent energy into factories and homes, and man will be freed for the tasks of the mind. It is not revolution but invention that will liberate the slave.
to be continued, salamat for now.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
More progress..... (3)
THE CONQUEST OF THE ANIMALS :
Our memories are too forgetful, and our imagination too unimaginative, to let us realise the gift we have in our security from the larger and sub human beasts of prey. Animals are now our playthings and our helpless food, but there was a time when man was hunted as well as hunter, when every step from cave or hut was an adventure, and the possession of the earth was still at stake. This war to make the planet human was surely the most vital in human history; by it's side all other wars were but family quarrels. That struggle between strength of body and power of mind was waged through long and unrecorded years, and when at last it was won, man's safety on earth was transmitted across a thousand generations, to be part of our heritage at birth.
AGRICULTURE :
Civilization was impossible in the hunting stage; it called for a permanent habitat, a settled way of life. it came with the home and the school, and these could not be till the products of the field replaced the animals of the forest or the herd as the food of man. No doubt it took centuries to make this greatest of all transitions in human history, but when at last it was made, progress began.
Civilization came through two things chiefly, the home, which developed those social dispositions that form the psychological cement of society, and agriculture, which took man from his wandering life as hunter, herder and killer, and settled him long enough in one place to let him build homes, schools, churches, colleges, universities, civilization.
More thanks to W.Durant.
Our memories are too forgetful, and our imagination too unimaginative, to let us realise the gift we have in our security from the larger and sub human beasts of prey. Animals are now our playthings and our helpless food, but there was a time when man was hunted as well as hunter, when every step from cave or hut was an adventure, and the possession of the earth was still at stake. This war to make the planet human was surely the most vital in human history; by it's side all other wars were but family quarrels. That struggle between strength of body and power of mind was waged through long and unrecorded years, and when at last it was won, man's safety on earth was transmitted across a thousand generations, to be part of our heritage at birth.
AGRICULTURE :
Civilization was impossible in the hunting stage; it called for a permanent habitat, a settled way of life. it came with the home and the school, and these could not be till the products of the field replaced the animals of the forest or the herd as the food of man. No doubt it took centuries to make this greatest of all transitions in human history, but when at last it was made, progress began.
Civilization came through two things chiefly, the home, which developed those social dispositions that form the psychological cement of society, and agriculture, which took man from his wandering life as hunter, herder and killer, and settled him long enough in one place to let him build homes, schools, churches, colleges, universities, civilization.
More thanks to W.Durant.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
Further progress ... ( 2 )
FIRE :
Fire made man independent of climate, gave him a greater compass on the earth, tempered his tools to hardness and durability, and offered him as food a thousand things inedible before. Not least of all it made him master of the night, and shed animating brilliance over the hours of evening and dawn. Picture the dark before man conquered it; even now the terrors of that primitive abyss survive in our traditions and in our blood, once every twilight was a tragedy, and man crept into his cave at sunset trembling with fear. how good it is to be liberated from our ancient fears!! We shall never be grateful enough for light.
More precious words by W.Durant
Compiled by me.
Fire made man independent of climate, gave him a greater compass on the earth, tempered his tools to hardness and durability, and offered him as food a thousand things inedible before. Not least of all it made him master of the night, and shed animating brilliance over the hours of evening and dawn. Picture the dark before man conquered it; even now the terrors of that primitive abyss survive in our traditions and in our blood, once every twilight was a tragedy, and man crept into his cave at sunset trembling with fear. how good it is to be liberated from our ancient fears!! We shall never be grateful enough for light.
More precious words by W.Durant
Compiled by me.
Friday, January 1, 2010
Ideas to better understand progress. ( 1 )
Let us first define progress as "increasing control of the environment by life," and let us mean by environment "all the circumstances that condition the coordination and realization of desire." progress is the domination of chaos by mind and purpose,of matter by form and will.
Certain great moments stand out as the peaks and essence of human history,certain advances which, once made, were never lost. Step by step man has climbed from the savage to the thinker and scientist, I will in the coming few days briefly outline these stages of man's growth, we start today with:
SPEECH ; think of it not as a sudden achievement, nor as a gift from the gods, but as the slow development of articulate expression, through centuries of effort, from the mating calls of animals to the lyric flights of poetry. Without words, or common nouns, that might give to particular images the ability to represent a class, generalisation would have stopped in its beginnings, and reason would have stayed where we find it in the brute. Without words, philosophy and poetry, history and prose, would have been impossible, and thought could never have reached the subtlety of Einstein or Anatole France. Without words man could not have become man--nor woman woman.
Words by W.Durant.
Compiled by me.
Certain great moments stand out as the peaks and essence of human history,certain advances which, once made, were never lost. Step by step man has climbed from the savage to the thinker and scientist, I will in the coming few days briefly outline these stages of man's growth, we start today with:
SPEECH ; think of it not as a sudden achievement, nor as a gift from the gods, but as the slow development of articulate expression, through centuries of effort, from the mating calls of animals to the lyric flights of poetry. Without words, or common nouns, that might give to particular images the ability to represent a class, generalisation would have stopped in its beginnings, and reason would have stayed where we find it in the brute. Without words, philosophy and poetry, history and prose, would have been impossible, and thought could never have reached the subtlety of Einstein or Anatole France. Without words man could not have become man--nor woman woman.
Words by W.Durant.
Compiled by me.
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