‘Now, that you’ve reached your personal pinnacle, which do you think is more important? Setting the right goal for yourself or reaching it by keeping on the ‘straight and narrow’?’
Well, staying on the straight and narrow is a goal in itself… The way you put it, you’re asking me to determine which came first, the chicken or the egg?
Neither. Evolution came first. At some point reached the ‘chicken and egg’ stage then went forward to giving birth to living offspring.
Same thing here. Life is opportunistic. Setting goals and following rules is OK, as long as you keep an open mind about things. Keep your eyes wide open yet fully aware that nothing is exactly as it looks like.
The only legitimate long term goal is ‘sustainable survival’. The rest are nothing but ‘staging posts’. In order to be able to do something – anything – you need to be alive. And kicking! In order to stay alive, you need to make as little damage as you go along. To yourself – as a living organism – and to the environment in which you live. To the natural environment each living organism depends on and to the social environment which allows us, human beings, to maintain and develop our human-ness. Our capacity to generate meaning by making successive decisions.
How to achieve this meta-goal? By following the common sense rules which become apparent as we go forward in time. Which become evident as long as we keep our eyes open….
“Behold, the man has become as one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat and live for ever: Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.“
Tradition is a collection of knowledge. Which has been agglutinating in time and is used as a ‘benchmark’ by the currently living keepers of the relevant tradition. ‘Relevant’ in the sense that not everything which is still remembered continues to be useful.
Functionally speaking, tradition is both a filter we use to interpret the reality and a guide we use when shaping future action. And we use it simply because the alternative would be to start from scratch whenever we see anything or have to do something. Like a child learning to walk and speak. Like a child who keeps saying ‘what is this and why do I have to…’ We get many of those answers from the traditions passed over by our ancestors. Without these traditions we would be like a lonely child. A collective child who keeps asking for direction but who gets no answer. Because there’s no one around to answer…
Ideology is also a collection of knowledge. Which has been put together, edited or both at the same time by an ideologue. Or group of ideologues. Psychologically speaking, ideology and tradition work in the same way. Both as a filter used when interpreting reality and as a guide for future action.
But there are some differences.
Tradition has been vetted by evolution. Individual traditions have evolved themselves. No modern Jew would ever consider stoning to death “a woman who had been caught in adultery”. Even if this used to be the biblical standard punishment for such a transgression… Some traditions have disappeared altogether. Because, at some point, they had ceased to be relevant. Their teachings were no longer helpful… At some point, those who were living in those traditions had understood, one way or another, that their particular tradition was suggesting an interpretation of reality which was … wrong! So wrong/useless that the entire tradition had to be abandoned. Like the Egyptian pyramids. Other traditions are still alive today. Because at least parts of them continue to be relevant for those who keep them. “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth”.
In fact, what we call ‘modern civilization’ is based entirely upon this particular piece of tradition. We’ve built it together, as children of the same father. We’ve been building it under the authority of the said father, who had given us dominion over everything which was moving under the sun. And the fact that we considered ourselves to be the children of the same father – siblings, hence equals – has given birth to the very notion of human rights.
Ideology, on the other hand, is still fresh. Some of it might make it, some of it might break us.
The bible itself has been nothing more but a piece of ideology. When it was written… The fact that those who had been inspired by the bible have survived, as a flock, for so long is a strong suggestion that the biblical tradition has been useful. That, overall, the suggestions derived by the ‘keepers’ from this particular tradition have helped them in their quest.
Other ideologies have been less successful…
Communism, for instance. On the face of it, the communist ideology is a continuation of the christian tradition. People are to be considered equals, resources are to be shared among the members of the community… what more can you wish? Well, it didn’t work out that way. It actually failed. Abysmally. I know, I’ve been there myself.
I’m not going to delve into why some ideologies work – and live to become traditions – while others fail. I’m not God, I don’t know everything. What is plainly visible, for those who want to see, is that authoritarianism – under any ideological pretext – is doomed to fail. This being the reason for which God – or the wise guy who wrote that passage – had banned Man from the garden of Eden. An immortal man would stick to his convictions until it would be too late. Until the heaven would had fallen upon his shoulders….
I cannot end this before sharing with you what prompted me to write it. The goal of Hamas – ideologically shaped and ideologically imposed upon its followers, regardless of any of the circumstances – is to destroy the state of Israel and to replace it with an islamic state. Is there a ‘promise’ about how people will live once that islamic state would be imposed? Except that they will have to obey? The goal stated by the communist ideology was equality! Not people’s happiness or anything like that. The way to obtain that goal was a continuous revolution. A sort of jihad, if you will… Now look at what Hamas has accomplished. At what Marx’s communists had accomplished…
Choose wisely. ‘Cause each of us is born into a tradition. Into a particular tradition… But ideology is something that each of us chooses. And can give up!
(A wise husband and a forgiving wife are the best recipe for a happy marriage.)
Pe bune?!?
Sună bine, nu? Cel puțin la prima strigare…
Daca stăm să ne gândim un pic… Drepți, ca să nu ne doară spatele!
Rabdarea soției e de-a dreptul inutilă, DACĂ se întâmpla ca soțul să fie prea înțelept. Sunt cazuri, chiar dacă foarte rare… Și pentru ca ‘use it or lose it’ – adică orice însușire/abilitate dispare dacă nu este folosită la justa valoare, răbdarea aia va dispărea în timp. Cu atât mai repede cu cât soțul este mai înțelept!
Pe de altă parte, o soție cu adevărat răbdătoare va reuși să scoată tot ce e mai rău din cel mai înțelept bărbat din lume. ‘Cel mai înțelept bărbat din lume’ este un superlativ relativ. Este vorba doar despre cel mai înțelept bărbat disponibil pe Pământ la un anumit moment! În nici un caz despre bărbatul perfect… Dacă cel mai înțelept bărbat din lume are o probabilitate de 1 la 4 miliarde, bărbatul înțelept, la modul absolut, este un personaj imaginar! Use it or lose it e valabilă, evident, și pentru înțelepciunea relativă… Mai ales că ‘înțelepciunea’ are prostul obicei de a i se urca înțeleptului la cap! Tocmai pentru că este ‘relativă’. Răbdarea… mai greu! Nu te laudă nimeni…pentru cât de mult ești în stare să rabzi…
Așa că… Bărbatul să fie cât de înțelept poate el iar femeia să facă bine să nu-i rabde prea multe! Doar că femeia ar fi bine să fie ea suficient de înțeleaptă încât să-l ia cu frumosu’ pe ‘deșteptul ei’ în desele cazuri când n-o să-l ducă mintea…
Marxism still works… Marxism is a dogma. Despite everything pretended by marxists, marxism – as an ideology – is an article of faith. And as long as there are believers who continue to promote a faith, any faith, that faith continues to survive. To work… On the other hand, there is a non-ideological side of marxism. A pre-ideological component, if you will. The analysis made by Marx before reaching his conclusion. Before reaching the conclusion that communism is ‘the answer’… The analysis was correct. Furthermore, even some of his predictions had been right. Our current obsession, induced by Milton Friedman, with profit as the ultimate goal of human activity has led us into an impasse. But Marx’s solution – to a very accurately defined problem – was an abject failure. Communism was a failure. Each and every time! But marxism still works… We, some of us, continue to believe according to this ideology…
It ends almost like it had started. Make good use of the interval!
Life and death are two strange words. Very different yet they describe the very same thing. If you think of it, death and life are like the faces of a coin. After all, the exclusive qualification for being able to die is to have been born… And it’s only us, languaging rational beings, who make the difference between living and dying. At the conceptual level, of course. OK, many others are capable of making the functional distinction between a corpse and a living body. We are impressed by the mourning behavior displayed by the elephants, for example. And even more so by the chimpanzee mothers who continue to carry the bodies of their deceased babies… But since we are the only species – known to us, humans – who uses language to relate to each-other, to think about the world and to plan ahead, I’m going to discuss here only the languaging/reasoning aspects of us making the difference between life and death. By making this difference we actually separate the inseparable. With momentous consequences. For us – individual human beings, for the species as a whole, for the rest of the species and for the rest of the world. The world as we know it… The origin of this difference is our conscience. Which is sophisticated enough to be able to make it and to talk/think about it. The elephants are also conscient enough to act upon the difference between a living body and a corpse. To recognize the skeleton of a deceased relative. To remember it. But, at least apparently, they are not able to speak about the whole thing. Nor to transmit over generations that those particular bones belonged to a particular individual who had been related to … As soon as all individuals who had directly known the deceased individual, all information about the identity of the corpse/skeleton are lost. For a while, the survivors remember only the fact that their ‘mothers’ used to ‘mourn’ over this particular set of bones but nothing more. Again, this is what we know, now, about the manner in which the elephants treat their dead. Which is very different from how we treat ours. And from how we relate to matters pertaining to life and death. We cherish life and we dread death. We cherish our lives and we dread our death. Ours and that of our (cherished) relatives and friends. And we are somewhat indifferent to the lives of others… To the tune of being able to dispatch animals, and plants, for food. And to kill other human beings. In war but not exclusively.
Man has a natural tendency to prey on other people. This being the reason why humans must be educated and for which we need a lot of coercive measures.
I strongly disagree. The first sentence is utterly wrong and the second is brazenly manipulative.
Something which can be educated isn’t ‘natural’. Not in the sense implied above! People can be educated to eat in a certain manner. As in having ‘table manners’. People can be educated about what to eat. And what to avoid eating. To avoid eating things which are both delicious and nourishing. People can be educated even about how much to eat! But you cannot educate anybody to stop eating!
What is truly natural about ‘Man’ – about all people, actually – is that they need to interact with other people. In order to become full fledged human beings, people need to live among other people.
What can be educated is behavior. How to interact with other people.
People can be educated to cooperate. Or people can be educated to gang up. And prey on those outside the gang.
Please note that those who gang up in order to prey on others do cooperate among themselves! Even if that cooperative behavior has a strong hierarchical nature.
Mother Earth being the source of life – the, not “a” – is a truism. Regardless. On the other hand, being a mere resource isn’t bad either… For the simple reason that all reasonable people treat resources is a responsible manner.
Right? Specially when speaking about resources which are ireplaceable! And since there is only one Earth… Huge, indeed, but finite nevertheless…
Which brings us back to ‘to each their own’.
Basically, there are two kinds of people currently living on Earth. Some continue to treat it as a Mother – take from her only what they need and refrain from littering her bossom. And the ‘cherry-pickers’. Who go by “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.” Who believe they had been given a free hand by their God. A free hand regarding the ‘dirt’ they have been made from… The only problem with the ‘cherry pickers’ – exclusivelly with the ‘cherry pickers’ – being the fact that they don’t read enough. Enough of their (own) Book.
‘Don’t eat any animal which has not been bled out first and don’t spill human blood?’ I’m afraid you’re still not getting it.
According to the book we’re talking about, God has made the entire world. Sparated the stars from the Earth, the water from the dry land, made all the plants and the animals… and Man. Which man needs the Earth to live upon. An Earth as close to how it currently is as possible, in order for man to live comfortably! But since “in the image of God has God made mankind”, then God himself needs the Earth. For whatever reason.
Which means we’d better take good care of His Creation. Of His entire Creation!
‘OK, no more floods. But you’re still going to feel the consequences of your own follies. You, your children and all those wallowing in the wicked way’.
And this has happened many more times across the world/along human history.
The fact that Stonehenge exists is ample proof that those people had been able to generate enough ‘wealth’ to build it. We’ve been able to find out that the boulders had been sourced from two places. The 20 tons hard-sandstone sarsenes ‘traveled’ about 20 miles while the 2 tons blue-stones had been schlepped for about 220 miles. According to Mark Pitts, writing for the British Museum. And we think we have a fair idea about how the whole thing had been put together. Read the paper. But we know close to nothing about the people who did it.
The stone ring is all that’s left of them. Isn’t it strange? For such a technologically sophisticated people – and rich enough to afford such a herculean endeavor – to disappear in the mist of history?
And here’s a selection of other abrupt endings/’hibernations’:
Mohenjo-Daro and Harrapa in Pakistan. Angkor Wat. The Great Chinese Wall The Egyptian pyramids The Athenian Parthenon The Roman Coliseum and the roads cris-crossing more than half of Europe Kuldhara, the ghost-city Machu Picchu And, last but not least, the cathedrals mentioned by Reuter’s Mark John. Europe did take a break after finishing building those cathedrals….
What am I trying to ‘suggest’?
That we, as a cultured species, have a tendency to evolve in fits and starts. We tend to reach pinnacles only to descend – sometimes temporarily – in abject ‘marasmus’.
Could ‘self-sufficiency’ explain at least some of this?
Don’t tell me capitalism is at fault for any of this. Capitalism is but a way of doing things. A road. Which we followed to where we are now. How we behaved en-route and what we decide right now was/is our own contribution!
nicichiarasa 