| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"Joseph H" |
| Date: |
31 Dec 2004 06:57:55 AM |
| Object: |
MND OF MATTER |
()wrote:
We have..."the wherewithal to run the world".. have we? Is this an
assertion, nothing more? Is there a
shred of theory behind it? Could you remove the "baldness" somewhat
and give your patient reader somnething to go on?
Joseph H replies: Yeah, you're right. I have been pushed into undue
brevity by the wish to keep peoples' attention. Anyway...I think we
underestimate what we amount to. After some billions of years of
energy, matter, planets, life etc..a creature emerges with the
capacity to perceive the whole show. I think it's a profoundly
significant event in the "history" of our universe. I'm not looking
for some vague "wonder". I'm looking for a recognition of what we are.
I say we have the "whewrewithal". We do, simple as that. We possess
the cognitive capacity to perceive and to organise. We have already
shown we can do it locally - and far more than locally. The globe is
"merely" a matter of scale. It is - to me - inconceivable that a
creature with our ability to reason and to organise should not go on
to create a global society reflecting these abilities.
You show some interest in my second point: that we very gradually
built up a superstructure of knowledge, of belief, of society, of
technology. The creature that we are, moving from very few starting
points, and very little knowledge, built up this superstructure. I see
this as a fraught process. Every advance had to be fought for. We
constantly had to build on what was there previously - even if we
sought to remove what was there previously. To go too far ahead - in
any area - was to lose contact and be rendered useless. To see too far
ahead was to be dismissed as a dreamer. To even see the process itself
was of no use. Immediacy was all. We have, I believe, inherent forms
of thought and action and we constructed our global society in those
modes. In so doing we ignored or forgot the fundamental truth of the
process: that we are a natural creature, a species of individuals with
great power. who were engaged in a colonisation of the planet. In
other words, the colonisation itself so occupied our minds that we
didn't see the colonisation. It was a crude, a cruel, a savage process
where individual beings were oppressed and beaten down and where gross
error was exalted.
My third point, that this process is now largely over, I still adhere
to. But i would augment it greatly. I believe- from about 1500 on - a
counter-process finally began, or took hold: to see us as we are, to
establish rights etc. It probably came out of artists and tradesmen,
and traders etc...modern society. It is - as with all human society -
also a fraught process. It bears the distinguishing marks - and forms
- of all human society. It developed inexorably. Rights, initially,
were crude and "owned" only by the group or class who won them.
Refinement cmae slowly and painfully. We are still refining rights. In
the last half-century our analyses have really taken off. We have
uneathered vast complexities, seen what rights really involve for the
dispossessed, the outsiders, those in our societies not in the past
considered "normal". The process is not complete at all. We have
created vast sophisticated societies - so sophisticated that many
outside them can't join in. I would say - and my web-site highlights
this - that we are now locked into a semi-blind individualism, We see
little beyond the passion of our quest for freedom and rights and
riches.
It is in this context that I move on my fourth point - now I'm down to
four! We need a perception of the whole show. We need to finally use
that capacity we acquired 50000 years ago - or whenever - to see the
whole thing. This, I believe, would give us direction; would give us
focus; would enable leaders - and peoples - the more easily organise
the kind of society we want. We are on the brink of that global
society, I think. But to be there we must see there!
Happy New year!
Joseph H
www.humanisation.org
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