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The freezing out of current realities from the big bang soup was found to have been curiously biased. Of all the initially possible scenarios, many were adsorbed in Planck time, and never dominated (antimatter for one). These asymmetries are now being puzzled out by CERN. The end result of this bias is the skewed nature of every reaction in all domains. (no area is free from it). It is therefore universal, all encompassing, and holds us in its grip. If we live, and think, these processes stem from the permissions physically accorded us by the bias, coupled with the earnest prompting of physical forces, from initial conditions mandated by history. If we are free, it is only within these boundaries. I sum it up as "The Tao"... the allowed way.
Delusion, on the other hand, is not bounded, except by the limitations of the dreamer. Reading the dance cards of the angelic population partying on a pinhead gains no one any insight. Searching for Baal is a mental disease.
The religious magisterium incites and allows delusive projection of biocultural memes as a deified absolute, removing each believer from his/her truly needed lifesearch.
The scientific magisterium has lagged in pre Einstein error space, and therefore paints no currently usable picture for humanity. It ought to catch up.
Cosmology now wanders in the desert of its own lack of data, spinning dozens of mutually exclusive fables, all unproven.
Imprinting and right brain parallel processing allowed protohumanity to mime knowledge to each other via what would now be called art. (A dance, showing how to kill zebra .. the inspirational/instructional paintings at Lascaux). Using these methods, unanimity could be arrived at sans language.
Intentionally fabricated icons holding visual & magical power for these right brain audiences were simply the next inevitable step, and so arrives "God" among the humans.
When survival is uncertain, and cohesion is required, totems are extremely potent ignitors of the human "hyper self", acting as they do through the more immediate sympathetic pathways, undiluted by grammar, syntax, and the snags of mere logic.
Mimetic influence makes 6 or 8 hunters act as a single super killer, more than the sum of its parts. Mimetic influence makes kings, pyramids, tribes, nations, crusades, jihads, and progressive movements. Religion and its devious twin, politics, operates mimetically via totems, and only pulls in language or logic as corrupted slaves to the totem.
Shall humanity inwardly cleanse itself of totems? I say it is in the nature of the beast to rely on totems, and that people with no inner capital filling their totem space will always wither before the more integrated, trustworthy will of a true believer.
Case in point: Obama versus Awlaki. (So far, Awlaki has the upper hand.)
This is why the assertions of Islamic spokesmen cannot be disproved, when they frame western civilization as corrupt, and needful of Islamification. These willful proselytizers wish only to fill up our empty, starving totem-space with Allah, so that we may be complete. This innate need is so evident to them, that they easily manipulate young westerners into committing suicide, granting the Allah totem as a life's fulfillment.
The reactive, totemless Bertrand Russell strain of anti-establishment western thinking gives no gifts as numinous, and so motivates no one.
We ought finally cast off Yahweh, and the endless acceptance/rejection the Yahweh totem, and seek out a viable post atheist philosophy.
Teilhardian evolution can provide a viable starting point, and an exalted overview for this very needed exercise.
H Springer on January 8, 2010, 8:34 AM
http://bigthink.com/ideas/17864 |
