Before Democracy there was AWE.
AWE was surely universal among beings self-ascribed as human.
AWE resided in the individual being before that AWE, felt by that being, was shared within the group.. The group became therefore the bearer of a collective Awe, on its way to develop Faith and Reason.
AWE likely existed before FAITH.
AWE precedes FAITH. AWE precedes REASON.
One may likely come to FAITH -- as a consequence of AWE.
Beings, many among us, come to faith, after AWE.
But EQUALLY, the one and the group may come to INQUIRY, DOUBT, SKEPTICISM and REASONED KNOWLEDGE as a consequence of AWE, instead of coming to FAITH.
FAITH and DOUBT are equal options, following upon AWE.
Faith is the prerequisite of Religion. Without Faith, continuing in Faith, a state of Faith, there can no Religion.
Doubt is the prerequisite of Science. Without Doubt, continuing Doubt, a state of Doubt, there can be no Science.
Faith requires Surrender, Science requires Doubt.
It was likely that within the group, not merely within the individual, that the notion of a shared universality of Breath was given shape and substance.
It was likely in the group that aggregated beings discovered the Breath Eternal. They came near to one another to collectively discover Breath.
What united them was Breath. What separated them from Death (known all too well among them) was Breath.
That each being, each one among them, shared Breath in common with all living others others and all of observable nature, was likely felt, noted and uttered.
The Breath Eternal likely became the basis of the social bond, Breath became the basis of community, Breath became the basis of endeavor to promote the well-being of the individual and the group, Breath became the ground of language, art and science.
In all instances, whenever or wherever Breath was perceived to be limited in scope, or adjudged to be possessed by few instead of ALL of Nature and the universe, Breath likely became deployed as the basis for violence and misery, injustice and want.
The Breath Eternal, from the earliest days of its acknowledgment, by individuals within groups, as part of the individual, as shared by the group and was universal, became the fountainhead for the making of Democracy.
Showing posts with label religion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label religion. Show all posts
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Women, Religion, Patriarchy and Militarism in South Asia
My NYT Comment #114 published April 16, 2009 8:36 am
Women, Patriarchy, Religion, Militarism & the Ethics of Tolerance in the South Asia Region
How interesting that Randy Cohen is posing the question of Tolerance (see below) as a living ethical precept. That's vitally important to do. But here, as elsewhere, the additional crucial questions are -- Tolerance of what? By Whom? Of Whom? What is the specific political context in which the precept of Tolerance is being posited? What is the social-political location of the one posing the questions?
Afghan women have been courageous for decades, actually centuries. This street protest (against an ordinance signed by Karzai, that targets mainly Shiite women), is the latest example of Afghan women's civil society heroism, their capacity to survive and endure, assert their human dignity, raise and protect their families.
It is a grave mistake to construct and advocate a division between Afghan women and Afghan men.
Afghan women and men belong to the same social fabric and their lives are bound together by common aspirations for escape from poverty, freedom from hunger, freedom from violence and a desire for employment, education, peace, stability, dignity.
Afghan men have suffered and endured, because men were particularly targeted during British colonial campaigns against them. Their fierce resistance defeated every British attempt to colonize them.
Before the Brits, Afghan men were forcibly recruited by every conqueror coming through the mountain passes, on their way to set up empires in New Delhi, or simply to loot and carry away treasure from western and northern India.
Now, after the end of repressive and exploitative colonial occupation by the Brits and after the 9-year Soviet debacle in Afghanistan, Afghan women and men jointly face the daily neo-imperial threat of US and US-led NATO campaigns against them.
Did the US (using Pakistan's ISI) create, train and fund the Mujahadeen who evolved into the Taliban? Was Osama bin Laden the CIA's star pupil?
Into the above toxic mix, throw in Saudi Wahabbism supported by weapons and fueled by Saudi money, a fact conveniently ignored by the US govt as the US shields its longstanding repressive petrodollar ally.
The US and US-led NATO have absolutely no legitimacy in Afghanistan or Pakistan.
They must get out ASAP, so that AFGHAN WOMEN can forge their own destiny together with their male kin, their families and communities and their own political and religious leaders.
The US, US-led NATO presence distorts any possibility of normalcy and creates new problems for the entire South Asia region.
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
— EthicalDemocracy, New York, NY
---------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
The Limits of Tolerance
By Randy Cohen
http://ethicist.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/14/limited-tolerance/?apage=5#comments
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My comment April 16, 2009 8:25 am
Women, Patriarchy, Religion, Militarism
Afghan women have been courageous for decades, actually centuries. This street protest (against an ordinance signed by Karzai, that targets mainly Shiite women), is the latest example of Afghan women's civil society heroism, their capacity to survive and endure, assert their human dignity, raise and protect their families.
It is a grave mistake to construct and advocate a division between Afghan women and Afghan men.
Afghan women and men belong to the same social fabric and their lives are bound together by common aspirations for escape from poverty, freedom from hunger, freedom from violence and a desire for employment, education, peace, stability, dignity.
Afghan men have suffered and endured, because men were particularly targeted during British colonial campaigns against them. Their fierce resistance defeated every British attempt to colonize them.
Before the Brits, Afghan men were forcibly recruited by every conqueror coming through the mountain passes, on their way to set up empires in New Delhi, or simply to loot and carry away treasure from western and northern India.
Now, after the end of repressive and exploitative colonial occupation by the Brits and after the 9-year Soviet debacle in Afghanistan, Afghan women and men jointly face the daily neo-imperial threat of US and US-led NATO campaigns against them.
Did the US (using Pakistan's ISI) create, train and fund the Mujahadeen who evolved into the Taliban? Was Osama bin Laden the CIA's star pupil?
Into the above toxic mix, throw in Saudi Wahabbism supported by weapons and fueled by Saudi money, a fact conveniently ignored by the US govt as the US shields its longstanding repressive petrodollar ally.
The US and US-led NATO have absolutely no legitimacy in Afghanistan or Pakistan.
They must get out ASAP, so that AFGHAN WOMEN can forge their own destiny together with their male kin, their families and communities and their own political and religious leaders.
The US, US-led NATO presence distorts any possibility of normalcy and creates new problems for the entire South Asia region.
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
— EthicalDemocracy, New York, NY
------------------------
My NYT comment #24 published
April 15, 2009 8:18 am
April 15th, 2009 4:26 am
Women, Religion and Militarism
As the editorial (below) notes, a woman was publicly flogged in Swat in Pakistan and earlier Afghanistan's Karzai signed into law an edit that appears to sanction rape in marriage.
Both these incidents show how religion and patriarchal culture can be deployed as deadly weapons against women.
But ...
I would submit that the US govt. and the US-led NATO forces don't give a hoot for women in either Pakistan or Afghanistan.
It seems hypocritical to argue that the US is concerned about women, when drone strikes kill women and children from the air. This happened (again) last week in a NATO airstrike and the civilian death toll which included women and children, was confirmed by President Karzai, with no denial from the US.
There's more to come, with more women dying when Obama sends more troops.
How would Obama feel if his wife and two daughters were killed in a drone strike?
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
--------------------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/15/opinion/15wed1.html
Editorial: Women, Extremism and Two Key States
Published: April 14, 2009
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/15/opinion/15wed1.html
Women, Patriarchy, Religion, Militarism & the Ethics of Tolerance in the South Asia Region
How interesting that Randy Cohen is posing the question of Tolerance (see below) as a living ethical precept. That's vitally important to do. But here, as elsewhere, the additional crucial questions are -- Tolerance of what? By Whom? Of Whom? What is the specific political context in which the precept of Tolerance is being posited? What is the social-political location of the one posing the questions?
Afghan women have been courageous for decades, actually centuries. This street protest (against an ordinance signed by Karzai, that targets mainly Shiite women), is the latest example of Afghan women's civil society heroism, their capacity to survive and endure, assert their human dignity, raise and protect their families.
It is a grave mistake to construct and advocate a division between Afghan women and Afghan men.
Afghan women and men belong to the same social fabric and their lives are bound together by common aspirations for escape from poverty, freedom from hunger, freedom from violence and a desire for employment, education, peace, stability, dignity.
Afghan men have suffered and endured, because men were particularly targeted during British colonial campaigns against them. Their fierce resistance defeated every British attempt to colonize them.
Before the Brits, Afghan men were forcibly recruited by every conqueror coming through the mountain passes, on their way to set up empires in New Delhi, or simply to loot and carry away treasure from western and northern India.
Now, after the end of repressive and exploitative colonial occupation by the Brits and after the 9-year Soviet debacle in Afghanistan, Afghan women and men jointly face the daily neo-imperial threat of US and US-led NATO campaigns against them.
Did the US (using Pakistan's ISI) create, train and fund the Mujahadeen who evolved into the Taliban? Was Osama bin Laden the CIA's star pupil?
Into the above toxic mix, throw in Saudi Wahabbism supported by weapons and fueled by Saudi money, a fact conveniently ignored by the US govt as the US shields its longstanding repressive petrodollar ally.
The US and US-led NATO have absolutely no legitimacy in Afghanistan or Pakistan.
They must get out ASAP, so that AFGHAN WOMEN can forge their own destiny together with their male kin, their families and communities and their own political and religious leaders.
The US, US-led NATO presence distorts any possibility of normalcy and creates new problems for the entire South Asia region.
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
— EthicalDemocracy, New York, NY
---------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
The Limits of Tolerance
By Randy Cohen
http://ethicist.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/14/limited-tolerance/?apage=5#comments
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My comment April 16, 2009 8:25 am
Women, Patriarchy, Religion, Militarism
Afghan women have been courageous for decades, actually centuries. This street protest (against an ordinance signed by Karzai, that targets mainly Shiite women), is the latest example of Afghan women's civil society heroism, their capacity to survive and endure, assert their human dignity, raise and protect their families.
It is a grave mistake to construct and advocate a division between Afghan women and Afghan men.
Afghan women and men belong to the same social fabric and their lives are bound together by common aspirations for escape from poverty, freedom from hunger, freedom from violence and a desire for employment, education, peace, stability, dignity.
Afghan men have suffered and endured, because men were particularly targeted during British colonial campaigns against them. Their fierce resistance defeated every British attempt to colonize them.
Before the Brits, Afghan men were forcibly recruited by every conqueror coming through the mountain passes, on their way to set up empires in New Delhi, or simply to loot and carry away treasure from western and northern India.
Now, after the end of repressive and exploitative colonial occupation by the Brits and after the 9-year Soviet debacle in Afghanistan, Afghan women and men jointly face the daily neo-imperial threat of US and US-led NATO campaigns against them.
Did the US (using Pakistan's ISI) create, train and fund the Mujahadeen who evolved into the Taliban? Was Osama bin Laden the CIA's star pupil?
Into the above toxic mix, throw in Saudi Wahabbism supported by weapons and fueled by Saudi money, a fact conveniently ignored by the US govt as the US shields its longstanding repressive petrodollar ally.
The US and US-led NATO have absolutely no legitimacy in Afghanistan or Pakistan.
They must get out ASAP, so that AFGHAN WOMEN can forge their own destiny together with their male kin, their families and communities and their own political and religious leaders.
The US, US-led NATO presence distorts any possibility of normalcy and creates new problems for the entire South Asia region.
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
— EthicalDemocracy, New York, NY
------------------------
My NYT comment #24 published
April 15, 2009 8:18 am
April 15th, 2009 4:26 am
Women, Religion and Militarism
As the editorial (below) notes, a woman was publicly flogged in Swat in Pakistan and earlier Afghanistan's Karzai signed into law an edit that appears to sanction rape in marriage.
Both these incidents show how religion and patriarchal culture can be deployed as deadly weapons against women.
But ...
I would submit that the US govt. and the US-led NATO forces don't give a hoot for women in either Pakistan or Afghanistan.
It seems hypocritical to argue that the US is concerned about women, when drone strikes kill women and children from the air. This happened (again) last week in a NATO airstrike and the civilian death toll which included women and children, was confirmed by President Karzai, with no denial from the US.
There's more to come, with more women dying when Obama sends more troops.
How would Obama feel if his wife and two daughters were killed in a drone strike?
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
--------------------------------------------------
New York Times copyright
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/15/opinion/15wed1.html
Editorial: Women, Extremism and Two Key States
Published: April 14, 2009
http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/04/15/opinion/15wed1.html
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Culture, Religion, Nation-State & the ETHICAL SELF: Denmark and the Cartoons on the Prophet Muhammad
My Published Comment on The Times of India 9 Apr 2009, 0105 hrs IST:
Denmark is a great country to visit, it has admirable social policies, Denmark has a democratic government and a democratic polity.
However Denmark lacks the basic and necessary understanding that freedom and a free press in democratic pluralist nation-states, does not include license to hurt cultural and religious sentiments.
The case of Denmark illustrates that democratic nation-states are no guarantee for the protection of cultural and religious sentiments of ALL of its citizens, Muslims among them. How are Danish Muslims expected to feel and react?
Ex-premier Anders Fogh Rasmussen lacks an ethical compass, essential for authentic leadership of democratic nation-states. Now, Rasmussen has found the job that fits right into his intolerant worldview -- heading up the US-dominated NATO which has absolutely no business conducting military operations in the South Asia region.
Rasmussen is the right man for that dirty job.
9 Apr 2009, 0105 hrs IST
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Prophet Muhammad cartoon goes on sale in Denmark
8 Apr 2009, 2311 hrs IST, AP
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4376765.cms
Times of India copyright
COPENHAGEN
: A Danish press freedom group said on Wednesday it is selling copies of a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad that caused outrage across
the Muslim World.
Some 1,000 printed reproductions of a drawing depicting Islam's prophet wearing a bomb-shaped turban are being sold for 1,400 kroner ($250) each, said Lars Hedegaard, chairman of the Danish Free Press Society.
"All we are doing is starting a debate," Hedegaard said. "We are using our freedom of speech."
Hedegaard said Danish artist Kurt Westergaard, who drew the cartoon in 2005, had given the society permission to produce the copies and sell them. Each numbered copy has been signed by Westergaard, Hedegaard said.
"We have not, and are not, breaking any laws," Hedegaard said.
Westergaard has been living under police protection since an alleged plot to murder him was discovered last year.
Twelve cartoons depicting the prophet, including the one by Westergaard, were published in the Jyllands-Posten newspaper in 2005.
The following year, they triggered massive protests from Morocco to Indonesia, with rioters torching Danish and other Western diplomatic missions. Some Muslim countries boycotted Danish products.
Islamic law generally opposes any depiction of the prophet for fear it could lead to idolatry.
Throughout the crisis, then Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen distanced himself from the cartoons but resisted calls to apologize for them, citing freedom of speech and saying his government could not be held responsible for the actions of Denmark's press.
On Saturday, Fogh Rasmussen was chosen to become NATO's new secretary-general, despite threats by Turkey, the alliance's only Muslim member, to veto his election.
=====================================================================================
Denmark is a great country to visit, it has admirable social policies, Denmark has a democratic government and a democratic polity.
However Denmark lacks the basic and necessary understanding that freedom and a free press in democratic pluralist nation-states, does not include license to hurt cultural and religious sentiments.
The case of Denmark illustrates that democratic nation-states are no guarantee for the protection of cultural and religious sentiments of ALL of its citizens, Muslims among them. How are Danish Muslims expected to feel and react?
Ex-premier Anders Fogh Rasmussen lacks an ethical compass, essential for authentic leadership of democratic nation-states. Now, Rasmussen has found the job that fits right into his intolerant worldview -- heading up the US-dominated NATO which has absolutely no business conducting military operations in the South Asia region.
Rasmussen is the right man for that dirty job.
9 Apr 2009, 0105 hrs IST
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Prophet Muhammad cartoon goes on sale in Denmark
8 Apr 2009, 2311 hrs IST, AP
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4376765.cms
Times of India copyright
COPENHAGEN
: A Danish press freedom group said on Wednesday it is selling copies of a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad that caused outrage across
the Muslim World.
Some 1,000 printed reproductions of a drawing depicting Islam's prophet wearing a bomb-shaped turban are being sold for 1,400 kroner ($250) each, said Lars Hedegaard, chairman of the Danish Free Press Society.
"All we are doing is starting a debate," Hedegaard said. "We are using our freedom of speech."
Hedegaard said Danish artist Kurt Westergaard, who drew the cartoon in 2005, had given the society permission to produce the copies and sell them. Each numbered copy has been signed by Westergaard, Hedegaard said.
"We have not, and are not, breaking any laws," Hedegaard said.
Westergaard has been living under police protection since an alleged plot to murder him was discovered last year.
Twelve cartoons depicting the prophet, including the one by Westergaard, were published in the Jyllands-Posten newspaper in 2005.
The following year, they triggered massive protests from Morocco to Indonesia, with rioters torching Danish and other Western diplomatic missions. Some Muslim countries boycotted Danish products.
Islamic law generally opposes any depiction of the prophet for fear it could lead to idolatry.
Throughout the crisis, then Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen distanced himself from the cartoons but resisted calls to apologize for them, citing freedom of speech and saying his government could not be held responsible for the actions of Denmark's press.
On Saturday, Fogh Rasmussen was chosen to become NATO's new secretary-general, despite threats by Turkey, the alliance's only Muslim member, to veto his election.
=====================================================================================
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Science, Religion & the Making of the Ethical Self in the Nation
A version of My NYT Comment #32
February 28, 2009 9:24 am Link
The flawed 2008 Pew survey(NYT article link below ) referred to in this article should have collected and presented data on the educational level of the respondents in this survey.
Jews, Hindus and Buddhists in the U.S. almost certainly attain higher levels of education, are well to do, make the connection between education and economic attainment, consequently they are less likely to subscribe to ideas, religious or otherwise, about magical personas, like angels and demons (referred to in the Pew survey questionnaire), operating in the world. Contrast that with the responses of Jehovah’s Witnesses, probably the least educated and not surprisingly poorest among all surveyed.
A piece of essential reading would be the late great Stephen Jay Gould’s article on religion and science as “non-overlapping magisteria.”
As a child I learned an important distinction from my famous geologist father. One can certainly be simultaneously religious and scientific. In fact it is important to combine exploration of the natural and social world, while still retaining a sense of awe about the still unexplained mysteries of our universe. Religion insists on Faith and Belief, in contrast, Science relies on Evidence and Proof. Religion and Science DON’T overlap, therefore don’t confuse the two. They are not equivalent because they cannot be compared. Don’t apply the rules of one to the other. At the same time, Don’t denigrate the one or the other.
Critical thinking, scientific reasoning and logical development of ideas are the core skills taught in colleges. These skills are essential for developing a knowledgeable participatory citizenry and a competent workforce. Both are essential for the working of democracy in the modern pluralist nation-state.
Such skills are essential for growing an ethical democracy, a project tentative at best in the US,India and many other democratic spaces, that was severely impeded by that magical thinking team of Cheney-Bush and their “Axis of Evil ” pseudo-Christian doctrine.
The dynamic construction of the striving-to-be Ethical Self acting with striving-to-be ethical others, in the modern pluralist nation-state, is central to the ongoing necessarily flawed project of Democracy.
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
—-----------------------------
New York Times copyright
February 28, 2009, 12:01 am
Bobby Jindal, the Exorcist
By Charles M. Blow
http://blow.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/28/bobby-jindal-the-exorcist-pro-or-con/
---------------------------------------
WSJ copyright
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203440104574405030643556324.html
Karen Armstrong says we need God to grasp the wonder of our existence
Richard Dawkins has been right all along, of course—at least in one important respect. Evolution has indeed dealt a blow to the idea of a benign creator, literally conceived. It tells us that there is no Intelligence controlling the cosmos, and that life itself is the result of a blind process of natural selection, in which innumerable species failed to survive. The fossil record reveals a natural history of pain, death and racial extinction, so if there was a divine plan, it was cruel, callously prodigal and wasteful. Human beings were not the pinnacle of a purposeful creation; like everything else, they evolved by trial and error and God had no direct hand in their making. No wonder so many fundamentalist Christians find their faith shaken to the core.
[GOD_cov2] Nippon Television Network
Richard Dawkins argues that evolution leaves God with nothing to do
But Darwin may have done religion—and God—a favor by revealing a flaw in modern Western faith. Despite our scientific and technological brilliance, our understanding of God is often remarkably undeveloped—even primitive. In the past, many of the most influential Jewish, Christian and Muslim thinkers understood that what we call "God" is merely a symbol that points beyond itself to an indescribable transcendence, whose existence cannot be proved but is only intuited by means of spiritual exercises and a compassionate lifestyle that enable us to cultivate new capacities of mind and heart.
But by the end of the 17th century, instead of looking through the symbol to "the God beyond God," Christians were transforming it into hard fact. Sir Isaac Newton had claimed that his cosmic system proved beyond doubt the existence of an intelligent, omniscient and omnipotent creator, who was obviously "very well skilled in Mechanicks and Geometry." Enthralled by the prospect of such cast-iron certainty, churchmen started to develop a scientifically-based theology that eventually made Newton's Mechanick and, later, William Paley's Intelligent Designer essential to Western Christianity.
But the Great Mechanick was little more than an idol, the kind of human projection that theology, at its best, was supposed to avoid. God had been essential to Newtonian physics but it was not long before other scientists were able to dispense with the God-hypothesis and, finally, Darwin showed that there could be no proof for God's existence. This would not have been a disaster had not Christians become so dependent upon their scientific religion that they had lost the older habits of thought and were left without other resource.
View Full Image
GOD_jump2
WSJ Illustration
GOD_jump2
GOD_jump2
Symbolism was essential to premodern religion, because it was only possible to speak about the ultimate reality—God, Tao, Brahman or Nirvana—analogically, since it lay beyond the reach of words. Jews and Christians both developed audaciously innovative and figurative methods of reading the Bible, and every statement of the Quran is called an ayah ("parable"). St Augustine (354-430), a major authority for both Catholics and Protestants, insisted that if a biblical text contradicted reputable science, it must be interpreted allegorically. This remained standard practice in the West until the 17th century, when in an effort to emulate the exact scientific method, Christians began to read scripture with a literalness that is without parallel in religious history.
Most cultures believed that there were two recognized ways of arriving at truth. The Greeks called them mythos and logos. Both were essential and neither was superior to the other; they were not in conflict but complementary, each with its own sphere of competence. Logos ("reason") was the pragmatic mode of thought that enabled us to function effectively in the world and had, therefore, to correspond accurately to external reality. But it could not assuage human grief or find ultimate meaning in life's struggle. For that people turned to mythos, stories that made no pretensions to historical accuracy but should rather be seen as an early form of psychology; if translated into ritual or ethical action, a good myth showed you how to cope with mortality, discover an inner source of strength, and endure pain and sorrow with serenity.
In the ancient world, a cosmology was not regarded as factual but was primarily therapeutic; it was recited when people needed an infusion of that mysterious power that had—somehow—brought something out of primal nothingness: at a sickbed, a coronation or during a political crisis. Some cosmologies taught people how to unlock their own creativity, others made them aware of the struggle required to maintain social and political order. The Genesis creation hymn, written during the Israelites' exile in Babylonia in the 6th century BC, was a gentle polemic against Babylonian religion. Its vision of an ordered universe where everything had its place was probably consoling to a displaced people, though—as we can see in the Bible—some of the exiles preferred a more aggressive cosmology.
There can never be a definitive version of a myth, because it refers to the more imponderable aspects of life. To remain effective, it must respond to contemporary circumstance. In the 16th century, when Jews were being expelled from one region of Europe after another, the mystic Isaac Luria constructed an entirely new creation myth that bore no resemblance to the Genesis story. But instead of being reviled for contradicting the Bible, it inspired a mass-movement among Jews, because it was such a telling description of the arbitrary world they now lived in; backed up with special rituals, it also helped them face up to their pain and discover a source of strength.
Religion was not supposed to provide explanations that lay within the competence of reason but to help us live creatively with realities for which there are no easy solutions and find an interior haven of peace; today, however, many have opted for unsustainable certainty instead. But can we respond religiously to evolutionary theory? Can we use it to recover a more authentic notion of God?
Darwin made it clear once again that—as Maimonides, Avicenna, Aquinas and Eckhart had already pointed out—we cannot regard God simply as a divine personality, who single-handedly created the world. This could direct our attention away from the idols of certainty and back to the "God beyond God." The best theology is a spiritual exercise, akin to poetry. Religion is not an exact science but a kind of art form that, like music or painting, introduces us to a mode of knowledge that is different from the purely rational and which cannot easily be put into words. At its best, it holds us in an attitude of wonder, which is, perhaps, not unlike the awe that Mr. Dawkins experiences—and has helped me to appreciate —when he contemplates the marvels of natural selection.
But what of the pain and waste that Darwin unveiled? All the major traditions insist that the faithful meditate on the ubiquitous suffering that is an inescapable part of life; because, if we do not acknowledge this uncomfortable fact, the compassion that lies at the heart of faith is impossible. The almost unbearable spectacle of the myriad species passing painfully into oblivion is not unlike some classic Buddhist meditations on the First Noble Truth ("Existence is suffering"), the indispensable prerequisite for the transcendent enlightenment that some call Nirvana—and others call God.
—Ms. Armstrong is the author of numerous books on theology and religious affairs. The latest, "The Case for God," will be published by Knopf later this month.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Richard Dawkins argues that evolution leaves God with nothing to do
Before 1859 it would have seemed natural to agree with the Reverend William Paley, in "Natural Theology," that the creation of life was God's greatest work. Especially (vanity might add) human life. Today we'd amend the statement: Evolution is the universe's greatest work. Evolution is the creator of life, and life is arguably the most surprising and most beautiful production that the laws of physics have ever generated. Evolution, to quote a T-shirt sent me by an anonymous well-wisher, is the greatest show on earth, the only game in town.
Indeed, evolution is probably the greatest show in the entire universe. Most scientists' hunch is that there are independently evolved life forms dotted around planetary islands throughout the universe—though sadly too thinly scattered to encounter one another. And if there is life elsewhere, it is something stronger than a hunch to say that it will turn out to be Darwinian life. The argument in favor of alien life's existing at all is weaker than the argument that—if it exists at all—it will be Darwinian life. But it is also possible that we really are alone in the universe, in which case Earth, with its greatest show, is the most remarkable planet in the universe.
[GOD_cov1] Bettmann/CORBIS
Charles Darwin
What is so special about life? It never violates the laws of physics. Nothing does (if anything did, physicists would just have to formulate new laws—it's happened often enough in the history of science). But although life never violates the laws of physics, it pushes them into unexpected avenues that stagger the imagination. If we didn't know about life we wouldn't believe it was possible—except, of course, that there'd then be nobody around to do the disbelieving!
The laws of physics, before Darwinian evolution bursts out from their midst, can make rocks and sand, gas clouds and stars, whirlpools and waves, whirlpool-shaped galaxies and light that travels as waves while behaving like particles. It is an interesting, fascinating and, in many ways, deeply mysterious universe. But now, enter life. Look, through the eyes of a physicist, at a bounding kangaroo, a swooping bat, a leaping dolphin, a soaring Coast Redwood. There never was a rock that bounded like a kangaroo, never a pebble that crawled like a beetle seeking a mate, never a sand grain that swam like a water flea. Not once do any of these creatures disobey one jot or tittle of the laws of physics. Far from violating the laws of thermodynamics (as is often ignorantly alleged) they are relentlessly driven by them. Far from violating the laws of motion, animals exploit them to their advantage as they walk, run, dodge and jink, leap and fly, pounce on prey or spring to safety.
Never once are the laws of physics violated, yet life emerges into uncharted territory. And how is the trick done? The answer is a process that, although variable in its wondrous detail, is sufficiently uniform to deserve one single name: Darwinian evolution, the nonrandom survival of randomly varying coded information. We know, as certainly as we know anything in science, that this is the process that has generated life on our own planet. And my bet, as I said, is that the same process is in operation wherever life may be found, anywhere in the universe.
View Full Image
GOD_jump1
WSJ Illustration
GOD_jump1
GOD_jump1
What if the greatest show on earth is not the greatest show in the universe? What if there are life forms on other planets that have evolved so far beyond our level of intelligence and creativity that we should regard them as gods, were we ever so fortunate (or unfortunate?) as to meet them? Would they indeed be gods? Wouldn't we be tempted to fall on our knees and worship them, as a medieval peasant might if suddenly confronted with such miracles as a Boeing 747, a mobile telephone or Google Earth? But, however god-like the aliens might seem, they would not be gods, and for one very important reason. They did not create the universe; it created them, just as it created us. Making the universe is the one thing no intelligence, however superhuman, could do, because an intelligence is complex—statistically improbable —and therefore had to emerge, by gradual degrees, from simpler beginnings: from a lifeless universe—the miracle-free zone that is physics.
To midwife such emergence is the singular achievement of Darwinian evolution. It starts with primeval simplicity and fosters, by slow, explicable degrees, the emergence of complexity: seemingly limitless complexity—certainly up to our human level of complexity and very probably way beyond. There may be worlds on which superhuman life thrives, superhuman to a level that our imaginations cannot grasp. But superhuman does not mean supernatural. Darwinian evolution is the only process we know that is ultimately capable of generating anything as complicated as creative intelligences. Once it has done so, of course, those intelligences can create other complex things: works of art and music, advanced technology, computers, the Internet and who knows what in the future? Darwinian evolution may not be the only such generative process in the universe. There may be other "cranes" (Daniel Dennett's term, which he opposes to "skyhooks") that we have not yet discovered or imagined. But, however wonderful and however different from Darwinian evolution those putative cranes may be, they cannot be magic. They will share with Darwinian evolution the facility to raise up complexity, as an emergent property, out of simplicity, while never violating natural law.
Where does that leave God? The kindest thing to say is that it leaves him with nothing to do, and no achievements that might attract our praise, our worship or our fear. Evolution is God's redundancy notice, his pink slip. But we have to go further. A complex creative intelligence with nothing to do is not just redundant. A divine designer is all but ruled out by the consideration that he must at least as complex as the entities he was wheeled out to explain. God is not dead. He was never alive in the first place.
Now, there is a certain class of sophisticated modern theologian who will say something like this: "Good heavens, of course we are not so naive or simplistic as to care whether God exists. Existence is such a 19th-century preoccupation! It doesn't matter whether God exists in a scientific sense. What matters is whether he exists for you or for me. If God is real for you, who cares whether science has made him redundant? Such arrogance! Such elitism."
Well, if that's what floats your canoe, you'll be paddling it up a very lonely creek. The mainstream belief of the world's peoples is very clear. They believe in God, and that means they believe he exists in objective reality, just as surely as the Rock of Gibraltar exists. If sophisticated theologians or postmodern relativists think they are rescuing God from the redundancy scrap-heap by downplaying the importance of existence, they should think again. Tell the congregation of a church or mosque that existence is too vulgar an attribute to fasten onto their God, and they will brand you an atheist. They'll be right.
—Mr. Dawkins is the author of "The Selfish Gene," "The Ancestor's Tale," "The God Delusion." His latest book, "The Greatest Show on Earth," will be published by Free Press on Sept. 22.
February 28, 2009 9:24 am Link
The flawed 2008 Pew survey(NYT article link below ) referred to in this article should have collected and presented data on the educational level of the respondents in this survey.
Jews, Hindus and Buddhists in the U.S. almost certainly attain higher levels of education, are well to do, make the connection between education and economic attainment, consequently they are less likely to subscribe to ideas, religious or otherwise, about magical personas, like angels and demons (referred to in the Pew survey questionnaire), operating in the world. Contrast that with the responses of Jehovah’s Witnesses, probably the least educated and not surprisingly poorest among all surveyed.
A piece of essential reading would be the late great Stephen Jay Gould’s article on religion and science as “non-overlapping magisteria.”
As a child I learned an important distinction from my famous geologist father. One can certainly be simultaneously religious and scientific. In fact it is important to combine exploration of the natural and social world, while still retaining a sense of awe about the still unexplained mysteries of our universe. Religion insists on Faith and Belief, in contrast, Science relies on Evidence and Proof. Religion and Science DON’T overlap, therefore don’t confuse the two. They are not equivalent because they cannot be compared. Don’t apply the rules of one to the other. At the same time, Don’t denigrate the one or the other.
Critical thinking, scientific reasoning and logical development of ideas are the core skills taught in colleges. These skills are essential for developing a knowledgeable participatory citizenry and a competent workforce. Both are essential for the working of democracy in the modern pluralist nation-state.
Such skills are essential for growing an ethical democracy, a project tentative at best in the US,India and many other democratic spaces, that was severely impeded by that magical thinking team of Cheney-Bush and their “Axis of Evil ” pseudo-Christian doctrine.
The dynamic construction of the striving-to-be Ethical Self acting with striving-to-be ethical others, in the modern pluralist nation-state, is central to the ongoing necessarily flawed project of Democracy.
Chithra KarunaKaran
Ethical Democracy As Lived Practice
http://EthicalDemocracy.blogspot.com
—-----------------------------
New York Times copyright
February 28, 2009, 12:01 am
Bobby Jindal, the Exorcist
By Charles M. Blow
http://blow.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/28/bobby-jindal-the-exorcist-pro-or-con/
---------------------------------------
WSJ copyright
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203440104574405030643556324.html
Karen Armstrong says we need God to grasp the wonder of our existence
Richard Dawkins has been right all along, of course—at least in one important respect. Evolution has indeed dealt a blow to the idea of a benign creator, literally conceived. It tells us that there is no Intelligence controlling the cosmos, and that life itself is the result of a blind process of natural selection, in which innumerable species failed to survive. The fossil record reveals a natural history of pain, death and racial extinction, so if there was a divine plan, it was cruel, callously prodigal and wasteful. Human beings were not the pinnacle of a purposeful creation; like everything else, they evolved by trial and error and God had no direct hand in their making. No wonder so many fundamentalist Christians find their faith shaken to the core.
[GOD_cov2] Nippon Television Network
Richard Dawkins argues that evolution leaves God with nothing to do
But Darwin may have done religion—and God—a favor by revealing a flaw in modern Western faith. Despite our scientific and technological brilliance, our understanding of God is often remarkably undeveloped—even primitive. In the past, many of the most influential Jewish, Christian and Muslim thinkers understood that what we call "God" is merely a symbol that points beyond itself to an indescribable transcendence, whose existence cannot be proved but is only intuited by means of spiritual exercises and a compassionate lifestyle that enable us to cultivate new capacities of mind and heart.
But by the end of the 17th century, instead of looking through the symbol to "the God beyond God," Christians were transforming it into hard fact. Sir Isaac Newton had claimed that his cosmic system proved beyond doubt the existence of an intelligent, omniscient and omnipotent creator, who was obviously "very well skilled in Mechanicks and Geometry." Enthralled by the prospect of such cast-iron certainty, churchmen started to develop a scientifically-based theology that eventually made Newton's Mechanick and, later, William Paley's Intelligent Designer essential to Western Christianity.
But the Great Mechanick was little more than an idol, the kind of human projection that theology, at its best, was supposed to avoid. God had been essential to Newtonian physics but it was not long before other scientists were able to dispense with the God-hypothesis and, finally, Darwin showed that there could be no proof for God's existence. This would not have been a disaster had not Christians become so dependent upon their scientific religion that they had lost the older habits of thought and were left without other resource.
View Full Image
GOD_jump2
WSJ Illustration
GOD_jump2
GOD_jump2
Symbolism was essential to premodern religion, because it was only possible to speak about the ultimate reality—God, Tao, Brahman or Nirvana—analogically, since it lay beyond the reach of words. Jews and Christians both developed audaciously innovative and figurative methods of reading the Bible, and every statement of the Quran is called an ayah ("parable"). St Augustine (354-430), a major authority for both Catholics and Protestants, insisted that if a biblical text contradicted reputable science, it must be interpreted allegorically. This remained standard practice in the West until the 17th century, when in an effort to emulate the exact scientific method, Christians began to read scripture with a literalness that is without parallel in religious history.
Most cultures believed that there were two recognized ways of arriving at truth. The Greeks called them mythos and logos. Both were essential and neither was superior to the other; they were not in conflict but complementary, each with its own sphere of competence. Logos ("reason") was the pragmatic mode of thought that enabled us to function effectively in the world and had, therefore, to correspond accurately to external reality. But it could not assuage human grief or find ultimate meaning in life's struggle. For that people turned to mythos, stories that made no pretensions to historical accuracy but should rather be seen as an early form of psychology; if translated into ritual or ethical action, a good myth showed you how to cope with mortality, discover an inner source of strength, and endure pain and sorrow with serenity.
In the ancient world, a cosmology was not regarded as factual but was primarily therapeutic; it was recited when people needed an infusion of that mysterious power that had—somehow—brought something out of primal nothingness: at a sickbed, a coronation or during a political crisis. Some cosmologies taught people how to unlock their own creativity, others made them aware of the struggle required to maintain social and political order. The Genesis creation hymn, written during the Israelites' exile in Babylonia in the 6th century BC, was a gentle polemic against Babylonian religion. Its vision of an ordered universe where everything had its place was probably consoling to a displaced people, though—as we can see in the Bible—some of the exiles preferred a more aggressive cosmology.
There can never be a definitive version of a myth, because it refers to the more imponderable aspects of life. To remain effective, it must respond to contemporary circumstance. In the 16th century, when Jews were being expelled from one region of Europe after another, the mystic Isaac Luria constructed an entirely new creation myth that bore no resemblance to the Genesis story. But instead of being reviled for contradicting the Bible, it inspired a mass-movement among Jews, because it was such a telling description of the arbitrary world they now lived in; backed up with special rituals, it also helped them face up to their pain and discover a source of strength.
Religion was not supposed to provide explanations that lay within the competence of reason but to help us live creatively with realities for which there are no easy solutions and find an interior haven of peace; today, however, many have opted for unsustainable certainty instead. But can we respond religiously to evolutionary theory? Can we use it to recover a more authentic notion of God?
Darwin made it clear once again that—as Maimonides, Avicenna, Aquinas and Eckhart had already pointed out—we cannot regard God simply as a divine personality, who single-handedly created the world. This could direct our attention away from the idols of certainty and back to the "God beyond God." The best theology is a spiritual exercise, akin to poetry. Religion is not an exact science but a kind of art form that, like music or painting, introduces us to a mode of knowledge that is different from the purely rational and which cannot easily be put into words. At its best, it holds us in an attitude of wonder, which is, perhaps, not unlike the awe that Mr. Dawkins experiences—and has helped me to appreciate —when he contemplates the marvels of natural selection.
But what of the pain and waste that Darwin unveiled? All the major traditions insist that the faithful meditate on the ubiquitous suffering that is an inescapable part of life; because, if we do not acknowledge this uncomfortable fact, the compassion that lies at the heart of faith is impossible. The almost unbearable spectacle of the myriad species passing painfully into oblivion is not unlike some classic Buddhist meditations on the First Noble Truth ("Existence is suffering"), the indispensable prerequisite for the transcendent enlightenment that some call Nirvana—and others call God.
—Ms. Armstrong is the author of numerous books on theology and religious affairs. The latest, "The Case for God," will be published by Knopf later this month.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Richard Dawkins argues that evolution leaves God with nothing to do
Before 1859 it would have seemed natural to agree with the Reverend William Paley, in "Natural Theology," that the creation of life was God's greatest work. Especially (vanity might add) human life. Today we'd amend the statement: Evolution is the universe's greatest work. Evolution is the creator of life, and life is arguably the most surprising and most beautiful production that the laws of physics have ever generated. Evolution, to quote a T-shirt sent me by an anonymous well-wisher, is the greatest show on earth, the only game in town.
Indeed, evolution is probably the greatest show in the entire universe. Most scientists' hunch is that there are independently evolved life forms dotted around planetary islands throughout the universe—though sadly too thinly scattered to encounter one another. And if there is life elsewhere, it is something stronger than a hunch to say that it will turn out to be Darwinian life. The argument in favor of alien life's existing at all is weaker than the argument that—if it exists at all—it will be Darwinian life. But it is also possible that we really are alone in the universe, in which case Earth, with its greatest show, is the most remarkable planet in the universe.
[GOD_cov1] Bettmann/CORBIS
Charles Darwin
What is so special about life? It never violates the laws of physics. Nothing does (if anything did, physicists would just have to formulate new laws—it's happened often enough in the history of science). But although life never violates the laws of physics, it pushes them into unexpected avenues that stagger the imagination. If we didn't know about life we wouldn't believe it was possible—except, of course, that there'd then be nobody around to do the disbelieving!
The laws of physics, before Darwinian evolution bursts out from their midst, can make rocks and sand, gas clouds and stars, whirlpools and waves, whirlpool-shaped galaxies and light that travels as waves while behaving like particles. It is an interesting, fascinating and, in many ways, deeply mysterious universe. But now, enter life. Look, through the eyes of a physicist, at a bounding kangaroo, a swooping bat, a leaping dolphin, a soaring Coast Redwood. There never was a rock that bounded like a kangaroo, never a pebble that crawled like a beetle seeking a mate, never a sand grain that swam like a water flea. Not once do any of these creatures disobey one jot or tittle of the laws of physics. Far from violating the laws of thermodynamics (as is often ignorantly alleged) they are relentlessly driven by them. Far from violating the laws of motion, animals exploit them to their advantage as they walk, run, dodge and jink, leap and fly, pounce on prey or spring to safety.
Never once are the laws of physics violated, yet life emerges into uncharted territory. And how is the trick done? The answer is a process that, although variable in its wondrous detail, is sufficiently uniform to deserve one single name: Darwinian evolution, the nonrandom survival of randomly varying coded information. We know, as certainly as we know anything in science, that this is the process that has generated life on our own planet. And my bet, as I said, is that the same process is in operation wherever life may be found, anywhere in the universe.
View Full Image
GOD_jump1
WSJ Illustration
GOD_jump1
GOD_jump1
What if the greatest show on earth is not the greatest show in the universe? What if there are life forms on other planets that have evolved so far beyond our level of intelligence and creativity that we should regard them as gods, were we ever so fortunate (or unfortunate?) as to meet them? Would they indeed be gods? Wouldn't we be tempted to fall on our knees and worship them, as a medieval peasant might if suddenly confronted with such miracles as a Boeing 747, a mobile telephone or Google Earth? But, however god-like the aliens might seem, they would not be gods, and for one very important reason. They did not create the universe; it created them, just as it created us. Making the universe is the one thing no intelligence, however superhuman, could do, because an intelligence is complex—statistically improbable —and therefore had to emerge, by gradual degrees, from simpler beginnings: from a lifeless universe—the miracle-free zone that is physics.
To midwife such emergence is the singular achievement of Darwinian evolution. It starts with primeval simplicity and fosters, by slow, explicable degrees, the emergence of complexity: seemingly limitless complexity—certainly up to our human level of complexity and very probably way beyond. There may be worlds on which superhuman life thrives, superhuman to a level that our imaginations cannot grasp. But superhuman does not mean supernatural. Darwinian evolution is the only process we know that is ultimately capable of generating anything as complicated as creative intelligences. Once it has done so, of course, those intelligences can create other complex things: works of art and music, advanced technology, computers, the Internet and who knows what in the future? Darwinian evolution may not be the only such generative process in the universe. There may be other "cranes" (Daniel Dennett's term, which he opposes to "skyhooks") that we have not yet discovered or imagined. But, however wonderful and however different from Darwinian evolution those putative cranes may be, they cannot be magic. They will share with Darwinian evolution the facility to raise up complexity, as an emergent property, out of simplicity, while never violating natural law.
Where does that leave God? The kindest thing to say is that it leaves him with nothing to do, and no achievements that might attract our praise, our worship or our fear. Evolution is God's redundancy notice, his pink slip. But we have to go further. A complex creative intelligence with nothing to do is not just redundant. A divine designer is all but ruled out by the consideration that he must at least as complex as the entities he was wheeled out to explain. God is not dead. He was never alive in the first place.
Now, there is a certain class of sophisticated modern theologian who will say something like this: "Good heavens, of course we are not so naive or simplistic as to care whether God exists. Existence is such a 19th-century preoccupation! It doesn't matter whether God exists in a scientific sense. What matters is whether he exists for you or for me. If God is real for you, who cares whether science has made him redundant? Such arrogance! Such elitism."
Well, if that's what floats your canoe, you'll be paddling it up a very lonely creek. The mainstream belief of the world's peoples is very clear. They believe in God, and that means they believe he exists in objective reality, just as surely as the Rock of Gibraltar exists. If sophisticated theologians or postmodern relativists think they are rescuing God from the redundancy scrap-heap by downplaying the importance of existence, they should think again. Tell the congregation of a church or mosque that existence is too vulgar an attribute to fasten onto their God, and they will brand you an atheist. They'll be right.
—Mr. Dawkins is the author of "The Selfish Gene," "The Ancestor's Tale," "The God Delusion." His latest book, "The Greatest Show on Earth," will be published by Free Press on Sept. 22.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)