CopyRight @ 1996
11/21/94 good speculative consideration of morality and beliefs
moralities
priest
3333three changes
PRIMARILY ABOUT INDIVIDUAL INDIVIDUAL
a b c
morality
new lessons
self awareness
SOCIETY
religion - priest
Conclusions ??
The conclusions drawn from this book have to be extensions
of what has come from the past. It must discuss the future in the
same form as the previous discussion of the past. It must discuss
the individual, the family, the society, our technology, our
beliefs, our dangers and our potentials.
A description could be of a warrior practicing the arts of
peace, but not of a peasent practicing the arts of war. There are
few peasants that survive. The wars killed them. The descendents
of the warriors must now find ways to live as the other castes
do. Still, they must remember how to be warriors or else other
warriors will come and replace them by war. This is one of the
reasons for the hybrid. Perhaps it suggests all the seperate
occupational castes individually hybridized with warriors.
This could describe a stratified society based on occupation
but all castes are hybridized with warriors. This would make the
social order such that those with power would have to consider
themselves leaders as opposed to owners.
Still, it seems that the most potential comes from the
full multi-caste, multi-tribal hybrid. It also seems to be the
situation that is most likely to occur as a result of natural
breeding patterns. Caste will be replaced by class. The talents
of children will be different from the talents of their parents.
Which one of these models might become reality? This is
probably up to human choice and action.
INTRO TO 9
A way to live
This is to consider all the different ways that humans have
found to live and grow. It is meant to show what is common and
what is rare, different methods and stratigies, all based on
widely varying situations, beliefs and potentials. The book is to
look at consequences. It is a description of many different ways
that people live and have lived. It is meant to show a way for
other people to live.
Conclusions
Conclusions.? Have you got any?
The conclusions drawn by this book are inherently limited.
The intention was primarily to illustrate a method of analysis
that could be applied to the human condition. That was done by
making an ecological study to find the importance and meanings of
each element of human existence. Obviously, this is not complete.
That is why it was written as an analysis technique of a complex
changing system. It can provide an understanding of a complex
situation much more than it can produce hard facts or
conclusions. This idea is fairly new and is written in a form
that is meant to grow and develop. Still, the book was written
from a starting point and it does show the development of many
factors. So this section will try to synopsize some points that
the book shows as trends and critical problems.
##########
INDIVIDUAL -- WEALTH
This book is especially pertinent right now because we must
find new ways to live. The world is changing quickly and the
guide posts are few. In a lot of ways, life is getting harder. In
other ways it gets seductively easier.
From weakness comes strength and from strength comes
weakness. Knowledge, is the only way to effect this. It is a
concept true enough to be well worth much consideration and it is
usually pertinant to examination of human conditions. It is not
to be neglected in any consideration of human nature or future.
Humanity has the potential to develop unbeliavable ability,
strength,.. and wealth. One of the most pertinant hazards of this, is the
potential dangers of the weaknesses that may be fostered,
including arrogance, sloth, complacency and other sillinous.
There is another factor that will also require education
tailored to promote family form. It is assumed that we can
develop a world where all members of the society can enjoy a
state of relative affluence. Wealth can become of such importance
to a person as to displace the family in importance. Wealth can
cause a disruption of the family and lapse of family values. It
takes careful education of children about the importance of the
family, social support and a loving home to prevent that from
happening. Some cultures, better than others, have developed the
techniques to use wealth as a tool rather than have it end up as
a threat to their family. There is great potential for danger due
to laziness generated by wealth.
Three Changes
Back to the more prosaic. Morality is the first topic
mentioned to emphasize that the basis of this study must be the
family and its survival strategy, morality. Still, that is only
part of human ecology. The next topic to extract conclusions from
is what are considered the three basic changes; beliefs, genetics
and technology.
The changes in technology suggest that we can provide
relative affluence for everyone. Adjusting to that situation is a
whole different problem of learning.
The changes relating to genetics suggest that everyone can
have health, beauty and brains as well as breadth and even depth.
And that is only considering rather simple technology utilizing
what genes are already present in the human gene pool. It seems
that we have little practical choice about the use of artificial
selection.
The changes relating to recent belief systems... will show a
broad change that could loosely be described as transition from
the world of the warrior to the world of the creative. There will
be massive changes in value, beliefs and mindsets. There will be
a greatly increased involvement of individuals in local, regional
and global issues.
Selfishness is a behavior most appropriate to a non-social
specie such as remote human ancestors. Complex social species
like humans, depend on cooperation and communication for success.
Humans must learn a greater awareness of manipulation. that
includes social, political, personal and commercial manipulation.
The only defense against manipulation is awareness and education.
More Mores
A moral system is a group of techniques that can aid a
person in the survival game that is life. A moral system is a set
of learned behaviors. They provide the survival information that
does not come from our genes. New moral lessons are developed as
new events and factors appear in the world. The earliest moral
systems were mostly about the family and the tribe. When cities
developed, new morals had to be developed, mostly relating to
interacting with other tribes that were in close proximity. This
is what much of occidental religion is about. With the rise of
the cities, came warfare. This produced great stresses that
resulted in the development of moral beliefs qualitatively more
advanced and introspective than anything before. It was the
horrors of iron age warfare that led to the ideas of the equality
of men in the eyes of god, the value of mercy and the brotherhood
of man. ( Zoroastans ). So what present elements of existence
present new moral challenges?
In the early 1960's, in the late spring of the hippie
movement, recreational drug experimentation had become common.
Two common drugs were LSD and amphetamines, both stimulants.
There was typical social propaganda against both. ( It is
interesting to note that since the discovery of DNA,
propagandists have often chosen to make an issue upon the claim
that various drugs cause chromosomal damage. What values were
they trying to plug into? ) Propaganda had little effect against
drug use. On the street though, word went out that "speed
kills". Injected amphetamines produced a strong euphoric high
that could kill by heart damage and other physiological effects.
It caused rapid physical deterioration. Also, the withdrawal from
the drug caused intense depression and suicidal tendencies.
Partly because there were other less stressful, damaging drugs,
like LSD, but mostly because the wide spread knowledge of
consequence, use of injected amphetamines ceased. The danger had
become common or social knowledge. Often it does not go that way,
but society adapted and learned the moral lesson quickly, because
the drug was so well known as extremely dangerous.
There have been drug problems in history, especially
recently, as new drugs have been discovered and purified.
Unfortunately, circumstances then, were so different that few
useful parallels can be drawn. Usually a social or political
upheaval, war, removed the problem, rather than solving it.
It appears that in the future, very powerful, addictive,
damaging synthetic drugs will be common. Already, a
representative of these type drugs is appearing. The powerful
crystal amphetamine "ice" is expected to soon become a more
common problem than cocaine. It is cheaper, easier to produce,
stronger, lasts longer, is more damaging and extremely addictive.
Like other stimulants, its use causes severe depression. This is
what humans must learn to deal with, both genetically and more
immediatly, by education. Normally, that education works best at
childhood. We are designed to learn and absorb these kind of
lessons when young. When we are older, we do not learn lessons
the same way. We are designed to learn from our parents, but
parents must know that it has to be carefully taught. It is a new
lesson to be learned and it is going to be a lesson more general
than the dangers of drugs. A similar danger can come from money.
Presently, conditions being what they are, the only thing
that could possibly slow drug use, would be early education. The
social and economic situation will have to change before that
happens. At the same time that the society is learning the
lessons of drugs, we are genetically adapting. Drugs act as a
selective effect. It is hard to say what they select against,
but consider the long history of alcohol in occidental culture.
Compare the effect of alcohol on individuals from cultures that
did not have alcohol. The response is different. It is hard to
visualize the effect of a long term drug prohibition. Few
successes or positive outcomes can be visualized. If they were
legalized, most of the people that take a warning are warned. If
for some reason, a person cannot resist drugs, they become a fly
and are selected against. Drugs are going to be a significant
selective effect for the near future, whether they are legal or
not and they will select against physical or mental weakness,
addictive tendencies and weak morality of the family and society.
It is obvious that different individuals and groups have
different responses to drugs. Alcohol is relatively innocuous to
some groups and individuals. Some go berserk.
It is notable that humans have always liked "drugs". Usually
they are part of tribal celebrations or rituals. The change in
conciousness may be an inspirational stimulant or it may be so
disorienting as to cause the user to think they are seeing a
whole different universe. Drugs generally do not cause serious
problems in a tribal situation because of controls, moral
lessons, that the tribe has learned. When drugs are purified,
sugar included, the action of and result of use is different.
Use of a natural drug often leads to few problems. Purification
of the same drug can cause addiction. South American Indians
chew coca leaves. They do not show addiction and the positive
effect of the drug as a stimulant at high altitude is very
important to the culture. The local Indians do show addiction
when the drug is purified.
Wealth can present dangers that require warnings and
actions. Wealth can cause blindness to lessons that a person
would otherwise learn. Wealth, like drugs, is something that we
will have to learn with. Some cultures already have these lessons
already developed some. It is a natural biological drive for
status that presents the problem. Status is desirable to an
individual, because it gives access to desirable reproductive
resources. Unfortunately, the wealth confuses the situation so
that the drive for social status can become for the sake of
status rather than any moral or survival success. It is like
stimulant drugs. Our natural drives get such a powerful stimulus,
that we almost cannot help responding to that desire, even though
we know its danger. It is harder to sense the dangers of wealth,
than the dangers of drugs. Mostly the hazard is when the desire
for personal wealth or status competes with the basic morals and
values of society and family. It is not the one with the most
toys that wins, it is the one who teaches their family how to
survive. Happiness is wonderful, but it must last more than one
generation.
Our society is built upon cooperation and mutual dependency.
Too often a person with much material wealth uses it to make
themselves separate from the society by rejecting the social
forms of cooperation, courtesy and organization. It is a nuisance
for the people that must deal with them, but it is actually more
likely to hurt the person that is acting anti-social. What looks
like status is a self isolation from the society. It is a
dangerous game to play. The individual has almost no chance of
successfully dealing with the world and society, except from the
level of money.
In terms of behavior, one of the most notable changes
relates to aggression. We, occidentals, started as very timid
agriculturists. Perhaps the most significant recent change in
human genetics and behavior relates to the advent of war and the
subsequent hybridization of civil populations with warrior
tribes. We had to learn moral lessons, how to survive warriors.
The solution included intermarriage. In the past 7000 years, when
this has primarily occurred, we have been forced to use and partly
to accept, the values and moral systems of the warriors. It has
been the only way to survive. It gave the warriors a great
reproductive advantage during that time and anyone that survived
has some warriors for ancestors. This aggressive nature and its
corresponding behavior systems has done much to create
civilization, but its very success causes it to be a strategy
with a rapidly shrinking niche. That is because warfare works
best against people that cannot fight back. Well, warriors have
done so well, that everyone is descended from one and so can
fight back. War fails as a strategy, especially as technology
develops since physical and mental ability to wage war does not
necessarily give any advantage at using the technological tools
of war.
This is all wonderful as a theory, but how does it translate
into current morality? Aggressiveness must be taught as an object.
It is simple, visible and widely effective strategy. It relates
to reproductive behaviors. Aggression can be very satisfying, but
more than most behaviors, it requires a controlling balance. Too
much or too little and the individual is out of the survival
zone. This is especially important with the present changes that
are occurring. Creativity and aggression (violence or
exploitation) are almost incompatible. If we lose the potential
for aggressiveness, we open the niche for warfare by losing
deterrence.
Children must be taught to avoid aggression, but that it
must be responded to by deterrence, not by submission.
Submission, as a strategy, is a holding action that ultimately
fails. The only solution for aggression is knowledge, not
ignorance. Assimilation does not always work.
Consider television. It is an excellent model of what
happens when aggressive principles are used to regulate a
creative endeavor. The creativity suffers.
#################################################################
The essence of the change in human ecology is going to
relate to beliefs. It has been called a change in conciousness.
Here it is called a mindset, largely to point out that each
person believes more than one thing. Each mindset is a collection
of beliefs about a topic. Much of human growth will be the
development of new mindsets.
Consider mindsets about war. The first set of beliefs would
have been developed by the war like tribes that first raided the
farmers of Anatolia. They would think of it like a hunt. "Look at
the prizes we have found". "I was brave and they scattered before
me". "It was rich beyond belief". Eventually a whole belief and
legend system about the value of fighting and war would develop.
The second set of beliefs would be created by the farmers who
were attacked. That would have been along the lines of the evil,
terror, starvation and death that was left behind. Both mindsets
were developed. On the side of war was the codes of warriors
based on loyalty to leaders who believed in their right to rule
lesser humans. On the side of peace, philosophies and methods
were developed to contend with the militarists. The Zorostans
developed ideas of the brotherhood of humans and the equality of
individuals in the eyes of god.
At present, the methods and beliefs of war and aggression are
well developed and culminate in the military dominated stratified
society. War is a highly developed technical science. The belief
system includes self aggrandizement and contempt for all other
human life.
The philosophies of peace are not well developed. Presently
they are mostly just responses to war. There has not been much
peace in the last 7000 years. Non-aggressive beliefs do not,
presently, promote as much creativity as does war. Much of the
belief in peace just had to do with enduring through the wars.
Yet through it all, there has been a desire for peace and freedom
from the rule of war. This is because most people were not
warriors and wanted the simpler existence of the community of the
tribe. The set of beliefs grew and spread. As they developed and
became common a strategy, techniques were developed for
contending with warriors. The strategies were based on widespread
cooperation of non-combatants to leash the power of the warrior
castes. The success of these strategies was based on the
widespread knowledge and development of the techniques and
beliefs of a mindset opposed to warfare, used by individuals that
are capable (because of hybridization) of war.
Our world is evolving beyond imperial wars, largely because
of the popularity and mindset of peace. Just as the development
of that mindset can be chronicled, from the time of the start of
warfare, the development of other mindsets can be traced. What
mindsets or changes in conciousness, are developing and how can
they help take us to a livable future?
Due to genetic hybridization and developments in military
technology, warfare if becoming a less effective strategy.
Consider the beliefs that make up the mindsets related to
status. Status relates to desirability as a mate, so the nature
of what comprises status is usually different for the two sexes.
Before the big game hunters, status would have related
primarily to fertility of the female and the reputation of the
parents (as much as parentage was understood). Status would have
related to food gathering ability, especially for a tribe that
did a lot of hunting. Different tribes would have different
concepts of status related to food gathering, especially if the
different foods were gathered primarily by the different sexes.
Ownership would have significance at times, but it was as limited
in importance as were the things that could be owned. During the
time of the big game hunters, status of the hunter increased
greatly for the men, but fertility was still the basic measure of
status for women. As various techniques for creating and using
tools were developed or learned, they became elements of status.
Leaders always had higher status.
For agricultural tribes their would be different aspects of
status just as there were different types of farming such as
slash and burn, terrace and river valley cultivation. Terrace
farming would have led to river valley farming and our modern
culture. It is hard to say what the forms of status would have
been in a terrace farming community, but it would still have
included fertility for the women. For men, status might have
included organizational/leadership/engineering ability as well as
physical size useful to building the terraces. It seems that in
the tribes that farmed the river valleys, size and strength to
use farm tools became important. The agricultural tribes of the
river valleys were the groups that created the first cities.
Along with all the other changes initiated with the creation of
the cities, were corresponding changes in concepts of status.
Ownership became a greater element of status. Then the niche for
the militarist opened and another concept of status grew.
Presently.. concepts of status are somewhat different.
Fertility was always an extremely important aspect of status. Now
that is not often part of the beliefs or needs of technical
peoples. Hunting ability is mostly a thing of the past. Material
ownership, once of limited existence, is now a paramount aspect
of status. Beliefs about beauty and its importance have changed
dramatically. The mindsets that are an individuals beliefs about
status have changed and developed.
P98AWAR
SURVIVAL
This is a discussion of an intelligent specie surviving into
the future. Our survival will be based on the use of tools, both
technical and philosophical.
This is written about the development of a "stable ecology".
That can end up being a contradiction. We will develop a
resource base with a potential for very long term use and
consistent characteristics, but humans are going continue
to change rapidly for a long time.
Intelligence is the ability to learn and adapt. Events in a
persons life are what develop the potentials of intelligence. A
person that uses their potential develops a self awareness that
replaces instinctive responses with conciously learned behaviors.
It is the highest development of intelligence and the only way
for humans to adapt to the new ecology.
It is common to meet an intelligent individual who is quite
stupid. Intelligence must be developed. It takes special demands
to bring it out. At the same time there are many people who have
less potential, but use it and have developed a complex
awareness of themselves and the world around them.
How can one form an educational event that will demand the
release of the potentials of intelligence? It is a vital
question. Part of the answer is for the society to start to value
intelligence instead of viewing it with suspicion.
How could a person adapt too and promote the post militarist
society that must be developed? One way is to develop the
potentials of intelligence and self awareness. Another way is to
learn and promote the beliefs and values appropriate to the next
ecology, including limiting and directing competition. Another
way, is to believe in the value of happiness.
************************************ ******************
The beliefs and philosophies of the old ecology are well known and
developed. They brought us this far. The beliefs and philosophies of the
technologies
new ecology, including tool uses as well as social institutions, must be
created and understood for how far we have to go. They
will have to be developed from careful thought and awareness of natural
bias. Luckily, many of the behaviors evolved and developed for previous
ecologies will serve very well in making the next ecology workable,
seemingly natural and comfortable. To a large extent we will make our next
society look like the ones we are most adapted to, what we were before the
niche for cities and warfare opened. That will probably include the reflection of
extended family and tribe as represented by community. Maximal
utilization of the forms that we are most adapted to, adjusted to present
circumstance, will offer the best social form. Simultaneously, our social
form and institution must respond to the social consequence of physical and
electronic communication. The importance and limitations of conservatism
must be understood and not forgotten.
#################################################################
P94PST
The Priest
Discussion of religion is to talk about institutions.
This is about individuals and about mindsets that they can use.
It is hard to guess about their future in the face of the great
changes occurring, but it is sure that for a long time, that
humans will continue to need the advice, hope, wisdom and
sanction of their community. A priest is one who helps their
people, whoever that might be. They are part of the moral basis
of any society. It may well be that the importance of the priest
will increase with the increase in human knowledge and ability.
Institutional religions may become something of the past, but
priests will be necessary in the future as they were necessary
before religion.
A priest is one who cares for their people. It is someone
involved in the problems of their people, whoever those people
may be. Usually a priest is also a teacher that instructs people
in the lessons that they must know to survive. Priests function
at many levels of the society. Some serve different communities
and some serve larger social groups. Presently, we think of
priests as representatives of larger, organized institutional
religions. Really though, we must understand priests to be
anyone who functions to preserve and promote the society. Very
often the role of a priest includes the functions of a
communication source. They create and communicate knowledge.
Very often the role of a priest is to listen. Their stock of
trade are lessons of morality. They protect their people,
preferably by education, especially from themselves. Since we
are new to this way of living, it does not come so naturally. It
takes careful teaching and lifelong thought for a person to
function as they should in the social environment of the cities.
Priests teach these lessons. Presently, some of these lessons
are perpetuated and taught by other institutions such as science
or education. Their main function will become more focused on
what it was originally, perpetuation of the family and community
or more generally, regulation of human reproductive behavior by
definition of community. It could be argued that church lessons
are for children and families, the rest is not their domain. It
seems odd that religions may find one of their future functions,
as in the past, is to keep track of and promote genetic knowledge
and technology. The Mormons already do and ancestry is a basic
concept to all humans that keep records.
Morality is many things. It is family, community, society,
beauty, health, creativity, technique, etc. By all standards, to
aid another individual of the society is to commit a moral act.
Creation is moral, as is truth and happiness. A priest is one who
promotes or teaches this in anyway. It might be said that to be a
concentious parent is to function as a priest to the community
of the family. The definition is not as important as the meaning.
All through society are redundant systems to compensate if
another vital aspect of the society fails. It reflects the
degree of complexity and problems of the society. It is easy for
some function of the society to fail and require adjustment.
Society or religion can replace what the family failed to teach
about the moral lessons that perpetuate the community and
society. If the political leadership fails in some point of
organization or creditability, religious organizations can
provide a focal point.
When considering the concept of a priest in relation to
society or religion, consider religion and its power structure as
separate. Priests existed before religion, to fulfill a
function. God did not make the world for his benefit, it only
serves people. The same statement can be made for religion.
So why consider religion and priests separately when trying
to discuss the future of the institution of religion? Religions
vary greatly, but the functions that they fulfill for society are
much more common. Organized religion could disappear, but
priests will not. The functions religion serves must continue
and some can only be accomplished by dedicated individuals.
The priest must protect the society. In history, many
priests were actually warriors. It was an environment of war that
promoted the growth of the great institutionalized religions.
Now, most hazards to society are much more subtle than war, but
require no less dedication to combat. Very often our moral
leaders will not be called priests, but that is how they
function and our survival will be dependent on that function.
In the final analysis, priest is a description of a mindset
based upon the knowledge of the needs of survival, including and
beyond the individual or family.
Video and mass media will offer incredible potential for
teaching moral lessons, but since morality is a community
function, it seems likely that community churches are a natural
structure and size for the basis of moral education.
9## Humans are very responsive to ceremony. Our development is long
and complex. Rites of passage, ceremonies of development and
maturity, are important to the organization of the society and to the
way the individual matures. We are developing a promiscuous ecology.
Humans widely consider "easy living" to be a desirable goal. We are
also stimulus and responce systems. Humans respond to their
enviornment. For a human to fully develop, it takes a lot of stimulus
or education, as we call it. Humans rose to challenge. What
challenges will humans find to raise themselves? What stimulus,
education or challenge will develop and release individual human
potential and maturity? One possibility is concious internal
reconciliation of the conflicts of a hybrid psychology.
For the earliest tribal humans, the tribal and family form
were primarily a response to the demands and dangers of the
environment, rather than the extended development period of the
children. As humans became better adapted to the hunter and
gatherer ecology and as human intelligence evolved and the
development period of children correspondingly lengthened,
monogamy was more important for the extended developmental
period.
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