Evolution, Science & Religion (Evolution)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Friday, June 22, 2012, 21:15 (4323 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

Tony,-> 
> > I don't believe at all that science is destroying us. In the worst case--global warming. But both yourself and David don't agree that it is occurring. What else does that leave?
> 
> Then you should study medicine. Or the 70% energy waste of automobiles. Or the waste produced by our power consumption. Etc etc etc. The reason ecological preservation groups have become so prevalent today is not because more or less people care about the environment, it is because it has become impossible not to see what we are doing to our home. 
> -Medicine? 200m lives were saved by penicillin alone. 2.3x the number of people killed in WWI and WWII combined. -Ball's in your court. -
> 
> LOL We are only a decade in. Give it time. -We're in the 21st now, Tony. When you look at those statistics, we're in a period of peace never seen in all of recorded history. There are two trends in war discussed in the book: -1. Violent conflict is on a downward trend. -2. Wars are more damaging. -It is largely because of #2, that conflict has been decreasing overall. Pinker (nor myself) is making an argument that this will persist forever, but he does make serious claims about what it is that has created this long trend of a low death-rate. -> 
> > We're not about to come unglued from the hinges and destroy each other. The crime rate in the US over the least 20 years demonstrates that we're on a massive "pacification" of our violent tendencies. 
> > 
> 
> Massive pacification of our violent tendencies? Where are you getting that from?
> -It's the numbers. I'll amend that our tendencies aren't any different, but it is definite that our strategies to manage our tendencies have been improving. -> > So what then, is it... that you seem to be fighting against, Tony?
> 
> People thinking that they are above the natural order. People thinking that because "this is all there is", that they must get absolutely everything out of this life and damn the consequences of their actions. I will admit that my experiences have given me a very negative view of humanity as a whole. I have been around the world and I have seen nothing to make me as optimistic as you are. In nearly every country I have been too I have witnessed violence, starvation, deprivation, poverty, and death first hand. With the exception of Iraq, I didn't even stay that long in most of them. A 'feel-good' book about how great we are is not reflected in reality. Take a trip to Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, Africa, China, North Korea, or even just down to Mexico and tell me how great humanity is.-This statement needs to be evaluated:-It isn't materialism to blame for this. Fact of the matter, is that this kind of view is equally present in spiritual thinking. The difference is that the claim is that the afterlife is all that matters. -The problem you state here has absolutely nothing to do with materialism OR spiritualism. It has everything to do training in empathy, which I will argue, is easier and more straightforward in a materialist framework because you can repeatedly demonstrate what is harmful, why it is harmful, and why you shouldn't do (it) to another being. -Belief in an afterlife has every much a chance at producing a nasty, virulent, evil kind of person as a belief where "this is all there is." -I'll take my own views:
1. This is the only life I'll ever have. Therefore I should live my life making the most humane and gentle choices for myself, my family, and the world around me. -2. The foundation for this morality is the irrefutable fact that humans are interdependent. We rely on everyone else, and in turn, we rely on our world and our environment. -So far, everything that I'm saying is 100% what you're saying. -So what the hell difference does it make if we invoke the supernatural in defending any of this, when especially--it has no better chance of producing a better human being? -As for the rest of your post, Pinker's book, and my point do not exclude the rest of the world. Pinker is very careful in arguing that the direct result of this "long peace" as he calls it, is due to the proliferation of democratic republics over the last 150 years. As republics have increased, violence has decreased. This is because we've been finding out that trade is more profitable than war, and trade is more likely when we allow the middle class of different countries to trade with each other, and less likely with dictatorships. -The most important technology in decreasing violence in the world has been government, specifically the government based upon a system of checks and balances... (though in our system, those checks are essentially gone.) -David's response to you here nails it home however: You can't just "hand" people a democracy. The culture needs to support the idea to begin with.

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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"