Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

On Politics (Part 3)

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This follows my earlier two postings ‘on politics’ including the proposition that the left think the right are evil:

“The truth is not as simple as the question are people good or bad, as we so often put it. It is not as easy as Hobbes or Rousseau, because Hobbes and Rousseau are both wrong about the essential, inescapable fact of human nature.

Namely, that humans are animals, pure and simple. We are not good. We are not evil. We are not angels or demons. As much as we may try to deny it, we are very much a part of this world.

We are the product of evolution, and evolution bequeathed to us a system that is damnably hard to improve upon. If we find the world today is not to our liking, perhaps it would do us well to examine those cultural systems that evolution gave us, that worked for us so well for millions of years.

I refuse to believe that striking bit of irrationality that of all the animals in the world, humans are unique twice–the only fallen animal, and the most exalted one. Our mythology talks of “the fall,” and makes us the worst of all animals. Or we can focus on our superior soul or intellect, and laud ourselves as the best. Neither is true, but those myths serve a purpose.”

… from a blog here http://anthropik.com/2005/04/the-state-of-nature/
by Jason Godesky and titled ‘The State of Nature”.

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  1. Neil Hewett says

    Humankind, like all complex organisms, is equipped with the most fundamental instinct for survival, but is also uniquely burdened with the irrefutable knowledge that death is inevitable.

    Reconciliation of these two conflicting realities is largely met through intellectual constructions of philosophical ‘afterlives’ that reassure devotees, that (actually) you do not have to suffer the fearful conflict that death is at the end of it all. You may rather choose immortality, but even more, an everlasting bliss basking in the infinite glory of god, if only you allow yourself to believe.

    According to Christianity, God is truth and Satan is the father of all lies. Such values clarification is necessary, otherwise who could be expected to believe that death may be side-stepped?