"Not wise to publicize the expedition at once. Too many unknowns, rivalries, tensions.
"Why couldn't humans, and other mortals, simply get on with the business of understanding the miraculous universe that was theirs and becoming one with it?" (p. 250)
Good question. What answer is suggested?
"Maybe because they were mortals?" (ibid.)
No way. Nothing in mortality implies rivalry. Human beings are plastic. They can both build and be shaped by either very aggressive or very pacific cultures.
Years ago, a guy "commenting" on the news on British TV quoted a book describing human beings as "naked apes" before referring to the (then) Troubles in Northern Ireland, neatly bypassing the explanatory power of centuries of British divide-and-rule in Ireland. If street violence is explained either by animal ancestry or by mere mortality, then governments have no responsibility to examine their own social policies.
14 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I'm sorry, but I disagree with you. To me, that phrase "Maybe because they were mortals?" indicates not only being unable to take the long view but also how IMPERFECT and fallen human beings are. And probably many other intelligent races, if they exist. And I am sure that was Poul Anderson's own view as well, as I could prove from quoting many very similar statements from his works.
Nor do I believe a "pacifistic" to be either very likely or even particularly desirable. What I meant by the last part about "desirability" is that I think it's precisely human aggressiveness which any society will need to be vigorous, forward thinking, even "progressive" in ways I would approve of. I would prefer that aggressiveness to be used in non bellicose ways, such as eagerness to achieve further advances in the sciences/technology or in commerce, trade, manufacturing, exploration, settling of other worlds, etc.
Sean
Sean,
Please don't apologize for disagreeing.
You do believe that some rational species might not have Fallen?
But do you believe, with CS Lewis, that such unFallen beings would be physically immortal? (I think that this belief goes right against everything that we know about physics and biology.)
Peaceful cultures are possible whether or not desirable.
Non-bellicose aggressiveness? Playing with words. Of course I agree with "aggressiveness" that is "non-bellicose"!
Paul.
There can be action without aggression and peace without passivity.
That "aggression" gets a good press and "peace" gets a bad press is a function of the kind of society that we live in.
Kaor, Paul!
Thanks! Esp. since we disagree so often about human beings and the nature of their societies.
Yes, I think it is likely that SOME intelligent races, if they exist, have not fallen. And I am not sure if an immortal, unFallen rational race necessarily contradicts physics and biology. Some of the ideas Frank J. Tipler discusses in THE PHYSICS OF CHRISTIANITY leads me to think that is what he may believe.
And I was trying to make a point with that playing on words with my "non-bellicose aggressiveness." But you understood what I meant!
My view is that human beings finds it very difficult to have a peaceful society without it eventually becoming passive, slack, even decadent. Unless there are outlets for ambition and opportunities allowing people to strive for and achieve great things. I remember how, in GENESIS, it was stated that the warrior spirit, if caged and unable to be used productively, will become destructive.
No, "aggression" gets a good press and "peace" a bad one NOT because of our societies but because of the kind of PEOPLE we are.
Sean
Sean,
But we are a certain kind of people because we have a certain kind of society which has a certain kind of history and future history will be different.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I still say that any kind of society we can see or speculate about are what they are because of the people who comprise it. And different peoples at different times, past and to come, will have different ideas and beliefs, and so shaping those societies.
Sean
Sean,
But you could have been taken at birth and brought up as a jihadist instead of as an American conservative Catholic. I do not think that you exist as a person apart from your upbringing. Individuals CAN interact very differently with their upbringings but their starting points are ALWAYS very different upbringings.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I have to agree it MATTERS how and by whom we were raised. And I agree there are many different systems of belief we could have been raised in. And that we would very likely believe that the ideas and beliefs inculcated in us as children were true. So I agree we START with very different upbringings: Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, etc., etc.
Sean
Sean,
Nowadays potentially it all comes together. Whatever our upbringing, we can inquire. We can buy the scriptures, philosophies and literatures of all traditions in any good bookshop or find them online. A friend at the Birmingham Buddhist Centre has, e.g., Jewish people inquiring about Buddhism. My mother asked me why I was reading the BHAGAVAD GITA since it wasn't about Catholicism! How could I find out about the celebrated GITA except by reading it? I find its teaching of karma yoga more applicable than anything in the New Testament but I had to read it to learn that. I gave my daughter a Bible and a Life of the Buddha. She attended a Baptist girls' group and grew up respecting the diverse beliefs of people around her.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I have NO objection to anyone reading the normative writings of other faiths, philosophies, or literatures. Even as a teenager I was reading the ANALECTS of Confucius and the MENCIUS, to name two of the Confucian classics. Plus the MEDITATIONS of Marcus Aurelius.
I have never read the BHAGAVAD-GITA, so I had to do some googling about it--and truthfully, it does not sound all that impressive. Some of the critics of the BG complained it was not truly all that "pacifistic" a work, what with it having the Hindu god Krishna exhorting Arjuna to do his "warrior duty" and fight his enemies, even if that meant fighting friends and relatives. Other critics complained the BHAGAVAD tolerated or supported the barbaric Hindu caste system.
Still, I'm willing to think the BHAGAVAD is worth reading as literature or poetry. But I strongly suspect Dante's DIVINE COMEDY to be far superior, both as poetry and in the range of topics found in it.
Compared to the BHAGAVAD, I think the CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY of Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius (you have to love those sonorous Latin names!) goes far more deeply and seriously into such issues as fate, free will, good and evil, the suffering of the innocent, etc. Or, for that matter, the books of Job or Ecclesiastes.
As for the New Testament (and the OT), I believe the Testaments were divinely inspired and they show God's gradual revelation of Himself to the human race thru the Jews, culminating with the Incarnation, Passion, and Resurrection of Christ. That makes irrelevant whatever defects they may have as simply literature.
Also, it's been over thirty years since I first read the Koran, as translated by NJ Dawood. And since that was before Nine Eleven and the current wave of jihadist fanaticism, it shows I was curious about Islam before it became such a burning issue. Truthfully, I was not impressed, finding most of the Koran boring, tedious, repetitive. And the less boring parts were largely repulsive.
I've also read translations of literary works ranging from Chinese short stories written during the Imperial era, some of Sir Richard Burton's translations from the 1000 AND ONE NIGHTS, BEOWULF, THE SONG OF ROLAND, Homer, and Virgil. Long before before it became so fashionable to be "multicultural" or "diverse."
Sean
Sean,
The GITA is encyclopedic. The reader has to choose which passages are helpful which, for me, are the teachings of karma yoga, nonattached action.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
"Eclectic" was one of the words I saw from critics describing the topics found in the BHAGAVAD-GITA.
Sean
Sean,
It is that. Krishna devotees emphasize bhakti (devotional) yoga and regard Krishna as the supreme deity. I emphasize karma yoga and regard Krishna as a personification. He says, "The gods are my million faces."
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
But not all critics take the BHAGAVAD-GITA that seriously. And I don't believe in any kind of a multiplicity of gods.
Sean
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