Dear lexi,

The ideas of the Enlightenment permeate our society. In general the opponents of the Enlightenment follow the we/they idea. Enlightened Christians, Jews and Muslims have incorporated Enlightenment ideas and seek to apply reason to their societies. Others reject modernity and seek refuge in biblical literalism and other uncritical acceptance of myth. I think Soros is wrong in regard to the unreadability of the Enlightenment philosophers. I have found Voltaire, Rousseau and Montesquieu quite readable. 'Candide' by Voltaire has even been made into a Broadway musical. Montesquieu's 'Persian Letters' satirised the society of his time through the observations of two fictional Persian travelers in Europe.

Reaction to the Enlightenment was not only in religion but also in philosophy. Hegel was a German philosopher who opposed the Enlightenment. He wrote "For it is in the nature of humanity to press onward to agreement with others; human nature only really exists in an achieved community of minds."

I see the above as a recipe for tyranny. Hegel's freedom was humanity working together as an organic whole in agreement on its eventual goal. The dissenter is an outcast. There is no room for the person who disagrees with or does not belong to the dominant paradigm. The gulag, the concentration camp, the graveyard and the crematorium are the destination for those who are not regarded as belonging to the volk or the vanguard class.

Hegel was influenced by Joachim of Fiore who saw society in three stages the stage of the father: Edenic peace, the stage of the son: human conflict, and the stage of the Holy Ghost: the millennium. Hegel also saw society in stages reaching an apotheosis. His apotheosis was the Prussian state.

Hegelians divided into right Hegelians who were predominantly German nationalists and left Hegelians the most prominent being Marx. Marx's three stages were primitive communism in an economy of scarcity, class struggle and the apotheosis of advanced communism or the classless society in an economy of plenty.

Marxism and German nationalism are two we/they ideas.

Yes, it's obvious that the Enlightenment has permeated the sensibilities of the heirs of modernity. The social, political and moral values enshrined in the Declaration of Independence have translated into a fair world order where equality and cooperation reign. There is no disconnection from the world around us. Our creative instincts are not tethered to profitable and unsustainable destruction.

The intellectual West deceives itself and cloaks its brutality in the garb of so-called civility - that is, until its appetites are opposed. Then it proceeds with all the barbarity inherent in man to impose its will.

David f., you appear to be quite adept at dividing various schools of thought into we/they dynamics....but you consider yourself to be on the righteous side of the divide. Your commentary immediately sets in stone a we/they attitude. How do you propose to move beyond this impasse?

Excellent question Poirot!

David IS good at attacking those who differ...but not so hot on reconciling.

The only kind of 'Christian' acceptable to David seem to be the brutal kind (which maintains his self understanding of victimhood) and those with the spiritual spine of a jellyfish (Spong)

In neither case an and would an evangelical Christian call them 'Christians'...which leads me back to David's original hate attack

"Evangelical Christians may feel justified in MURDERing those who reject their preaching"

I've already provided definitions of 'Evangelical' but seems not to have had any redeeming impact on David.

When people doggedly resist being enlightened by fact.. there is a word for it.. starts with "b"

For the Evangelical Christian, reconciliation between 'them/us' is based on one thing alone.. "in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek,slave nor free, male nor female" Gal 3:28

For a person to be 'in Christ' they do 2 things.

1/ Repent of sin
2/ Believe in Christ

Neither of which can be enforced by law or brutality because 'belief' can never be forced.

Hence.. any mention of murder, brutality, cruelty in connection with EVANGELICAL Christians must be spurious, and based on ulterior Christphobic motives...which I've already pointed out.

Dear Al,

The ideals attributed to Christ are not necessarily those practiced by his adherents - after all, we're only human. There's plenty of evidence of brutal words and acts committed by Christians resting on the bedrock of a we/they construct.

David f. likes to drag out his mounds of corpses as a device for shutting down opposing argument.
I've noticed that the imperial West is just as adept at producing mounds of corpses when it suits the agenda - it's also handy at turning a blind eye when its junior partners proceed in the same vein.

The we/they dynamic is a psychological construct inherent in the species.

It is "man" who produces the mounds of corpses.

AGIR:

Richard Dawkins points out in his book, "The God Delusion," "as recently as 1922 in Britain, John William Gott was sentenced to nine months' hard labour for blasphemy: he compared Jesus to a clown. Almost unbelievably, the crime of blasphemy is still on the statute book in Britain, and in 2005 a Christian group tried to bring a private prosecution for blasphemy against the BBC for broadcasting "Jerry Springer, the Opera." Dawkins tells us that, "In the US of recen years the phrase, "American Taliban" was being coined... their web pages were a rich source of obnoxiously barmy quotations, beginning with a prize one from somebody called Ann Coulter,..."We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity..."
Other gems include Congressman Bob Dornan's "Don't use the word "gay" unless it's an acronym for "Got Aids Yet?" and General William G. Boykin's "George Bush was not elected by a majority of the voters in the US, he was appointed by God!" As Dawkins points out - all the ingredients are there: slavish adherence to a misunderstood old text; hatred of women, modernity, rival religions, science and pleasure; love of punishment, bullying, narrow-minded, bossy interference in every aspect of life. The Afghan Taliban and the American Taliban are both good examples of what happens when people take their scriptures literally and seriously. They provide a horrifying modern enactment of what life might have been like under the theocracy of the Old Testament. Kimberly Blaker's, "The Fundamentals of Extremism: The Christian Right in America," is a book-length expose of the menace of the Christian Taliban (not under that name)."

We are willing to label Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Idi Amin just to name a few, as sub-human zealots - why not those who preach religious hatred against others who won't accept the fanatics' views? Humanity cannot afford to have fundamentalists with their fingers on the nuclear war-button. There is no greater reason for living the good life, which requires seeking the good life for one's fellows and accepting that this one is the only one we have.

Dear Poirot,

You wrote, "The we/they dynamic is a psychological construct inherent in the species."

That may be quite true, and maybe we can't get beyond it. Then we’ll have to do the best we can with it.

At the moment it's hard for me to get excited about anything.

AGIR can keep on with his silly mumbojumbo. Maybe nobody else will pay attention to it. Maybe they will. Whatever. There are real problems of cruelty, conflict & destruction & he worries about what people are doing sexually. How absolutely silly!

Since my last post I’ve been overcome by a sense of well-being.

Saturday we went with the Queensland Mycological Society looking for fungi & found some. Yesterday I talked to my son in Virginia on the phone & I never had heard him sound happier. He’s preparing his courses in anthropology for the next term, is writing book reviews and consulting to the National Science Foundation. It made me feel good that he was so happy.

His younger daughter is skiing with his wife. His older daughter is in Pittsburgh enjoying her life as artist, writer and waitress. My granddaughter in Wilmington, Delaware sent me a couple of emails about her liking for Doctor Who. Her Dad told me about his musical gig at the Fresh Time Café with the Owl Taker Trio. My other five descendents are all well as far as I know.

Just uprooted some lomandra longifolia (dilly) bushes that were growing where we didn’t want them. Our plants are really flourishing due to the rains – delicious pineapple. Talking about what to do with the bromeliads that are crowding out the macrozamia.

My wife and I are both reading “The Brothers Karamazov”. We read the same things sometimes and talk about it. Will read some more today.
I wish you all well, and as Cleopatra said to Antony, “I’m not prone to argue.”

Maybe tomorrow I’ll feel like discussing or arguing.