Schroedinger said:
By the way am I the only one that gets a bit misty eyed at how incredible it is we're examining ourselves and the universe with the tools we're developing ourselves. How incredibly brilliant it is that our species is becoming such a voracious race of infovores? It is one of the things that has given me more joy than I could ever feel in the raptures of any religious fervour
Similar thoughts often strike me. It's all quite astounding really. An ironic thought which once hit me was that,
if determinism holds, deterministic processes have humorously managed to produce beings which both question and think about determinism. Similar thoughts pertain to evolutionary algorithms which produce beings that can recognise these very algorithms. I <3 reflexive structures.
Schroedinger said:
At least until we come to understand the nature of consciousness as a purely biological construct, or something more. If we can create consciousness or save it or... analyse it in any way, I think we're significantly closer to understanding the main reasons for god, the fear of death, but then we get into the whole concept of consciousness vectors and duplicating consciousness and all manner of juicy moral arguments which I think escape the notions of this current thread.
Just because the ideas are fresh in my mind: yesterday I finished reading a
book on existential psychotherapy (which for me finds a nice realm of intersection between philosophy, psychology and medicine) whose first section considers anxiety experienced in the face of death and the various ways in which we try to cope. The writer, Irvin Yalom, two primary patterns of coping (1) an individual style which involves affirmations of one's specialness and/or immortality (think feats of heroism, attempts to continue one's genetic line, mad grabs at power and resources, and working on lasting projects like statues, books, scientific theories and institutions) & (2) cultivation of a belief, conscious or unconscious, in an 'ultimate protector' (a god, a king, a religious leader, a significant other etc...) that is in some way seen as greater than death (note that manifestations of this needn't be 'benevolent' in form - the masochist may surrender themselves to the violent whims of a powerful other [wise crack --> think old testament?]).
Naturally religion tends towards the latter category. It is interesting to note that most humans have the childhood experience of doting parents (stereotypically a mother) who swoop down to satisfy our needs and protect us from harm, and so most of us have some level of direct experience with the concept of an 'ultimate protector'. Perhaps this plays a role in which the concept comes so naturally to us? Similarly, immortality/specialness approaches may have some roots in the self-centred perspective from which we view the universe. I find the origins of religious thought quite interesting in the context of these kinds of ideas.
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Also, a tangent which just came to me (in relation to the work of a moral/evolutionary psychologist
Geoffrey Miller). I once read the suggestion that the pagan moral virtues (things like strength, beauty, generosity, courage) may have come about through sexual selection since they tend to be indicators of reproductive fitness (like the cumbersome peacock's tail, a human must be very well of to be able to afford generosity!). One might then wonder, 'but what of the typical christian virtues?' such as temperance, prudence, patience etc (there is some overlap of course).
One suggestion I came across was that 'pagan' virtues seem to typify dominance behaviors while 'christian' virtues seem to typify submissive behaviors. It is valuable for an organism to be able to make use of both types of behaviors since displays of dominance, or alternately, submission, may displace physical conflicts which tend to leave both parties worse for wear. Sexual selection may again act here, as it makes sense to choose mates who can practice appropriate dominance/submission behaviors in order to navigate the social environment (note that courtship involves alternating displays of dominant pagan virtues and submissive christian virtues). The interesting tie in comes from the suggestion that
christian virtues may tend to be submissive because the church always stands in relation to a dominant god and such behaviors encapsulate our natural means of showing deference. What just struck me as interesting is that this pagan/christian (dominant/submissive) virtue division finds an interesting analogue in the immortality/ultimate-protector division of defences against death anxiety mentioned above... especially once psychopathology enters the picture.
Interconnected ideas are the best.
