Postmodernity and christianity

[zhao]

Again, a very selective reading of 'surviving hunter-gatherers': you've taken the Dobe to be representative of all pre-agricultural people still existing, and extrapolated back to assume that this was the norm throughout all societies in the distant past.

no not just the Dobe. again from the Jarred Diamond article you apparently still refuse to read:

Are twentieth century hunter-gatherers really worse off than farmers? Scattered throughout the world, several dozen groups of so-called primitive people, like the Kalahari bushmen, continue to support themselves that way. It turns out that these people have plenty of leisure time, sleep a good deal, and work less hard than their farming neighbors. For instance, the average time devoted each week to obtaining food is only 12 to 19 hours for one group of Bushmen, 14 hours or less for the Hadza nomads of Tanzania.

Have you heard of these guys? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yanomami

and in particular: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yanomami#Violence

these are not band level, nomadic gatherers and hunters.

these are tribe level horticulturalists who live in villages, with hierarchies and division of labor.

and as such, they do not exemplify the primary lifestyle of our ancestors.

it is not my personal belief, because i smoke too much weed and am prone to idealism, but commonly accepted in the field of Anthropology, that the band level gatherer/hunter is the primary form of social organization practiced by human beings for most of history. a lifestyle characterized by egalitarianism, equality, etc.

Suppose that an archaeologist who had visited from outer space were trying to explain human history to his fellow spacelings. He might illustrate the results of his digs by a 24-hour clock on which one hour represents 100,000 years of real past time. If the history of the human race began at midnight, then we would now be almost at the end of our first day. We lived as hunter-gatherers for nearly the whole of that day, from midnight through dawn, noon, and sunset. Finally, at 11:54 p. m. we adopted agriculture.

 

[nomadthethird]

look at the lifestyle of the surviving gatherer-hunters, it is an egalitarian, communal existence without private property or permanent leadership, equality between the sexes,

Sorry to call this one out, too, but saying that a "gatherer-hunter" lifestyle somehow equates to equality between the sexes is kind of rich considering the fact that most of our secondary sex characteristics and the distinct traits that we attribute to the biological sexes evolved in part because of the strict gender roles assigned to gatherers and hunters during the first hundred thousand years or more of human evolution.*

People who talk about the "equality" of the sexes in this sort of "band" society I think miss the point of what the modern movement toward feminism, gay rights, or sexual liberty is about. As far as I'm concerned, being given no choice but to spend your life pushing out children on some steppe for the good of the band or tribe isn't really "equality", it's just a really convenient evolutionary mechanism for social cohesion.

and during this process the original connection to each other, to one self, to the world, to a nameless divinity which was inside us and all around us, the original grace, was lost.

As much as I think Diamond makes good points, I don't think he even hints at this being the case. This is something new age philosophers or spiritualists have extrapolated from his work, or misappropriated from it.

*When I say human here I mean homo sapien, so the first hundred thousand years of homo sapien evolution.

 

[nomadthethird]

Here's a program I just saw on TV last night about Eden. The last half of the second part is the interesting stuff about ice age, floods, and lost hunter-gatherer lifestyles:

Part 1

Part 2

 

[zhao]

Sorry to call this one out, too, but saying that a "gatherer-hunter" lifestyle somehow equates to equality between the sexes is kind of rich

relative, relative to our modern society.

As much as I think Diamond makes good points, I don't think he even hints at this being the case. This is something new age philosophers or spiritualists have extrapolated from his work, or misappropriated from it.

nor did i as much as insinuate that he did.

you can be as derisive as you like, because you are invested in a materialist, anti-spiritual world view (the hostility and condescension is clear in your words), but taking into account this (Diamond's and others') version of the story of our ancestors, this "original sense of connectedness" does not require much extrapolation.

it is not Diamond's field, so i'm not sure if i can find any quotes of him talking about the evolution of spirituality before and after the dawn of agriculture, but i am certain that he would agree with the general gist of what i have been saying.

 

[zhao]

oh wow wow wow!

Jarred Diamond lecture on yootoob: The Evolution of Religions

i just found it and have not watched yet... let's see what he has to say...

 

[nomadthethird]

you can be as derisive as you like, because you are invested in a materialist, anti-spiritual world view (the hostility and condescension is clear in your words), but taking into account this (Diamond's and others') version of the story of our ancestors, this "original sense of connectedness" does not require much extrapolation.

it is not Diamond's field, so i'm not sure if i can find any quotes of him talking about the evolution of spirituality before and after the dawn of agriculture, but i am certain that he would agree with the general gist of what i have been saying.

I'm really not trying to be derisive, I was just wondering why you were equating certain ideas with Diamond's that's all. But you're right. I don't believe in spirits. If/when someone can show me one, I'll believe in them. Until then, no dice.

 

[zhao]

I'm really not trying to be derisive, I was just wondering why you were equating certain ideas with Diamond's that's all. But you're right. I don't believe in spirits. If/when someone can show me one, I'll believe in them. Until then, no dice.

um... right. spirituality = belief in ghosts. :slanted:

you are not trying but the way you use the words "spiritualists" or "new age philosophers" clearly convey hostility.

the diamond lecture on the evolution of religion regretably is only concerned with the most recent 10,000 years, i.e. post agriculture, the earliest examples being tribal society of new guinee. it's too bad that he does not address the pre-agricultural lifestyle.

watching the Q and A now and just wishing someone would ask about pre-history... damn these UCLA students ask some stupid ass questions. "why is it so difficult to objectively look at religions?", "I'm a jew, and the old testament quotes you used don't reflect the judaism that i practice" shut the fuck up you dumb shits!!!

 

[zhao]

some interesting stuff about the role of the sexes from wiki on paleolithic era:

Anthropologists have typically assumed that in Paleolithic societies, women were responsible for gathering wild plants and firewood, and men were responsible for hunting and scavenging dead animals.[6][11][20] However, analogies to existent hunter-gatherer societies such as the Hadza people and the Australian aborigines suggest that the sexual division of labor in the Paleolithic was relatively flexible. Men may have participated in gathering plants, firewood and insects, and women may have procured small game animals for consumption and assisted men in driving herds of large game animals (such as woolly mammoths and deer) off cliffs.[11][56] Additionally, recent research by anthropologist and archaeologist Steven Kuhn from the University of Arizona shows that this division of labor did not exist prior to the Upper Paleolithic and was invented relatively recently in human pre-history.[63][64] Sexual division of labor may have been developed to allow humans to acquire food and other resources more efficiently.[64] Possibly there was approximate parity between men and women during the Middle and Upper Paleolithic, and that period may have been the most gender-equal time in human history.[20][50][55][65][66][67] Archeological evidence from art and funerary rituals indicates that a number of individual women enjoyed seemingly high status in their communities,[66] and it is likely that both sexes participated in decision making.[50] The earliest known Paleolithic shaman (c. 30 000 BP) was female.[68] Jared Diamond suggests that the status of women declined with the adoption of agriculture because women in farming societies typically have more pregnancies and are expected to do more demanding work than women in hunter-gatherer societies.[69] Like most contemporary hunter-gatherer societies, Paleolithic and the Mesolithic groups probably followed mostly matrilineal and ambilineal descent patterns; patrilineal decent patterns were probably rarer than in the following Neolithic period.[28][70]

this certainly paints a picture in which women have had an increasingly more difficult time as the subject of exploitation and slavery, since the advent of civilization.

there is a chapter on paleolithic religion but it's not very much to do with our conversation...

 

[zhao]

from: Before the Fall By Steve Taylor

…”Many of the world’s cultures have myths that refer to an earlier time when life was much easier, and human beings were less materialistic and lived in harmony with nature and each other. In ancient Greece and Rome this was known as the Golden Age; in China it was the Age of Perfect Virtue, in India it was the Krita Yuga (Perfect Age); while the Judeo-Christian tradition has the story of the garden of Eden. These myths tell us that, either as a result of a long degeneration or a sudden and dramatic “Fall,” something “went wrong.” Life became much more difficult and full of suffering, and human nature became more corrupt. In Taoist terms, whereas the earliest human beings followed the Way of Heaven and were a part of the natural harmony of the Universe, later human beings became separated from the Tao, and became selfish and calculating. Many of these myths make clear references to the hunter-gatherer way of life – for example, the Greek historian Hesiod states that during the Golden Age “the fruitful earth bore [human beings] abundant fruit without stint,” while the early Indian text the Vaya Purana states that early human beings “frequented the mountains and seas, and did not dwell in houses” (i.e. they lived a non-sedentary way of life). The garden of Eden story suggests this too. Originally Adam and Eve ate the fruit from the tree of knowledge, until they were forced to leave the garden and forced to “work hard and sweat to make the soil produce anything.” It appears that, at least in part, these myths are a kind of “folk memory” of the pre-agricultural way of life. The agricultural peoples who worked harder and longer, had shorter life spans and suffered from a lot more health problems must have looked at the old hunter-gatherer way of life as a kind of paradise.”…

 

[Mr. Tea]

um... right. spirituality = belief in ghosts. :slanted:

Don't put words in other people's mouths. Nomad didn't say "ghosts", she said "spirits".

Which really brings us to the crux of the matter, and something that's bothered me for some time. What, exactly, do we mean by the words "spiritual" and "spirituality"? Is it meaningful to be spiritual without, at some level, believing in spirits?

Now I don't have a problem with the use of the word in the sense of calling Detroit the 'spiritual home' of techno, or Isaac Newton the 'spiritual father' of modern physics, because in this sense the word can be taken to be used in a metaphorical or figurative sense. But to call yourself a 'spiritual' person, or to say that some group of people have a 'spiritual' connection (especially in contrast to other societies that have allegedly lost that 'connection') - what does that mean, exactly?

The way I see it, it's not really meaningful to call yourself a 'spiritual' person without believing in something like a spirit or spirits - be it a God or gods of some kind, the Tao, the Buddha, the Holy Ghost, Brahman, whatever. Otherwise, what possible meaning can the word have? 'Ghosts', in the strict sense of the unquiet souls of the dead, have nothing to do with it.

damn these UCLA students ask some stupid ass questions. "why is it so difficult to objectively look at religions?"

Less difficult for atheists than for Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, yadda yadda... (or, indeed, New Age pantheists of whatever stripe).

 

[luka]

mr tea are you a robot? with nomad its just typical teenage awkwardness. but you are actually serious.

 

[swears]

Robots are cooler than ghosts. Not as cool as werewolves or lizard-people, though.

 

[nomadthethird]

Now I don't have a problem with the use of the word in the sense of calling Detroit the 'spiritual home' of techno, or Isaac Newton the 'spiritual father' of modern physics, because in this sense the word can be taken to be used in a metaphorical or figurative sense. But to call yourself a 'spiritual' person, or to say that some group of people have a 'spiritual' connection (especially in contrast to other societies that have allegedly lost that 'connection') - what does that mean, exactly?

The way I see it, it's not really meaningful to call yourself a 'spiritual' person without believing in something like a spirit or spirits - be it a God or gods of some kind, the Tao, the Buddha, the Holy Ghost, Brahman, whatever. Otherwise, what possible meaning can the word have? 'Ghosts', in the strict sense of the unquiet souls of the dead, have nothing to do with it.

I agree with this.

Luka, go make someone a coffee for minimum wage and blow me.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Robots are cooler than ghosts. Not as cool as werewolves or lizard-people, though.

Hmm, yeah, OK. Where do ninjas fit into the coolness hierarchy?

 

[Mr. Tea]

mr tea are you a robot? with nomad its just typical teenage awkwardness. but you are actually serious.

No I'm Mark from Peep Show, remember?

Or was it swears that said that? Never mind.

 

[nomadthethird]

No I'm Mark from Peep Show, remember?

Or was it swears that said that? Never mind.

That's a great film, one of Hitchcock's favorites. I just rewatched it last week. Then I reread Virilio's The Vision Machine and Mulvey's Visual Pleasure in Narrative Cinema. Then I read about gene regulatory networks and the Cambrian explosion. Just for to expand my headspace.

J/k. That shit is for herbs!

Why would you want to learn about things? Really, it's so much better to be stuck in an 8th grader's idea of being one of the "cool kids" for the rest of your life...that's how I pick all of the music I like, everything I watch, and wear...basically my entire identity...and my career...yeaahh...

 

[swears]

Not that Peep Show...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Corrigan

Rather harsh on Mr Tea really, I was projecting, obviously.

 

[Mr. Tea]

"I can't have an affair! I'm not French! I'm the least French man on the planet! The only cheeses I eat are Cheddar and Red Leicester..."

Great stuff.

 

[nomadthethird]

Not that Peep Show...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Corrigan

Rather harsh on Mr Tea really, I was projecting, obviously.

Haha, ok that makes more sense*. I really should've wondered why you were comparing Mr Tea to a serial killer. It's just both have "Mark" in them, too.

("possibly bi, but basically un-curious." hahaha)

*plus the movie is Peeping Tom not Peep Show, I was confused

 

[scottdisco]

anyone that eats black pudding and drinks cask ale cannot be a robot.