I am exhausted after a long day of work, but
I have a thought…
In thinking about spirituality, the belief in a god or
a spirit world, in an evolutionary sense, that makes
perfect sense for a new species on the rise…
that creating a god, which is what the original members
of the species did, it makes sense… the world is a dark
and mysterious place that really makes no sense…
if you think about it… the inclusion of a divinity,
a powerful source of magic, that can, relatively so
make the world make sense… the crops fail, and
the answer in this world is we have displeased god,
floods that take out entire villages, god is mad
at us…we can explain the woes and tribulations
of the world with an explanation about god…
and given our evolutionary place at that time, it makes
sense to ‘‘blame’’ a divine presence for our misfortunes…
But today, we have solid and rational explanations for
most acts of nature… a storm destroys our crops,
we don’t have to bring in a supernatural explanation…
the recent flooding in Texas, doesn’t have to come
from god or some other metaphysical explanation…
We can, with science explain the flooding…
I contend that this comes from our continued
evolutionary development… just as infants can’t
do anything at first, but over time develop into
children and then teenagers and then adults…
this evolution of children is also seen in the overall
development of our species… we come to science
from religion as part of evolution…exactly the same
way children grow from infants to adults…
this path of religion is an ancient one… for example,
as I have previously explained… that the belief
in god didn’t come first… it was the second stage of
our development…not the first… so, Kropotkin,
what was the first stage of religion?
Ever watch children… and something will move into their
eyesight, but they don’t seek answers as to why that event
happened, they simple accept it… the first stage of religion
is what I call the Magical stage… there is no cause and effect
for children… stuff just happens and that’s it…
no wonder where it came from or how it got there…
children just accept it as magic… no sense of cause
and effect… that is the first stage of religion…
the second stage, the one we are still in,
that god/a metaphysical cause created us, the sky,
the world… suddenly, we have cause and effect…
something happens and we can see cause and effect
in terms of a god creating that event…
that is the second stage… and what pray tell, is
the third stage… we better understand cause and
effect… and we create science to study that cause
and effect… no longer do we just magically accept
reality, nor do we seek out a metaphysical explanation…
we can find our cause and effect of existence within the laws
of science and the within the role of natural forces that
dominates the universe…
the current secular age is simply the third age of human beings…
where we have moved from magical thinking to god/metaphysical
to being able to explain the universe in terms of science and
reason… and for a while, we shall be engaged in this
age of science… but what is the next age?
the next age, as I see it, will be where we are the creators
of our reality…today, we can explain it, but we can’t create it…
and the next stage will be the age where science creates our
reality…the first step of this new vision actually came from
Kant… when he took our vision of the universe, which
was from the outside in, to our vision becoming inside out…
we no longer see reality as being outside of us…
we are beginning to understand that reality, our vision
of what is real, comes from our own viewpoint, our own
understanding comes from the inside of us, not from
the outside in… and what will be this next step?
Where we can view reality from either the inside of us,
or from the outside of us… we can shift our perspectives
to either within us or outside of us… and we can do this with
ease in the next step of evolution…we can even, with
training see both sides, from within and outside of us…
Today, as we have for millions of years, passively waited
to see what would happen to us… we don’t institute
change, we simple react to change… but in the new
world, one moved along by evolution, we begin to
be the creators of our change…if you want a better world,
you have to be the creator of that… you have to make it
happen… it doesn’t happen magically or through god,
but change happens if, if we become the change we
want to see…This new idea is a radical change over the
past millions of years… the ancient world, simply reacted
to change, Marcus Aurilias… for example, preached stoicism,
the acceptance of change through clinched teeth…
but no more… we don’t have to wait for the change to
happen, we can simply be the change… for millions
of years, human beings passively waited out the change
that was happening… grin and bare it… but no more…
the next evolutionary step will be active in creating
our future…not as we have done for a million years,
which is wait for the change, passively…
evolution requires us to no longer be a passive vessel,
for us to wait for the end… nope… our next
step in evolution is to be active and creators of
our world, our times, our universe…
can you give up your metaphysical beliefs and grow, as
evolution requires us to grow, into active, creating beings,
that are willing to change the world…
In case you weren’t paying attention, this change of
becoming active in one’s own life is part of being
Liberal… liberals don’t wait for the change to happen to
them… conservatives wait for the change to happen,
and they are convinced that whatever change happens,
is out of our hands and only god can make
worthy changes in our lives… thus, they hang on
to tradition… if it is good enough for our grandfathers,
it is good enough for us…passively waiting out
change instead of initiating it… creating it…
being part of change, and not as the usual
conservative being, who just simply waits for change to
happen… the evolution of human beings comes
into play where we no longer passively wait for change,
as conservatives always do… we become the change we
want…
Kropotkin