Ancient and Modern Enlightenment: from Noosphere to Technosphere

Hope you all had a happy new year.

I have an article up on Scott Bakker's blog, on the difference between ancient and modern enlightenment. Here are the first few paragraphs:

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Enlightenment is elite cognition, the seeing past collective error and illusion to a hidden reality. But the ancient idea of enlightenment differs greatly from the modern one and there may be a further shift in the postmodern era. I’ll try to shed some light on enlightenment, by pursuing these comparisons.

Ancient Enlightenment: Monism and Personification

Enlightenment in the ancient world was made possible by a falling away from our mythopoeic, nomadic prehistory. In that Paleolithic period, symbolized by the wild Enkidu in the Epic of Gilgamesh and by the biblical Adam in Eden, there was no enlightenment since everything was thoroughly personified and so nothing could have been perceived as unfamiliar or alien to the masses. The world was experienced as a noosphere, filled with mentality. Only after the rise of sedentary civilization in the Neolithic Era, when farming replaced nomadic hunting in 10,000 BCE, which allowed for much larger populations, was there a loss of that enchanted mode of experience which actually depended on a sort of blissful collective ignorance. As a population increases, the so-called Law of Oligarchy takes hold, which means that social power must be concentrated to avoid civilizational collapse. Dominance hierarchies are established and those in the lower classes become envious of the stronger and more privileged members who are sure to display their greater wealth and access to women with symbols of their higher status. By doing so, each social class learns its boundaries so that the social structure won’t be overridden, which would invite anarchy.

As Rousseau argued, civilization was the precondition of what we might call the sin of egoism. Contrary to Rousseau, prehistoric life wasn’t utopian; at least, objectively, human life in the Paleolithic Era was likely quite savage. But the ancients seemed to have an easier time perceiving the world in magical terms, judging from the evidence of their religions and extrapolating from what we know of children’s experience, given their similar dearth of content to occupy their collective memory. Thus, even as they killed each other over trifles, the prehistoric people would have interpreted such horror as profoundly meaningful. In any case, I think Rousseau is right that civilization made possible a falling away from a kind of intrinsic innocence. Specifically, the increased social specialization led to an epistemic inequality. As food was stored and more and more people lived together, there was greater need for practical knowledge in such areas as architecture, medicine, sanitation, and warfare. The elites became decadent and alienated from nature, since they found themselves free to indulge their appetites with artificial diversions, as specialists took care of the necessities of survival such as the harvesting of food or the defense of the borders. These elites codified the myths that expressed the population’s mores, but while the uneducated majority clung to their naïve, anthropocentric traditions, the cynical and self-absorbed elites more likely regarded the folk tales as superstitions.

Duck Dynasty Delusions and American Social Cohesion in Jeopardy, Experts Warn

Dateline: WEST MONROE, LA—Phil Robertson, star of A&E’s Duck Dynasty, got into trouble with his politically incorrect comments about homosexuality being un-Christian. For financial reasons, A&E stood by Mr. Robertson, Duck Dynasty will continue filming, and conservative groups have applauded the network.

However, shockwaves from the swirling winds created by the clash between conservative and liberal delusions are still propagating and culture critics warn that they threaten to destroy America with a mega tornado of bluster.

“It’s a true clash of the titans,” said one culture critic. “In one corner, you have fundamentalist Christianity, which A&E can’t afford to alienate since its brand is based on nostalgia for the 1950s myth of the wholesome family and, through a hostile takeover led by the likes of Ronald Reagan and Jerry Falwell, that myth is now owned by conservative Christianity. In the other corner, you have the progressive champion, Gay Culture, which has been on a tremendous upswing over the last couple of decades.

“America is fervently committed to Christianity, of course, but it’s also just as dedicated to progress. The two are in conflict, so American culture as a whole is effectively one big game in which the people compete for the title of Greatest Hypocrite. But now the conflict has come to a head with the Duck Dynasty fiasco and my colleagues and I are still measuring the aftershock from the titanic clash of self-delusions.”

Another sociologist clarifies: “People think that their conceits can be easily dismissed, that if someone pretends to be something they’re clearly not, we can just laugh off that fakeness. But that’s not how it is, since hardly anyone has the stomach for harsh truths. So we cling to our illusions even though, deep down, we know we can’t take them seriously since they’re fraudulent and often archaic.

“For example, we pay lip service to Christianity, but were Jesus to return he’d set almost all of North America ablaze with unquenchable cosmic fire, sending the hundreds of millions of hypocrites into perdition along with their pets, possessions, and dwelling places. There would be nothing left of us.

“But that’s only the truth, you see. We prefer the false front, the white lie, the mass delusion. That’s where the myths of family and conservative Christianity come in. We can pretend to be good Christians as long as we say an empty prayer a day over an enormous fried dinner, and scapegoat hapless homosexuals—as if Jesus would have thought gay people marrying were the greater cause of suffering than, say, war, the out-of-control prison system, or under-regulated plutocratic capitalism, all of which the conservative ‘Christian’ embraces.

“And liberals, too, need their myths to avoid facing the unpleasant truth. There’s homosexuality in other animal species, but most animals aren’t as self-righteous and preoccupied with abstract ideas as us. So gay people are bound to be ostracized for tribal, moralistic reasons. Those folks should have their human rights, of course, but they ought to be sad, not gay, because they’re stuck in a species that gets carried away by ideologies.

“Also, liberal Christians pretend that even after they read the whole Bible as a subjective metaphor, the remaining religion is the least bit interesting.”

Hope for Sufferers from Crazy Uncle Syndrome

Dateline: NEW YORK—Leo Cornwallis belongs to roughly the third of modern male siblings that suffer from Crazy Uncle Syndrome, according to the Sociological Index of Abnormality. But Leo and a growing number of others like him have sought to mitigate their condition by joining the Crazy Uncles Society.

Morris Pencilpusher, a sociologist at NYU who studies the syndrome, says that most boys in modern societies grow up to be relatively well-adjusted and successful, according to that Index which defines normality in terms of a range of politically correct criteria. But some men are naturally eccentric, unpopular, unemployed, and perhaps homeless.

“Human parents tend to have multiple children for the same reason members of other species do,” said Professor Pencilpusher, “to ensure that at least some of their offspring will know what the hell they’re doing in life and won’t fritter away their time until they’re left to twiddle their thumbs alone in the corner.

“Inevitably,” he continued, “some genetic mutations will be misaligned with the environment in important ways, so the bearers of those genes won’t succeed in many of their endeavours. Their failures will force them to compensate with madness, which blocks out the harsh reality. The dregs of humanity prefer to live in a fantasy world, just as the normal folks would prefer not to have the losers in their midst.”

“You can imagine how hard it is for me at my extended family reunions,” said Leo. “Me, I’m single with no children or prospects, and I’m broke, unemployed, and middle-aged. My insanity keeps me active, but I have to work extra hard at those reunions to block out all of the success on display. I mean, one of my brothers is a doctor, the other an astronaut. My sisters-in-law are lawyers. My parents and grandparents are rich, as are most of my uncles and aunts. So when they get together, their wealth and happiness go with them. Their conversations and mannerisms overflow with signs of their normality.

“As for me, I don’t fit in so well. I’d rather talk about ideas in philosophy, religion, or politics. The normals just sigh and say, ‘There goes crazy Uncle Leo again, always barking his madness in our direction.’ And then I have to ignore that snub and my craziness takes over. Sometimes I’ll jump into the kitchen sink and swing the microwave over my head by its cord like a morning star. Maybe I’ll dance around the living room, shirtless, while my normal family members are exchanging pleasantries and sipping coffee. And they’ll laugh at me and say again, ‘There’s crazy Uncle Leo for you.’”

The Crazy Uncles Society has been a boon for ostracized cretins like Leo. “When I feel I’m about to explode with pent-up eccentricity, I head straight to my chapter of the Society and let it all out,” he says. “We crazy uncles support each other’s madness. Our little reunions are very different from those preferred by normals, let me tell you. At the Society, no one bats an eye if you feel like ramming your head through a wall or not showering or shaving for a week or being an alienated loser, drifting through the concrete jungle with nothing to distract you from the private hell of your vision of life’s absurdity. I can even have a philosophical conversation with a fellow crazy uncle without everyone thinking I’m wasting my time on nonsense.”

Victims of Ice Storm learn Horrible True Meaning of Christmas

Dateline: TORONTO—Many Torontonians and Americans have had their power knocked out by a catastrophic ice storm, but some are taking solace in the fact that being cursed with such utter darkness has taught them the true, horrible meaning of Christmas.

The ice storm has brought down thousands of large tree branches which knocked out power lines, causing power outages in the homes of over 200,000 Torontonians alone. Huddling around their candles, fireplaces, and flashlights, in the bitter coldness of the Canadian winter, with darkness falling at 4:30pm, some of these haggard Canadians have rediscovered the original purpose of Christmas.

“It suddenly dawned on me,” said one Torontonian, holding his two children by the fireplace in his living room which has become his family’s makeshift bedroom. “With all this coldness and darkness and with the winter solstice coincidentally happening right about now, who needs this nonsensical Santa Claus fellow? It’s all about the sun, isn’t it? Sol Invictus, as the Romans used to call it, the Unconquered Sun. What’s the point of worshipping Jesus, either? Without the sun, we’d really be screwed.

“You don’t appreciate the sun until it’s gone for a long while and you’re left without substitutes like commercial light bulbs or power generators. Not until you’re sitting in your house, which feels more like a cave in the evening and nighttime, with all the lights out and no heating or distractions from TV or the internet—not until you’re looking out the window at the desolation, at the trees torn in two by the weight of the frozen branches and at the fire trucks going by and the ice coating absolutely everything outside, that you start to beg for the sun to return.

“How spoiled we’ve become with this Santa Claus impostor! Jesus said to give away all your possessions, because you’ve got more important things to do, worrying about, you know, your eternal destiny in the afterlife. And now on Jesus’s alleged birthday we’re supposed to be consumed with acquiring more and more possessions? How obscene is that?

“Anyway, I’ve got even more important things to worry about now, like keeping my kids from freezing to death. Bless the sun’s return in full force around our silly little Christmas Day!”

Asked about the true meaning of Christmas, the shivering Torontonian said, “It’s that we’re no better off in some ways than our ancient ancestors who literally worshipped the sun. But the sun’s not alive. Neither, of course, is the freezing rain. We’re at the mercy of indifferent natural forces.

“By all means, let’s be jolly when the days will finally start to get longer around Dec 25. But is it too much to ask to spare a thought for the true hero in all of this and not be distracted with tales of some fat guy who cares too much about children? Or with myths of some ancient bearded dude who would pretty much hate all of us awful hypocrites if he were still around? Bless the sun, I say! And to you, Unconquered Sun, even though you can’t hear me and you couldn’t care less, I say, irrationally: Get yourself back here ASAP before I freeze my balls off!”

RWUG News

Just a quick note: the search function on this blog hasn't worked for a long while, but I've recently replaced it with some HTML code that works. So now you can search this blog again. The search tool is located down on the right, just above the labels. 

And if you're reading this blog on a mobile device's tiny screen, you won't see the search tool (or the labels). But that's OK, because you don't need no stinking search tool, right? 

Also, I've added a menu at the top with quick links to separate parts of this blog.

Happy holidays everyone!

Wall Street Banks’ Financial Dealings stump the Lord Almighty

Dateline: NEW YORK—A cabal of Wall Street bankers runs a global crime syndicate that buys the regulators of their industry, rigs the rules of the market, and uses convoluted financial instruments and bogus mathematical models to siphon cash from the majority of people in modern economies, according to many experts. However, no judge or jury has convicted the bankers of any crime, because no one other than the bankers understands exactly how they’re doing what they’re doing.

“That’s all going to change,” said Laura Lickspittle, head of the US Securities and Exchange Commission, which is supposed to regulate the black hole that is the financial securities industry. “As our critics point out, the SEC has resorted to employing a workforce of hundreds of trained monkeys instead of people, because of budget cuts and a lack of political will to learn about the nature of global financial fraud. As you can probably tell from my fur, I myself am merely a monkey.

“But we begged Washington for assistance. ‘Mr. President,’ I told him, ‘you know, we’re just a lot of shrieking monkeys over here compared to the diabolical masterminds we’re up against. We need help.’”

Help came in the form of aliens from another planet. “I had this ace in my back pocket,” said the president. “We’d made secret contact with the Poindexters years ago. Now we’ve asked them to prosecute the Wall Street bankers and they’ve agreed.”

The Poindexters are an advanced extraterrestrial species specializing in the science that sustains a number of intergalactic empires. “We conquer planets before breakfast,” said the top Poindexter adjudicator, upon the alien race’s arrival on Earth. “So we think we can figure out what your bankers are doing to you.”

The trial lasted several weeks, during which time the Poindexter attorneys struggled to explain the alleged financial crimes to a jury and to counter the Wall Street lawyers’ obfuscations. The prosecutors’ efforts were hampered by the jury’s inability to stay awake for much of the trial.

In the end, when the jury voted to acquit on all charges, the Poindexters conceded defeat. “We tried to untangle the bankers’ sinister schemes. We really did. But these guys are friggin criminal geniuses. I mean, come on! In fact, we’d like to take them off your hands for you. We could use their weapons of mass economic destruction—however the hell those weapons work.”

The bankers refused to leave Earth, which led the president to invoke Plan B. “I’m shooting for the fences on this one,” he said. “I happen to have a second back channel. This time, I’m calling on God.”

With transcendent splendor, the creator of the universe materialized in front of the White House. His voice boomed as he declared, “I’m not supposed to be judging anyone yet, but I’ve had a look at the evidence. As to how the bankers’ financial instruments work, I’m stumped. I don’t have the foggiest idea what those wonks are up to—and I design universes for a living, so this doesn’t sit well with me.”

God vanished and the stock market shot up a million points.

Robopundit Alex Castellanos soft sells Republican Anarchism

Dateline: PALO ALTO—Robotics Corp, a Fortune 500 company, treated reporters to a behind-the-scenes look at the manufacturing of their preprogramed artificial persons for use in selling conservative policies in the United States. The featured model is called the Alex Castellanos, which belongs to the company’s Moderation Class of automata.

“We have three classes of automated pundits that we design and assemble here at Robotics Corp,” boasted the CEO Tom Fiddlesticks. “There’s the Mad Dog, which we license exclusively to Fox News. There’s the Neuter, used mostly on liberal networks like MSNBC. The Neuter we just program to sound more or less like liberals so it can then quibble with the liberal pundits and distract and confuse the viewers. And then there’s my favourite class, the Moderate, which is featured on networks like CNN that appeal to viewers who pretend they can tell the difference between facts and infotainment.”

Often mistaken for a flesh and blood person, the robopundit Alex Castellanos has worked on numerous Republican presidential campaigns, including George W. Bush’s, and is billed as a guest commentator on CNN where he sells right-wing policies which, if enacted, would usher in a nakedly plutocratic and neofeudal slaughterhouse the likes of which hasn’t offended the conscience since the age of the robber barons.

“What I love most about the Castellanos model are the little details,” said Mr. Fiddlesticks. “Castellanos’s facial features and voice were designed to make the Republican policies he defends seem as harmless as possible. The sad, drooping eyelids, the well-groomed moustache, the extra pounds in the cheeks and throat which put at ease the average, obese American viewer; and then there’s the real kicker, which is his voice. The timbre was calculated to be silky-smooth and winsome so that no matter how atrocious the implications of what this robot is saying, you just want to wrap yourself up in a warm blanket and fall asleep listening to more of what he’s selling. It’s a thing of beauty.”

The Castellanos model never loses its temper on television, assured Mr. Fiddlesticks. “His programming forbids it, whereas the Mad Dog model is just the opposite. Castellanos masterfully soft sells even the most demonic of Republican ravings. He can mitigate the worst of the horrors that creep and crawl out of the Republican Party.”

Thanks to the narrow parameters of television punditry, only the top half of robopundits need be manufactured. So when a live CNN segment has been aired, a team of handlers wheels the legless Alex Castellanos off stage and into a portable engineering station for daily maintenance. Said Mr. Fiddlesticks, “The engineers will grease the moustache, test the voice modulator, and buff the eyeballs so they twinkle just right. For that winning smile, they’ll use car wax.”

As Robotics Corp’s financials indicate, there’s a booming market for conservative robopundits. “Viewers have a superabundance of information on the internet,” explains Mr. Fiddlesticks, “so plutocrats face the challenge of managing public opinion in the face of the grotesque lopsidedness of their policies.” Most observers around the world agree that only the top one percent of the American population benefits from the Republican platform, just as only the handful of aristocratic families lived in luxury during the medieval Dark Age while the massive peasantry toiled all day and subsisted on gruel.

Love or Disgust? A Christian debates a Misanthrope

            Standing on a downtown street corner was a new monastic Christian named Jason, who wore a sort of monk’s robe with a large hood, long dreadlocks, and glasses. Beside Jason was a crude sign saying “Jesus was homeless.” Jason bid passersby a good morning, most of whom ignored him completely, but when one fellow crossed his path—a balding man in shabby clothes—the fellow smiled and Jason asked, “Why are you smiling, friend?”

“I just thought you were staging some sort of postmodern play or performance art, since you look like a medieval monk or something.”

“I’m just a Christian.”

“Yeah, I can tell that from your sign, but you’re not what someone would expect from a Christian nowadays.”

“No, I’m not. I agree completely. I should be more specific and identify myself as a new monastic Christian. It’s a Christian movement dedicated to getting at the essence of Jesus’s message and making it relevant to the modern world.”

Authentic Christianity

            “What’s that essence?”

            “To love fellow people as much as you love yourself.”

            “Alright and how is that relevant today?”

            “Well, Jesus’s message is relevant in that it’s radical in our egoistic societies. After modern science and capitalism and democracy, not to mention the flawed examples set by most Western churches, it’s subversive to speak of the moral imperative to love each other as companions in this fallen world. Instead, we’re taught to look out mainly for ourselves, to compete and horde possessions like dragons, to fight and kill, to divide and conquer. Jesus’s message amounts to radical egalitarianism and socialism. If practiced, it would set the modern world on fire.”

            “Are you saying the Church should be a humanistic, communist enterprise? Aren’t Christians supposed to glorify Jesus and recognize that they can’t do anything right themselves, that we’ve just got to grovel now and wait for Jesus to return to fix the world, because of our tendency to corrupt everything?”

            “Ha ha! No, that’s the ‘conservative Christian’ distortion of Jesus’s message. You’ll hear it from these so-called evangelical Christians who are in bed with the most anti-spiritual libertarians and crony capitalists you’ll ever want to meet. They say we’ve got to idolize the Bible, follow its every letter, and worship Jesus. I do think Jesus was divine, but God didn’t make me a simpleton. I happen to know about the political and theological divisions between the early Christian sects which led to the canonization of scripture.

“The Bible is a political document, you know. The Gnostics and the Jewish Christians under James became marginalized and the winners got to write Church history to rationalize their compromise with the Roman Empire. The Gnostics taught individual empowerment through the divine power within each of us, while the universalists wanted to establish a global version of Judaism for the gentiles, under a power hierarchy headed by a Caesar-like pope with absolute authority through the Holy Spirit. And so they interpreted Paul’s letters, forged some others, and selected some interpolated gospel narratives to support those ambitions.

“By the time you reach modern Christianity, you’re talking about grotesque political compromises that are antithetical to what Jesus’s life was about. You have to read between the lines provided by the Catholic Church, which won out in the early power struggle, but Jesus was clearly a socialist, a pacifist, and an uncompromising moralist. He was a spiritual visionary with his eyes set on an ideal world. Compared with his ideal, the real world is revolting, and he lived with that contrast in mind. That’s why he didn’t care about earthly happiness. We’ll be happy in heaven, where we belong.”

“So it’s left versus right-wing Christians, is that it? Each reads into Jesus what they want to see. Leftists want a radical Marxist and conservatives want an authoritarian to rubberstamp our animalistic side, our tendency to divide into warring groups of rich and poor, friend and foe, patriot and traitor.”

“I’m curious where you’re coming at this from, friend, since you sound like you’ve put some thought into this already. But I agree that that’s what the conservatives are doing. However, new monasticism isn’t the same as liberalism or socialism. There’s some overlap on various social issues, such as vegetarianism, the death penalty, wealth distribution, and so on, but I’m an ascetic like Jesus. Liberals defend private property and communists worship the state. I don’t say the state should have totalitarian control over all the nation’s wealth, but I also think we have a moral and a spiritual duty to think long-term and to care most about what’s really important, which is each other’s welfare, not about signaling how much more happy and popular we are on account of our wealth and power. We should voluntarily renounce much of what we take for granted, because it’s bad for our spiritual well-being. And I don’t worship the state. I worship the divine spark of consciousness in each of us, which makes us truly equal.”

“Hmm. I can go along with much of that, as it turns out. But there are sticking points…”

RWUG News

Hi, all! Hope you're having a pleasant holiday. 

Thanks to all of you who bought my first novel, God Decays. I wanted to let you know that a reader has set up a forum to discuss the book, and that I've started writing the sequel. 

Also, I'm planning to invade YouTube soon, to let everyone there know that they're trapped within an undead god. That should be fun. 

On another note, my satirical news pieces are appearing also on websites that specialize in that sort of thing, such as GlossyNews and The Spoof. If you like satirical writing, you'll find a lot more of it on those sites. When I've written enough of those articles, I'll collect them in a special PDF.

Cheers! 

Smart Phones Turn their Users into Assholes, Researchers say

Dateline: BERKELEY—While many Americans are reeling from the news that the NSA is spying on their locations by tracking their mobile devices, social scientists are concerned about a more existential threat: those devices are turning people into assholes.

Ordinary users of smart phones, eReaders, and the like are noticing the change. Said one, “A decade ago, you used to be able to have a friendly chat with a stranger. But now everyone’s always wired in; they’re looking down at their mini computers, texting or tweeting someone, googling this or that, or playing a game app. You’ll be asking someone a question and he’ll be multitasking, giving you only half his attention while he’s checking his email.”

Social scientists at UC Berkeley have a theory to explain what’s happening. They call it assholization. It began long ago, they say, at the dawn of technology. Tools made us more efficient and powerful and that started turning our ancient ancestors into assholes. “It’s largely just a matter of being corrupted by power,” says Dr. Stanley Pishposh, the lead researcher at Berkeley studying this phenomenon. “At one point, long, long ago, we must have been settling disputes with just our fists. Then we invented the ax and those earliest ax users were perhaps the first full-fledged assholes to walk the planet. They bullied those without axes, you see. Again, we used to have to run from here to there. Then we domesticated horses and you had the rise of the nobles who could afford them—again, big-time assholes, thanks to that advance in technology.

“Then the car replaced the horse and you saw this exponential increase in assholization. Now there’s road rage and street racing and running through stop signs and monster truck rallies. There are the drivers that cut you off and drive slowly in the passing lane and give you the finger and sell you a lemon of a used car and key your car doors and listen to assholian talk show hosts on the car radio. Cars have made us even bigger assholes.

“Finally, there’s computerization, which really tips the scales. Technologies like the internet and mobile devices make us incredibly more powerful than our ancestors, which naturally corrupts us all the more. You have anonymity on the internet which turns people into trolls terrorizing cyberspace. You’ve got curt emails, intelligence-draining tweets, and assholes showing their penises in video chat rooms. You’ve got computer viruses and spam and popup ads, all brought to you by monumental assholes.”

We used to have to rely on morality or the law to defend us when we couldn’t ensure our security because we had so few tools, but now we have an army of machines that makes us feel invincible. According to Dr. Pishposh, “nine times out of ten, a primate with nothing to fear acts like an asshole.”

The researchers hypothesize that we’re adapting to an environment that contains more and more machines, which makes us more robotic in our thinking and behaviour. “Computers don’t yet have much emotional capacity,” explains Dr. Pishposh. “There’s something about programming a computer with a lot of math and logic; you don’t get much intuition or feeling out of that machine. So assholization itself begins with the advent of technology. An ax is an asshole. Just try dropping one on your foot and you’ll see what I mean. The ax won’t get out of the way, let me tell you. And a car is a big, whopping asshole. Cars kill people all the time, the buggers. And computers, too—assholes, the lot of them. They cost an arm and a leg, they always crash on you, and you think your porn is well-hidden, but no it turns out you forgot to password-protect one of the directories and then your wife finds it. I hate it when that happens.