God, War, and Climate Change
And a burning question for the 21st century.
The following are random thoughts that will be more adaquately addressed in a more comprehensive article in the near future. These ideas will hopefully serve as food for thought, whether you’re relaxing at home with nothing to do or in the busy streets of the city. Please think deeply about these things. We should always do our best to remember Socrates: the unexamined life is not worth living. Hope you enjoy.
I find one thing particularly interesting about the human species. We humans have well established ourselves—evidenced by thousands of wars, races between nations for more and more powerful technology, attempts at exterminating entire peoples, and countless power-grabs by despots—as the most selfish organisms on Earth. We have managed, somehow, to be the most obviously intelligent species on the planet, and yet, simultaneously, we have also made clear that we are the most self-destructive (and indeed destructive in general) species on the planet by far.
Take Silent Spring, the book that famously launched the environmental movement in the States just 55-ish years ago. In it, Rachel Carson lays out her case brilliantly, crediting the ingenius side of humankind for its groundbreaking accomplishments in the hard sciences but critizing it’s inherent and very visible flaws with regards to ethics, hubris, and a strange tendency for self-destruction. Philosopher and famous public intellectual Yuval Noah Harari would disagree with Carson, arguing that no—humans are not naturally flawed or perfect; rather, we simply act off the information given to us. For example, if a young man was born in Nazi Germany and knew nothing else, how could that person have turned out to be “good”? Perhaps their parents were opposed to the regime? Maybe they managed to get ahold of some banned books and were “enlightened”? In most cases, neither—and, therefore, most young men ultimately joined the Nazi Party and committed unthinkable atrocities. The arguments on both sides seem meritable, and I’ll do a deeper dive after I’ve finished reading some more Rousseau and Hobbes. I suggest you join me in that endeavor!
Additionally, there are many examples from the past showing that humans do come together in incredible ways to achieve large goals. These times of mass unity and cooperation are often—if not every time in history—in times of dire existential threats. The most immediate example that floats to the top of my brain is World War II. There was so much human ingenuity that was awakened during WWII it’s almost difficult to comprehend. How’s it possible that just 122 years ago, the first plane looked like a sketchy homemade glider made of paper (because that’s what it was essentially, though I’m exaggerating) and today the planes are simply magnificent and a marvel of human engineering? I mean, just search up a picture of the inside of the cockpit, or the inside of the engines, or the wings, or the walls—it’s incredible! Huge advances were made in chemistry, biology, communications, technology—and yet, similar advances were not found in philosophy. Why?
My ultimate question is this: why is it that people visciously fight things they directly see, whilst concurrently ignoring much greater issues they indirectly see, while simultaneously believing something that doesn’t necessarily exist?
Put differently, why do (many) people fight or support wars against their neighbors, while ignoring climate change and believing so deeply in God?
To be continued.
