Many of our terms for freedom have religious origin in the rough phrase 'freedom from debt' - more and much wider than than Xtian kicking over the tables of the money-lenders. There have been many debt jubilees in history, often on the death of a 'king'. Debt slavery is and has been much wider in human communities than most seem to know. We are not widely informed on biology and anthropology in this regard. Religion can raise the best and worst in us. Much of it raises the notion of adherents as some kind of chosen people, sometimes restricted to the in-group blood line. The Yazidi are such an example.
Chimps seem to have a form of 'religion' connected with the seasons - as many of our belief systems. I saw footage of some southeast Asian spiders this morning - they lay eggs in a central tower surrounded by a henge - immediately bringing Stonehenge to my mind, though they don't hack stones to shape. Religion raises Facil's 'we might both (all) be wrong' phrase to my mind, something often missing in our argument despite knowledge that we can make many equally powerful arguments about the same stuff (Sextus Empiricus). To judge between arguments we need something mystical (religious). I say this as a scientist knowing magic wands don't work. Religion could be rebellion, a postmodern moment, oversimplifying to the extreme, of incredulity towards metanarratives like government, law and economics - a dreamtime against material and spiritual debt-rules. Black holes have recently become 'grey', but dreamtime might challenge the geometry we use. Global warming and much else on pollution challenges us to think 'This Changes Everything' (Naomi Klein) - the economics of 'we can never afford to do the right things' in my view. So what does religion offer on the postmodern moment of rebellion? -- --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups ""Minds Eye"" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
