While it may very well be that all that we are nothing but a cosmic soup of atomic matter, it certainly does seem that humanity has the unique ability to stir the pot.

As of late, I have given some thought to the arguments of Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Edward Wilson, Peter Singer and a number of other players in the current debates about God, morality, and evolutionary biology.  Their basic premise seems to be that what it means to be human or a part of nature can only be explained by evolutionary theory.  Moreover, this theory leads the to the inexorable conclusion that all can be reduced to an explanation as to how atomic physics have played out in the last however many billion years or so. (See, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universe ). Nary a thought is given to the real fact that all of us have an epistemological gap between us and the beginning of time, such that no present explanation of our world can suffice to explain it entirely.  God does readily fill that epistemological void.

While it may very well be that all that we (and the universe we have our be-ing in) are nothing but a cosmic soup of atomic matter, it certainly does seem that humanity has the unique ability to stir the pot.  This ability is seen nowhere else in the ‘natural world.’  Indeed, it is this very deviation from cosmic destiny, evolutionary theory, or even simple neuro-psychology, that uniquely defines what it is to be human.

Unlike the natural world, we are not dependent on the synchronicity of our coexistence with/in  the many moving and interactive elements of the earth’s evolved environment.  Ostensibly, we are readily able to defy what nature might otherwise dictate.  Singer and others have, rather oddly, concluded that behavior which defies nature is somehow ignoble or immoral.  Isn’t everything “natural,” in the sense that all that is must be derivative of evolutionary processes and atomic destiny?  What possible moral difference could stirring the pot of cosmic existence make, if we can only have derived our ability to stir the pot from the very substance found in the pot?  There has to be a clear distinction made between the subject and objects confronted by human existence.

As an aside, this does not mean that morality would have to be completely dependent on some traditional notion of God. It is simply a matter of distinguishing a difference between intentionality, conscious acknowledgment and the human experience of what is “moral,” from that which is simply a byproduct of evolutionary necessity and atomic structure. Whether these aspects are distinguishable from each other is the question that Professor Dawkins raises. The conceptual parsing done by Dawkins is actually quite admirable and necessary to the understanding of either side’s argument.

Moreover, it seems readily apparent that the process of evolution for the ‘natural world’ moves at the same pace as it has from the beginning of time (barring any natural disasters).  Animals and plants are not dependent on us for their existence in a natural state.  They only evolve at certain scientifically definable rates in accordance with the environmental variables which govern the process.

Simply put, humans command the ability to even deprive ourselves of the natural synchronicity with nature.  It is indeed arguable that we sometimes separate from nature and defy it.   At a minimum, we stand out from nature.  For example, a lion cannot simply redefine itself or make claim to an existence other than that which it has at its essence. A view toward’s Heidegger’s philosophy on death would also underscore the reality that humans are perfectly capable of  experiencing “unnatural” deaths.  Most lions and other creatures will die substantially the same way and of the same causes.  Humans, however, bear a capacity for defining even the parameters of our own deaths.  Certainly, our nearest alleged “relatives,” chimpanzees, can hardly lay stake to such abilities.  In other words, there is something about the human experience that can be completely differentiated from that of the animal experience.  Indeed, this statement can be made even without accounting for the unique capacity of humans to conceive of [a] God, to understand beauty, and to engage in the fine arts.

Nevertheless, we can rightly claim that humans engage in unnatural acts.  They engage in acts that defy natural selection and the otherwise undisturbed progression of the natural world outside of humanity.  Animals are not generally self destructive in any real way.  Humans, on the other hand, are completely competent to destroy themselves and everything else around them.  Indeed, humankind is readily able to change its environment quickly and drastically.  And, in so changing, it becomes apparent that we are the only creatures on earth that are capable of self-directed evolution, even to the point of destroying ourselves.   Seemingly, evolutionists are ready to deprive of humankind of this sacred and distinct attribute shared by no other living creatures.

Frankly, it seems inconsistent to stand by an evolutionary biology explanans for why things are the way they are, and yet complain about the seemingly out of control, or even allegedly  immoral, progress of humanity.  Morality simply has no place in a universe driven only by the predisposed nature of atomic structures and the rules of physics to which they are bound.  In a very important sense, the effect of human existence on the environment is no less evolutionary or atomically driven than any other process that is claimed to have arisen from a purely evolutionary beginning.  That is, if one believes that all must have come from simple existence which led to a graduated complexity.

In order to speak of “moral” behavior, one must first believe that there is some constituent part of the universe which can be moral or act in a moral way.  If we rely simply on the synaptic firing of our neurons, coupled with a genetic destiny, it simply does not make sense to incorporate a moral lexicon into human existence.  However, if one believes that moral behavior is a step above, or uniquely differentiated from, the coldness of evolutionary survival of the species, it must follow that one believes that there is a higher arche to the human existence.  Whether this is attributable to God or a higher being/be-ing (a template for higher being or a more complex nature outside of the natural rules that apply to all other creatures), or not, seems to be the real question.

There are a good number of evolutionary biologists and philosophers of our time who readily conclude that all of human existence can simply be explained by reference to the primordial atomic soup from which all has evolved.  They do not explain where the atomic structure/fabric came from, they do not explain the source of the energy driving all that is, they ignore or gloss over the origins of art and beauty, and they completely ignore the obvious fact that the human line of species significantly deviates from otherwise predictable genetic destinies or even basic natural evolution of the rest of nature and its evolving complexity.

At first glance, the basic problem with evolutionary biology is that it rests upon what appears to be a purely linear view of the time-space continuum.  This purely linear view adds an unnecessary viscosity to the stream of the cosmos and nature itself. The evolutionists view does not account for the fact that all matter, or representations of matter, derive from an admittedly common source and theoretical moment of being put in motion.  That is, all things that can be perceived in the real world are the same age by reference to atomic matter, interactivity, and movement of the cosmos.

The only difference between one atomic structure and another is the ‘present’ constituency of the thing perceived.  Under a non-linear view of time, it may just be the case that the “age” of things is a function of where they are in the movement of the “cosmic swirl.”  An evolutionist should not confuse the properties of age with actual age — if time can even be said to be a good structure for cosmology.  If there was a single moment of creation, moving forward, differing “ages” of the atomic world’s constituents are not so obvious as to merit the conclusion that the universe actually is 13.7 to 37 billion years old or any other specific age for that matter.  If, at the time the cosmos was put in motion, certain aspects of reality were given characteristics in their atomic structure that give off the impression of being “older,” it may simply be that the evolutionist has been fooled in much the way a purchaser of art might be fooled by the acquisition of a good faux painting.  The thing acquired or perceived has all of the characteristics, but is lacking in the need of its original creator and an understanding of the process leading up to the perceived masterpiece.

In other words, the moment of creation may simply have been a stirring of the pot by an Omnipotent and wholly self sufficient Primary Mover.  A cyclical or interwoven time structure is not the same as a linear structure which starts from a given point and brings us to something called “today.”  The ’swirl’  of the cosmic mass we call reality should not be confused with a purely linear view of reality, upon which evolution must rely (i.e., reliance on a Big Bang, primordial soup, then various periods of evolution/advancement of varying species).  Obviously, if linear time is the framework for the edifice of evolution, there is a strong likelihood that evolutionary theory is defectively constructed.

Additionally, it seems that the atheist opposition confuses their perceived improbability of God with ultimate exclusion from the range of all possibilities.  In the view of Dawkins and his company, it is nearly an absolute truth that God does not exist.  Were it the case that Dawkins could overcome the long standing objections that might be made by George Berkeley as to the importance of human perception in all of this, perhaps a better argument could be made.  However, Dawkins and his crew presuppose the validity and concrete values of their perceptions and just assume that a consensus gentium argument will carry the day because a vast number of other evolutionary biologists happen to agree on the notion that God, Creationism or Intelligent Design are improbable or altogether wacky.  Solipsism remains a strong enemy of confidence in the truth values of our own perceptions.  In fact it does seem that the utility and efficacy of certain “memes” bears out this very problem.  Cultural evolution is a product of passed on perception, without necessary regard to or of principles deriving from mathematics or physics.

In order for anyone’s argument to work with respect to great cosmological arguments, it does seem that the veil of basic human perception must first be torn and put aside in favor of an unobstructed view of reality.  Humanity has proven itself quite incapable of divesting itself from its condition as a status which depends purely on the senses and humanized logic.  Professor Dawkins and his ilk may be assured that just as great a number of scientific theories have fallen, after ready acceptance by consensus, as have arguments for the existence of particular gods or ontologies.  In large part, it seems that the human defect of limited perception is the cause of a great number of these many failed scientific theories throughout history. Indeed, it seems apparent that our singular or collective experiences limit the conclusions to which we may arrive.  Experience naturally limits the parameters of what we can actually know.  Admittedly, the breadth of one’s “experience” can be widened with knowledge/exposure to mathematics, physics, chemistry, theory of biology, philosophy, and other areas of learning.  However, the expansion of theory is dependent on the limits of our own personal knowledge and that of our colleagues in thought.  The limits of humanity do not give way simply because one believes in evolutionary biology.

Father Time has proven himself to be a bitter enemy to the life span of most scientific theories.  As human perception ‘evolves,’ scientific theories die.  Sometimes they die by the weight of their own complexity or the simply are shown to be inconsistent with the collective perceptions of an advanced humanity.  Oddly, however, the explanatory value of a higher cause or higher being has not died since the conceivable beginnings of human thought about the source of our being and the reasons for our existence.  This may be simply because a belief in God does provide a fabric to all that is.  Or, it may just as well be that the vast majority of humans have perceived something that can only be described as God.  For as many scientists and theologians as there have been in history, there have probably been nearly as many fools among them.

The pervasive perception of God, or the empirical basis for the use of a word such as “God,” cannot be simply disregarded.  Simply because Dawkins has not personally perceived something that might be called God does not allow him to summarily dispense with any Wittgensteinean objections as to the limits of our language and ability to articulate what we experience.  It is undeniably the case that the Judeo-Christian view of the world has rather successfully sufficed to unite an advancing/progressive group of humans, indeed the entirety of Western Culture, of which Professor Dawkins would be a participant.  The “memes” of, or which are, Christianity have proven to be a rather powerful force by any account.  See generally, John 1:1-4 (KJV).

It seems to me that the evolutionists of our time ought to give some minor consideration to the thought that the theoretical explanans and the actual explanandum of human existence are conceivably different.  If truth be the sum of its complete, necessary and agreed upon conditions, the evolutionary biologists/theorists have plenty of agreement, but could not possibly have a complete or necessary epistemological basis for the ultimate truths they espouse.  Admittedly, the same applies for a strict historical or epistemological view of Christianity.

In the case of both Evolutionary Theory and the belief in God, there is indicia of pure religion.  Religion requires certain elements, which appear to be:  1.)  A redemptive or explanatory story for what is;  2.) An explanandum/definiendum which outside of complete human perception or experience;  3.) Preachers and prophets of the truth or content contained within the explanans/definiens; 4.) A body of the faithful who simply may have no epistemelogical basis for a belief in what is explained or the explanation itself; 5.) A desire to operate by explanatory fiat or ultimatum.  Zealotry on behalf of any such religion can lead to discord and unnecessary viscosity in the stream of otherwise valuable arguments.  Certainly, both sides of the Intelligent Design argument seem perfectly capable and willing to lift the sword toward the other.

Or it may very well be that the enemies of God are simply asking the wrong questions even about their own existence and be-ing (Dasein) in the Heideggerian sense.  Perhaps it is just that they think it important to “stir the pot” in the proverbial sense.  But what sense does it make to stir the pot if you’re in it?

 

 

<a href=”http://www.forexchecklist.com”>forex trading online</a>

Jag förespråkar atomistisk sammanhållning: att umgås med personer som berikar ens liv, att bara umgås med sådana, att (kunna) välja bort alla andra och att trivas med och stå stark även i ensamhet. Med andra ord: vänskap grundad i autonomi och reciprocitet. Kanske är det något sådant Edmund White har i tankarna när han skriver följande i sin bok City Boy (s. 27):

Maybe because I spent my forties and fifties in Paris, I later came to embrace the importance of the “milieu.” I could see that our American brand of Romantic individualism didn’t really amount to much; one was only as good as one’s circle, and a superior, stimulating milieu could raise the level of conversation, of sophistication, even of moral discrimination and esthetic refinement, certainly of ambition and accomplishment.

Se även inlägget “Vänskap”.

Jag ogillar starkt att bli approcherad på gatan av okända människor som ber mig att donera till olika ändamål. Inte därför att jag ser det som fel att organisationer försöker samla in pengar, ofta med ärliga motiv, utan därför att jag inte tycker om att bli approcherad av okända människor. Det är irriterande att bli stoppad i sina tankar när man är på väg någonstans och att behöva säga nej. (Jag säger bara ja till söta insamlare). Nå, nästa gång jag blir stoppad ska jag istället för att bara säga nej ställa de fyra frågor Bryan Caplan rekommenderar:

1. Aren’t you at least partly to blame for your problems?
2. Can’t someone closer to you help?
3. Isn’t there someone else in the world more deserving of my help?
4. Aren’t you a complete stranger?

Vi får se om det biter. Problemet kan bli att de vill veckla in sig i långa svar som jag inte har tid eller ork att lyssna på.

Niklas Ekdal i DN idag:

Är Sverige världens mest välmående samhälle därför att vi är så föga religiösa? Eller är vi föga religiösa därför att vi lever i världens tryggaste samhälle? För mig är det uppenbart att den sistnämnda tolkningen ligger närmast sanningen.

James Buchanan i “Afraid to Be Free: Dependency as Desideratum”:

For many, the state, as the collectivity, moved into the gap left by the demise of the church’s parental role. The individual who sought familylike protection, but who no longer sensed the presence of such protection in the church, or in God so embodied, found a substitute in the collectivity. The individual could feel that he or she “belonged” to the larger community and was necessarily dependent on that community. The death of God and the birth of the national state, and especially in its latter-day welfare state form, are the two sides of the coin of history in this respect.

Ja, det finns dilemman för en liberal ateist. Ska man föredra Skylla (en stor stat) eller Karybdis (livaktig religion)? Kan man tänka sig frånvaron av båda? Krävs då istället någon annan övergripande institution som ger individer trygghet och en känsla av sammanhang? Är tanken på autonoma utan en sådan institution orealistisk? Jag hoppas (delvis inspirerad av Nietzsche) inte det.

If you’re in the mood to read a great book about physics, there is no author I can recommend more highly than Richard Feynman, the great American physicist and teacher.  At the beginning of his famous Lectures on Physics delivered at CalTech (which you can find in Six Easy Pieces), Feynman remarked on the most important idea in science:

If, in some cataclysm, all of scientific knowledge were to be destroyed, and only one sentence passed on to the next generations of creatures, what statement would contain the most information in the fewest words? I believe it is the atomic hypothesis (or the atomic fact, or whatever you wish to call it) that all things are made of atoms—little particles that move around in perpetual motion, attracting each other when they are a little distance apart, but repelling upon being squeezed into one another.

There are a few reasons why this is such a powerful statement.  First of all, it emphasizes how absolutely crucial the idea of the atom is to our understanding of the universe.  If you play the game where you keep asking “why?” to every statement someone makes, at the end of the long sequence of why’s you will come to a statement about atoms (or, if you keep going past that, to the Big Bang).  This is especially evident if you play the physicists’ version of the “why” game, wherein you keep asking where did the energy come from? Writ large, the things we do are a result of our psychology, and our psychology is a result of our biology, and our biology — the workings of our mind and body — is a result of or so atoms all pushing and pulling on each other in complicated ways.  The atom absolutely reigns supreme in our understanding of Nature.

However, knowing that the world is made of atoms doesn’t do you any good if you don’t know how the atoms interact with one another.  That’s why Feynman didn’t end his statement at “all things are made of atoms”; it is imperative to our understanding of the world that we know something about how atoms push and pull on each other.  Knowing that atoms attract each other when they’re kind of close but repel when they are really close allows us to predict that atoms can pull together to form large structures without collapsing onto the same point.

But why is it true?  What is the origin of the attraction and repulsion between atoms?  After all, an atom is a neutral object: it has positive and negative charges that completely cancel each other, so why should it attract or repel another atom?  The answer is fairly subtle, and surprisingly poorly-known, given that it is fundamental to the “most important idea in science”.

Not a hypothesis any more

The belief that the universe is made of atoms is at least 2500 years old, but until fairly recently it was just that: a belief.  During the last 200 years or so the evidence for “atomism” grew increasingly strong, until it really became impossible to imagine an explanation for things that didn’t involve atoms.  But it was still sort of a matter of faith, in the sense that you couldn’t actually see an atom.

That is no longer the case.  I am sort of amazed to say that I live in an era when people can actually look at individual atoms through high-powered microscopes.  Below is a picture of a metal surface taken with an atomic force microscope.  The lighter atoms are tin, and the darker ones are silicon.

Of course an atom is not actually a hard ball; what you’re seeing is the electron cloud that surrounds each atom in a mostly-spherical shape.  And these days we can do a lot more than just see atoms; we can actually manipulate them individually.  The above image is from this paper, where scientists at Osaka University were able to rearrange silicon atoms one at a time to spell out “Si”.

It’s a little surprising to me that the first real picture of an atom wasn’t met with much fanfare.  I guess no one was surprised by it, but still, it would have been nice to have some kind of party to celebrate the culmination of 2,500 years of atomism.

Why atoms attract

Roughly speaking, an atom is made of two parts: the positive nucleus and the negative electron cloud.  And, most of the time, these parts exactly cancel each other so that the atom is neutral.  Here is a rough picture of one:

an (ugly) atom, with its positive nucleus in the middle and a negative electron cloud surrounding it

When the electron cloud is exactly centered around the nucleus, there is no electric field outside the atom.  Thus, the atom should not push or pull on anything else.  But it can happen that the electron cloud gets shifted to the side a little bit, so that it is no longer centered around the nucleus.  When that happens, electric forces pull on both the nucleus and the electron cloud to bring them back together.

The result is a kind of “atomic springiness”: when the nucleus gets separated a little from the center of the electron cloud, electric forces arise that pull the two back together.  And so the electron cloud can oscillate around the nucleus if it is disturbed a little bit.

As it turns out, the electron cloud is always oscillating around the nucleus.  This is a result of quantum mechanics, which says that any object in a trap (e.g. the electron cloud stuck in the potential well of the nucleus) will bounce around with a characteristic frequency.

So the electron cloud of an atom is not always centered around the nucleus, but rather is fluctuating back and forth.  And when the nucleus and the electron cloud are not centered, there is a resulting dipole moment, which means that there is an electric field surrounding the atom.  This field pulls on other nearby atoms.

Imagine, for a moment, two isolated atoms, each of which has an electron cloud oscillating around its nucleus.  At first the two atoms may have completely independent oscillations, but after a while the oscillations of one atom start to affect the other atom.  The two atoms start to oscillate together (in phase), so that the positive side of one atom is always facing the negative side of the other, and vice-versa.  As a result, the atoms begin to pull toward each other.  I imagine it something like this:

In physics language, we would say that the dipole field of one atom induces a dipole in the other atom, and we call this the Van der Waals force.  It’s pretty weak compared to the attraction between individual charges and it has a short range.  Of course, it’s still strong enough to allow geckos to climb on walls.

Why atoms repel

We’ve seen that atoms pull themselves together, but why should they stop?  Why not just keep pulling until the two atoms sit right on top of each other?

The answer, once again, comes down to quantum mechanics.  This time it involves the Pauli Exclusion principle, which says that two electrons cannot occupy the same space and have the same energy.  If we brought our two atoms extremely close together, then their electrons would occupy the same volume.  This cannot happen unless some of the electrons move to higher energy levels.  So pushing the atoms together requires a lot of energy: enough to move about half the electrons to a higher energy state.  And whenever moving in a particular direction costs energy, a force arises that pushes in the opposite direction.

Here is a schematic depiction of the process of pushing two atoms together:

The top row shows the atoms being pushed together and the bottom row (the little horizontal lines) shows the energy levels occupied by the electrons.  Once the electron clouds of the two atoms start to overlap, their electrons can no longer have the same energy, but must go to a higher energy state.  So the atoms would “prefer” to remain apart, at least enough that their electron clouds don’t overlap strongly.

There are lots of details that I’m omitting here.  The strength of the repulsion between atoms depends a lot on the structure of their electron clouds.  This is the rich and wonderful playground of chemistry.  The hydrogen atom, for example, has essentially no energy cost associated with being pushed into another hydrogen atom because there are two equivalent energy states for each of the electrons to occupy.  A helium atom, on the other hand, repels other heliums fairly strongly because there is a big difference between the energy level for the first two electrons and the energy level for the second two.  That’s why hydrogen atoms naturally form the molecule but helium atoms remain separated.

Putting it together: Lennard-Jones

The attraction and repulsion of atoms is often put together to form something called the “Lennard-Jones” potential, which looks something like this:

On the attractive side, the force goes to zero like , where r is the distance between atoms.  This law is fairly easy to derive by thinking about “one dipole inducing another”.  The repulsive side has the force going to infinity like .  I don’t know of any derivation of this fairly strange result, and as far as I know it is a purely experimental fact.

Med newageiga ‘jobbcoacher’ och scientologibeundran bland M:s och FP:s politiker undrar man om tvångsupprepningen i än mer enhetlig kongruens med det totalitära 30-talet nu också inkluderar spiritistisk ockultism på brutalkitschigt återtåg.

Om (S)-skolan var “vänsterflum“, vad är då inte “högerflummet” i jämförelse?  Särskilt om man dristar sig till en historisk betraktelse av alla de extremt flummiga högervridningar som förekommit i historien.

1930-talets högerextremism var ju som bekant djupt religiös. Nazisterna gick till och med så långt att man i det ‘eklektiska’ skapandet av sin nyhedniska religion via geopolitikens Karl Haushofer och ariosofen Guido van List samt gruvingenjören och amatörastronomen Hans Hoerbiger m fl tog djupt intryck av Madame Blavatskys teosofi. 

Karl Haushofer var inspirerad av den svenske högerpolitikern och statsvetaren Rudolf Kjellén när han skapade sin geopolitiska teori om ”Lebensraum“. Enligt vissa var Haushofer därutöver även initierad i tibetanska Bonpasprästerskap med påstådda kopplingar till indisk thugeekult och assassinernas mördarsekt.  Hitler hade en personlig astrolog , man hade en astrologihögskola osv.

Enligt Thomas Nydahls recension av  Göran Dahls granskning av högerextrema böjelser för New Age-liknande tankar i boken Nazister – radikalare än Hitler? sägs om de “gröna nazisterna”:

“Vi får lära känna “superfascisten” Julius Evola, sufiern René Guénon, religionshistorikern och antisemiten Mircea Eliade, förre missionären Jakob Wilhelm Hauer som tog bort förnamnet Jakob för att “det var av judiskt ursprung”, ariosofer som Guido von List (den passionerade alpinisten), gruvingenjören och amatörastronomen Hanns Hörbiger från Österrike, “genrens knäppgök nummer ett” Wilhelm Landig och en rad andra, mer eller mindre obskyra men för den tiden viktiga, och inflytelserika figurer, liksom vi får sidoblickar på vad män som Wagner, Nietzsche och Strindberg spelade för roller i dramat.”

Vidare:

“Men det kanske allra viktigaste i boken är att Dahl också tecknar ett slag samtids- och framtidsperspektiv. Han gör det via ett kusligt kapitel om nazismens arabiska förbindelser, där han visar hur tongivande nazimakthavare efter det tyska nederlaget etablerade sig i arabvärlden och därifrån spred sin antijudiska politik. Kapitlet om tiden efter 1989 hakar i där denna mellanperiod upphör och analyserar det som ibland kallas “den nya högern”.”

Och enligt ett examensarbete “New Age i studieförbunden - ett fenomen i tiden”, så dras följande slutsatser angående Medborgarskolan – Moderaternas studieförbund (s 43):

“Resultatet av min undersökning har visat att Medborgarskolan är det studieförbund som helt klart har flest New Age-inslag i kursutbudet. Medborgarskolan har som mål att erbjuda ett så mångskiftande kursutbud som möjligt. Man betonar vidare att man som studieförbund måste vara beredd att anpassa sig efter samhällsförändringarna och dess nya förutsättningar. Detta är viktigt eftersom förväntningarna från både staten och allmänheten förändras snabbt. Det är enligt min mening ganska uppenbart att New Age-inspirerade cirklar anordnas just för att de efterfrågas ‘av marknaden’. Om man studerar Medborgarskolans historia tycker jag heller inte att det är särskilt konstigt att just Medborgarskolan är mest positiv till att anordna New Age-inspirerade cirklar. Eftersom Medborgarskolan inte anser sig vara särskilt bunden till sin huvudman är det naturligt att man gör sina egna val. Men enligt min uppfattning är det just huvudmannens nyliberalism man följer då man är mån om att följa marknaden och ge folk det de vill ha. Vidare kan Medborgarskolans intresse för kulturarv och kulturtraditioner bidra till intresset för New Age. Stora delar av New Age handlar ju om återupplivandet av gamla kulturer. Här spelar enligt min uppfattning också den ideologiska konservatismen hos huvudmannen stor roll.”

Så vad händer när det visar sig att jobbcoachernas affirmationer inte leder till att de nu mer än 500 000 arbetslösa ’snabbt kommer i jobb‘ utan tvärtom förblir lika arbetslösa som innan, i takt med att massarbetslösheten växer?

Vem skall man skylla på då? Tänker de för negativt? Måste de gå i aromaterapi och kristallhealing? Om inte det heller hjälper? Vem ska bota dem från det negativa tänkande som vi har anledning att misstänka kommer att skapas av världsdepressionens Jantelag, när den lägrar sig över klotet och tar ett järngrepp på mänskligheten?

Om vi då alla åkallar Tom Cruise samtidigt, kommer han med sina scientologlegioner och sitt varggrin och räddar oss?

Läs: Aftonbladet: “Arbetslösa erbjuds kosmisk energi”,    Aftonbladet: “Fick 891 000 utan att jobba”,  Sydsvenskan: “Malmöpolitiker hyllade scientologer vid invigning“, Politikerbloggen, Aftonbladet: “Moderaten Maj Steen pratar med andra sidan”,  SR,  Expressen, AB3, AB4,   AB5,   Expressen2,  DN1,   SVD1,  DN2,  AB6,    SVD2,  AB7,    SVD: “Ovanligt med fusk-examen på så hög nivå“,

Se: Recension av Göran Dahl Nazister – radikalare än Hitler?, Nazism and the New Age, Hitler and the Occult, “Space Aliens from the Pentagon” – diverse teorier om UFO-teoriernas koppling till Hitlers guru Hans Hoerbiger och även koppling till New Age-profeten Edgar Cayce

Läs Bloggarna: Tant Grön – “Massarbetslöshet väntar – fler jobbcoacher åt folket“, Den Osynliga Patienten, Annarkia – “Valfrihetens dilemma och nyliberalismens våndor”,  Åsikter om allt – en konservativ humanists åsikter: “Arbetsförmedlingen för vem?”,   Alliansfritt Sverige: “Om jobbcoacher och vidareutbildning“,  Reflections by Margareth Osju: “Kosmiska reflektioner//energisökning via AF“, LOKE – Kultur och politik: “Individualism föder nyandlighet“, Törnebohms hotspot: “Arbetsförmedlingen och Flower Power“, ADHD uppmärksammas koncentrerat: “ADHD Handbok och jobbig New Age Coaching“,  Ett hjärta RÖTT, Bokmalen: “Detta går bra att använda våra skattepengar till“, Mina Moderata Karameller: “Hur får man jobb som coach på Arbetsförmedlingen“, Linapans historier: “Andliga coacher ska hjälpa arbetslösa“, jonas en annan tid ett annat liv: “Bluff Otto ger upp“, friktion: 6 år i Lund utan examen,  Unga Humanister i Småland: “Maj Steen utnyttjar människor!”, Claes Krantz: “Spöktroende moderater”, Politikerbloggen: “Toppolitikern tror på spöken – håller seanser mot betalning“, Att älska Alex Schulman, Lantis i storstan: “Religioner är farliga“, Madonnan, Skvallerbitchen: “Och ungefär där föll Will Smith“,  Alliansupproret,     Kulturbloggen,  Mina Moderata Karameller: Politiker och bloggar,   Kent Persson (M),  Opinionsbloggen,  In Your Face,  Badlands hyena: (S)anningen om (S)ahlin mörkläggs

Se tidigare bloggposter: Den socialmoderata (M)enigheten, Del II – Den sovande regeringen ZZ,

Arthur Schopenhauer går i Parerga und Paralipomena till djurens värld, närmare bestämt till piggsvinen, för att visa på för- och nackdelar med att leva tillsammans med andra:

A number of porcupines huddled together for warmth on a cold day in winter; but, as they began to prick one another with their quills, they were obliged to disperse. However the cold drove them together again, when just the same thing happened. At last, after many turns of huddling and dispersing, they discovered that they would be best off by remaining at a little distance from one another. In the same way the need of society drives the human porcupines together, only to be mutually repelled by the many prickly and disagreeable qualities of their nature. The moderate distance which they at last discover to be the only tolerable condition of intercourse, is the code of politeness and fine manners; and those who transgress it are roughly told—in the English phrase—to keep their distance. By this arrangement the mutual need of warmth is only very moderately satisfied; but then people do not get pricked. A man who has some heat in himself prefers to remain outside, where he will neither prick other people nor get pricked himself.

Jag gillar också “moderate distance” till andra — det som kan kallas atomistisk sammanhållning — och håller, apropå den sista meningen, värmen rätt bra själv.

Den 30-årige huvudpersonen i Ferdydurke, en roman av Witold Gombrowicz, känner av kostnaden av att ingå i ett socialt sammanhang:

Vilken förbannelse att det inte finns något fast och slutgiltig ordning i våra liv på denna planet, att allting här är i evig rörelse, i ständig växling, att var och en måste förstås och uppskattas av sin nästa, och att vad dumma och inskränkta tänker om oss skall vara lika viktigt som vad kloka, subtila och skarpsynta tänker! Ty djupast är människan avhängig av den bild av henne som skapas i en annans själ, även om den själen är en kretins. Och jag protesterar med all kraft mot dem av mina kollegor som intar en aristokratiskt föraktande attityd inför de okunnigas åsikter och säger: Odi profanum vulgus. Vilken billig undanflykt, vilket eländigt sätt att smita undan från verkligheten i förljugen inbilskhet! Tvärtom hävdar jag att ju dummare och mer eländig kritiken är, desto mer klämmer den åt, precis som en sko som är för trång.

Åh, dessa mänskliga åsikter, denna avgrund av omdömen och åsikter om ens intelligens, om ens hjärta och varenda detalj i ens varelse som släpps loss när man varit oförsiktig nog att klä sina egna tankar i ord, sätta dem på papper och sprida dem bland människor! Åh, papper, papper! Ord! Ord! … Och så har vi lantjunkarnas åsikter, pensionärernas, de lägre ämbetsmännens småaktiga kritik och de högre ämbetsmännens byråkratiska domar, landsortsadvokaternas ställningstaganden och de ungas extremistiska åsikter, gamla herrars hänförda meningar för att nu inte tala om doktorinnors, barns, kvinnliga kusiners, jungfrurs och kokerskors åsikter, ett helt hav av åsikter som definierar oss och formar oss i andra människors själar. Det är som att födas i tusentals trånga små själar! (s.10—11)

Det finns starka skäl för social distans, atomism och autonomi. Talet om gemenskap och sammanhållning som enbart goda företeelser bör avvisas. De lägre ämbetsmännens småaktiga kritik, bara en sådan sak!

Se de tidigare inläggen “Är tillit mellan människor enbart bra?”, “Atomistisk sammanhållning” och “Konflikten mellan individualism och sammanhållning”

Henrik von Sydow är bra på många sätt, men jag kan inte dölja min besvikelse över denna skrivning i Expressen:

För egen del är jag, numera, anhängare av vår monarki. Kungens agerande vid tsunamikatastrofen vintern 2005 bevisade att det traditionella och konstitutionella argumentet för monarki var giltigt och relevant också i Sverige på 2000-talet. Vi behöver, uppenbart i kristider, offentliga institutioner som är genuint gemensamma, samlande och icke-politiska. 

Är detta det främsta argumentet för monarki? Behövs den för att vi behöver en folkpsykolog? Behöver man hjälp vid en kris föreställer jag mig att det finns skickligare terapeuter än Carl XVI Gustaf. Rent allmänt finner jag det kollektivistiska språkbruket störande. Vilka är dessa “vi”? Vadan detta behov av “gemensam” tröst? Vad menas med idén att man ska “samlas”? Och hur i hela friden klarar sig människor i republiker vid kriser? Man undrar, man undrar.

Se tidigare inlägg: “Obegriplig sorg”, “Bort med monarkin”, “Argument för republik”, “Balans i statsskicket”
Tips: Dennis Josefsson. Media: Göran Skytte, PJ

Lorca

I en fin essä, “Bödeln och poeten”, skriver Henrik Berggren om Spaniens tidigare diktator Francisco Franco och författaren Federico García Lorca: 

De var helt olika, men deras livsöden hade en sak gemensamt. Båda formades av två av den moderna europeiska historiens mäktigaste krafter: nationen och familjen. Allt av Francos våld och förtryck syftade till att upprätthålla dessa institutioner; Lorcas poesi och dramatik försöker spränga dem. Ändå är det inte så enkelt som att Franco var för och Lorca emot familjen och nationen. I deras egna liv var det paradoxalt nog Lorca som hade det mest harmoniska förhållandet till sin egen familj och kultur medan Franco med våld försökte skapa en familjelycka och ett Spanien som aldrig funnits.

Det jag särskilt fastnade för var just beskrivningen av Lorcas relation till den lilla världen: till familjen och  hembygden. 

Lorcas förhållande till sin familj var också ambivalent. Å ena sidan utgjorde familjen ett skydd och stöd som han inte kunde vara utan. Den gjorde det möjligt för honom att förverkliga sitt konstnärskap, men den skyddade också hans privatliv från alltför närgången insyn. Han förde ett ambulerande, stundtals bohemiskt liv, men kunde alltid återvända till den trygga familjegemenskapen i Granada, den stad han älskade. I en värld av ogifta onklar och tanter som alltid fanns i den stora familjens krets var han bara en av många, om än ovanligt litterärt framstående.

Å andra sidan var det också nödvändigt för honom att ta sig ur dess grepp. Hans dramatik handlar i hög grad om kvävande familjegemenskap där individens frihet krossas av traditionella hedersbegrepp och kollektivism. “I byn kan man läsa tankar på långt håll”, “man ser tvärs genom väggarna”, “skvallret lämnar oss aldrig i ro” – det är alla repliker från “Bernardas hus”. Inte minst såg Lorca – kanske därför att han var homosexuell – det pris kvinnorna betalade: “Det värsta straffet på jorden är att födas till kvinna.” Och över allt svävar blodsbanden och hedern: “Familjen har sin heder och hedern är en börda som alla måste bära.”

Lorcas syn påminner mig mycket om min egen. Jag älskar och behöver min familj men kräver utrymme och frihet — autonomi — att forma mitt eget liv, vilket också förklarar varför jag inte vill bilda en egen familj. Det förvånar mig att så många människor så lättvindigt går in i långa relationer och annat som binder. De lever det traditionella livet, utan så mycket eget ifrågasättande. Lorcas syn fångar också väl varför jag inte kan leva i småstäder, som i den jag växte upp, och varför jag trivs i Sverige, som inte präglas av hederskultur och tvingande familjeband. Sammanhållning och gemenskap har förstås sina poänger, men bara i begränsad och villkorad form. Atomistisk sammanhållning är min melodi. Och, som det verkar, Lorcas.

Jag har lite asociala drag: jag har alltid tyckt om att vara mycket för mig själv och trivs ofta inte i sociala sammanhang. Härförleden läste jag en artikel om den intellektuelle giganten, domare Richard Posner, som jag fann styrkande:

Half a dozen times a year, Posner and Charlene will have people over for dinner – often the Chicago economist William Landes, Posner’s best friend, and his wife – but, on the whole, Posner prefers to avoid social life. “People don’t say interesting things,” he says. “A lot of socializing is just dull – I’d rather read a book. I have a friend, an economist who’s Swedish, and he told me that Sweden has terrible television, so people there spend their time visiting each other. But that’s worse, because when you watch television you get some information, you even get some moral instruction, you learn to be nice to single mothers or what have you, but socializing, particularly family – well, that is deadly. When you’re just talking with your friends about trivia, what’s the point?

Jag vill dock betona att jag har ett stort behov av mina nära vänner, precis som Posner har behov av Landes. Det är mer ytliga sociala umgängen som jag ofta ogillar. Till skillnad från många andra, har jag noterat, som älskar barer, klubbar, mingelfester, fika hit och fika dit etc. Slutligen undrar jag om någon vet vilken svensk ekonom Posner är vän med.

John Adams verk Harmonielehre är starkt. Det får mig att tänka på en storstad av atomistiska människor som rör sig fram och tillbaka utan att beröra varandra.

Här är Adams nya självbiografi.

Or- In Darkness, Light
A preface: this is my second foray into full philosophy, the first being Why Capitalism? This article was inspired not by any particular topical event, but only my recent studies of pre-Socratic philosophy. Therefore, I await its reaction with a strange unease, as I have written it with an almost vicious streak. With this I hoped to give a lightning tour of the argument- as Nietzsche would put it, to philosophise with a hammer. Therefore, I present In Obscuris Lux.

This essay is primarily primed for those who are called “fundamentalists”; I have little quarrel with those who believe in a god, yet have a doubt in that opinion- for that shows that it is by their independent reason and logic they have come to their present state of mind. What I rally against here is those who give up their reason, and place their mind and in-fact their entire nature and existence, in the grasp of some other. This is something I decry, as it is not often that this is the result of voluntary action- that is, someone could ethically sell themselves if it was by their full and independent consent.

Therefore, I see this fundamentalism as a form of slavery, and it is often in the times of the greatest weakness that it strikes. Observe the most common cases of when persons start associating themselves with religion. It is often during childhood; but to take a more adult case, there are those who are the so-called ‘born-again Christians’. And I posit that those of this denomination often turn to this devotion during weakness- after alcoholism, after sadness or rejection, or even after near-death. For it is forever the case that something when strong moves little, and is thus indestructible; and it is when one degrades or is shocked, as in the cases outlined before, that one truly and fundamentally is able to change. I emphasise those qualifications because a change of opinion is different to a change of devotion- for often when one changes an opinion, it is when a new case arises which voids the prior logic and reason- and thus to criticise this kind of change would be utterly hypocritical, I being no different from others that I once held opinions and feelings which I do not hold now.

It is in this that this philosophy- which is, to quote Islamic literalist Ayman Zawahiri: “[we] believe in our religion, both as an ideology and practise!”- so vile, so despicable and slavish. It prays on those who are weak or sick, or even those who have a will-in-the-making: our children. Children are like those who first followed these Prophets- dependent on these men to reveal to them the truth, rather discover it themselves.

To attack the core of fundamentalism, and I speak of it in the more Christian context, we must look at the origins of it as a movement; which are, that it was one rooted in anti-clericalism, and two in the birth of the Anglican, Rome-independent church, which during the upheaval of the Commonwealth of England and the Protectorate sparked a radicalism which manifested in many forms. One positive form was Quakerism, that Religious Society of Friends- a school which I share many thoughts with, which would make me a Non-Theist Friend. It is in this openness, which is almost Eastern rather than tyrannical and Abrahamic, that I find a joy. The ultimate root of what is called Evangelicalism is that the Church was considered corrupt, and that therefore faith should be placed in a literal interpretation of the Bible and Gospel. Therefore, the real idea of a Theocracy reared its head, which had not taken place for many centuries, not since the founding of the Church of Rome, with its political and pragmatic uses at the heart of its power and direction, especially under the corrupt Borgia family. Not only is this idea dangerous, but it is also logically false, as I shall outline. We must look historically, as any theology or school which deliberately interprets literally must answer the same questions and look at the same arguments as those who composed the texts themselves.

The origin lies in the teaching schools of the Hellenic world, especially those pre-Socratic so-called Atomist and Epicurean schools. Although confusing now, due to the nomenclature being used concurrently in scientific physics- such as motion, atoms, et cetera- the debate uniformly centred on the nature of the universe. The materialist, Atomist, view was that the universe and all matter was constructed of indivisible units called atoms, and that all things were made up of either atoms or void. The very fact that this idea made existence all important, and the idea that things have always existed, always will and cannot be ‘created’ or ‘destroyed’, void being a state of nothingness, meant that the idea of a creator became logically absurd. It was the rival, metaphysical, Aristotelian and Platonic view, that the universe was created. Indeed by admitting that the universe was created, meant that there must instinctively and intuitively be a creator. This, however, appealed to Socrates and his students, who have since become the face of ancient Greek philosophy. Thus, when it came to the formation of Christianity, no doubt this had a great influence, such was the power of the Socratic and metaphysical thinkers, who too influenced Rome.

However, now that the entire physics behind the anti-Atomists has been proven wrong, that there are no basic elements, that energy cannot be created nor can it be destroyed, and that the universe did not have a ‘beginning’ (in that the universe did not suddenly come into being as it is, that it expanded and was summoned from a singular point in the Big Bang, and thus whatever expanded exponentially must too have existed before in its previous form), and that ultimately everything is made up of singular units called Atoms, then surely the entire logic behind a creator falls down, and surely what was prophecy is now revealed as madness? Surely then, it is the materialists who have been proven right, and it is their arguments who we should re-examine. In-fact, the similarity behind the current ‘atheist’ philosophy and that of the ancient Atomists isn’t all too different.

Nietzsche believed that the world had taken a wrong course when it had caught the winds of Socrates’ thoughts, and that all this led to the creation of Christianity- for it is true that Christianity is a mesh of thoughts and ideas, and that it is not coherent, and that it is certainly not unique, as is proven with the similarities with the Roman cult of Mithras. Therefore, let us look at the current and contemporary trends with an Epicurean bent. To take an example, let us examine the rejection of geology, carbon dating, palaeontology and indeed cosmology in their Young Earth Theory. They posit, just as with almost every other conflict, that the lack of evidence to support them is in itself not a barrier to their theory. However, how is the lack of something a something? How is void in itself an atom?

It is a truth that the Universe runs on a single law- one thing having something, and another not having such a thing. I say that it is a single law, that it is a single thing, because the secondary is a nothing, and is therefore the opposite of a thing, of a something. Indeed, only in thought, which is in itself a non-physical thing, does a nothing exist. A true nothing would be unperceivable, as our senses would not be able to detect it. Indeed, how is anything super-natural even able to be sensed? For the senses are the faculties- the conduits of data to the brain and consciousness. Therefore, how can anything ultra-natural or beyond-nature even be perceivable? The answer is- that it cannot be, as it would violate the principles of the human physiology and chemistry. Indeed, the only place it can exist is in the mind itself, and often this is a souring of the senses by a chemical, by a something, by a hormone, by a fear. Therefore, anything supernatural cannot be truly sensed, and anything thought to be sensed is but an invention of the mind, then how could we even perceive the Christian God? Isn’t he beyond our very faculties to comprehend? Thus we must come to the conclusion that everything is material, and that metaphysics is but a branch of the psyche. I elaborate on this because the fundamentalists break all these laws, and they step on them and think of their inventions as things beyond us, when they are in-fact products of themselves. Imagine if someone said suddenly that in darkness they could find light. One would laugh at such a madman, as darkness is the absence of light. But similarly imagine a man saying that the lack of evidence disproving something was in itself a qualification to ignore every piece of evidence against him, once again one would not think this person stable or reasonable to any degree. But then imagine that a man said “There is no proof God doesn’t exist, therefore I see no reason why I shouldn’t believe in him”- and this would be acceptable. But, how is this acceptable? And once more, how is this acceptable when the very roots of the arguments they accept literally have been proven to be wrong? Surely this leads this man to actually be saying “I interpret my holy book literally for no other reason than to comfort myself, and to stop any re-interpretation which would distort my comfort”. But surely, wouldn’t placing a literal interpretation in the hands of ones’ leaders result in not a soft, malleable, pragmatic sceptre, but a rule of law and doctrine which is iron and in-fact intrinsically cruel? Surely then they do not escape the perversion of pragmatic rulers, and in-fact hand such men- who have always and will always exist so long as power tempts man in any degree- a power which would corrupt them absolutely, even though it is to escape the corruption of the present, it would simply be an older and blinder corruption. How then, can there be darkness in this light? How can from nothing be something? How could there be creation from nothing, how can there be void and then atoms? How can there be from the immaterial material?

It seems to me that it lives in a small world, this philosophy, where the internal and external contradictions are ignored and repressed. ‘Fundamentalism’, to me, seems in practice to be a synonym of Isolationism, of Regression and of Fear. It is the reaction of a religious intellectual group which saw its systems failing and being exploited, and even seeing their hold on society slipping and ripping. Thus why they must ruin the tradition of the past few centuries since Newton, wherein Theologians have deliberately reconciled with Science. Now, they reject it, and in the process embitter the world. All arguments of this nature are, by virtue of their proof, argumentum ad ignorantiam, as they ignore or even translate all data to their own means. Let us demonstrate an example- one position of the Young Earth Theory is that the Christian God placed the fossils on Earth which contradict the very basis of the theory. This is an equivalent to a conclusively proven form of madness suddenly being taken as a form of sanity, however strange.

The very fact that the central ideology makes such demands of logic, of reason, of imagination, of ignorance, and of regression in order to support its central tenants shows its utterly flawed nature; as it is the case, that any ideology is flawed when it cannot operate on the most basic level within Occam’s Razor. Let us take an example, that of Free Market Economics for example. The central and simplest tenant can be summed as ‘Competition is beneficial’. This can be used in almost every challenge against the ideology- for example, if the government made it law that everyone owns the same car, or set-up and maintained a subsidised and cartel-esque car firm which fulfilled this function. In any analysis of the idea, from the proposition, to the implementation, to the results and denouement, the central and simplest tenant can be applied to argue against it and answer any situation. It does not demand leaps of logic intrinsically, nor does it appeal to ignorance. If it so happened that the idea was successful, even still proponents could point to the even more successful companies abroad. The burden of proof always rests with the expounder of the opinion, never with the opponents.

It is my opinion that this shifting of burdens, and of this appeal to ignorance, shows that it is a sick ideology- that is, that it is ill and dying. Just as those who flee to her in their weakness, this old rabble-rouser has seen the last of its green days- and all they can do is protest, isolate themselves from contact, and deny, simply to preserve their way of life; because, just as the old statists and tyrants knew, that as soon as a challenge against them succeeded, or people started not turning their ears to them at the first resort and more to individuals, then that was the weakening of their rule. And what results from the enforcing that usually follows, of the iron attack? Revolution- and this time, those religious men do not have the power they desire over law, and only over individuals. Yet, this revolution is coming, or is even happening- and we will revolve once more, we shall go back to the Pre-Socratic, Pagan, individual way, where it is just Schools of Thought, and the whether one believes in the Gods or Creators will be a much more pragmatic manner. Perhaps we shall even head back into the depths of Theology afterwards, and begin the cycle of history once more…but not after a true materialist individualist culture has its day. And then, perhaps the men will rise, like I, who see man’s selfishness and ego more as motivations and encouraging of acts which before seemed difficult; godlike; selfless- when in-fact they are nothing of the sort. Men shall arise who see every problem as conquerable, as selfish, as winnable, as human, and they will perhaps in-fact be supermen, just as Nietzsche envisioned- but because they will be beyond that man who came before, who was beaten and restricted by his ignorance of his own nature. They will be comprehensible to us, they will not be supermen- they will simply be Men. The barrier between us and them is that we still look at things through the same squint and restriction of perspective- we act much as we used to, although we may think different. And that realm of thought is that place where progress takes place, and where soon it shall invade into action. It is only in the mind- or from things resulting from the mind- that contradictions can happen; they do not extend to the physical world as such. It is when we believe they do, and when they can, that we start inventing our own reality, and start looking through the world through our own self-fashioned imperfect lens. There will be no fundamentalism of any form- no faith, only freedom to act how one thinks, and in that universe there will be room for all- those who are godfearing, those who are not, and those who are possibly something else.

Consider what physicist Thomson wrote in 1928:

Not so long ago atom was regarded as indivisible, impenetrable, eternal, unaffected by heat, electricity or any other physical agent.

This is culture. Professional physicists have been believing in these eternal objects that violate all known conservation laws and all known processes of nature because it is in their culture.

This social assumption of eternal particles then defines the “physical” theories they invent. If physicists base their theories on the assumption of eternal particles their theory will be a by-product of culture of physics. If the theory is expressed in the language of mathematics it will still be a sociological theory.

• The atom in the history of human thought
• Atomism from the 17th to the 20th Century

So argues this talk (PDF).  Try and stick through what seems like gratuitous anti-psychiatry, Tom-Cruise-style, because it builds toward some fascinating, even moving, ideas.  I might even borrow the book he’s selling!

These last few Native-related things come via the Native Studies program at St. Thomas University in New Brunswick.

Jag har gått i en demonstration i mitt liv — i den mot löntagarfonder 1983. Anledningen till att demonstrationstill-fällena inte har blivit fler, och skälet till att jag trots motstånd mot FRA-lagen avstod från att demonstrera idag, är av psykologisk karaktär. Att demonstrera passar helt enkelt inte ihop med min introverta och atomistiska personlighet. Att gå tillsammans i ett kollektiv, att vara högljudd, att lyssna på appeller, att vara arg, att basunera ut ett stiliserat budskap, att observeras av andra — inget av detta harmonierar med den typ av person jag är. Jag vill läsa och skriva i min ensamhet istället.

Frågan mer allmänt är varför vänstermänniskor tenderar att demonstrera mer än högermänniskor. Det beror antagligen inte på att högermänniskor är introverta atomister som jag. Det kanske snarare ingår i en borgerlig livsstil och uppfostran, som antagligen i sin tur är positivt korrelerad med en borgerlig politisk uppfattning, att inte manifestera politiska åsikter i offentligt kringströvande grupper?

Källa till individualism?

Hur påverkar pengar oss människor? En artikel i Science ger detta svar:

The results of nine experiments suggest that money brings about a self-sufficient orientation in which people prefer to be free of dependency and dependents. Reminders of money, relative to nonmoney reminders, led to reduced requests for help and reduced helpfulness toward others. Relative to participants primed with neutral concepts, participants primed with money preferred to play alone, work alone, and put more physical distance between themselves and a new acquaintance.

Dvs. när människor påminns om pengar blir de mer individualistiska och mindre samarbetsvilliga. Hur kan det förklaras? Peter Singer kommenterar:

Vohs and her colleagues suggest that as societies began to use money, the necessity of relying on family and friends diminished, and people were able to become more self-sufficient. “In this way,” they conclude, “money enhanced individualism but diminished communal motivations, an effect that is still apparent in people’s responses today.”

De flesta ser nog denna effekt av pengar som något negativt, även om de i allmänhet ändå godtar pengar pga. deras fördelar, som torde överväga. Men jag ser snarast effekten som en ytterligare fördel! Jag har starkt atomistiska drag och vill inte vara bunden till andra människor. Pengar ger möjlighet till distans, vilket jag värdesätter.

I samma anda, se två tidigare inlägg om min skepsis mot vurmandet för tillit och samarbete.

Tips: Greg Mankiw.

Idag är det USA:s nationaldag. Men jag har svårt för sådana dagar av två skäl:

1. Jag är vad man skulle kunna kalla en autonomist eller psykologisk atomist och ogillar allmänomfattande manifestationer av enighet och samsyn.
2. Jag bedömer att nationalism i huvudsak har negativa sociala konsekvenser.

Vad skulle hända om någon protesterade mot flaggdyrkan på en amerikansk sportarena? Så här säger Jim Alexander, vars företag tillverkar enormt stora flaggor:

“People go ape when they see it. It’s a feeling. It’s a feeling that takes over a whole stadium. If anyone in the stands opened their mouth and objected, there would be hell to pay.”

Just det: om man inte deltar i masshysterin ses man som en svikare. Intressant nog fastslog USA:s högsta domstol 1943, pga. Jehovas vittnen, att amerikanska barn inte får tvingas att svära trohet till flaggan. Det är inte varje dag jag och JV står enade (om än av olika skäl)! Men fortfarande lever den sociala stigmatiseringen av den som vågar ifrågasätta nationalismen kvar.

Bertrand Russell insåg nationalismens bisarra (och farliga) karaktär:

“Americans and Englishmen, when they become acquainted with the Balkans, feel an astonished contempt when they study the mutual enmities of Bulgarians and Serbs, or Hungarians and Rumanians. It is evident to them that these enmities are absurd and that the belief of each little nation in its own superiority has no objective basis. But most of them are quite unable to see that the national pride of a Great Power is essentially as unjustifiable as that of a little Balkan country.”

När jag berättar att jag faktiskt ska arbeta på midsommarafton reagerar de allra flesta med förundran. “Stackars dig”, säger de. Men det är inte synd om mig — tvärtom! Jag är genuint glad över att få sitta vid min dator och skriva om Hayek och Keynes idag istället för att äta sill, samla blommor och dansa runt stänger. Jag har inget behov av kollektivt umgänge grundat i meningslösa traditioner. Snarare känner jag mig besvärad om jag deltar i sådant (vilket har hänt, särskilt i yngre år, av hänsyn till familjen).

Keynes såg sig heller inte som bunden av traditioner utan som fri att forma sitt liv som han själv önskade:

“We repudiated entirely customary morals, conventions and traditional wisdom. … But we recognized no moral obligation on us, no inner sanction, to conform or to obey. Before heaven we claimed to be our own judge in our own case.”*

__________________________________

*S. 97 i Keynes, J. M. (1949). Two memoirs. London: Rupert Hart-Davis.

Ikväll såg jag och Anders dansföreställningen Breaking Boundaries, med avgångselever från Kungliga Svenska Balettskolan och Balettakademin. Mycket imponerande insatser. Det som slog mig är att jag framförallt uppskattar “atomistisk dans”, dvs. dans utan handling och anknytning, dans som är ren från kulturell kontext och som bara manifesterar teknik, rörelse, känsla. Dansens syfte, enligt denna syn, är inte att jag ska känna igen mig och bekräftas utan att jag ska få en direkt upplevelse av dansen som sådan.

Dans med handling kan jag tycka om, men då i regel trots handlingen, inte på grund av den. Ett bra exempel är John Neumeiers balett Peer Gynt, som har (en bekant) handling men som framför allt innehåller enormt starka rörelser och rörelsemönster som i sig ger (åtminstone mig) enorm livsglädje.

Denna syn går helt på tvärs mot vad som skulle kunna kallas en konservativ kultursyn, där kulturen ses som ett redskap för att förmedla en kulturell samhörighet och distinkta, traditionella budskap. Sådant avvisar jag: det distraherar och förstör den rena konstupplevelsen.

Se ett tidigare inlägg om min konstsyn.

På bilden: Caroline Cavallo i William Forsythes In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated. En koreografi för en ny tid! (Foto: Martin Mydtskov Rønne.)