rough draft of opening remarks at panel on religion and the environment at St. Edwards University in Austin, Texas
Since I cannot begin to lay out my full worldview in just a few moments in order to derive how that worldview informs my approach to the environment, I will, instead, simply point out a few defining features of my religious/political/scientific worldview and connect those to my stance on the environment.
First of all I reject the mythology of the fall. I reject the idea that man was, in some idealized past, perfect, and that he might again, although through no power of his own, re-achieve that perfection. Instead I believe the version of meta-history that Occam’s Razor would select: We humans are a species who has become sentient. We are infants (or toddlers, or adolescents, if you prefer) who are just figuring out how to come to terms with the fact that this sentience has significantly disconnected us from the processes of biological evolution which produced us.
Second, I embrace the concept of free-will. I believe that we are, individually and collectively, self-determining to a very significant degree. I believe that we can and do create our own destinies.
While I do not believe that there are good and evil people, I do believe that there are good and evil ideas. Ideas that foster accurate and clear apprehension of the truth are good. Ideas that propagate life and health are good. Ideas that cloud and obscure the true nature of the universe are evil. Ideas that propagate disease are evil. It is through the replication of ideas or memes and no longer through the replication of genes that human destiny will be determined. Put another way, genetic replication is necessary but not sufficient for any human future worth the name. This is essentially a combination of memetic information theory with Buddhist philosophy.
Lastly, I belong to a Unitarian Universalist Church not because I identify as a Unitarian Universalist, but because I believe that the Unitarianism Universalism is the contemporary religion most closely poised to become what I would call post-denominational. It is denominational thinking that separates Christians, Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Sihks, Buddhists, etc. Even when Christians use the term non-denominational, what they mean precisely denominational in its implication: we are not allied with them. Post-denominational thinking recognizes that, within the context of a human meta-history, many mythologies, philosophies, and prophecies have developed. As Gandhi famously said, “I am a Christian and a Muslim and a Hindu, and so are all of you!” If we survey this variety of human wisdom traditions we can begin to ascertain patterns. Some patterns reveal falseness: they reveal the self-serving, the greedy, the insecure, and the power hungry, these are ultimately revealed by their fruits. Other parts of the pattern seem to reveal insight, insight into the true nature of life and the universe, insight into the nature of humanity, insight into the value of justice, honesty, integrity, and compassion. Post-denominational religion, or Religion writ large, is concerned with harvesting, developing, expanding, and teaching human wisdom, regardless of culture, language, race, ethnicity, national or regional origin, or any other contrivance which has classically separated brothers and sisters from one another.
In light of these articles of faith which I have outlined I believe that our responsibility as an emerging sentient species is to learn how to grow and nurture our world of ideas, societies, and technologies in symbiosis with the natural orders of the universe. Starting at the smallest scale this relates to having a clear understanding of the true nature of how our daily decisions and choices impact the world around us and taking full responsibility for these decisions and actions. At the medium scale it means finding a way to design and sustain a global human population which promotes the health and biodiversity of the other species on this planet as they continue along at the much slower pace of biological evolution. At the large scale, it means a continued commitment to growth in both knowledge and wisdom for the human species, a quest which must ultimately include the exploration and colonization of space.
First of all I reject the mythology of the fall. I reject the idea that man was, in some idealized past, perfect, and that he might again, although through no power of his own, re-achieve that perfection. Instead I believe the version of meta-history that Occam’s Razor would select: We humans are a species who has become sentient. We are infants (or toddlers, or adolescents, if you prefer) who are just figuring out how to come to terms with the fact that this sentience has significantly disconnected us from the processes of biological evolution which produced us.
Second, I embrace the concept of free-will. I believe that we are, individually and collectively, self-determining to a very significant degree. I believe that we can and do create our own destinies.
While I do not believe that there are good and evil people, I do believe that there are good and evil ideas. Ideas that foster accurate and clear apprehension of the truth are good. Ideas that propagate life and health are good. Ideas that cloud and obscure the true nature of the universe are evil. Ideas that propagate disease are evil. It is through the replication of ideas or memes and no longer through the replication of genes that human destiny will be determined. Put another way, genetic replication is necessary but not sufficient for any human future worth the name. This is essentially a combination of memetic information theory with Buddhist philosophy.
Lastly, I belong to a Unitarian Universalist Church not because I identify as a Unitarian Universalist, but because I believe that the Unitarianism Universalism is the contemporary religion most closely poised to become what I would call post-denominational. It is denominational thinking that separates Christians, Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Sihks, Buddhists, etc. Even when Christians use the term non-denominational, what they mean precisely denominational in its implication: we are not allied with them. Post-denominational thinking recognizes that, within the context of a human meta-history, many mythologies, philosophies, and prophecies have developed. As Gandhi famously said, “I am a Christian and a Muslim and a Hindu, and so are all of you!” If we survey this variety of human wisdom traditions we can begin to ascertain patterns. Some patterns reveal falseness: they reveal the self-serving, the greedy, the insecure, and the power hungry, these are ultimately revealed by their fruits. Other parts of the pattern seem to reveal insight, insight into the true nature of life and the universe, insight into the nature of humanity, insight into the value of justice, honesty, integrity, and compassion. Post-denominational religion, or Religion writ large, is concerned with harvesting, developing, expanding, and teaching human wisdom, regardless of culture, language, race, ethnicity, national or regional origin, or any other contrivance which has classically separated brothers and sisters from one another.
In light of these articles of faith which I have outlined I believe that our responsibility as an emerging sentient species is to learn how to grow and nurture our world of ideas, societies, and technologies in symbiosis with the natural orders of the universe. Starting at the smallest scale this relates to having a clear understanding of the true nature of how our daily decisions and choices impact the world around us and taking full responsibility for these decisions and actions. At the medium scale it means finding a way to design and sustain a global human population which promotes the health and biodiversity of the other species on this planet as they continue along at the much slower pace of biological evolution. At the large scale, it means a continued commitment to growth in both knowledge and wisdom for the human species, a quest which must ultimately include the exploration and colonization of space.
Comments