When one thinks about it, it's pretty scary how little we really know. Pretty much everything is based on our own assumptions. Take the proposition that the sun will rise tomorrow. True, thousands of years of experience suggest that we will see the first signs of light in the morning, but all it will take is one experience of the sun not being there for our assumption to be exposed for the theory it is. And that's not even factoring in the predictions that our sun will die one day of old age anyway.
Science has no trouble with the concept of the one exception bringing down a mighty theory. That's because science basically is aimed at the exceptions that disprove the rule as a way of moving our understanding forward. If we knew everything about the world that there was to be known, generations of graduate students would be without dissertation topics. This means that with every generation, there can be no sacred cows. Unfortunately for the scientist, this skeptical approach to all ideas has sometimes led to the bonfire. Most of the rest of us just call it progress and we adapt more or less gracefully depending on how threatened we feel.
Judging from the firestorm over allowing gay marriage, increasing taxes on the wealthiest, providing medical coverage, and limiting the plethora of weapons used by peeved citizens against one another (anyone who thinks that personal guns are to defend against the government hasn't visited North Dakota nuclear silos lately), there has to be a lot of threat and paranoia swirling around us.
In fact, I am having trouble identifying where religion and politics begin and end. They seem to be on a continuum. Religion has become political and politics has become religion. On the one side, we have religion (heavily evangelical but also Catholic) attempting to use the political process to impose sectarian moral dogma on everyone regardless of personal beliefs. On the other, we have politics (primarily conservative) that keep alive the dogma of failed economic policies (trickle down, free markets, make a buck at all costs). Neither position can stand the test of truth, but that seems beside the point.
As anyone who reads this blog knows, I have scant sympathy for either religion or politics. My primary objection to both is their blatant hypocrisy. Neither advances our understanding of the human condition or makes our lives more productive. Religion imposes the morality of two thousand years ago while politics merely encourages the self-serving. Both are probably necessary. Both need to be kept in their places.
But who can be objective about them in the glorious mud bath that is our current experience? I've heard our time called the age of me-first. I would call it the age of the wallow.
We wallow in religious nonsense designed to make us feel superior to the other church down the road. We wallow in taking sides in political debates that mean nothing in the context of history and remind us only how tribal we are. We know nothing for sure, yet we are willing to send our sons to war to "prove" we are right--or is it maybe to convince ourselves that we matter in an expanding universe that science is bringing to a computer near us?
If anyone wants a good thing to ponder, it might be what Christ's teachings would be
about corporate America. Want to bet he'd sound more like Occupy Wall Street than FOX news?
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