One set of illusions that are common and very dangerous in our society are the illusions that many people have about human behavior and causality. A lot of people believe that there has to be a reason why we are here. That the complexity of this world is too great for it to have developed naturally, and that this constitutes proof of a creator. A lot of these same people have a simplified and either/or conception of human volition. They think people can be forced to act a certain way. For these people the ideas of B.F.Skinner and other behavioralists are very popular. It should come as no surprise that these are people who believe in the efficacy of torture, of force, of prophylactic invasions and bombing campaigns.
They are inevitably shocked when humans don't act the way they expect them to. For them every outcome is the result of a moral decision that can have only two colors; good or bad.
Oddly they often judge the outcome of their own behavior by it's apparant effect. Thus they can build up whole entire systems of false linkages between causes and effects. Justify their own behavior by the goal of its outcome, and then blame their enemies for the hell they create trying to create their idealized and distopic paradise. These are the folks who, like Pat Robertson, see an earthquake or hurricane in a neighbors home as God's Judgement, but who are strangely silent when it happens to their home. Who will do anything and everything to outlaw not just abortion, but birth control and religious choice. And they do all this on the basis of a distorted understanding of human nature and causality.
They can't even understand their own bible, Koran, or get it strait what is an interpretation, an allegory or a parable and what has to be literally true as they interpret to be. Thus these are folks who create entire systems of nonsense and call it "Neo-Millenialism" even though there is absolutely nothing in the bible that details exactly what the Anti-Christ will look like or that there will be anything remotely resembling a rapture. Their misunderstanding of human nature and psychology is only trumphed by their misunderstanding of their own religion.
And these people would be funny, except they have money, are in important positions and are allied with conservatives and others whose religion is money and who are using them and being used by them, to create repressive laws and push for a repressive country. Gay marriage isn't an issue for most of us. Some Christians and Jews may find it mildly distasteful, but it is only an issue for these confused and deluded folks. And evolution is only an issue for these idiots too. Anyone who has the slightest sense of humility would see that the myth of creation, doesn't have to be interpreted in human terms. A God who stands outside of human conceptions of time and space would be able to create the world, time and all, in 7 days no problem. 7 of his days. It is insane to measure the real world by a preconceived yardstick.
But these folks would do it. And if we let them they'd set us back into the dark ages like those which really began in the 4th century when Constantine made Christianity the State religion.
Chris
Posted by cholte at June 5, 2006 06:19 AM