The Way It Is-----Life Consumes life.

[boagie]

Hi Everyone!

Life lives upon life,as a snake consumeing its own tail.This reality is part of being in the world,it is indeed natures way,but as such, how do we deal with it today.Primary cultures,hunters and gatherers were subject to guilt.This guilt moved them to develop a whole mythology around the hunting,killing and consumption of their fellow creatures.These mythologies told them these creatures,whom they had a deeper respect for than is so of our present mentality,give themselves up to man to become mans life,this is the origin of the sacred animal.They by performing a ritual,inacted their myth,first in honour and gratituted for the sacrafice the animal has done willingly,then to release the animals spirit to return to its heavenly home.This in the hope that the animals will return and continue to sacrafice themselves to be man's life.

Today we contract the killing out,through the division of labour and specilization.We buy our meat wrapped in cellophane and largely forget just what it is we are consumeing,so out of touch are we with the ways of nature.Christianity has delt with this problem of life consumeing life by making nature corrupt,something to be corrected by man.They have made the animal into something less than significant,very close to objects for the use of man.The present state of the world says to us we must renew our respect for the world in which we live,for the animals whom we share this small planet with.We need to rethink our approach to nature,we need to drop the idea that nature is corrupt,we need a new vision,a new mythology,one based on respect,knowledge and reason.What are your views,is this happening anywhere,how do you explain resistence found in society against this renewed relationship to nature.







"Reason is the enemy of faith." Martin Luther

[Pythagorean]

Boagie, this subject is vast and complex and profound.

I was just thinking what about the nature of a woman as such, or the nature of a man as such? I mean is it natural for women to be a feminine home-maker and a bearer of children? And is it natural for a man to be a masculine protecter and a provider?

Would a return to nature imply that men and women take up their former traditional roles?

--Pythagorean

[boagie]

Pythagorean,

I am a little puzzled as to what you mean by a return to nature,the reality that life lives upon life remains reality reguardless of any misconceptions on the part of society or the individual.Are you suggesting a delusional approach to life the better? That indeed is where mythology often comes in, but its function is to aline ones psyche with that reality which is nature, ones life becomes an expression of that nature and so justifies itself to itself.

The traditional roles of the male and female were as expressions of the larger reality of nature.Society is an artifical context which insulates us from nature and thus it becomes,what is most immediate to us,and what we must first adapt too.If it is out of line with our biological natures,then you have a situtation of chaos,but nature is still leaned toward as people still fall into these roles,even if it is with bitterness.We as a people adapt to society reguardless of how at odds it might be with nature,our nature,which is ultimately the same.

The frightening thing is that people are utterly out of touch with the realities of life,there dependence upon the earth and the other animals for their life.They believe that the great hunt refers to the supermarket experience.This is one cause of the consumer mentality,an unsubstainable way of life.Christianity does not deal with this and cannot deal with it in future,it is not like an oral tradition which can change with the needs of the times.I am unsure as to whether I have addressed your concerns Pythagorean,biology is biology,it changes slowly,though faster than Christian mythology.



Reason is the enemy of faith." Martin Luther

[Mr. Fight the Power]

The view you are describing is hardly universal, it is much more a "western" thing. As you and Pythagorean are both keenly aware, science and philosophy is rapidly adopting the position that a man's life is not objectively more important than any animals.

[boagie]

Originally Posted by Mr. Fight the Power

The view you are describing is hardly universal, it is much more a "western" thing. As you and Pythagorean are both keenly aware, science and philosophy is rapidly adopting the position that a man's life is not objectively more important than any animals.

Mr Fight the power,

In response to your first sentence,if this view is not universal, that is unfortunate,as the reality is universal.This reality does not itself stress the superiority of man.Our ancestors,hunters and gatherers did not think of the animal as on a lower level of a scale,with humanity at the top.Their rituals were to put them in touch with the reality,that life consumes life as natures way,and to relieve the guilt they felt at killing their fellow beings.

Their mythology functioned as it should,to put man in accord with nature and the universe as they understood it.It was an oral tradition handed down and altered as circumstances changed to allow for adaptation,perhaps this was not intentional,but more the nature of oral traditions.With the traditions of the middle east,as the written word of God,this is unchangeing,cast in stone,and so not a viable mythology for the present.No one is claiming here that one form of life is more significant then another,but it is the traditions of the middle east which support this psychological stand.





Reason is the enemy of faith." Martin Luther

[Mr. Fight the Power]

Originally Posted by boagie

Mr Fight the power,

In response to your first sentence,if this view is not universal, that is unfortunate,as the reality is universal.This reality does not itself stress the superiority of man.Our ancestors,hunters and gatherers did not think of the animal as on a lower level of a scale,with humanity at the top.Their rituals were to put them in touch with the reality,that life consumes life as natures way,and to relieve the guilt they felt at killing their fellow beings.

This is what I am referring to. This human-centered view of reality is mainly just a corruption brought about by Western moralists.

I think most realize that life is life, some living creatures destroy other living creatures, some living creatures create other living creatures, but life goes on.

[boagie]

Mr Fight the power,

You may be right about Western moralists corrupting our view of reality,though I believe personally Christianity beat them to it.Do you have any figures in particular in mind when stateing this.


We all destroy living creatures in the process of killing and consumeing to live.I am unaware of any examples of creatures creating creatures accept by procreation.My point in introduceing this topic,is to underline the need for a different mindset than that provided by the outdated mythologies of the middle east.




Reason is the enemy of faith." Martin Luther

[gnosis]

"as a snake consumeing its own tail." ---no doubt

First off, after catching up on the thread, i think we have to look at some of the reasoning behind life consuming life, and with faith maybe collectivly justify our only available option in EATING.

If its Christian context we're looking for, justification is in fact there, for isnt it said "Mans to be the shepards of the earth?" or somthng like that?

Otherwise, yes i think there is a generqal guilt that many of us feel when consumung other forms of life. However, that will always be there. I think what we're doing, packaging meat already destroyed and ready for us to take home is a fine idea; number one, it illeveates some of the guilt we areselves have towards consuming other anamals. At the same time, it relinquishes some of the savagness brought forth by killing an anamal. Who knows, maybe when one kills another form of life, hes less hesitant to kill another human being?

Oh, and when man began hunting &gathering, you say he never looked at the world as being the top of the food chain. I now ask you, was he, at the time at the top of the food chain?

[boagie]

gnosis,

tried to respond and lost lengthly post will try when it seems likely to suceed,

[boagie]

gnosis,

My point was that primitive peoples did not see themselves as superior to other creatures,indeed sometimes these other creatures possessed characteristics that man envied,example the power of a bear,the ability of flight.A ritual is a myth inacted.The myth these people inacted in the world was of the nature of thanking the animal for sacrificeing itself to man,to become man's life.This to is the origin of the sacred animal,that animal which played the central roll in the survival of a given people.To the plains indians it was the buffalo,to the people of the west coast of Canada, it was the salmon.It is an entirely different mentality.

Actually there is an experiment one can try which might give you a hint of another possiablity,address everything in the world as a thou and you will feel a change in your own psychology occurring.When you no longer meet in the world with an it, but only a thou,your in another world.The question of being at the top of the food chain,no, primitive man certainly was not at the top of this food chain.Modern man is,as long as he stays out of the deep woods and/or the ocean,where the old condition can still be relived.




"We are cousins to the trees,made of the same stuff, arranged into a different order." Carl Sagan