Difference between revisions of "Gaianism (book)/Introduction/Religion"
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| − | + | This is the '''''Why a religion''''' Chapter of the ''Introduction'' section of the book [[Gaianism (book)|Gaianism]]. | |
| − | This is the ''Why a religion'' Chapter of the '' | + | <onlyinclude> |
| − | + | === [[:Gaianism (book)/Introduction/Religion|Why a religion]] === | |
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| − | + | {{Quote box |quote=If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch,<br>you must first invent the universe. |source=Carl Sagan, ''Cosmos'' |width=30% |qalign=right |align=right}} | |
| − | === Why a religion === | + | When does the human life of an individual begin? At conception? At birth? When the nervous system begins forming? Or perhaps when yo finishes forming? Perhaps at the moment we experience self awareness? What is the value of the life of a human individual? What is the value of a non-human individual? How is more important the life of a human individual than the life of a non human individual, and why? How is more important the life of a non-human individual than the life of another non-human individual, and why? How is more important the life of a certain human individual than the life of a certain other human individual, and why? We all have personal answers to these questions, these are part of our core values, that we subconsciously consult with for every thought that crosses out minds, for each decision we make, each choice we take. Atheists and theists alike, our whole existence dances to the rhythm of religious thinking. |
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| + | Religions are not necessarily about faith in God, or belief in Gods, or even constructed around sacred texts. Being about consensus and clarity, Gaianism pays careful attention to linguistics and etymology: at least in English and other languages derived from or influenced by Latin, the word ''religion'' comes from the Latin ''religare'', meaning re-ligate, reconnect; this can perhaps be interpreted as reconnecting with what is essential, the mystery of life, that which belongs in an experiential realm and cannot be communicated or explained. Dictionaries give at least three meanings for religion: (1) "the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods", (2) "a particular system of faith and worship", and (3) "a pursuit or interest followed with great devotion". Interestingly, neither the ancient Greeks, nor the Egyptian, nor the Chinese had a word equivalent to ''religion''. The Indian, European and Middle-Eastern influenced cultures, the word ''religion'' is most often related to the dictionary's 1st meaning simply because in these cultures the most prevalent form of religion is that of the belief and worship of the notion of the Hebrew God Yahweh, and its later reinterpretations as Jesus in Christian Religion, and Allah in Islam, and the gods of the Vedic religion and derivatives like Hinduism. However, in other cultures the word ''religion'' commonly relates to the 2nd meaning in the dictionary, where religious beliefs are closer to forms of [[w:animism|animism]] in which there are no deities, such as Buddhism, Shinto, some Native American religions, and even some European religions like the Celtic. The dictionary's 3rd meaning relates to fervent customs, such as sporting competition and consumerism, which become quasi-ritual and a central part of people's lives and their social expression. In Gaianism, ''religion'' means, specifically, a collection of shared beliefs that translate into values resulting in socially-impacting practices, whether such beliefs are related to deities, the spiritual, or any other form of belief, i.e. that which one can't reconcile with one's factual knowledge. | ||
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| + | Understanding why Gaianism is designed as a religion requires, firstly, understanding Gaianism's main principle and main purpose, being ''consistency'' and ''safeguarding humanity'', respectively. The notion of ''consistency'' is applicable in a range of contexts, for example ''[[w:intellectual honesty|intellectual honesty]]'' is a form of consistency between held beliefs and factual knowledge, and ''[[w:intellectual rigour|intellectual rigour]]'' being the consistency of standards. ''Safeguarding humanity'' is also applicable in a range of contexts, such as, biologically, meaning protecting the human species from undue extinction, and culturally, meaning protecting what which we can come to understand as our ''humanity''. Everything Gaianism represents spans directly or indirectly from this principle and purpose. These fundamental characteristics define, support and reinforce each other, however it is important to maintain an awareness that they're both arbitrary choices, and therefore do not require being explained or justified in on themselves: they just happen to be what defines Gaianism. However, dedicating time and resources to this pursuit does require defining and understanding underlying motivations and reasons, and all motivations and reasons are basically rooted in belief. The holding of beliefs is an unavoidable characteristic of being human, and possibly a characteristic of any forms of intelligence that rely on abstract thinking to model reality in their brains as a way to anticipate outcomes and make decisions based on those anticipations. | ||
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| + | It is said that science has to do with facts, and religion with values. Anyone who's not affiliated to an organised religion, or doesn't consider themselves religious, however, would passionately object to this notion. Although values are not the exclusive domain of ''organised'' religions, they are always sourced from what can be can called "religious thinking", which includes any form of faith, mysticism, magical thinking, and generally any belief or belief systems. There is almost nothing in human life that doesn't involve belief systems; even Science is ultimately based on belief systems such as ethics and humanism. Facts cannot be values: facts belong in the realm of objectivity{{ref|Religion O}}, facts are facts regardless of our subjective opinion or consideration. Whilst deriving our values from facts is a sensible practice, holding values and beliefs that are at odds with facts is folly, and the latter seem to comprise the great majority of the values and beliefs we rely on, in any current culture. Which brings us to Gaianism's purpose. Fulfilling on "protecting humanity", especially whilst maintaining it's principle of consistency, requires a number of beliefs that are often not aligned with long-held beliefs, often rooted in old religions or ancient mysticism, as most of them are now invalidated by current scientific knowledge. Even the linguistic constructions that we rely on for everyday communication are rooted on, and assist to the survival of, old, obsolete beliefs. In pursuing the highest effectiveness for protecting humanity, Gaianism intends to take on the most updated factual knowledge, and with it review, and update, every social value that is or can be detrimental for our long-term survival. | ||
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| + | There are many mysteries around our experience of being alive. For example, our sense of self, or how placebo works, or where does life (as we know it) come from or what sparked it, or if we're alone in the universe, or what happens to our subjectivity when we die. Most of what used to be mysteries until just a few years or decades, however, are now either well understood or, at least, understood to a degree that invalidates many previously held assumptions and beliefs around those mysteries. Whilst the experience of self remains a mystery, we now know a great deal about life and consciousness, for example that that we become conscious about our decisions a few milliseconds later than we actually make those decisions, and that our experience of self can be by altered by physical and psychological trauma, and that our overall experiences can be tricked, and that our experience of self is largely influenced by knowledges and beliefs. We also now know a lot more about how, at least in mammals, certain emotions depress the central nervous system causing a cascade of biochemical reactions that affects the subject's overall homeostasis eventually leading to disease, and we know what Earth life and its environment looked like when it begun spreading around the globe (cyanobacteria and an atmosphere devoid of free oxygen gas). We also know the difference between total and partial brain death, and some ways to cause reanimation of a dead animal or plant, and the suspension of their life for any period of time. We also know a great deal about social and psychological characteristics of human beings thanks to ample statistical studies, such as that children raised by a single-parent or same-sex parents can be (and often are) just as intellectually sound and emotionally stable as those raised in traditionally constituted families. | ||
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| + | Our current understanding of life and the natural world through scientific disciplines like psychology, biology, archeology, palaeontology, physics, etc, invalidates most of the traditionally held beliefs people still rely on for everyday decision making. Despite this, as science does not deal with values, we continue to rely mainly on the traditional values we were raised with, surrounded by, or come across with through literature or other forms of communication as we develop. People rely on technology on a daily basis for mostly everything they do; such technology is, overwhelmingly, the direct or indirect result of scientific knowledge. However, people use technology even whilst being scientific illiterate, similarly to how our companion animals are able to open doors. Not only scientifically illiterate people use magical thinking to explain (to themselves and others) natural phenomena and the workings of human technology, but most people believe they know better than the collective of scientists in their field of expertise, and consider themselves able to challenge their authority. This is exacerbated by the fact that everybody is scientifically illiterate one way or another: scientific knowledge is too vast for anyone being able to be on top of all knowledge; and also the fact that most financing for the advancement of science and technology is motivated by greed or the perpetuation of the system through growth and economic development, as opposed to the promotion of people's freedom, health and self expression. Whilst scientific advancement is positive regardless of lucrative or political intentions behind it, such intentions do contribute to create distrust in science, even though, absurdly, everybody does happily make use of the technology being unconcerned with having it be the result of the type of thinking they distrust. | ||
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| + | People do rely on a vast number of scientific notions on a range of aspects of their everyday life, like the causes of infectious disease and strategies to regain health, or in performing maintenance in their car engines, | ||
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| + | Whilst general scientific notions reach the everyday life of people, such as that diseases are not a divine punishment or curse and that can be cured with proper nutrition, exercise and/or medicine, or that we breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide, most of our knowledge is not factual, but rooted in beliefs that are largely incorrect, such as that the money supply is controlled by a country's government or state, or that we need to consume large quantities of protein to get or stay strong and healthy. | ||
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| + | Whilst Humanism was an important doctrine in that it rebelled against the power of European churches and helped establish science as an authority in its field, Humanism failed to address the obsolescence of deeply-rooted values, traditions, standards and ideals. | ||
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| + | , and that we're required to make sense of and establish common understandings in order to plan and socialise, or simply to cope with the fear of uncertainty. | ||
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| + | Fulfilling on this purpose also requires holding a number of values that define, moderate and limit actions and behaviours. | ||
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| + | . Values denote something's degree of importance or significance. | ||
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== Notes == | == Notes == | ||
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| + | # {{note|Religion O}} Objectivity is actually inaccessible, all of our knowledge is situated and subject to other related knowledge including beliefs; it can be said that there are only degrees of objectivity, and factual knowledge is characterised for a high degree of objectivity, one that is so high that is very difficult of practically impossible to disprove with current knowledge and technology. | ||
| + | <!-- # {{note|Religion A}} {{cite web|title=Health |url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health |accessdate=22 July 2014 }} --> | ||
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| + | And the beliefs that are consistent with Gaianism's purpose | ||
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| + | Being consistent with its purpose requires Gaianism to being serious and honest regarding the fulfilment of such purpose, and as we will see, consistency appears to be a fundamental requirement for the safeguard of humanity, so t | ||
| + | However, most people a reason, justifying and explaining why they'd dedicate time and resources to these pursuits. | ||
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| + | and by extension protecting as well the kind of environment we're adapted to and we know to be adequate for us, and by extension, sustainability | ||
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| + | Gaianism is intended to be simple, consistent, and pragmatic; it has just one goal: ''Health''. Environmental, social, physical, emotional, and intellectual health. Health is defined as "the level of functional or metabolic efficiency of a living organism"{{ref|Religion A}}, however Gaianism extends the notion of ''living organism'' to super-organisms such as ecosystems, societies, and the Living Earth. Health, however, is not easy to diagnose, or even to define or understand, because efficiency is the extent to which time, effort or cost is well used for the intended task or purpose, and Life doesn't have a task or purpose, just as Energy doesn't have a task or purpose, nor any other physical properties or Natural phenomena. Leaving personal beliefs aside, life simply ''is'', it just happens to be. We may choose a purpose for our own life, and we may also choose to believe in a purpose for all life, but however much we may choose to believe in something, that doesn't make it a fact. So in order to measure Health, or even agree on what Health is, it is necessary to begin by choosing and developing consensus for ''the meaning of Life''. We can choose it to mean to be happy, or to grow old and prosper, or to guarantee the survival of the species, or even something absurd as the number 42. Gaianism proposes beginning with a consensus, at least among Gaians, to have the meaning of Life be the protection of Life on Earth as it was when the Human species awakened to reason, or at least as it is as we found it ourselves in our own lifetimes, and the protection of reason, knowledge, human culture, human life, and self determination. | ||
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| + | One of the defining characteristics of being human is making meaning as a form of determining how to act or choosing which action to do next. Most animals behave instinctively, them seem to do what they're compelled to do, as a bodily response. There is no much thought put into why to do something. So a spider doesn't ponder "what is the purpose of making my spiderweb". It doesn't even plan it, doesn't say "five minutes more" after waking up and starts spinning the web reluctantly because it's feeling lazy that day. A spider suddenly feels the urge, for some reason, some biochemical pathway prompts the spider to start spinning. The spider doesn't question start spinning. The spider doesn't spin because it's hungry. | ||
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| + | Much of human behaviour is still based on this very biological characteristic of instinct. You react instinctively to danger, we react instinctively to attraction, we react instinctively when hungry, or sleepy. However most of what we'd like to consider "conscious decisions" are even unconscious decisions but not instinctive. It happens because of the meaning we make of things. And we make meaning in language, so we're linguistic beings, we live in a world of language. We think in language, we plan in language, we ponder in language. | ||
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| + | Much of meaning making has to do with belief. We don't have evidence for everything we know and we don't behave in accordance to logic and knowledge of facts. Most of the decisions we make throughout the day, any day, any time, have to do with beliefs. Some of them we have chosen freely, considered, and are aware of, but the great majority of those beliefs are not our own, but we have inherited them, and we take them for granted. And the very notions of an unsubstantiated belief is religious thinking. Is the thought of a supernatural thing, or being, or process. And by supernatural I mean something without a Natural explanation, or based from evidence extracted from the Natural world, as could be physics or to some degree, biology. | ||
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| + | So, when planning something like the Gaianism that has a clear goal, and that it is honest in terms of achieving that goal, as much as practicable, and they have an understanding about the function of meaning, the mechanism for which humans behave and are capable of achieving a goal, one has to understand that there are three possible choices: either one ascribes to other religion thinking fully, or partially, or one develops our own unique religious thinking based on our own conclusions beginning from the Natural world and developing those conclusions as complexity develops. | ||
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| + | Gaianism's objective, or goal, is Health. Is a choice, there is no reason for it. Is the reason for Gaianism's existence, perhaps, but there is no reason for this choice. This choice can be justified and it can be explained, but it doesn't have a reason in on itself. So in order to justify and explain this reason, this choice, being Health, Gaianism develops its own set of beliefs utilising knowledge, logic, consistency, and intellectual honesty, building from scratch, from the very beginning of all beliefs. And that is, possibly, the Meaning of Life. So what is the meaning of life? Each religion has its own meaning of life. Most religions place the meaning of life on something supernatural itself, as the objective of a supernatural being, so for most religions we don't choose the meaning of life, but instead we choose the creator of a meaning of life, the creator of life itself, and we believe what is it that this creator of life and the meaning of life intends by creating life. All theistic religions, religions that are created around one or more creators/givers of life and reality, of the physical world, of properties, that we call Gods, posit the meaning of life in this external figure and then claim to know what their intention is, because of someone having communicated with these supernatural being(s) and they received their wisdom in terms of what it is that they plan, wholly or in part. Other religions are not concerned with these types of figures, with Deities, such as shintoism or buddhism, animism, spiritualism, where the meaning of life is simply a mystery and there are supernatural beings all around and we have an undying soul. So this is just to compare those who posit the meaning of life as a creation of a supernatural being or creator, or those who are content with not knowing and not caring what is the meaning of life. However this is perhaps not true, everybody has a meaning of life, somehow. Pondering about life is unavoidable. Having a reason to do something is part of our natural behaviour and a result of our language. We need to make meaning, we can't stand behaving meaninglessly. | ||
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| + | A greater understanding of the natural world and its mechanic provides us with factual information that we could use to create our own Meaning of Life. And in the case of Gaianism, to justify its goal, in a way that seems logical and consistent. When we observe life, by the way we haven't and by we I mean Academia, Science, Scientists, there is no consensus as to what life is, how to distinguish something that is alive and something that is not alive in a very clear and concise way. There are certain characteristics though that enable us to identify at least a number of commonly spread properties of what we understand for to be alive in our planet. So we consider something to be alive if it can metabolise, and replicate. (I would have to research a bit more into the latest definition of life; at some point in time it used to be metabolise and replicate, but now it is understood that there are many beings that are alive and they will not replicate, they are not intended to replicate, they're intended, perhaps, to help other creatures to replicate, but there are no reason for them for being alive). | ||
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| + | Back to the meaning of life and what life is. So we're clear that there is no meaning to life. We allocate meaning to life for our own benefit because we need to, because we have to have some sort of consistency, justification, in our logic, to make meaning of the world, make meaning of what happens, perhaps to be capable of picturing what our lives are going to be in the future, and maybe have a sense of ownership of ourselves. So we can simply say that the meaning of life is to metabolise. That is consistent with reality. That's something that it is alive has no more reason to be alive than to stay alive. The goal of life is to maintain life for as long as possible, for which life needs to metabolise. Also, the meaning of life is to endure, and this is key for the selection of Health as a goal of Gaianism. If the meaning of life is to endure, which is consistent with our understanding of what life processes are, it is the outcome of continuous metabolic processes. Metabolism enables endurance. Without metabolism, something/anything that is alive and doesn't metabolise becomes still, motionless, and there is no life in stillness, motionless. All life is moving, it is metabolising. It doesn't mean it is dead, it just means it is not alive whilst not metabolising. And metabolising simply enables the possibility of continuing metabolising, provided the conditions are hospitable for metabolic processes. And as a result of metabolic processes, metabolism keeps going on, metabolism endures. So the meaning of life is endurance, is what we can allocate that purpose to life: that purpose is to endure. | ||
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| + | To endure is to sustain, to sustain what is, and therefore sustainability is the capacity for endurance. Health is the condition that enables endurance. Lack of health is the lack of the environmental circumstances by which life fails to metabolise in such a way that enables endurance. So the meaning of life is Health, it is the pursuit of Health. It is the pursuit of health, to endure, and endure to continue metabolising. | ||
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| + | We know today that all life is connected. It is connected between each other through its environment. All metabolic processes consume environmental resources and produce waste, which on turn becomes environmental resources for other resources, sometimes. So knowing, and by knowing I mean having factual evidence of reality, of the interconnectedness, of the environment, we realise that every action has a cascade of consequences which causes ripples towards the future that causes the kind of environment we'll live in in the future. Now, the difference, perhaps the essential difference, between living in a world of instinct and living in a world of reason is that in a world of instinct there is no conscious choice, or intention. There is no choice. Just as the spider doesn't choose how to spin a web, or why to spin a web, or when to spin a web, a spider suddenly feels the urge to spin a web. Humans, through reasons, have a choice; we can plan our actions in accordance to our understanding of the world, and to the world we want to come to live in in the future. If a spider had reason, it would have a choice every day whereas to spin a web or not to spin a web, according to her conscious choice. Maybe the spider's choice would be not to spin a web because it would rather go somewhere else, or could be curious as to "how if I spin my web in this other shape?", or "what if I start spinning my web in this other style?". A spider with reason could spin every day a web with a different shape, but they can't. As humans, we have the capability of constructing our future as a result of our choices, we have the freedom to behave, we have free will. Free will is not exclusively human. We have human free will, other animals have other kids of free will, which are different than human free will, because perhaps of a less developed abstract language, perhaps because of their reduced capacity for logical thinking, or just plain thinking. | ||
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| + | So, recapping, when we consider that the reason for life is Health, and we realise that we're all connected, as a result of this realisation we realise that if we cater for our own individual health only, but disregard the health of our environment, we will not be able to endure as effectively as if we cared both about our health and that of our environment, in such a way our environment promotes our own health. We're confronted today with a world which is highly unhealthy, it is inhospitable for life, full of toxic waste, natural environments are degrading at an increasing pace, the pressures we pose on the world as a result of the increasing population of our species is driving other species to extinction, is affecting climate in a way that it will no longer continue in the same way life as it is has developed (so the climate is growing different that which has happened to be what is hospitable to life). We don't know whereas the climate will change in a way that it will be different but still hospitable to life, or if will become inhospitable to life. For example, there was a time in which Mars would have been hospitable to life, but it is certainly inhospitable to life today. We don't have the science or the technology to predict exactly and precisely what will happen as a result of the changes in climate that we're pushing. But what is certain is that the climate will change and that life will be required to adapt to a different environment. | ||
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| + | So when the meaning of life is Health, and by Health we realise that considering what we know about reality and about the world, caring for our own individual health or the health of our own individual family, or group, or even nation, or species, may not be conducive to the sustainability of our health, we come to realise that the only way we can endure and maintain health as individuals towards the end of our lives and as a species toward the end of the life of our species, we must protect our environment just as much as we protect our own lives. We must protect the environment that we know to be hospitable to our own survival. And since we don't know any environments that could be hospitable to life for our own survival other than the one that has enabled our becoming the way we are, we must protect the environment, to continue to be, the kind of environment that promoted our existence. | ||
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| + | Gaianism's goal is Health, and its objective is the promotion of Health. And by health it means physical health, emotion health, psychological health, social health, and environmental health. And in order to achieve its goal, based on the belief that the meaning of life is the endurance, it must develop its own set of beliefs, it can't rely on beliefs that are not consistent with this core belief, the belief of the meaning of life being that of endurance. So Gaianism is incompatible with any other religion, and the absence of a religion, sometimes called atheism (which is incorrect, atheism is the non-belief in the existence of a deity), a religious experience involving a meaning of life other than to endure is inconsistent with the pursuit of the fulfilment of Health as a goal. And therefore Gaianism must become a religion in its own right in order to fulfil on that goal, and have the fulfilment of such goal as its objective. | ||
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| + | Gaianism also has one objective: the implementation of any strategies that could most effectively promote and sustain Health. | ||
| + | Health can be understood in two ways: absence of symptoms of illness, and | ||
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| + | http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biopsychosocial_model | ||
| + | Biopsichosocial | ||
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| + | Gaianism is not so much about its principles and values as it is about its goals and objectives. | ||
| + | Most, if not all, of Gaianism's principles and values are a function of, and designed in consistency with, the achievement of its goals and objectives. | ||
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| + | Recapping on these goals and objectives, these are two-fold: human and environmental. Although they're intimately connected | ||
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| + | Gaianism's objectives could be achieved within communities and localities. However, achieving such objectives globally would require for the great majority of people living in technologically advanced societies to adopt similar objectives as well. Considering the accelerating environmental degradation, population growth, increase in inequality, reduction of privacy, increase in the incidence of obesity, cancer, allergies, and mental health issues, etc, it is not difficult to conclude that Humanity is not developing towards ensuring the health, safety and endurance of Gaia, and freedom from labour, inequality, imposed violence, oppression, and submission. Even when individuals and groups of people could develop lifestyles with comparatively higher consistency with Gaianism's goals, such as living in eco-villages, transition towns, reusing and recycling, reducing consumption, investing in renewables, bartering, lending and gifting, doing community work, cruelty free lifestyles, etc, even when these efforts are very important in their own right, they only serve to reduce very marginally the accelerating speed. | ||
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| + | ) The world is highly connected and no one is an island. | ||
| + | All current and past technologically advanced lifestyles and their supporting cultures became dependent on constant growth, and therefore have been inherently unsustainable, delivering themselves to the mercy of external factors and pressures for preventing the impossible. | ||
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| + | Gaianism is concerned with affecting the world as profoundly as practicable in terms of these objectives. | ||
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| + | Gaianism is, first and foremost, a pragmatic and urgent strategy for implementing its founding principles and objectives. | ||
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| + | First and foremost, Gaianism is defined as culture | ||
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| + | Gaianism is way of life, and addresses every aspect of life. | ||
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Latest revision as of 10:32, 28 July 2014
This is the Why a religion Chapter of the Introduction section of the book Gaianism.
[edit] Why a religion
 | This chapter is a stub. |
If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch,
you must first invent the universe.
When does the human life of an individual begin? At conception? At birth? When the nervous system begins forming? Or perhaps when yo finishes forming? Perhaps at the moment we experience self awareness? What is the value of the life of a human individual? What is the value of a non-human individual? How is more important the life of a human individual than the life of a non human individual, and why? How is more important the life of a non-human individual than the life of another non-human individual, and why? How is more important the life of a certain human individual than the life of a certain other human individual, and why? We all have personal answers to these questions, these are part of our core values, that we subconsciously consult with for every thought that crosses out minds, for each decision we make, each choice we take. Atheists and theists alike, our whole existence dances to the rhythm of religious thinking.
Religions are not necessarily about faith in God, or belief in Gods, or even constructed around sacred texts. Being about consensus and clarity, Gaianism pays careful attention to linguistics and etymology: at least in English and other languages derived from or influenced by Latin, the word religion comes from the Latin religare, meaning re-ligate, reconnect; this can perhaps be interpreted as reconnecting with what is essential, the mystery of life, that which belongs in an experiential realm and cannot be communicated or explained. Dictionaries give at least three meanings for religion: (1) "the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods", (2) "a particular system of faith and worship", and (3) "a pursuit or interest followed with great devotion". Interestingly, neither the ancient Greeks, nor the Egyptian, nor the Chinese had a word equivalent to religion. The Indian, European and Middle-Eastern influenced cultures, the word religion is most often related to the dictionary's 1st meaning simply because in these cultures the most prevalent form of religion is that of the belief and worship of the notion of the Hebrew God Yahweh, and its later reinterpretations as Jesus in Christian Religion, and Allah in Islam, and the gods of the Vedic religion and derivatives like Hinduism. However, in other cultures the word religion commonly relates to the 2nd meaning in the dictionary, where religious beliefs are closer to forms of animism in which there are no deities, such as Buddhism, Shinto, some Native American religions, and even some European religions like the Celtic. The dictionary's 3rd meaning relates to fervent customs, such as sporting competition and consumerism, which become quasi-ritual and a central part of people's lives and their social expression. In Gaianism, religion means, specifically, a collection of shared beliefs that translate into values resulting in socially-impacting practices, whether such beliefs are related to deities, the spiritual, or any other form of belief, i.e. that which one can't reconcile with one's factual knowledge.
Understanding why Gaianism is designed as a religion requires, firstly, understanding Gaianism's main principle and main purpose, being consistency and safeguarding humanity, respectively. The notion of consistency is applicable in a range of contexts, for example intellectual honesty is a form of consistency between held beliefs and factual knowledge, and intellectual rigour being the consistency of standards. Safeguarding humanity is also applicable in a range of contexts, such as, biologically, meaning protecting the human species from undue extinction, and culturally, meaning protecting what which we can come to understand as our humanity. Everything Gaianism represents spans directly or indirectly from this principle and purpose. These fundamental characteristics define, support and reinforce each other, however it is important to maintain an awareness that they're both arbitrary choices, and therefore do not require being explained or justified in on themselves: they just happen to be what defines Gaianism. However, dedicating time and resources to this pursuit does require defining and understanding underlying motivations and reasons, and all motivations and reasons are basically rooted in belief. The holding of beliefs is an unavoidable characteristic of being human, and possibly a characteristic of any forms of intelligence that rely on abstract thinking to model reality in their brains as a way to anticipate outcomes and make decisions based on those anticipations.
It is said that science has to do with facts, and religion with values. Anyone who's not affiliated to an organised religion, or doesn't consider themselves religious, however, would passionately object to this notion. Although values are not the exclusive domain of organised religions, they are always sourced from what can be can called "religious thinking", which includes any form of faith, mysticism, magical thinking, and generally any belief or belief systems. There is almost nothing in human life that doesn't involve belief systems; even Science is ultimately based on belief systems such as ethics and humanism. Facts cannot be values: facts belong in the realm of objectivity[1], facts are facts regardless of our subjective opinion or consideration. Whilst deriving our values from facts is a sensible practice, holding values and beliefs that are at odds with facts is folly, and the latter seem to comprise the great majority of the values and beliefs we rely on, in any current culture. Which brings us to Gaianism's purpose. Fulfilling on "protecting humanity", especially whilst maintaining it's principle of consistency, requires a number of beliefs that are often not aligned with long-held beliefs, often rooted in old religions or ancient mysticism, as most of them are now invalidated by current scientific knowledge. Even the linguistic constructions that we rely on for everyday communication are rooted on, and assist to the survival of, old, obsolete beliefs. In pursuing the highest effectiveness for protecting humanity, Gaianism intends to take on the most updated factual knowledge, and with it review, and update, every social value that is or can be detrimental for our long-term survival.
There are many mysteries around our experience of being alive. For example, our sense of self, or how placebo works, or where does life (as we know it) come from or what sparked it, or if we're alone in the universe, or what happens to our subjectivity when we die. Most of what used to be mysteries until just a few years or decades, however, are now either well understood or, at least, understood to a degree that invalidates many previously held assumptions and beliefs around those mysteries. Whilst the experience of self remains a mystery, we now know a great deal about life and consciousness, for example that that we become conscious about our decisions a few milliseconds later than we actually make those decisions, and that our experience of self can be by altered by physical and psychological trauma, and that our overall experiences can be tricked, and that our experience of self is largely influenced by knowledges and beliefs. We also now know a lot more about how, at least in mammals, certain emotions depress the central nervous system causing a cascade of biochemical reactions that affects the subject's overall homeostasis eventually leading to disease, and we know what Earth life and its environment looked like when it begun spreading around the globe (cyanobacteria and an atmosphere devoid of free oxygen gas). We also know the difference between total and partial brain death, and some ways to cause reanimation of a dead animal or plant, and the suspension of their life for any period of time. We also know a great deal about social and psychological characteristics of human beings thanks to ample statistical studies, such as that children raised by a single-parent or same-sex parents can be (and often are) just as intellectually sound and emotionally stable as those raised in traditionally constituted families.
Our current understanding of life and the natural world through scientific disciplines like psychology, biology, archeology, palaeontology, physics, etc, invalidates most of the traditionally held beliefs people still rely on for everyday decision making. Despite this, as science does not deal with values, we continue to rely mainly on the traditional values we were raised with, surrounded by, or come across with through literature or other forms of communication as we develop. People rely on technology on a daily basis for mostly everything they do; such technology is, overwhelmingly, the direct or indirect result of scientific knowledge. However, people use technology even whilst being scientific illiterate, similarly to how our companion animals are able to open doors. Not only scientifically illiterate people use magical thinking to explain (to themselves and others) natural phenomena and the workings of human technology, but most people believe they know better than the collective of scientists in their field of expertise, and consider themselves able to challenge their authority. This is exacerbated by the fact that everybody is scientifically illiterate one way or another: scientific knowledge is too vast for anyone being able to be on top of all knowledge; and also the fact that most financing for the advancement of science and technology is motivated by greed or the perpetuation of the system through growth and economic development, as opposed to the promotion of people's freedom, health and self expression. Whilst scientific advancement is positive regardless of lucrative or political intentions behind it, such intentions do contribute to create distrust in science, even though, absurdly, everybody does happily make use of the technology being unconcerned with having it be the result of the type of thinking they distrust.
[edit] Notes
- ^ Objectivity is actually inaccessible, all of our knowledge is situated and subject to other related knowledge including beliefs; it can be said that there are only degrees of objectivity, and factual knowledge is characterised for a high degree of objectivity, one that is so high that is very difficult of practically impossible to disprove with current knowledge and technology.
