OK, tell me where all those civilisations of the past have gone to,
because THEY did NOT survived.
Tell me what makes YOU so sure this current global civilisation can
survive. I am more than happy to be shown where I am wrong, but if you
TRULY disagree with what I am saying, I would like you to provide some
clear and unambiguous empirical evidence to back up your assertions.
Without that, you are simply complaining that I am just strongly
expressing an opinion. I never deny this, in the context that we are
speaking of here, but I think that my opinion on this is as good as
anybody's that I have seen so far.
To help you chew on this:
* compassion is the acting out of the ability to see oneself in the
other and the recognition that, except for the throw of some
cosmic dice, I am he or she and they are me; compassion
facilitates the breaking down of the fear and false consciousness
which underpins unconscious projection; compassion is a sign and
manifestation of authentic being and strength, not weakness;
without compassion truly human life is well nigh impossible
* ethics is the foundation of civilisation and is the acting out of
the ability to see that we each depend on many, many others for
our survival and well being and they depend upon us, and that the
true genius and strength of humankind is our ability to cooperate
with each other rather than a propensity to strive against others
* democracy is essentially the systematic implementation of the
non-violent resolution of conflict, it requires that everyone's
voice be heard and democracy advances as the excessive and
aggressive power of the rich and powerful is curtailed and
controlled; Karl Popper gave the most succinct explanation of why
democracy is both better than all the alternatives and absolutely
essential and the basic form of his argument is this: all policies
formulated by governments and governing bodies will have
unexpected negative consequences, no matter how good the policies,
and it is to be expected that at least 50% of the unforeseen
consequences will be significantly adverse and negative for those
who experience them so it is imperative that the negative
consequences of policies be made known to those who govern and
that the rulers take notice and actually ameliorate the problems.
If the rulers cannot be made to correct these unforeseen negative
outcomes then over time the negative outcomes will accrue to the
extent that the people feel driven to rebel or vote with their
feet and leave the land of the rotten regime.
* the advent of scientific method into human culture is what has
made the modern world; this modern era is a time of transition in
which every traditional belief and practice is being challenged by
the application of scientific method and of the fruits of the
application of science; in this world of great and ceaseless
changes, the continued application of scientific method is and
always will be essential for allowing us to adapt to all the
unforeseen outcomes of change so far; with scientific method human
beings have the ability to journey out into the solar system and
beyond, to be citizens of the galaxy, but without scientific
method humans will die out on a devastated planet
Regards
Mark Peaty CDES
mpeaty.domain.name.hidden
http://www.arach.net.au/~mpeaty/
Klortho wrote:
>
>> The other thing I do is check to what extent a person's speech and
>> writings support and affirm the four fundamental ingredients of
>> civilisation:
>> Compassion, democracy, ethics and scientific method. No civilisation can
>> survive without all four of these.
>>
>>
>
> Talk about assertions without any evidence!
>
>
> >
>
>
>
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Received on Wed Feb 28 2007 - 11:56:57 PST