For me theological arguments use what is already metaphor attempting to capture, imperfectly because of the limitations of human language, what is instinctively understood: some people's brains are wired in ways that exclude them from "normal" and "healthy" human interactions.
More and more and more I'm noticing that the people causing the most destruction to our society today may be described as very high-functioning autistics. A crucial piece is missing from them.
Add to them the sociopaths, who are destructive in more overt ways. Autistics are unlikely to be serial killers; sociopaths are. Sociopaths and their sub-species go into politics. Autistics create Microsoft.
The greatest definition of evil I've ever encountered is that by the 17th cent. British theologian William Law:
"If a delicious, fragrant fruit had a power of separating itself from that rich spirit, fine taste, smell, and color which it receives from the virtue of the sun, and the spirit of the air; or if it could in the beginning of its growth, turn away from the sun, and receive no virtue from it, then it would stand in its own first birth of wrath, sourness, bitterness, and astringency, just as the devils do, who have turned back into their own dark root, and rejected the Light and Spirit of God: so that the hellish nature of a devil is nothing else, but its own first forms of life, withdrawn, or separated from the heavenly light and love; just as the sourness, astringency, and bitterness of a fruit, are nothing else but the first forms of its own vegetable life before it has reached the virtue of the sun, and the spirit of the air."
I'd say people like Gates are incapable of recognizing evil. And I'd say sociopaths find goodness boring and laughable.
The normal person finds each of these natures incomprehensible and many human beings find it necessary to create concrete realities in the attempt to explain the ungraspable. I myself believe in what for convenience in discourse with others I too call God. But I do not believe in Satan. I see only profoundly damaged human beings--but I believe the damage, though arising from many causes, remains physiological.
As an ethnic and cultural Jew but now entirely without dogma person raised in a moderately observant family, the core belief of Christianity is pretty much incomprehensible to me, but the religious thinkers most appealing to me happen to be Christian--though all of them were regarded as heretics or at the least disobedient to Church authority. Meister Eckhart, Teresa of Avila, Law, Therese of Lisieux--each understood something I recognize as truth, only limited by that one issue that profoundly separates us. I think most people inclined to believe in what we call God need a certain framework that helps make the unknowable tangible to them.
Funny thing. I'm primarily a fiction writer (who was kicked out of commenting on a webzine that had published me for 4 years because I was just a little wee bit too frank) and am planning to launch my own Substack as soon as I can organize myself sufficiently. Your encouragement is really heartening. Made my day, truly.
Organizing oneself "sufficiently" is a myth. No reason you can't start your own Substack as serialized fiction. or a review of magazines. Or, a review of Substack.
I can use a dose of stern retorting, so thanks for a spoonful.
Actually I have a whole body of previously-published flash that as I understand I retained the copyright to, and I just need to revise (since I'm much better now than when I started) and begin posting to my own Substack, which would give me a year's worth of content. I figured that stuff ought to be available free.
But would YOU pay the minimum to read something newly improved that you could find in its original form for free?
Subscribed to your Substack and tweeted I'd done that. You've done me an extremely good turn, kicking me in the keister sufficiently to get me going. Thank you, Bill.
Substack worthy! I'm also on a journey trying to dig into the nature of those predisposed to dark-triad personality traits and the moral implications of exceeding Dunbar's number. Saving your comment to disc for repeated reading. Well thought out and expressed.
The wiki page is a good place to start. It is a theory correlating the size of part of the human brain with the number of people we can remember as unique individuals at any one time. Replications studies have estimated that number between 150 and 250. For those of us who see an overlap with other social primates, chimpanzee troops reach a maximum size of about 200 before they fragment into smaller groups. There are many mental and moral implications of gathering in groups larger than Dunbar's number, among which includes the incapacity to depend on a purely empathy-driven morality, and the necessity of using abstraction to create faux-empathetic laws as a proxy for empathetic morality and to build and hold large hierarchies together. At a more subconscious level, customs, traditions, habits do the same thing as law to hold large populations together and in this high-tech era, algorithms do the same. There are trade-offs for either purely empathetic or purely rule-driven moralities, and thus ebbs and flows in personal human integrity as well as thriving and desolate periods of human history ... fractals of each other. I am in my later years, so I tend to see the world through a lens of 'end-times', but occasionally return to the hopes and dreams of youth.
Just finished The Enemy Part IV. I wish my family members and several former friends would read it, but its content is not their cup of tea -- more like a shot of hemlock to their life styles. It sure was great to find Substack a few months ago. BHerr and Berenson are what I thought my former friends were like before the blinders got blown off two years ago. What percentage of the American population still wears them? A higher percent than I ever thought possible.
My return to Jesus a few years ago has kept me sane. So has the TV series "The Chosen." If you haven't seen it, it's the first multi-season video series about Jesus ever. Available on YouTube (so far), DVD or stream it from the app on your phone. As of today over 379 million (that's right, over 379 million) views by people world wide. It will make you fall in love with Jesus all over again. And, keep you sane.
Thank you BHerr. Look forward to Part V and your other ruminations.
I’m so grateful for those like you who’ve seen with clear vision (thanks to the eyes of faith) that we are indeed in the midst of a spiritual battle between the literal forces of good vs. evil. As difficult as these past few years have been, it has been obvious (at least to me) that God is working to awaken people and call to them through the valley of shadow. Our great enemy does walk about like a lion, seeking whom he may devour. But God is yet with us, and He is gathering in His flock. I see and read a lot, and often find His voice in many unexpected places.
Thank you for your light in the dark. God bless your labors, and may His grace continue to be with us all.
Eden, I feel this comment. It's never too late. I can't even imagine living for years and then having your life, your perceptions and core beliefs, completely turned upside down.
I commend you for being willing to change the very foundation you've built your life on.
I feel like you would really benefit from reading a book called The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel. He was a journalist for the Chicago Tribune trying to disprove Christianity. In the end, he objectively comes to the conclusion that Christ was real and was who he said he was. It's a fascinating, objective argument, and from what I intuit with you, you might really benefit from that argument.
One of the worst things in life is feeling alone, being alone. I know Substack has been a very important thing to me to make me feel not alone. Like you said "I feel like I've found normal people again." It's funny, but it's true.
Another project I'm a part of is my podcast at Lunchtimeinrome.com. We discuss how the importance of not being alone, of finding people to join you in your emotions and on your journey. You might really find it beneficial if you join us at the table.
I'd love to continue discussing all of this stuff with you. I can tell you've completely changed chapters in your life. I'm glad the writings here have helped and have met you where you are.
I can't imagine how lonely that is for you in San Fran. I miss that city, but I have zero desire to go back. It's absolutely insane, as you know.
Write it up! I'm going to subscribe to your newsletter now. Let's keep talking, because there may come a day when we have to do this in secret. But the TRUTH will always win in the end.
For me theological arguments use what is already metaphor attempting to capture, imperfectly because of the limitations of human language, what is instinctively understood: some people's brains are wired in ways that exclude them from "normal" and "healthy" human interactions.
More and more and more I'm noticing that the people causing the most destruction to our society today may be described as very high-functioning autistics. A crucial piece is missing from them.
Add to them the sociopaths, who are destructive in more overt ways. Autistics are unlikely to be serial killers; sociopaths are. Sociopaths and their sub-species go into politics. Autistics create Microsoft.
The greatest definition of evil I've ever encountered is that by the 17th cent. British theologian William Law:
"If a delicious, fragrant fruit had a power of separating itself from that rich spirit, fine taste, smell, and color which it receives from the virtue of the sun, and the spirit of the air; or if it could in the beginning of its growth, turn away from the sun, and receive no virtue from it, then it would stand in its own first birth of wrath, sourness, bitterness, and astringency, just as the devils do, who have turned back into their own dark root, and rejected the Light and Spirit of God: so that the hellish nature of a devil is nothing else, but its own first forms of life, withdrawn, or separated from the heavenly light and love; just as the sourness, astringency, and bitterness of a fruit, are nothing else but the first forms of its own vegetable life before it has reached the virtue of the sun, and the spirit of the air."
I'd say people like Gates are incapable of recognizing evil. And I'd say sociopaths find goodness boring and laughable.
The normal person finds each of these natures incomprehensible and many human beings find it necessary to create concrete realities in the attempt to explain the ungraspable. I myself believe in what for convenience in discourse with others I too call God. But I do not believe in Satan. I see only profoundly damaged human beings--but I believe the damage, though arising from many causes, remains physiological.
Such a good comment. I appreciate the honesty, and I do love that quote!
Thank you.
As an ethnic and cultural Jew but now entirely without dogma person raised in a moderately observant family, the core belief of Christianity is pretty much incomprehensible to me, but the religious thinkers most appealing to me happen to be Christian--though all of them were regarded as heretics or at the least disobedient to Church authority. Meister Eckhart, Teresa of Avila, Law, Therese of Lisieux--each understood something I recognize as truth, only limited by that one issue that profoundly separates us. I think most people inclined to believe in what we call God need a certain framework that helps make the unknowable tangible to them.
Ever thought about writing your own Substack? You're a great writer and thinker.
Funny thing. I'm primarily a fiction writer (who was kicked out of commenting on a webzine that had published me for 4 years because I was just a little wee bit too frank) and am planning to launch my own Substack as soon as I can organize myself sufficiently. Your encouragement is really heartening. Made my day, truly.
Yay!
Organizing oneself "sufficiently" is a myth. No reason you can't start your own Substack as serialized fiction. or a review of magazines. Or, a review of Substack.
I can use a dose of stern retorting, so thanks for a spoonful.
Actually I have a whole body of previously-published flash that as I understand I retained the copyright to, and I just need to revise (since I'm much better now than when I started) and begin posting to my own Substack, which would give me a year's worth of content. I figured that stuff ought to be available free.
But would YOU pay the minimum to read something newly improved that you could find in its original form for free?
Subscribed to your Substack and tweeted I'd done that. You've done me an extremely good turn, kicking me in the keister sufficiently to get me going. Thank you, Bill.
Substack worthy! I'm also on a journey trying to dig into the nature of those predisposed to dark-triad personality traits and the moral implications of exceeding Dunbar's number. Saving your comment to disc for repeated reading. Well thought out and expressed.
Thanks Steve! What's Dunbar's number?
The wiki page is a good place to start. It is a theory correlating the size of part of the human brain with the number of people we can remember as unique individuals at any one time. Replications studies have estimated that number between 150 and 250. For those of us who see an overlap with other social primates, chimpanzee troops reach a maximum size of about 200 before they fragment into smaller groups. There are many mental and moral implications of gathering in groups larger than Dunbar's number, among which includes the incapacity to depend on a purely empathy-driven morality, and the necessity of using abstraction to create faux-empathetic laws as a proxy for empathetic morality and to build and hold large hierarchies together. At a more subconscious level, customs, traditions, habits do the same thing as law to hold large populations together and in this high-tech era, algorithms do the same. There are trade-offs for either purely empathetic or purely rule-driven moralities, and thus ebbs and flows in personal human integrity as well as thriving and desolate periods of human history ... fractals of each other. I am in my later years, so I tend to see the world through a lens of 'end-times', but occasionally return to the hopes and dreams of youth.
Howdy,
Just finished The Enemy Part IV. I wish my family members and several former friends would read it, but its content is not their cup of tea -- more like a shot of hemlock to their life styles. It sure was great to find Substack a few months ago. BHerr and Berenson are what I thought my former friends were like before the blinders got blown off two years ago. What percentage of the American population still wears them? A higher percent than I ever thought possible.
My return to Jesus a few years ago has kept me sane. So has the TV series "The Chosen." If you haven't seen it, it's the first multi-season video series about Jesus ever. Available on YouTube (so far), DVD or stream it from the app on your phone. As of today over 379 million (that's right, over 379 million) views by people world wide. It will make you fall in love with Jesus all over again. And, keep you sane.
Thank you BHerr. Look forward to Part V and your other ruminations.
Wow, I appreciate this comment! And yes, The Chosen is so powerful. Really really worth the watch.
I’m so grateful for those like you who’ve seen with clear vision (thanks to the eyes of faith) that we are indeed in the midst of a spiritual battle between the literal forces of good vs. evil. As difficult as these past few years have been, it has been obvious (at least to me) that God is working to awaken people and call to them through the valley of shadow. Our great enemy does walk about like a lion, seeking whom he may devour. But God is yet with us, and He is gathering in His flock. I see and read a lot, and often find His voice in many unexpected places.
Thank you for your light in the dark. God bless your labors, and may His grace continue to be with us all.
Eden, I feel this comment. It's never too late. I can't even imagine living for years and then having your life, your perceptions and core beliefs, completely turned upside down.
I commend you for being willing to change the very foundation you've built your life on.
I feel like you would really benefit from reading a book called The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel. He was a journalist for the Chicago Tribune trying to disprove Christianity. In the end, he objectively comes to the conclusion that Christ was real and was who he said he was. It's a fascinating, objective argument, and from what I intuit with you, you might really benefit from that argument.
One of the worst things in life is feeling alone, being alone. I know Substack has been a very important thing to me to make me feel not alone. Like you said "I feel like I've found normal people again." It's funny, but it's true.
Another project I'm a part of is my podcast at Lunchtimeinrome.com. We discuss how the importance of not being alone, of finding people to join you in your emotions and on your journey. You might really find it beneficial if you join us at the table.
https://lunchtimeinrome.com/
I'd love to continue discussing all of this stuff with you. I can tell you've completely changed chapters in your life. I'm glad the writings here have helped and have met you where you are.
Also, if you're up for it, you could take our Relational Needs Questionnaire to understand your emotional needs better.
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScUBgGvh9sEp6n5T1UNfYJ6_2Cs8n3y4OGfnwCZbIUDxEPGpA/viewform
It's a fascinating assessment that I think would be beneficial to you.
I can't imagine how lonely that is for you in San Fran. I miss that city, but I have zero desire to go back. It's absolutely insane, as you know.
Write it up! I'm going to subscribe to your newsletter now. Let's keep talking, because there may come a day when we have to do this in secret. But the TRUTH will always win in the end.