Boris Johnson's Philosophy fun-time. Part:1

[The Dharma Bum]

I don't think it can be proven that ethics have any sort of objective basis, or all cultures would have the same or similar set of ethics. Instead what is seen as sacred or profane is wildly different from culture to culture. Since the basis for ethics is so clearly subjective it can be seen as a form of cultural aesthetic.

[Gnostic]

[The Dharma Bum]

All that is terrible, of course it is time to discard the suppressive thinking of the past. It is inarguable that humans accomplish far more in conditions of autonomy and freedom, simply compare the advancements we enjoy in the modern age, so your idea that without morals or religion the world would degenerate into "dog eat dog survival" is completely off base. To say the opposite would be far more accurate. Today the human individual is trapped in a life of drudgery, and to resist is to end up living under a bridge somewhere unless you are lucky enough to belong to the privileged class.

The truth is "morality", "religion", "tradition", "education" are suppressive programs promoted by the state system that do more to hold humanity back from realizing it's full potential in order to foster the exploitation of society by the ruling elite than they do to result in any type of competent or reasonable self-governance.

Indulging the outlandish whims of a small segment of society by lavishly granting access to vast resources is useless from a practical standpoint and we've wasted thousands of years on that because of the ideas you think are necessary to control and guide humanity to a positive result. None of that has ever resulted in any positive result. Whatever positive result and goodness that has ever occurred in the course of human events has usually been the result of intelligent people acting courageously in the face of authoritarian pressure so generally speaking it's despite morality and religion that people do good, not because of them.

Yes, of course it is time to move on from all that. We have the capacity to build whatever kind of society we want.

[Gnostic]

[The Dharma Bum]

All great points. I wish I had a better answer for you.

[Gnostic]

I guess I'm a pessimist ala schopenhauer. I don't have much faith in humanity or in individual human's ultimate aims and goals in life. We are animals whose self preservation comes first. And then after that comes base greed and consumption. It's in our very nature. On top of that, for some physiological reason in our "more developed" brains, we harbor capacities for "evil" and selfishness, destruction and violence, much more so than all the other animals on earth. We even get off on watching our fellow beings fight one another, such as boxing, football, etc. I'm not saying such agonistic games are altogether bad...agonistics can contribute to certain advancements in people. But I'm sure you get the point.

You are an optimist. Which is positive and I don't mean to argue with your excellent points. I guess I fall into the same category I'm describing for people...I like to debate and argue lol.

Anyway I just don't see the way things are with contemporary morality and ethics and religion changing anytime very soon.

[The Dharma Bum]

It's cool, I like to argue and debate too.

Anyway, it seems like those age old concepts are proving to be less and less comprehensive in their ability to help people solve contemporary problems. You can see cracks appearing in the edifice forming everywhere. Look how much society has transformed since the 1950s, that's not even a full generation. And like you pointed out we really are still very primitive in many respects. That doesn't necessarily preclude rapid advancement.

Anyway, I expect big changes. We are uncovering the truth about things, which is infinitely superior to believing untruth about our nature. This is really what morality and religion are all about. Noble lies, so-called. These systems are proxies for the truth, that emerged in a time when not much was known about the actual nature of human existence. They served their purpose when we were in darkness but in an age when we are rapidly unraveling the mysteries of the very universe itself they are no longer adequate.

People want to know the truth about things and they want to live their lives in a reasonable manner. At this point adherence to archaic ideas interferes with this pursuit. That's why so many social changes have happened in the last few decades. People want tolerance, equality, and respect. Let's as a society encourage this and it will solve most of our social issues.

[The Dharma Bum]

You see, the problem with appealing to the sensuous appetites of human beings as a method of pacifying society is that sooner or later human beings are going to drink that well dry and they will smash the system the very second it ceases to service those appetites.

[Gnostic]

[Gnostic]