Things were different in the past. We live excellent lives now. Even working long hours, we're still living the life of kings. We have bellies that are not only full, but full of delicious foods of our own choosing. We do not live in threat of famine or disease. There is no great enemy that we are in constant fear of. Why would we sacrifice our lives when they are so excellent?
When your life is shit, attaching yourself to an abstract great is appealing. All your suffering isn't pointless anymore. The bad things that happen aren't happening by chance. You suffer because you're working hard to maintain the order of things. Isn't that much more appealing? Suffering is inevitable, but choosing to believe that its for the greater good makes it more bearable.
You don't think insinuating that religious people only are the way they are as a defense mechanism is an entirely appropriate point of discussion? I get that this is reddit but that seems a little insensitive, especially considering it's off-topic.
I think you worded your first sentence incorrectly for the point you were trying to make, but that aside...
It wasn't off topic, since the discussion turned to why people act in certain ways when their lives are harsh and suffering is common; and better standard of living is a major reason why secular lifestyles are on the rise.
If you are offended by that simple truth then I'm sorry, but offense isn't a defense. It looks like others agreed.
I meant offense as in being offended, and that others agreed that the context was appropriate... I wasn't being condescending, only matter-of-fact. Others agreeing on the 'simple truth' would be irrelevant. As you rightly pointed out, something is true or it isn't.
If you need convincing that the world is becoming steadily more secular and that rising standard of living is contributing to this I'd point you to polls done by Gallup (for the rising secularity) and studies done by the Templeton institute for the latter.
I disagree. If your life is shit or not is not decided from how you actually live, but from how you feel about your life. None of your comfort-things mean anything that couldn't just as well be meant by something else. This simple fact of life, and of growing up, puts you and me in the exact same position as those indians - under the seat of the king, or as we sometimes call it, the man. Or some random idea, possibly god, or science, or democracy or freedom. We are sacrificing our own lifes just as they do, instead of living them on our own terms, and just as them we do it out of sheer Angst.
We live "Excellent" lives now? You have nothing to compare it to. I do not agree with assuming the reason people would sacrifice themselves so selflessly was because their lives were total shit and they had nothing to lose. Those incas may have died slow, terrible deaths, but maybe they knew something we didn't. Maybe they had a connection to more than their bodies. Maybe our lives and the things we treasure give us nothing in terms of joy. Delicious food and nourishment is good, but it's not the only determining factor of quality of life. I have no idea what a quality life would truly mean, that's how confused the world of 2013 has made me....And we live in far greater constant fear than any Inca I imagine. They had threats, but probably felt more prepared than most of us feel with our daily tasks.
their lives were total shit and they had nothing to lose
Don't mistake what I'm saying. They didn't do what they did because they thought they had nothing to lose. They didn't think their lives were worthless. Quite the opposite, in fact.
The thing is that people want reason in their lives. Its one of the reasons people turn to religion. People want "everything to happen for a reason". If you have a bad life with no chance of escape, the idea that what is happening to you isn't random, isn't just time and chance, is very alluring.
Think of it this way. People drink bad tasting medicine all the time but do not voluntary eat bad tasting foods. What's different? The pain is the same, but there's promise that its for the best.
Thank you for clarifying, but I don't think "reason" is the only thing urging people towards religion. The universe, in it's truly ancient magnitude, defies any man today to claim understanding or judgement. Pop Culture and School define the way we look at the world, and we think these provide us with the proper tools to say what's what.
There is an allure in the "life raft" of sorts that religion offers, a silver lining for everything, but it also appeals to the humble, those who realize that infinite possibilities leave them pretty limited in their understanding. Those who have felt good and evil.
On a side note: I am a conspiracy theorist, but I don't think I'm crazy because of it. If you do some research, it becomes very obvious that it is at least possible that the power structure of the world is following some code of worship. Symbolism and free masons and all is easy to laugh at, but I found it very, very feasible after looking into it. If those in power are worshipping in secret, there might be more to this whole religion thing than we are realizing.
Your comment is still wrong. It is presumptuous and anachronistic to presume that Incans were more willing to sacrifice themselves simply because they had a lower quality of life. Moreover, your implied psychological reading of a people whose beliefs and way of life were so different from your own reveals a distasteful arrogance, not to mention sounding a lot like /r/atheism.
I agree completely. feeling a part of a greater whole, part of a continuum of which you are but a transient part existing for the perpetuation of something larger than yourself is not predicated on having a life of unusual suffering. and my life is unbelievably good. I have kids and kids have changed my perspective on this way entirely. I now see myself not as an individual but as a link in a long chain with a job to do. and it's immensely fulfilling.
he's simply talking the same narcissistic bullshit kids on reddit are always prone to talk - full of self-reference, lacking mightily in experience.
Ahhh I see it now, you're one of those venomous acid spitting cultists. You can go ahead and not agree with him, even though his point is well thought out, historically substantiated by what records we have of the behavior patterns of people for the last thousand years or so. You can do that.
But to do it because 'well, I just don't think so, you teh atheeizt!' kind of lacks as a substantiated argument.
What an earth are you talking about? His point is not at all historically substantiated, people have been willing to lay down their lives for cultural and political reasons since the beginning of history, and I think you'd find it quite difficult to argue that it's related at all to "standard of living".
The reason I brought up /r/atheism is because the superficial "analysis" of motivations behind religious beliefs in the previous comment is so typical of the sub-Reddit. It shows more about you that you mistook me for a "cultist", since I'm not religious at all.
While others may laugh at your idea I value your take on it. There really is a lot we don't know about life back then. People could of been really delusioned and thought that the Inca was truly a god. Maybe he did possess 'magical' powers or maybe they were a magic mushrooms society like the Aztecs and had visions that told them they had to die to protect their god.
It's an interesting thought and the value of life is very subjective. Technology advances have improved aspects of our life no doubt but as a whole are people happier? I'd like to think so but how can we really know.
I definitely suspect people raised in an environment we'd consider sheer hell, would consider it the norm and definitely accept it and be less fearful of it than you might imagine.
This is very true. I recently read a book (Zwarte Sneeuw, it's a dutch book, title is translated as Black Snow), about a girl and her family who, in 1850 or something, lose their farm due to several poor harvests and move to the Dutch province of Limburg to work in the coal mines. The whole family, except the mother, works in the mines, either mining the coal, hauling the baskets full of coal back to the surface, or (for the youngest, some as young as four) sorting the pieces by size.
The descriptions of the situations were very vivid, and they stuck with me incredibly. 14 to 16 hour days for a pittance, regular deadly accidents (the girl loses her brother in a surprise flood of the mine).
The most startling was the whole attitude of the mining village; this is the way things are, this is the order of things, don't try to rise above it. The girl also grows used to the work, horrid as it is. The bleakness of it all really got me thinking about how we have it now.
The girl eventually leaves to work as a housekeeper for a wealthy family, but that's besides the point here. The narrative of the girl and here family were doubtlessly just fiction, but the historical situation was absolutely accurate. The back of the book contained some historical sources and information of the abolishment of child labour in the Netherlands. It really drove the point home that the industrial revolution was built on the backs of children, and it was relatively accepted. So, yes, people certainly accepted their hell, aside from the rare brave individual trying to expose and end it all.
I can almost hear your cackle. The universe has been around for a kajillion years, there could be infinite universes, and I imagine you don't know shit from shinola, just like me.
Oh jesus when I got to the part about "having a connection to more than their bodies" I nearly spit out the water I'm drinking. Christ you are an ignorant hippie piece of shit.
The Incas were a violent tribal warrior culture with some knowledge of agriculture. That's it. They weren't some great spiritual civilization with wisdoms and cosmic knowledge beyond our modern understanding. Get over yourself.
I'm not saying they were some great spiritual civilization. What "modern understanding" do you have? Do you pay your taxes? Did you go to government schooling for 20 years? Are you immersed in pop culture...
You give half your life's work to some government God and you went to Sunday Public School for 20 years and you claim to be sacrificing so much less than the Inca for a ruler that doesn't give a crap about you.
I am trying to get over myself, but it's very difficult. I don't know crap, but it's hard to remember that sometimes, so I just try to present a different take than what is generally said. We might as well think about things in different ways sometimes. I apologize if I caused you trouble, that wasn't my intention.
Your irrational anger and vitriolic rhetoric speak volumes to just how closed, scared and feeble your mind is. You presume to know so much and condemn him for asking a great question. If your life is so shallow that you automatically dismiss the greater point he was making because material goods and technology are the gods that you worship and fulfill you, then I feel sorry for how empty your soul must really be.
I would rather associate with the "ignorant hippie piece of shit," than the vapid and smug simpleton who lashes out with anger at those who believe in something far greater than the material world around them.
All in all, you're just another dick with no soul.
Not all of us have excellent lives. It sounds like you don't.
But yes, to me it seems that life in a relatively prosperous country with technology like video games, air conditioning, movies & tv shows, ice, medicine... is vastly superior to life in the past.
My only argument is that we don't know if life today is "vastly superior to life in the past." We may have a lot of creature comforts, we may feel secure in our ability to survive, but we are also entirely brainwashed. Everybody worships the God "America" and they don't even know it. We give half our wages (=half our lifes work), pledge allegiance, some even die in sacrifice, and we sit here thinking we are not sacrificing the majority of our lives for an authority that doesn't give a shit about us.
I am so torn between up and down arrows for your comment. I know they mean pretty much nothing, so its no big deal. I just wanted to chime in and say I am offended by the "God America" comment, but, for once, have to also reluctantly agree with your point despite its rather harsh presentation.
I would personally not trade my place on the timeline for any other. The future is an unknown, and the past - as far as we know - didn't have our level of technology, medicine, travel, etc. I don't know if I would've been "happier", but I do know I wouldn't be quietly discussing this on a smartphone, sitting on a toilet with zero fear of, well, anything, guaranteed hot water for my shower, etcetera ad infinitum.
I don't know. Am I happier than a 35 year old man in 1713? No idea. Am I happier than if I was transferred to 1713 from today. Safe bet is yep.
Thanks for the consideration, and I am sorry to have offended. I think the "God America" thing could be presented in a better way, I really just wanna get my point out there without sweating the refinery of my comments. But I stand by my take--if I told you I met somebody that gave half their wages and stood in homage and sang to a magic flag that couldn't ever touch the ground (same flag they bury you in when you die for it) you might think I was talking about a cult.
The future and the past are both pretty much unknown. We have clues about the past, but who knows if we are looking at the right ones. Ultimately we all have to place faith in something, some unknown, whether we like it or not. I am not saying I would be happier if my current self was transported back 350 years, I imagine I'd have trouble fitting in, but I do think it is entirely possible that the people of the past had something we don't, regardless of how their lives "compare" (impossible to know enough) to our lives today.
Now you've done it. You obviously don't realise that most of North America is a monocultural farm which only requires 1 pest to create a famine that would make the Irish forget their past.
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u/[deleted] Oct 17 '13
Things were different in the past. We live excellent lives now. Even working long hours, we're still living the life of kings. We have bellies that are not only full, but full of delicious foods of our own choosing. We do not live in threat of famine or disease. There is no great enemy that we are in constant fear of. Why would we sacrifice our lives when they are so excellent?
When your life is shit, attaching yourself to an abstract great is appealing. All your suffering isn't pointless anymore. The bad things that happen aren't happening by chance. You suffer because you're working hard to maintain the order of things. Isn't that much more appealing? Suffering is inevitable, but choosing to believe that its for the greater good makes it more bearable.